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YC Open Office Hours for Black and Hispanic Founders

blog.ycombinator.com

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Re: YC Open Office Hours for Black and Hispanic Founders

#211

Post by orthoganol »

Uptrenda wrote: post #209

This probably won't be very popular: but isn't the notion of special treatment from YC partners on the basis of race inherently racist? I think anyone who is black or Hispanic would much rather associate with YC on the basis of their own individual merit only now everyone who has anything to do with YC will have to wonder if they are there because YC felt the need to help out the poor, underprivileged, black dude or…

If they were snubbing Whites or Asians to help underrepresented groups, then they'd be exercising an unjustifiable racism. Merely going the extra mile to help another group however is not that. YC should do it, and anyone should happily accept an advantage offered to them.

This may be controversial as well, but the black founders I know are rich Ivy leaguers (granted I only know a few). They don't need extra help. (I know there probably are other black founders who didn't grow up in privilege who do not fit into that category.) I don't personally know any hispanic founders, my anecdotally-based sense of things makes me feel like they are urgently underrepresented.

Re: YC Open Office Hours for Black and Hispanic Founders

#212

Post by frankdenbow »

Uptrenda wrote: post #209

This probably won't be very popular: but isn't the notion of special treatment from YC partners on the basis of race inherently racist? I think anyone who is black or Hispanic would much rather associate with YC on the basis of their own individual merit only now everyone who has anything to do with YC will have to wonder if they are there because YC felt the need to help out the poor, underprivileged, black dude or…

The front door application to YC is the same that it was before. YC is seeing that they aren't interacting with enough minority founders and are doing targeted outreach to groups so that they can speak to more of them. Adding more minority founders to the funnel, as they would if they wanted to see more hardware startups and talking to places that serve hardware startups.

Re: YC Open Office Hours for Black and Hispanic Founders

#213

Post by ejstronge »

78666cdc wrote: post #203
anigbrowl wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's take a look at the actual citation: Taken from a forthcoming paper by Sampson and Kristin L. Perkins, “Compounded Deprivation in the Transition to Adulthood: The Intersection of Racial and Economic Inequality among Chicagoans, 1995-2013,” in the Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences. Professor Sampson has an endowed chair at Harvard and was previously the chair of his department there. While I…

And Watson, from Watson and Crick, who discovered the underlying commonality of all humanity, DNA, and won a Nobel prize for that work, was extremely racist[0]. That's the problem with arguing based on name recognition. Cite rigorous, peer-reviewed, established work. Let the veracity of the work speak for itself. [0] http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/dec/01/dna-jam...

I'm not sure if this is your implication, but neither Watson nor Crick is an expert on race (race being not a biological phenomenon but a very social one).

Re: YC Open Office Hours for Black and Hispanic Founders

#214

Post by sneak »

Uptrenda wrote: post #209

This probably won't be very popular: but isn't the notion of special treatment from YC partners on the basis of race inherently racist? I think anyone who is black or Hispanic would much rather associate with YC on the basis of their own individual merit only now everyone who has anything to do with YC will have to wonder if they are there because YC felt the need to help out the poor, underprivileged, black dude or…

“You don't get the lightning bolt in Mario Kart when you're already in first place.” —spotted on the internet

Re: YC Open Office Hours for Black and Hispanic Founders

#215

Post by poppysan »

djtriptych wrote: post #193
johnathanNYC wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I completely disagree with this, but can you elaborate on racism not being in policy. I think you are confusing systemic racism (in regards to white privilege) with slurs, discrimination, hating someone's skin color, etc.

I mean it's possible to have ideally equitable policy and do almost nothing to address the root causes of racism.

It's also possible to have policy that is intended to stifle, or harm a specific race. I mean Jim Crow laws were less than half a century ago.

It's a shame that we have to debate this in 2015...

Re: YC Open Office Hours for Black and Hispanic Founders

#216

Post by ignoramceisblis »

bakhy wrote: post #15
arturventura wrote: post #9

I'm not trying to be a troll, I'm just trying to find a justification. Having something that says you can only can come in if you are "Black, Hispanic, Women, Veterans, and International founders" kinda racist as fuck? It sounds exactly like segregation to me. Again, not trying to be a troll. Not American, just trying to understand.

when certain groups are underrepresented, then doing something proactive to improve that is not racism, it's fighting against it. IMO social context is key. it's asymmetric, and to fix it, you need asymmetric action. if the scale is tipped to one side, then to balance it out, you add some weight to the other.

What is "under-representation"? How do you measure it, and how do you determine when all "certain groups" (which are what, exactly?) are "represented" proportionately?

These are serious questions. How do we decide: what groups should be represented (what about ugly individuals? people with specific disabilities?), and when everything is all "fair"?

Re: YC Open Office Hours for Black and Hispanic Founders

#217

Post by unabst »

Uptrenda wrote: post #209

This probably won't be very popular: but isn't the notion of special treatment from YC partners on the basis of race inherently racist? I think anyone who is black or Hispanic would much rather associate with YC on the basis of their own individual merit only now everyone who has anything to do with YC will have to wonder if they are there because YC felt the need to help out the poor, underprivileged, black dude or…

Inherently racist in the same vein as the word "tolerance". Not seeing race is the opposite of racism, not tolerance. What is there to "tolerate"? I'd much prefer YC announce their office hours as "everyone welcome including African American and Latinos" as targeted encouragement if that was indeed their intent.

Re: YC Open Office Hours for Black and Hispanic Founders

#218

Post by ericschmidt »

Uptrenda wrote: post #209

This probably won't be very popular: but isn't the notion of special treatment from YC partners on the basis of race inherently racist? I think anyone who is black or Hispanic would much rather associate with YC on the basis of their own individual merit only now everyone who has anything to do with YC will have to wonder if they are there because YC felt the need to help out the poor, underprivileged, black dude or…

100% agreed. This is the most condescending, patronizing, outright racist initiative that I've seen yet from an incubator like YC.

The racism is implied. It's not overtly stated.

By giving office hours to black and hispanic founders, YC must first presuppose that black and hispanic founders need special treatment.

This racist initiative goes against everything YC stands for and it's absolutely ridiculous.

Re: YC Open Office Hours for Black and Hispanic Founders

#219

Post by mc32 »

nostrademons wrote: post #185
copperred wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It is an example of a white male privilege" No it is not. You cannot point to poor treatment of one group as evidence of the "privilege" of another group. There are more than two colors of people.

Isn't that precisely what privilege means? Having advantages that accrue to you simply by membership in one group? There are degrees of privilege, too. I'm not white - I'm multiracial white/Asian, though I look basically Asian. I'm also not a Stanford grad, and my parents weren't millionaires. However, I grew up middle-class in a reasonably affluent suburb, my parents stayed married, they were highly educated, and I'…

What I read in that is that we can say Argentinians are privileged vs Paraguayans, because due to circumstance beyond anyone's control, Argentines are better off than Paraguayans. Same for Greeks vs Swedes?

Re: YC Open Office Hours for Black and Hispanic Founders

#220

Post by dang »

Uptrenda wrote: post #209

This probably won't be very popular: but isn't the notion of special treatment from YC partners on the basis of race inherently racist? I think anyone who is black or Hispanic would much rather associate with YC on the basis of their own individual merit only now everyone who has anything to do with YC will have to wonder if they are there because YC felt the need to help out the poor, underprivileged, black dude or…

I'm not sure it serves HN very well to have exactly the same entirely generic debate come up every time there's a thread about anything like this.

Rehashing the same political divide over and over merely produces the identical hash over and over. That doesn't count as interesting in HN's sense—nothing predictable does. Meanwhile, interesting discussion about the specifics of the story at hand largely gets drowned out.

I'm not sure what if anything we can do about this, but it's seems lame and not in the spirit of gratifying intellectual curiosity.

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