Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Major U.S. cancer center ousts ‘Asian’ researchers after NIH flags foreign ties

sciencemag.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 127 posts

Re: Major U.S. cancer center ousts ‘Asian’ researchers after NIH flags foreign ties

#11

Post by sneak »

IdontRememberIt wrote: post #8

I remember when I was young (+40 years ago), many Swiss private banks would only hire Swiss people. That rule was due to the French IRS equivalent having their own employees sent to Switzerland and hired by Swiss bank. They were mole transmitting confidential information about French clients. So these private banks had to restore trust and security. Honestly still today, for some critial jobs, I do not understand com…

It is racist to assume that someone’s place of birth determines their allegiances.

Re: Major U.S. cancer center ousts ‘Asian’ researchers after NIH flags foreign ties

#12

Post by greggyb »

sneak wrote: post #11
IdontRememberIt wrote: post #8

I remember when I was young (+40 years ago), many Swiss private banks would only hire Swiss people. That rule was due to the French IRS equivalent having their own employees sent to Switzerland and hired by Swiss bank. They were mole transmitting confidential information about French clients. So these private banks had to restore trust and security. Honestly still today, for some critial jobs, I do not understand com…

It is racist to assume that someone’s place of birth determines their allegiances.

No it's not. Some form of prejudice, certainly, but not racism.

Re: Major U.S. cancer center ousts ‘Asian’ researchers after NIH flags foreign ties

#13

Post by president »

yumraj wrote: post #2

I wonder why the headline says 'Asian' instead of saying Chinese, since all three researchers were Chinese with ties to China. As an ethic Indian, I'm kinda offended when all Asians are just lumped together as I believe it promotes general racism and bias against anyone from that continent .

So you're fine as long as racism is only directed towards races other than your own?

Re: Major U.S. cancer center ousts ‘Asian’ researchers after NIH flags foreign ties

#14

Post by peteradio »

sneak wrote: post #11
IdontRememberIt wrote: post #8

I remember when I was young (+40 years ago), many Swiss private banks would only hire Swiss people. That rule was due to the French IRS equivalent having their own employees sent to Switzerland and hired by Swiss bank. They were mole transmitting confidential information about French clients. So these private banks had to restore trust and security. Honestly still today, for some critial jobs, I do not understand com…

It is racist to assume that someone’s place of birth determines their allegiances.

Thats a pretty inclusive view on what racism is.

Re: Major U.S. cancer center ousts ‘Asian’ researchers after NIH flags foreign ties

#15

Post by anotherboffin »

sneak wrote: post #11
IdontRememberIt wrote: post #8

I remember when I was young (+40 years ago), many Swiss private banks would only hire Swiss people. That rule was due to the French IRS equivalent having their own employees sent to Switzerland and hired by Swiss bank. They were mole transmitting confidential information about French clients. So these private banks had to restore trust and security. Honestly still today, for some critial jobs, I do not understand com…

It is racist to assume that someone’s place of birth determines their allegiances.

I really don't think racist is the term to describe this discrimiation, since you could hardly say Swiss and French are from a different race.

edit: clarification

Re: Major U.S. cancer center ousts ‘Asian’ researchers after NIH flags foreign ties

#16

Post by okasaki »

>Four of the five NIH letters to MD Anderson contain very specific allegations of what NIH terms “serious” rule violations. One letter, for instance, asserts that a researcher had violated peer-review confidentiality by emailing to a scientist in China an NIH grant application marked as containing “proprietary/privileged information.” A different letter alleges that a researcher had shared “detailed information on as many as 8 NIH applications” with a daughter. NIH asserts several researchers had “active and well-supported research programs in China,” or financial ties to foreign firms, that they did not disclose. Three of the letters specifically mention a researcher’s potential involvement in China’s Thousand Talents Program, an effort started in 2008 to establish ties with Chinese or Chinese American scientists working outside of China by offering funding, salary, and other research support.

This sounds like really boring stuff that the scientists may not even have known that they weren't allowed to do.

Re: Major U.S. cancer center ousts ‘Asian’ researchers after NIH flags foreign ties

#17

Post by robbintt »

president wrote: post #13
yumraj wrote: post #2

I wonder why the headline says 'Asian' instead of saying Chinese, since all three researchers were Chinese with ties to China. As an ethic Indian, I'm kinda offended when all Asians are just lumped together as I believe it promotes general racism and bias against anyone from that continent .

So you're fine as long as racism is only directed towards races other than your own?

Chinese is a nationality or citizenship status. If the focus were reporting han chinese then it would enter the territory of racism.

Re: Major U.S. cancer center ousts ‘Asian’ researchers after NIH flags foreign ties

#18

Post by IdontRememberIt »

sneak wrote: post #11
IdontRememberIt wrote: post #8

I remember when I was young (+40 years ago), many Swiss private banks would only hire Swiss people. That rule was due to the French IRS equivalent having their own employees sent to Switzerland and hired by Swiss bank. They were mole transmitting confidential information about French clients. So these private banks had to restore trust and security. Honestly still today, for some critial jobs, I do not understand com…

It is racist to assume that someone’s place of birth determines their allegiances.

It was a matter of nationality (family bounds, schools you attended, school/univeristy friends, friends, etc), not race. A Swiss being black could have been hired.

Switzerland is a small village, so if you break the law, everybody will know it. So locals tend to respect the law (social pressure).

Today a company would be bbqed in the news paper for such a heavy policy.

Re: Major U.S. cancer center ousts ‘Asian’ researchers after NIH flags foreign ties

#19

Post by president »

sneak wrote: post #11
IdontRememberIt wrote: post #8

I remember when I was young (+40 years ago), many Swiss private banks would only hire Swiss people. That rule was due to the French IRS equivalent having their own employees sent to Switzerland and hired by Swiss bank. They were mole transmitting confidential information about French clients. So these private banks had to restore trust and security. Honestly still today, for some critial jobs, I do not understand com…

It is racist to assume that someone’s place of birth determines their allegiances.

By your logic, people from all nations should be able to get top secret government security clearances. Let me know how that works out.

Re: Major U.S. cancer center ousts ‘Asian’ researchers after NIH flags foreign ties

#20

Post by danso »

codegeek wrote: post #9
yumraj wrote: post #2

I wonder why the headline says 'Asian' instead of saying Chinese, since all three researchers were Chinese with ties to China. As an ethic Indian, I'm kinda offended when all Asians are just lumped together as I believe it promotes general racism and bias against anyone from that continent .

Funny you say that because in the US, Indians are not considered Asians in practice even though of course South Asia is, well in Asia. I have seen many people argue that Asians only mean East Asians and does not include South Asians. However, the official census lumps all Asians together.

How are Indians not considered “Asians in practice” when they are considered as such by the Census, the authoritative organization that sets the categorization standard?
Post reply on HN