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

sciencemag.org

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

#21

Post by michaelhoffman »

okasaki wrote: post #16

>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…

If you are a funding peer reviewer you know you are not allowed to send grant applications to anyone unauthorized. It's not boring; a big deal is made out of this repeatedly and it is a serious lapse.

Of course this is something that is rarely punished because in most cases there's no way for the authorities to know. Too bad for these folks that they seemed to be under investigation.

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

#22

Post by i_am_proteus »

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 .

The United States Government has official racial categories for individuals, of which "Asian" is one.

Employers and academic institutions are required by law to categorize employees/researchers/students into these racial categories.

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

#23

Post by awakeasleep »

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.

I believe you are spreading misinformation here.

The Census Bureau determines ethnicity and race within America for legal purposes (including employment)

Asians are people from 'the far east' 'southeast asia' and 'india'

https://www.census.gov/mso/www/training/pdf/race-ethnicity-o...

BY NO MEANS am I defending this, I believe much of our race 'stuff' is indefensibly stupid and unscientific from biological, historical, and sociological perspectives, and the American idea of "Asian" is one of the worst concepts of all.

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

#24

Post by pishpash »

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…

Funny that, I've heard it that it's barbaric to use uninvolved family as blackmail for an individual's liabilities. Guess not when it's suggested by "non-Barbaric" peoples!

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

#25

Post by robbintt »

danso wrote: post #20
codegeek wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

Its just the view the English language has consensed on at the ground level. It's not decided intentionally.

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

#26

Post by lotsofpulp »

vinay427 wrote: post #10
lotsofpulp wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US, Asian = people from eastern Asia. In the UK, Asian = people from southern Asia.

Sure, but even if we continue to abide by this inconsistent terminology, "eastern Asia" is not the same thing as China, so the OP's point still seems relevant.

I'm not endorsing the use of the terminology, nor do I use it, but that has been my experience with others who use it in the US and UK. I know the US Census lumps Indians and Chinese together in one as Asian, but colloquially, I never hear anyone in the US refer to Indians as Asians.

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

#27

Post by duxup »

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…

When worked as technical support we had some large banks as customers who insisted everyone who worked their cases be US citizens. We worked with some semi sensitive technical data, but nothing directly banking related. A few banks required drug and credit checks (the credit checks were just dumb).

Amusingly they were happy to hire on connected people in less friendly nations when operating overseas.

I think the citizen thing was reasonable, credit check maybe not.

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

#28

Post by booleandilemma »

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.

As an American, when I hear Asian I think Chinese/Japanese/Korean.

Despite the fact that I know India is in Asia, I don’t think of people from India as Asians.

Incidentally, Israel is also in Asia, but I don’t consider Israelis to be Asian either.

https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/what-continent-is-israel...

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

#29

Post by duxup »

okasaki wrote: post #16

>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…

It sounds like they have pretty clear rules that you're not allowed to do that.

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

#30

Post by ConfusedDog »

Why not look into other ethinic's ties with foreign nations that taking advantage of US funded research? Probably because they are not considered to be threats, and sharing common good research results is not necessarily a bad thing. (Military tech is different story.) The fact is US is considering China as a threat under Trump's throne, so researchers with Chinese heritage is under much higher scrutiny than other races is the racism happening right now. It is a much more subtle and dangerous form of Racism, reminded me War World II Japanese-Americans. What's happening in this article is just a symptom.
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