WSJ & Goldman Sachs: If Western Civilization Dies, Put It Down as a Suicide

kellycriterion

I thought that this article was a rather odd way of defending the author's beliefs, which in my judgment could have been achieved by different means.

You could conceivably argue the author's entire point the opposite way based on the Goldman memo. Here are the two interpretations:

Author's Way: "The Goldman Memo prescribes a proper way of speaking about trans and non-binary people, and in prescribing this mode of speech, Goldman is reverting to the same exclusionary policies of Old Wall Street and Old London that it had originally subverted."

The Other Way: "The Goldman Memo marks the next step in developing a truly meritocratic organization, one where gender expression and sexuality are not used as exclusionary tests. This memo is entirely consistent with the original success of the organization, which was predicated on broadening the constituency of people who could be successful financial professionals."

The piece fails to answer one question which is crucial to the argument: "why is acceptance of different gender expressions and sexualities a departure from liberalism, as the author argues?" Yes, you can say that this is a matter about free speech, but it would also have been true that antisemitic speech would have gotten someone thrown out of old Goldman Sachs, and that's the same behavior we're talking about here: speaking ill of someone that the firm has invited in accordance with its meritocratic and liberal norms.

I think the author's piece is self-defeating, and that the thesis could have been made clearer through a different presentation.

EDIT: Last point, but the author's argument seems to go like this:

"Goldman was great because it hired the scrappy guys that everyone else excluded."

"Well, what about we consider hiring a scrappy nonbinary person who dresses a little odd and shaves their head?"

"No, not like that!"

It's just weird to hear people fight "corporate wokeness" with the arsenal of liberalism. The wokeness IS liberalism. If you want to critique it, it has to come from someone like DeSantis who has already rejected liberalism.

"I'll fight one of my largest employers in Orlando because I don't agree with their position on gay people. (Yes, DeSantis claims he has an electoral mandate on this because he won the election. Fine.)" - this is not the handiwork of a liberal. The author's critique is internally inconsistent.

I think that you are completely missing the author's point. The article is really extremely simplistic, designed to be comprehended by the masses, so I must admit I am a bit confused as to how you could write such a lengthy response while still missing the point. Allow me to over simplify an already transparent message: 

1. In the 80s / 90s, hiring decisions in banking were driven largely by social class and other indications of old money

2. During that same period, GS decides to prioritize hiring by merit exclusively. Now, this may surprise you, but I wasnt alive in the 80s, much less working at GS, so I cannot confirm or deny the point the author makes, but this is clearly his argument. 

3. Now, enter 2023. Corporate recruiting is skewed heavily toward diversity recruiting. ALL firms have abandoned the Goldman Sachs model, which many modern banks adopted. Worse still, all COMPANIES have abandoned merit based hiring, emphasizing absurd pronouns in the name of eQuaLiTY. This is the key component you have glossed over, merit based hiring IS NO LONGER THE NORM, but a secondary approach for all non-POC /  non-LGBTQ individuals. 

4. Now, time to step away from the article and draw my own conclusion. When you hire without prioritizing merit above all else, are you OBJECTIVELY hiring the best candidate? Please explain to me how that may be the case, I am open ears. What basis for hiring mirrors merit / performance / capability? And if we are prioritizing folks with certain sexual beliefs / skin tones, we are straying even further from capitalism. We are no longer selecting the best to fuel our innovation, but providing a different form of subsidization, subsidizing the less optimal candidates due to ethnicity and / or sexual orientation.