An Argument for Meritocracy

Since I retired, I have more time to be angry. This difficult condition is encouraged by a partisan press and amplified by the relentless provocation of half wits who, on a daily basis, find innovative ways to offend. Pretentious entertainers who think our national anthem is an editable document to be bent to their political will, virtue signaling politicians who want to make it a crime to be skeptical of insubstantial evidence regarding Residential Schools…or any Indigenous issue for that matter…and fatuous fabricators of new genders, to name just a few of the daily indignities offered. What should be regarded as utter nonsense, and was so regarded until recently, now passes as enlightened opinion. If you have half a grip on reality, these ideas gaining the upper hand can only be regarded as evidence of a country seriously adrift.

But the most exasperating trend, arbitrary and downright dangerous, has to be ?offering up EDI (equity, diversity and inclusion) as an alternative to merit and ability in choosing leadership.

Amor Towles wrote, “If excellence is expected, you can’t have the wrestlers throwing the javelins.” And so with professional sports, somewhat uniquely in these times, only ability matters and teams don’t recruit left wing based on skin color. But the relative importance of excellence is conspicuously devalued when talent and execution is not so immediately observable as it is in sports. For example, educational institutions may require particular sexes, ethnicities, sexual orientations and a variety of arbitrary classifications be employed preferentially, fully aware none of these factors provide any evidence of the capability to educate. Not only is this nonsense simply a variation on old-fashioned prejudice, disadvantaging members of the excluded groups, the damaging effect of whimsical selection criteria on students may not be known for years. Similarly in business, where EDI arm waving is becoming an Olympic event, fashionably credentialed directors are given the keys to the boardroom even though they may be ill equipped to lead or advise.

Hiring based on capricious criteria…race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religious beliefs…is not just a flimsy scaffold upon which to attach critical responsibility, it is objectively dangerous. Scientists, doctors, military leaders, city planners and pilots need to be good at their jobs; most people couldn’t care less what color they are.

Its unpleasant to admit but human behavior, objectively observed, is rife with ?tribalism and xenophobia bred into our genetic material over millennia. Suspicion and distrust of people we don’t know, who don’t look like us or don’t think like us, who don’t live where we live, is omnipresent; Black and White, Muslims and Jews, Catholics and Protestants, Republicans and Democrats; the list is long.

Given this unpleasant reality, getting to a non-racist Nirvana, will likely take many generations, assuming its achievable at all. But we can start by ensuring equality of opportunity is an objective of every public and private organization. Public policy can establish an objective standard, objectively applied, and require the private sector follow suit.?But a durable solution takes time and we?imperil a good outcome if we are seduced by feeling good now rather than doing good later.

My vote for who gets the big jobs goes to meritocracy, built on, and evolving from talent and hard work. The alternative is a subjective sorting controlled by whoever happens to be in charge. If there is any such thing as ?white privilege, getting rid of it in favor of woke privilege isn’t progress.