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Federal Judge Upholds Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Process

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Re: Federal Judge Upholds Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Process

#521

Post by cloverich »

tathougies wrote: post #419
cloverich wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I should have said "as much". My implication is that the gap between asian's and whites is both smaller and closing more rapidly than that between black's and whites, based on what I've read and experienced. It doesn't mean there isn't discrimination (etc). > Basically all post-slavery discrimination against blacks happened to Asians. Can you please cite anything that can support the opposite claim? I'm not arguing t…

Underlying your position, is the belief that the main reason that African Americans face poorer outcomes than Asian Americans in aggregate is because they have faced more discrimination against them. You are unwilling to compromise in this belief. You are using Asian's relative success against African Americans to argue that they must therefore not have experienced discrimination. This reasoning is backwards. You oug…

> Underlying your position, is the belief that the main reason that African Americans face poorer outcomes than Asian Americans in aggregate is because they have faced more discrimination against them. You are unwilling to compromise in this belief.

Different discrimination. I'll elaborate.

> You ought to first quantify the discrimination (you'll have to figure how to do that yourself)

Sure. Slavery is worse. Multi-generational race based slavery is worse still. That on top of pulling people from multiple distinct ethno linguistic groups, separating their families, destroying their culture and language, and killing them, is worse still. That's the history of blacks in America. Its not just discrimination (which is bad). Its the wiping out of culture that's the problem. When you put discrimination on top of it, you get what we have today. That's what I believe to be true based on what I know so far. To tie that back in, I think it makes sense that it would take generations of affirmative action like repairs to fix the problem. Its not that I don't think Asians (etc) were not discriminated against. Its just that I think it was a (much) larger, more severe scale, that warrants an independent reparation. Its perhaps comparable to Native Americans. I bet they fare similarly in modern America (I don't know the stats).

> we would be forced to conclude that other groups

No. I don't know much about those other groups. It could be any number of extrinsic factors that put them into a similar position (as measured by, e.g. poverty?).

Re: Federal Judge Upholds Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Process

#522

Post by richmunk567 »

JamesBarney wrote: post #420
rohit2412 wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, asians are less likely to be leaders because of their race? African-Americans are more likely to be leaders because of their race?

You're misreading the statistics. If students are admitted in a race blind way then you get 16 times as many Asians as African Americans. He's just arguing they're not 16x more likely to be leaders than African Americans.

You are spot on. There appears to be a fair amount of evidence to support your observation:

https://www.unz.com/article/why-harvard-is-right-to-discrimi...

Re: Federal Judge Upholds Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Process

#523

Post by ballark »

richmunk567 wrote: post #512
simmanian wrote: post #492

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you arguing that Asians inherently make worse leaders than people of other races? To me, Harvard keeping Asians out would create a negative feedback loop where Asians are not perceived as leader materials.

https://www.unz.com/article/why-harvard-is-right-to-discrimi...

This article is full of obvious logical errors.

They claim that East Asians develop cognitive capacity at an earlier age than other races and that gives East Asians a compounding practice advantage that gives them the edge in academic scores. The article claims, based on this premise, that universities like Harvard should actually discriminate even more against East Asians.

The article is full of obvious leaps designed to sound smart but are actually logically vacuous.

Much of the article essentially boils down to this: Young East Asians test highly > The quantity of older East Asian who are successful don't reflect the quantity of young East Asians who achieve academically > Therefore, East Asians start smart and then other races catch up cognitively in adulthood A) Racism is likely factor here. East Asians are less represented in leadership because leadership perceives East Asians are being less leaderly. Now we're using the symptoms of racism in order to justify the racism itself. B) Nurture versus nature is a complicated and unsettled debate yet the author tries to claim that because China has a creativity problem, it's proof that East Asians as a race has a creativity problem. Never mind that Japan is a world leader in innovation. C) Article repeatedly use test scores to say something qualitatively about the characteristics of a race. For example, East Asians test high on math therefore East Asians have more quantitative reasoning capabilities. You could just as easily attribute this to cultural differences in study priorities.

2) "If these children are scoring as high as 120 on average at the age of four (despite being hospitalized for malnourishment) and 110 to 112 at the age of ten, it is implausible that their IQ goes up as they grow older" Come on. Why? You can't just assume that hitting a high IQ at an early age means that it cannot continue growing. Especially when these IQ scores are being compared against age groups.

Re: Federal Judge Upholds Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Process

#524

Post by [deleted] »

daseiner1 wrote: post #311
muh_gradle wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We all know that number should probably be higher if we're actually caring about academic performance. Affirmative action doesn't actually bother me as much as legacy based admissions. Just absolutely idiotic that it's accepted.

I don't see why academic performance, beyond an institution's decided-upon base threshold, should be the sole or even dominant admissions factor. Especially at a liberals arts college like Harvard.

[deleted]

Re: Federal Judge Upholds Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Process

#525

Post by kemiller »

CWuestefeld wrote: post #509
throwaway_law wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is very clear that race-conscious admissions are systematically racist and discriminatory. Every time the SCOTUS hears one of these cases they acknowledge that, but the justification is that these classes are/have been historically discriminated against and constitutional admissions which take race into consideration are a temporary measure to right these historical wrongs by leveling the playing field. So the e…

the justification is that these classes are/have been historically discriminated against and constitutional admissions which take race into consideration are a temporary measure to right these historical wrongs No, that is not the justification being used. The argument used to justify this racism is that a rich education requires exposure to diverse people and ideas, and so the educational mission of the school requi…

They do in fact look at diversity along those lines too.

Re: Federal Judge Upholds Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Process

#526

Post by aesthesia »

CWuestefeld wrote: post #509
throwaway_law wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is very clear that race-conscious admissions are systematically racist and discriminatory. Every time the SCOTUS hears one of these cases they acknowledge that, but the justification is that these classes are/have been historically discriminated against and constitutional admissions which take race into consideration are a temporary measure to right these historical wrongs by leveling the playing field. So the e…

the justification is that these classes are/have been historically discriminated against and constitutional admissions which take race into consideration are a temporary measure to right these historical wrongs No, that is not the justification being used. The argument used to justify this racism is that a rich education requires exposure to diverse people and ideas, and so the educational mission of the school requi…

Is that the only dimension along which schools measure diversity? It's much easier to become a National Merit Scholar in some states than others; I imagine similar considerations are made in university admissions. A cursory search suggests that geography is indeed taken into account in admissions: https://qz.com/653167/if-you-want-to-get-into-an-elite-colle...

Similarly, coming from a minority religious or cultural background can also be a plus for a college application. Perhaps your complaint is that the process by which these benefit an applicant is less systematized than it is for race? Or that racial preferences are too systematized?

The other categories you mention are likely to be diverse by default---colleges already have a pretty good distribution of short and tall people, and the hand dominance distribution is also pretty representative. There aren't any mechanisms that impede the society-wide distribution of these traits from replicating itself in the student body.

Re: Federal Judge Upholds Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Process

#527

Post by gnicholas »

thrill wrote: post #513
gnicholas wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would guess it would be 5-4 against Harvard, with Thomas, Alito, Kavanaugh, Gorsuch, and Roberts in the majority. Which one of these would you have ruling in favor of Harvard's AA plan?

I believe Roberts would vote with Harvard.

The same Justice Roberts who said: "The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race."?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parents_Involved_in_Community_...

Re: Federal Judge Upholds Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Process

#528

Post by richmunk567 »

dwoozle wrote: post #383
rohit2412 wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, asians are less likely to be leaders because of their race? African-Americans are more likely to be leaders because of their race?

A grades and SAT admission model creates a class that is ~70% Asian. America’s future leadership class is categorically not 70% Asian.

There are things other than hard work required for leadership in politics, business and even science. Those things appear to correspond with academic performance at different rates for different populations.

https://www.unz.com/article/why-harvard-is-right-to-discrimi...

Re: Federal Judge Upholds Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Process

#529

Post by kemiller »

packet881 wrote: post #490
bigendian1234 wrote: post #459

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW, I'm a white person who used to think of affirmative action as unfair discrimination. That was true until I spent time volunteering teaching technical skills to kids in poor immigrant neighborhoods. Now that I have had an up close experience with these communities, I'm here to tell you institutional racism is real and we're far from it making sense to end these programs. There simply is not a quick easy solution…

Feel free to make your voice heard by your vote and donate from your paycheck. This is a zero sum game and my ancestors were not oppressing either latinos or Africans. I'll make my voice heard by not voting for Democrats.

If you are an American citizen or resident then you benefit from the system that did oppress them. It’s not about your personal ancestors.

Re: Federal Judge Upholds Harvard's Race-Conscious Admissions Process

#530

Post by autokad »

bigendian1234 wrote: post #459
tomschlick wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but the justification is that these classes are/have been historically discriminated against and constitutional admissions which take race into consideration are a temporary measure to right these historical wrongs by leveling the playing field. So under that thought process... when does the temporary measure end? Is there a specific goal? Or is it something unachievable like "when income inequality is fixed".

FWIW, I'm a white person who used to think of affirmative action as unfair discrimination. That was true until I spent time volunteering teaching technical skills to kids in poor immigrant neighborhoods. Now that I have had an up close experience with these communities, I'm here to tell you institutional racism is real and we're far from it making sense to end these programs. There simply is not a quick easy solution…

> "those who are not oppressed simply have no real frame of reference to understand the problem"

Yet somehow you think you are enlightened by a little volunteer work. as far as immigrants in America go, Asians make more money than whites. When you compare Chinese, the difference is starker.

FWIW, I don't think you were really that poor. I grew up white, male, and poor from Appalachia. I promise you, there was no privilege in that. Its a crime against humanity that someone's test scores are worth less than another's simply because they were not born with enough pigment in their skin.

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