Weight of broadly held perceptions that the person is really not the most qualified candidate, but is rather the best “diversity hire” we could find. Biden - he was shoring up political support from black voters, so you can see why he did it, but generally, that’s not an issue.

The time to try to give a slightly taller ladder is early in life, in education. I mean early education. That’s a whole other set of problems, and education is a problem generally. But there’s an argument that Gay was ill-prepared to handle the political controversies leaping up suddenly from the Mideast conflict - because Harvard placed focus in the wrong place to achieve a diversity hire. But about a few months later, that well meaning intention may have set “diversity” back.
[Post edited by hoolstoptheheels at 01/05/2024 1:17PM]