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The issue is that this is the level of the writing that other students have successfully coerced universities into giving high grades to over the last 30 years. If she had just done a woke AI slop essay with no citations she gets a solid 9/10 or whatever. So the "standards" argument is completely specious.
It's amazing university endured for any length of time as a useful signal in the first place.
If you told me your business was to give paying customers certificates for good grades that they need to get good jobs and denying these certificates for bad grades causes paying customers to get mad, well we all know what's going to happen.
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The fact that it's specious is what makes the whole affair depressing.
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