In Supreme Court brief, Yale and peers defend use of race in admissions • Hacker News Board

Re: In Supreme Court brief, Yale and peers defend use of race in admissions

#181

Post by btilly » Tue, Aug 02, 2022, 4:13 PM UTC

xiande04 wrote: post #101

btilly wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm reminded of https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1526975113597489154 : Yale is the epicenter of the woke mind virus attempting to destroy civilization. Paul Graham's immediate chime of support shows it isn't just a piece of random silliness on Elon Musk's part. And other things I've seen (eg the harassment of Amy Chua) certainly fit. This amicus brief speaking up for racism and discrimination (as long as it is aga…

How exactly does Amicus entail racism and discrimination against Asians?

The lawsuit that they are filing an Amicus in was brought by an Asian-American organization for the purpose of getting Harvard to stop specifically discriminating against Asian-Americans.

Therefore the brief is arguing for racism and discrimination against Asians.

What is particularly galling is that the argument in the brief is defending the university's ability to pick students who have been affected by their race. Thereby implicitly arguing that Asian-Americans have NOT been affected by their race.

Meanwhile, back in reality, hate crimes against Asian-Americans are up over 300% nationwide: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/anti-asian-hate-c....

Re: In Supreme Court brief, Yale and peers defend use of race in admissions

#182

Post by TameAntelope » Tue, Aug 02, 2022, 4:14 PM UTC

notch656a wrote: post #176

TameAntelope wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

>People want different treatment as a result of their different values and life experiences that they gather from their cultures Yes exactly. A white kid adopted by someone in a village in Kenya isn't going to want to be treated like an Englishman, and a black kid who grew up his whole life in a Montana country town full of white people with white parents (probably) doesn't want to be treated differently than the res…

No post body was provided.

Re: In Supreme Court brief, Yale and peers defend use of race in admissions

#183

Post by samatman » Tue, Aug 02, 2022, 4:15 PM UTC

HelloMcFly wrote: post #174

samatman wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not Asians primarily. They are discriminated against more stiffly, but are far outnumbered in the US by Whites, who also get the thumb placed on the wrong pan of the scale. The focus on Asians is because of a doctrine that discriminating against Whites is very good and correct, because they deserve it.

> a doctrine that discriminating against Whites is very good and correct, because they deserve it. This is an argument put forth in bad faith. The thought - agree or disagree - is white individuals in America have systemic advantages that persist due to historical social practices the manifest across many years of education and just existence in life in America. It's not about "deserving less" but about acknowledging…

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Re: In Supreme Court brief, Yale and peers defend use of race in admissions

#184

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 02, 2022, 4:15 PM UTC

HelloMcFly wrote: post #174

samatman wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not Asians primarily. They are discriminated against more stiffly, but are far outnumbered in the US by Whites, who also get the thumb placed on the wrong pan of the scale. The focus on Asians is because of a doctrine that discriminating against Whites is very good and correct, because they deserve it.

> a doctrine that discriminating against Whites is very good and correct, because they deserve it. This is an argument put forth in bad faith. The thought - agree or disagree - is white individuals in America have systemic advantages that persist due to historical social practices the manifest across many years of education and just existence in life in America. It's not about "deserving less" but about acknowledging…

[deleted]

Re: In Supreme Court brief, Yale and peers defend use of race in admissions

#185

Post by quantumwannabe » Tue, Aug 02, 2022, 4:15 PM UTC

samatman wrote: post #86

btilly wrote: post #33

To quote from the brief. Unlike applicants whose identities have been affected mainly by their socioeconomic or geographic circumstances, applicants whose formative experiences relate to race or ethnicity would be denied the opportunity to convey their full, authentic selves when competing for admission to selective schools like Amici. And so we guarantee that millions of Americans will have a formative experience th…

It's not Asians primarily. They are discriminated against more stiffly, but are far outnumbered in the US by Whites, who also get the thumb placed on the wrong pan of the scale. The focus on Asians is because of a doctrine that discriminating against Whites is very good and correct, because they deserve it.

Because schools withhold a large percentage of their spots for "legacy students", a White kid who isn't rich or well-connected is less likely to get into these elite schools than an Asian kid with the same grades. Half of the White students at Harvard are legacy students [1] and White students make up 44% of the Harvard student body. 50.9% of Gen Z is White [2], meaning that slightly less than 51% of the population is competing for 22% of the slots. The same numbers for Asian students are 5.3% of Gen Z and 25.9% of the spots at Harvard. Now, the proper numbers to use are probably SAT scores or some other "skill metric", but finding the proper stats to use is difficult since College Board locked them down, and in this case the population stats don't affect the conclusion because while more Asians have high scores as a percentage of their group than Whites do, it is canceled out by the difference in population sizes.

Assuming Affirmative Action is still in place, once the current generation of Asian Ivy League grad's kids start applying for schools, this issue will start to apply to Asian kids as well.

[1] https://www.thedp.com/article/2019/09/penn-upenn-philadelphi...

[2] https://www.brookings.edu/research/less-than-half-of-us-chil...

Re: In Supreme Court brief, Yale and peers defend use of race in admissions

#186

Post by SllX » Tue, Aug 02, 2022, 4:16 PM UTC

colinmhayes wrote: post #161

SllX wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here’s a good reason: people don’t deserve to be discriminated against on the basis of their race.

No one deserves anything. Things happen anyway. Clearly everyone has their own definition of fairness. Seems to me that someone at admissions office for the ivy’s has read kendi and was reasonably convinced that his take on reverse racism is correct. You can disagree, but since fairness isn’t a concept that even make sense metaphysically it’s hard to say they’re wrong.

Let me put it another way: the bulk of the abolitionist movement sought to end slavery because slavery was cruel and evil. It wasn’t to reverse the flow of a cruelty and it’s consequences back towards a subset of them or redirect the flow towards a different group of people but to end the cruelty altogether. Fairness is irrelevant here because as you rightly point out, life isn’t fair, but since we legally bar discrimination on the basis of race—a form of law I happen to agree with—Yale should be held accountable per our laws.

If they want to change our laws, they should go ahead and meet up and see if they can’t put together a good case for bringing back racism as a legal practice. Seems that’s what they’re trying to do actually.

That said they should also be prepared for the consequences of success because that would give implicit license and justification to a much larger and more powerful group of people in their own country to start discriminating on the basis of race again. Or put another way: there isn’t a world where “reverse racism”—an oxymoron by the way—doesn’t lead back to “anti-reverse racism”, aka “racism”.

We can stop being cruel or not, but we can’t justify bigotry in one direction without giving license to bigotry in the other direction. You would have to convince people to stop looking out for themselves and their children, which is like asking people not to be people. It’s an insane proposition to start with.

Re: In Supreme Court brief, Yale and peers defend use of race in admissions

#187

Post by notch656a » Tue, Aug 02, 2022, 4:16 PM UTC

Ekaros wrote: post #124

light_hue_1 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We discriminated against blacks in the past, so whites and asians deserve to be discriminated against in the present. Is this your position? White people took everything for hundreds of years. Then, they turned around and said "Oh look, we own everything but let's just forget about skin color now". Discrimination resulted in massive inequality. The median net worth of a white family is $200k. The median net worth o…

So use that then. Take median wealth of applicants families and discriminate against anyone who is richer. Entirely objective metric.

The counterpoint is probably going to be something along the lines of, what if the median wealth of one family is that way because dad and mom were working 100 hours a week each, fed the kids ramen everyday, and the kid got no attention at all. Then you're comparing that to some family that ate cavier on their yacht everyday while their parents worked 20 hours a week in their medical practice and devoted the entire rest of their time to the kids education and taking the kids on bullshit "volunteering" trips to make the kid look like mother Teresa for his college and med school application.

Same family wealth, but clearly cavier kid had the leg up. Maybe better to compare full time wage or something? Personally I would dispense with both race and wealth as metrics.

Re: In Supreme Court brief, Yale and peers defend use of race in admissions

#188

Post by JumpCrisscross » Tue, Aug 02, 2022, 4:17 PM UTC

TameAntelope wrote: post #178

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> not bearing any burden, as there are a lot of schools who aren't Yale that will accept you. This isn't the case for those who are benefiting from Affirmative Action. I went to a state school on a merit scholarship, so I'm pretty far outside direct impact from these decisions. If someone thinks their only chance of going to college is Yale, they're wrong. Fixing that lack of institutional knowledge makes more sense…

> If someone thinks their only chance of going to college is Yale, they're wrong. They're not wrong, that's literally the lived experience of many, many folks. This is exactly the problem; you're not taking the perspective of people who actually are discriminated against in America. And I didn't say "of going to college". This isn't just about college, it's about opportunities for a high degree of success in a person…

> This isn't just about college, it's about opportunities for a high degree of success in a person's life. Yale doesn't represent "college" it represents "prestigious college that will open doors for the rest of their life".

Why is Yale the only shot for the child of a wealthy, well-connected person of one race but not the poor, unconnected child of another?

> makes perfect sense to prefer them over people who will get other shots at a highly successful life

This is the assumption that rightfully grinds people. Why do we assume because someone is Asian they will not face those barriers? And again, how convenient that the actual descendants of slave traders have reserved seats, too, at these prestigious institutions.

Re: In Supreme Court brief, Yale and peers defend use of race in admissions

#189

Post by hackerlight » Tue, Aug 02, 2022, 4:17 PM UTC

zmgsabst wrote: post #156

api wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I largely agree, but here's an attempt at a "steel man" of the opposing point of view: Unjust discrimination is complex, often subconscious, and deeply rooted in institutional structures and culture. It's too complex and elusive to address directly beyond the obvious removal of explicit regulations (desegregation) and finger wagging. Those things have already been done and yet extreme inequalities persist, so address…

But what’s missing from your steelman is why returning to racial discrimination will solve the problems of past racial discrimination — rather than making them worse, by teaching a whole new generation to be racists.

Forget making it worse as the primary concern. I am concerned about fascism emerging as a backlash to anti-White discrimination. People are pissed that their society has turned against them and will abandon democracy to fix the situation.

Re: In Supreme Court brief, Yale and peers defend use of race in admissions

#190

Post by SpicyLemonZest » Tue, Aug 02, 2022, 4:18 PM UTC

hotpotamus wrote: post #133

aceHN wrote: post #48

If your goal is equal opportunity you can look at socioeconomic class without considering race. Fundamentally the idea that race must be considered to achieve diversity is an inherently racist idea - you don't believe some races will get in without help.

> you don't believe some races will get in without help. What if they didn't? What if the Supreme Court decision results in zero (or near zero) black people being admitted into Ivy League schools?

Then I would say the Ivy League is doing something very wrong. When California and Washington passed ballot initiatives prohibiting race-conscious admissions, demographics shifted a bit but black admissions were nowhere near zero.