Social Justice    
Math & Engineering Give Way   

   Has it been eight months already? A 950-ton footbridge with a "reinvented I-beam" design was being assembled over a seven-lane boulevard in the Miami area. Down it came on traffic, killing seven and injuring nine. 

   This wasn't the first bridge or tunnel collapse in history. Science and technical lessons sometimes are learned the hard way. Until recently, math and engineering knowledge was priority in the business of math and engineering. 

   Today, inclusiveness and diversity rule in many university science departments, whites Janie B. Cheaney in WORLD magazine. A professor at Michigan State in August published an essay. Social justice warriors "have sought the soft underbelly of engineering, where 'diversity' and 'different perspectives' and 'racial gaps' and 'unfairness' and 'unequal outcomes' are daily vocabulary." 

   A soft underbelly in the realm of steel and concrete?

   The prof claims that equations, ratios and aerodynamics are giving way to "group representation, hurt feelings and microaggressions." 

   Cheaney writes, "...the hard sciences were mostly immune. The push to get more women in STEM fields directs grant money into gender-specific programs. Many women are proficient, even brilliant in math and science, but the goal of equal representation skews objectives." 

   "Science is becoming an agent of change rather than discovery," she adds.

   Cheaney doesn't infer that social-justice goals had anything to do with the footbridge collapse. Who knows? 

   I was a white male in arts & sciences - majoring in journalism. You wouldn't trust your life near any bridge, tunnel or building I might design. Neither should you trust your life with the work of any engineer, white or color, male or female - unless - he or she is 100 percent proficient.

       Jimmy