Previously I posted about how a tiny group (vegetarians, kosher, halal) can have an outsized impact on society. In each case, vegetarians, kosher, and halal eaters cannot eat the “general” food, but the rest of us can eat the vegetarian/kosher/halal food. In a sense, vegetarian/kosher/halal people are “intolerant” of general food, but the rest of us are “tolerant” of vegetarian/kosher/halal food. When I use the words “tolerant” or “intolerant” I’m being purely descriptive here, not judgmental. See original post linked below.

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The point of the exercise is to show how tiny groups can have outsized impacts. Another fable follows.

Imagine that in 1950, in the universities, there were only two types of professors: people who like tofu, “Tofus”, and people who like steak, “Steaks”. In general they get along well… they go to lunch together, have each other over for parties, and collaborate on research.

However, the Tofus are just slightly intolerant of the Steaks, deep down thinking of Steaks as barbarians who don't really fit in the modern world. Just slightly. Hardly noticeable.

But the Steaks, though they may chuckle at the Tofus’ taste in soft, squishy flavorless food, pay no heed otherwise.

So anytime a professor, let’s say in the Department of Economics, retires and a new one has to be hired, a typical Tofu on the hiring committee will lean toward hiring a fellow Tofu job candidate simply for his culinary tastes rather than for his knowledge of Economic theory, ability to teach, or research interests. Whereas a typical Steak, being more tolerant, will judge the applicant on the relevant factors just as knowledge of economic theory, ability to teach, and research interests.

Over many years, very subtly, something interesting will happen. The universities will become majority Tofu.

The Steaks will barely notice it happening because it’s so subtle. After all, they get along just great with Tofus. Their kids are on the soccer team together. They cannot imagine that a Tofu would actually be biased in favor of hiring a fellow Tofu simply due to his food preferences. Any early variation or trend in the fraction of Tofus vs Steaks will look like randomness.

Fast forward to 1980 and the universities are now 75% Tofu and 25% Steak. Steaks will finally start noticing that this isn’t a random process, and it seems like every year, the ranks of the Tofus inch up, and each year, it becomes just a bit more difficult to eat your steak lunch in the cafeteria without a dirty look from a Tofu. When the topic of preponderance of Tofus is raised, the right and proper explanations are given: that many people convert to enlightened Tofu eating after entering the universities as Steaks, or that smart people choose to eat Tofu so of course universities should tend toward Tofuism. But it’s certainly not bias or intolerance!

It’s now 2015, and the universities are now 99.5% Tofu and 0.5% Steak. Tofus are now much more open about their intolerance of Steaks. “Why should we hire people so unenlightened?” “The university is no place of Steak knuckle draggers.” Existing Steaks keep their heads down. They just want to keep their jobs and feed their families. The brazen intolerance from Tofus is out in the open, justified, and flaunted.

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The point of this exercise is to show how small asymmetries of tolerance can lead to outsized effects.

Would it matter if instead of starting at a 50/50 split of Tofus/Steaks in 1950, we started with 0.5% Tofus and 99.5% Steaks?

My guess is that by 2015, the end result would be the same: 99.5% Tofus and 0.5% Steaks.