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In between blogging about fursuit collections, former motte moderator TracingWoodgrains has started to blow up on twitter after wading into an ongoing feud between Steve Sailer and propagandist Will Stancil.
Something in the replies must have really upset him (possibly interactions with a number of replyguys making not-so-veiled threats about what happens to people who associate with bigots or question "lying for the pursuit of good aims"), because he suddenly got really invested in proving that the recent FAA-DEI scandal is real.
After giving up on conservative journalists and deciding to do the legwork himself, he's now posting PACER documents from the recent FAA lawsuit, proving that the FAA HR department sent black applicants a list of resume buzzwords that would get their applications fast-tracked, via the National Black Coalition of Federal Aviation Employees.
A few hours ago this got the attention of Elon Musk, and Tracing is promising a follow-up, somehow trying to juggle 1L coursework with doing more investigative journalism than the entire conservative media put together. Obviously one of these things takes more time than the other, but I'm sure he'll have a coffee break free for the journalism bit.
One reason I think this could be important is that it's going to paint a huge target on Tracing's back. Propagandists have been claiming that the FAA DEI story was fake, the test designed to favor black applicants never existed, etc. They're going to get very angry at this evidence becoming widely known, and tracing is in a unique position to spread it outside the right wing news ghetto that prevents most liberals from ever encountering facts like these.
I'm not saying it's certain they're going to go after his law school, but he's in a uniquely vulnerable position right now, with very few allies in a position to help him (and probably a number who will suddenly decide he's on the enemy side of the fiend-enemy distinction.) So if anyone is in the position to help if he needs it, maybe start reaching out early.
Unfortunately all of this is getting difficult to follow without a twitter account (I even have one, but they're not letting me log in right now for no apparent reason). It's going to get even harder as Nitter instances die off. If anyone has a reliable account and would be willing to make screenshots, I'd love if you could take over covering the story as it develops.
Edit: his effortpost is now out on twitter and at his blog. I'll copy it into a reply below in case the nitter instance goes down again.
Just a note, this has obvious parallels to colleges letting DEI departments screen out the 80% of applicants before any objective hiring process begins:
It's a very effective method of manipulating procedural outcomes, isn't it?
Let me see if I understand this
1: we must increase diversity of ATCs
2: let’s impose AA style quotas
1: no that would cause backlash
2: what about a final exam that’s actually a biographical questionnaire?
1: what, and only hire people with black-sounding upbringings? too blatant
2: but what if the right answers to the questionnaire are random but we separately and secretly tell the people we want to hire how to answer?
1: let’s do it!
Is that really it? Tell me I’m misunderstanding this!
It's really blatant. If I summed up the Biographic Assessment right, there are 28 actually-scored questions, with 179 possible points.
To pass, you need a 70%, or 126 points, meaning you can miss no more than 53 points.EDIT: maybe 114 minimum score, and 65 missed points?)30 points are the "lowest scoring class" grades (15 for science in high school, 15 for history/polysci in college), 3-4 points go for not playing a lot of different high school sports, 2-5 points if you worked too much or too little during your last year of college, 2-10 points if you were unemployed too long or not long enough before applying, 5 points if you took the wrong number (1-6 hours) of art/music/drama/dance, 3 more points if you had three years of formal training.
I dunno if "random" is the right word, but it's pretty close. You lose 2 points compared to someone who had been unemployed the last three years if you didn't submit formal suggestions to your boss, but three formal suggestions would cost you 8 points. Peers describing you as a person who "takes chances" is worth points, rather than costing them. You lose a point for "Baccalaureate-transfer oriented" rather than "Other" to describe your aviation coursework, which is just a mess.
It's possible for someone to pass without the answer sheet, but I don't think the model air traffic controller would.
If the class allegations are true (and they seem well-evidenced!) the Biographical Assessment was issued before you could even attempt the AT-SAT, rather than a final exam. Worse, you could only take the Biographic Assessment once; while some questions like "how long unemployed/how long training" change over time.
EDIT: I'm not sure on the 70% number. I could have sworn I saw it leafing through this stuff yesterday, but I'm not seeing it now. The plaintiffs cite a FAA e-mail saying the pre-cognitive-testing weedout would filter out 70% of applicants (139-24), but the grading rubric for that comes with the Biographical Assessment Answer key says that the score calculation was...
(yes, literally: that 30 divided by 7.48 is at least not my typo.).
With the final score requiring the output of that math equation of 70, and the Biographical Assessment score at or over 114. 114 is a weird percentage (63.68%) of 179. Might have been selected as the outcome of picking the second-'best' answer in every scored question, although I think someone actually being in that category would be impossible for college/no-college reasons.
I don't know the range for the (non-cognitive?) AT-SAT score mentioned at the end of that score weighting sheet is, but assuming that the final metric is taken against 70 as a number rather than a percent of something, a perfect Biographical Assessment score would let you pass with an 86, and a minimum 114 Biographical Assessment would require a score of 180 on the other test.
What kind of formula is that??? They could've written =0.757BAS + 0.526SAT - 53.122 and removed six numbers. Heck, they could've set it to =BAS + 0.694SAT and set the threshold to >=162.6 to pass instead of 70 (assuming I didn't mess up my algebra, of course).
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See here:
https://www.themotte.org/post/851/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/183748?context=8#context
They didn't use stereotypical black-sounding answers. The test was totally rigged.
Is there any way to impose consequences for the lies required to pass the test? You get a bonus for saying you were unemployed--how many of the people who passed were actually unemployed? I'd hope to use that to reverse the damage somewhat.
There's a precedent for the bulk firing of ATC, but even if it worked, it's not an elegant fix. And at best it's hating the players, rather than the game.
That's true, no need to be vindictive. I think we have a shortage of qualified air traffic controllers anyways.
Colluding to cheat your classmates out of a job seems like a fireable offence to me. It's actually more straightforward than the usual DEI case because (per other comments) you won't even pass by having a stereotypical 'minority' background, you basically have to cheat to win. Firing such people isn't vindictive, it's restoring justice to a really screwed up situation.
I get that it's a little cruel, but if the lesson people take away is "when you hear about something like this, you're better off blowing the whistle rather than taking advantage, because otherwise you'll be blacklisted for life" I think that's a step towards a better world.
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I think you are not
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