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Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action in college admissions

latimes.com

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Re: Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action in college admissions

#161

Post by paulvnickerson »

Relevant summary from the decision:

> Because Harvard’s and UNC’s admissions programs lack suffi- ciently focused and measurable objectives warranting the use of race, unavoidably employ race in a negative manner, involve racial stereo- typing, and lack meaningful end points, those admissions programs cannot be reconciled with the guarantees of the Equal Protection Clause. At the same time, nothing prohibits universities from consid- ering an applicant’s discussion of how race affected the applicant’s life, so long as that discussion is concretely tied to a quality of character or unique ability that the particular applicant can contribute to the uni- versity. Many universities have for too long wrongly concluded that the touchstone of an individual’s identity is not challenges bested, skills built, or lessons learned, but the color of their skin. This Nation’s constitutional history does not tolerate that choice.

Re: Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action in college admissions

#162

Post by skrebbel »

The concept of affirmative action is foreign to me (quite literally so). I only know it from American media, and I've come understand it to mean "positively discriminate based on race, so long as it's a minority race" - please correct me of I'm wrong.

But anyway, my question for the Americans here who grok this stuff: I assume the intent is to help disadvantaged people have opportunities that more priviledged people have already. Right? I mean, I can get behind that. But then why the entire detour with race? Why not just.. well, let poor people come first? Would the goal suddenly not be met if poor smart white kids get into good schools, too? Who loses in this case?

I don't mean this as a hihi actually sneaky anti-affirmative-action post, I don't understand the subject matter well enough (nor America in general). I genuinely don't get why the race thing is part of the equation. Shouldn't this just be run-of-the-mill social democratic "lets hand out some extra opportunities/benefits to the poor" program?

Re: Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action in college admissions

#163

Post by mywittyname »

losvedir wrote: post #41

As someone of Hispanic descent this is very interesting to me. Affirmative Action probably helped my father, whose father was a construction worker and mother a homemaker both of whom dropped out of high school, get into college and ultimately become a doctor. But because my father was a doctor, I had a fairly privileged upbringing. I'm a generation removed, but growing up in California always had to indicate my back…

My friend, you absolutely deserved to go to MIT. I'm sure the person you "beat out" for your spot landed at a different, but equally impressive college and had an experience that they wouldn't trade for anything.

> Though I possibly have been discriminated "for", and benefited tremendously from it.

So have a lot of people. You're probably surrounded by people whose familial background benefited them in numerous ways. You just happen to have some empathy about yours.

Re: Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action in college admissions

#164

Post by theratattack »

VoodooJuJu wrote: post #147
JustBreath wrote: post #8

Whatever your opinion about recent supreme court decisions, this has all underscored what has been true for a long time: Legislating via the judicial branch is a bad idea. If it only takes 5 out of 9 people to make laws for 600 million, it only takes one seat change to revert them. (Edit: sorry, 300 - pre-caffeine posting)

The judicial branch does not make laws. You're implying that the judicial branch legislated in this case. They did no such thing. They interpreted existing laws for a particular case, gave their judgement, and applied the existing law. Indeed, legislating via the judicial branch is a bad idea, and so it's a good thing that they do not and are not able to.

> They interpreted existing laws

In the dissent at least, the court is very much interpreting court precedent and almost entirely ignoring the law itself

Re: Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action in college admissions

#165

Post by ellisv »

kenjackson wrote: post #25
JustBreath wrote: post #8

Whatever your opinion about recent supreme court decisions, this has all underscored what has been true for a long time: Legislating via the judicial branch is a bad idea. If it only takes 5 out of 9 people to make laws for 600 million, it only takes one seat change to revert them. (Edit: sorry, 300 - pre-caffeine posting)

I don’t love the decision, but I actually like the process. And I don’t think it is legislating. It is interpreting the law. I’d like term limits on Supreme Court justices. But I think the arguments on both sides of this debate are well thought out. Again I don’t love the decision, but Im OK with it. That said I’d love to see universities stop giving weight to legacies. But the money is just too strong.

> I don’t love the decision, but I actually like the process. And I don’t think it is legislating. It is interpreting the law.

I think this is naive. Roberts is not "calling balls and strikes" despite what he would have you believe. The conservative wing of the court has been willing to adopt a range of interpretations to accommodate their outcome.

It's not just setting aside precedent but their increased use of emergency motions (shadow docket) to issue orders without explanation.

Re: Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action in college admissions

#166

Post by xyzelement »

psychphysic wrote: post #135

Good. I'd be sickened to hear I got a lucrative opportunity because of the colour of my skin (which incidentally is not white and I'm not oriental so I'd guess I'd have benefitted from affirmative action if it was present where I grew up).

If you read some of the comments here, you'd see that colleges have been discriminating against Asians.

As a group asian Americans have had no trouble being over represented in colleges based on purely merit.

Re: Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action in college admissions

#167

Post by euix »

brightball wrote: post #151
azinman2 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If affirmative action is what enabled your father to become a doctor, then it almost certainly sounds like the success story that motivates the action. I don’t know percent of the time a similar story is required to justify the means, but it sounds like you should embrace the path that your family’s life has taken. The alternative, presumably, would be effectively unfair knowing what could and then did become.

Something else that isn't really factored into most of these conversations is the level of gatekeeping around professions and schools where a much larger group of people can succeed or even flourish, yet never get the opportunity due to limited class sizes. Around the healthcare debate specifically, there were a lot of people who talked about the restrictive policies that artificially limit the supply of doctors as w…

What's that saying? Something like: "It's not that Einstein was so brilliant, it's that so many more Einsteins spend their whole lives in the farm fields" and in between is there is a whole spectrum of talent vs opportunity and recognition going from brilliant and unknown to famous and undeserving.

Re: Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action in college admissions

#168

Post by kelipso »

kenjackson wrote: post #107
kelipso wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

The idea is that there are more kids who could succeed at the college than there are spots. So find the right bar and do lottery. A lot of this comes down to what you think the mission of college is. Is it to educate the highest achieving kids who apply? Or to graduate a certain type of student? Or something else? For me I know it’s not just to educate the highest achieving kids. If the top college in the world ended…

[flagged]

Re: Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action in college admissions

#169

Post by kllrnohj »

DeathArrow wrote: post #33
geraldwhen wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Admissions departments will find proxies for race. The next year of Harvard freshmen will not be majority Asian. The admissions department won’t allow that to happen.

> Admissions departments will find proxies for race. And that would be the same thing. If someone can prove it, it's illegal.

From the SCOTUS opinion:

> “Nothing in this opinion should be construed as prohibiting universities from considering an applicant’s discussion of how race affected his or her life, be it through discrimination, inspiration, or otherwise,” Roberts wrote.

Sure seems like proxies for race are if anything explicitly called out as being OK by SCOTUS rather than illegal.

Re: Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action in college admissions

#170

Post by Auracle »

azinman2 wrote: post #93
losvedir wrote: post #41

As someone of Hispanic descent this is very interesting to me. Affirmative Action probably helped my father, whose father was a construction worker and mother a homemaker both of whom dropped out of high school, get into college and ultimately become a doctor. But because my father was a doctor, I had a fairly privileged upbringing. I'm a generation removed, but growing up in California always had to indicate my back…

If affirmative action is what enabled your father to become a doctor, then it almost certainly sounds like the success story that motivates the action. I don’t know percent of the time a similar story is required to justify the means, but it sounds like you should embrace the path that your family’s life has taken. The alternative, presumably, would be effectively unfair knowing what could and then did become.

Well, there’s someone out there who is white or Asian that didn’t get to become a doctor. Are their kids as successful?

Otherwise I agree with you. It’s in the past. We all have advantages and disadvantages, whether genetic or societal. There’s no reason to feel bad about something in the past you had no control over.

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