<p>I just want to point out that "Jew" is not a race. That's like saying protestants or catholics were a race. Italians and Jews have been assimilated as part of the "white" culture, and I do not believe they are comparable to asians, african-americans, native americans, etc..</p>
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I just want to point out that "Jew" is not a race. That's like saying protestants or catholics were a race. Italians and Jews have been assimilated as part of the "white" culture, and I do not believe they are comparable to asians, african-americans, native americans, etc..
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<p>race is a social construct...what we call race right now is only a pseudo-belief...</p>
<p>socioeconomic is not a pseudo-belief though ^^</p>
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That's like saying protestants or catholics were a race. Italians and Jews have been assimilated as part of the "white" culture, and I do not believe they are comparable to asians, african-americans, native americans, etc..
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<p>Out of curiosity, what is your definition of "white culture"? Does it reflect the Yankee steadfastness of New England, the 'Bubba' mentality of the Old South, or the evangelical communities of the Mountain West?</p>
<p>Because I hate to break it to you, but not all whites are the same.</p>
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They think because I'm a honor student and don't sag my pants I'm not black! My own people hate me because I'm smart. These social aspects are why things such as affirmative action exist.
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<p>So they get an advantage just because they dont want to do it? Does that sound equal or just? If you can be different, so can they. They chose to have black friends and do w/e they do. Instead of having affirmative action which only supports their actions, they should have major programs to educate better parenting and modeling for that society to change it.</p>
<p>It's like if you are poor, the government should just throw money at you, they should instead teach you how to make money. They are as intelligent as anyone else, they can learn to earn.</p>
<p>Dear morons who insulted my grammar on a forum,</p>
<p>You act as though I am unable to spell and use capital letters correctly simply because I chose not to on a forum. Please learn to think. This is exactly what I was talking about.</p>
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Please learn to think.
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<p>I think you missed the point completely.</p>
<p>You don't get the point, affirmative action exists for like me that are striving to break the cycle, you really must not understand do you? imagine if your entire race pressured and ridiculed you simply because you were a honor student. You have no idea so hard it is to succeed when your entire community shuns yopur every attempt, even family. Now multiply this for the general black population. It's just not the same. The minority cultures are so....... please walk into the "hood" and you'll understand what I'm talking about, how many "Ivy leaguers" you know come from there? the environment.</p>
<p>^ completely true,
for many, or most, afican americans like me, there is no support system for being a top student, many of my classmates have personal SAT tutors, homework tutors, essay readers, personal college admissions counselors who basically do their whole applications, etc. I had to do all that on my own, and the fact that I did it on my own with little support, and achieved the same level of academic success, is something that colleges should take into account.
Many people, even close friends and family, dont understand why I would want to spend my summers taking advanced college courses and doing internships. Even some of my black friends mock me for being soo smart. </p>
<p>And yes there are many minorities who have every advantage. I personally discovered that most blacks who are wealthy in the US and have children attend top universities, are foreigners. Rich families from Africa, Haiti, Jamaica, etc. Not african americans who have four grandparents descended from slavery. Just an interesting fact I noticed.</p>
<p>colllegebound, I, a white kid, had to do all that on my own too, and I achieved great success. it is not caucasians that get special advantages, it is rich kids. therefore, perhaps you should get special consideration because of your economic background, but not because of the color of your skin</p>
<p>Biggest black population concentration in the US is in NY. I live in NY. There are free homework helps and SAT tutors. No they probably aren't in the Hood, but NYC is also known for its good public transportation. It took me a hour to get to the SAT tutor place. Everyone has their own hardships. I'm not saying being black is easy. </p>
<p>And Espadaleader, I don't know what horrible view you have of black people but just because some people ridicule you does not mean the whole population ridicules you because you are smart and capable. If you truly feel that way, you need to move to another place. I seriously dont see the black population ridiculing Obama and he's black and he graduated out of a top university.</p>
<p>@ Collegebound - do you only think of slavery? what about those asians who died in the coal mines and stuff. how do you think asians worked when they came to this country? and how japanese were rounded up in concentration camps? did you ever think of that? I'm not trying to compare who suffered more, i'm trying to say African Americans arent the only ones. </p>
<p>EDIT:
@guynameded - I agree completely. it has already been said several times in this thread but people don't seem to get it.</p>
<p>Perhaps it's time to switch affirmative action from race-based to socio-economic based. I think it would reflect better how far we have come (many minorities do not need help simply because of the color of their skin) but also how much further we have to go (many poor people, from white Appalachia or South Boston to urban blacks, face overwhelming odds).</p>
<p>See, you two fail to understand the intricate social aspect of this situation. please, you must understand me. Are you listening? African American citizens face unfathomable pressures from their own society, pressures unique to African Americans, not native Africans, or Caribbean blacks or Canadian blacks. Are you listening? Good. The African American society shuns education and intelligence, and embraces the opposite. It is an epidemic in my society. If your a educated male, your considered a "white" boy or a "sell out". The support isn't there from our community. The reason Cornell only enrolled 4.5% bof African Americans, (roughly 150 out of the enrolling class) is not because of slavery, or racism, or lack of education, it is because the African American society is counterproductive to success. For example, Blacks felt Obama was "too white" "not black enough", "he talks like a white boy", have you hear that sentiment before? it is rampant, it is the same sh**t most successful African Americans have to live through, you want to do research? the divide between educated black individuals and educated blacks is staggering, if the educated individuals come back to the "hood" the "hood" will deem us "goodie goodies" and not black enough. It is because of these pressures, affirmative action exists. For example remember The fresh prince of Bel-Air? This is a very good example if you remember. Okay Carlton was a Princeton applicant blah blah, and went to a all-white school blah blah, but will smith character would always ridicule him because of his intelligence (Also I speak for other minorities as well)</p>
<p>Blacks end up segregating, they educated "college blacks" and the working class blacks, don't let one come across the other. The black community is so frail, and as a result, our success is hindered. Why</a> is a black person considered a "uncle tom" or "sell out" for speaking proper? - Yahoo! Answers
copy this link and just get an example what I'm talking about. Listen I understand where your COMING FROM too, a lot of my friends nag me about it too, I hate affirmative action, but Is is needed (also the topics I listed are not only tied to blacks)</p>
<p>Oh! and damn it's only 4.5% blacks in the class of 2012 anyway! don't you see a problem with those numbers? But yeah reply back</p>
<p>P.S. I only read the first paragraph, everything else idk.</p>
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I just want to point out that "Jew" is not a race. That's like saying protestants or catholics were a race. Italians and Jews have been assimilated as part of the "white" culture, and I do not believe they are comparable to asians, african-americans, native americans, etc..
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<p>Jew not the same as being protestant. Jewish is not a race (common divisions include Jews in the Caucasian race, though genetically they cluster about halfway between Europeans and Middle Easterners). But Jewish is an ethnicity, not only a religion. So there's a fundamental difference between classifications of Jews and other religions.</p>
<p>And I was comparing Jews to blacks in being largely blackballed from top universities. That's why Brandeis U was started. Read "The Chosen" to note the exclusion of Jews from the Ivy League (HYP in particular).</p>
<p>@ Espadaleader</p>
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African American citizens face unfathomable pressures from their own society, pressures unique to African Americans
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<p>The statement above summarizes most of your point and the majority of your posting in this thread. I agree with what you're saying concerning the pathology of anti-intellectualism amongst blacks. It's surely dissuades some intelligent and motivated black students from pursuing academic excellence.</p>
<p>But unfortunately for your argument, this pervades other ethnicities and cultures, specifically lower class and rural whites. Aren't whites living in a small town in South Dakota privy to the same biases that an urban black is? Aren't they lacking the suitable academic role models that urban blacks lack? Aren't they surrounded by different minded individuals that don't understand the pursuit of intellectualism like you are? </p>
<p>While your point about blacks is valid, it surely doesn't apply ONLY to that racial group. If affirmative action for blacks/hispanics is underpinned on these grounds, then surely lower class whites should get the same benefit.</p>
<p>(Note: I don't really agree with socio-economic affirmative action either though. I understand the intention and I think the reasoning is valid; that a difficult environment can truncate academic development. But for top schools, a student must come in prepared. They must be able to immediately compete in high level classes with high achieving peers. While I'd love to accept the underdog kid, I think the immediate rigor, and exorbitant cost, of the Ivy League leaves the kid at a disadvantage that is extremely difficult to overcome. I also am wary of considering anything short of living in a crime-ridden neighborhood with a crackhead mom as "disadvantaged". Not having money for Kaplan Test Prep or going to a school with only 1 AP is not "disadvantaged".)</p>
<p>But there will NEVER be socio-economic affirmative action instead of race-based affirmative action. Why? Because the poorest whites score slightly higher than the richest blacks and the poorest whites score almost 200 points higher than similarly financed blacks. If it went to solely socio-economic, the black acceptance rate would be dwindle to almost zero at top schools.</p>
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But for top schools, a student must come in prepared. They must be able to immediately compete in high level classes with high achieving peers. While I'd love to accept the underdog kid, I think the immediate rigor, and exorbitant cost, of the Ivy League leaves the kid at a disadvantage that is extremely difficult to overcome.
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<p>I would suggest that a lot of these high-achieving working or middle class white kids are just as intellectually able as their richer counterparts, if not moreso -- they are just less groomed. And the nice thing about a place like Cornell is that it can be an engine of meritocracy for these types of students.</p>
<p>That's what makes the admissions process so tricky -- and why so many students bemoan Cornell's lack of the use of numbers while I applaud it. Do you really want to take a 1500 SAT middle-of-the-pack student from a top East Coast private school who has spent their summers in Africa teaching blind kids to write poetry over a 1400 SAT top 2.5% of the class student from a large public school in Ohio who had the lead in their high school musical?</p>
<p>Now, I probably don't consider the later student any more disadvantaged than dontno does, but it's unclear to me that the former will necessarily be a better student and make a better contribution to Cornell's campus than the later.</p>
<p>There is certainly truth to what you're saying, Espadaleader. I went to a very expenseive private high school with a pretty sizable black population and I know that many of them grappled with being considered "sell outs" and such. </p>
<p>You used the initial reaction to Obama as an example, yet when all was said and done 97% of black people supported Obama. If you ever spend time in the African American areas of Washington, DC or on the Metro, you'd be hard pressed to not find dozens of black people wearing Obama hats, pins, shirts.... entire stores have sprung up specifically to serve the demand for black people to express their pride in this Ivy League educated, University of Chicago constitutional professor from Hawaii. I've seen many black people interviewed saying they now believe they can do anything, saying how inspired they are to get an education. </p>
<p>It is terrible how anti-intellectual the culture can be (same with many working class white cultures though), but the evidence is there that people will behind a success story.</p>
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[quote]
See, you two fail to understand the intricate social aspect of this situation. please, you must understand me. Are you listening? African American citizens face unfathomable pressures from their own society, pressures unique to African Americans, not native Africans, or Caribbean blacks or Canadian blacks. Are you listening? Good. The African American society shuns education and intelligence, and embraces the opposite. It is an epidemic in my society. If your a educated male, your considered a "white" boy or a "sell out". The support isn't there from our community. The reason Cornell only enrolled 4.5% bof African Americans, (roughly 150 out of the enrolling class) is not because of slavery, or racism, or lack of education, it is because the African American society is counterproductive to success. For example, Blacks felt Obama was "too white" "not black enough", "he talks like a white boy", have you hear that sentiment before? it is rampant, it is the same sh**t most successful African Americans have to live through, you want to do research? the divide between educated black individuals and educated blacks is staggering, if the educated individuals come back to the "hood" the "hood" will deem us "goodie goodies" and not black enough. It is because of these pressures, affirmative action exists. For example remember The fresh prince of Bel-Air? This is a very good example if you remember. Okay Carlton was a Princeton applicant blah blah, and went to a all-white school blah blah, but will smith character would always ridicule him because of his intelligence (Also I speak for other minorities as well)
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<p>Lets cut to the chase here. Justice is relative and everyone has biases. In theory its nice to say that everyone has a shot - everything is fair - but in reality - life isn't fair - nothing is fair - you just gotta take what you get and deal with it. Don't listen to anyone who tells you 'no' or 'you can't'. It just reminds me of Michael Phelps and his middle school teacher, who allegedly in his autobiography, said he'd never be successful in life. So just ignore people who project racism and elitism and get on with it - I mean, why would you care? you have nothing to prove to them. In the end the people who keep judging others are the ones who are left standing alone. Just focus on what you have to do and hopefully you'll make the right choice in whatever you do! Good Luck!</p>
<p>Lol at the michael phelps comment: there are so many successful people who have had teachers who were reported to say something similar. Einstein had his teacher tell him the same thing, Keynes too, and i'm sure many others.</p>
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<p>This type of example is not really what I’m referring to. Though I’d probably take the 1500 kid b/c the second kid isn’t really disadvantaged. I imagine someone in that environment, assuming they have a relatively stable home life, should have scores commensurate with their ability. But also, I’m talking about a hypothetical affimratrive action based on socioeconomics, not the actual admissiosn process we have now.</p>
<p>I’m specifically referring to individuals from impoverished backgrounds (Appalachia, MidWest, projects) who have well below average stats, like 200 SAT points below (on 1600 scale). I imagine these kids would be at a large disadvantage coming into such a rigorous environment. This disparity in preparation (and possibly innate ability, though this is nebulous b/c I agree that their environment has probably somewhat stunted their intellectual development) will be incredibly difficult to overcome. And these kids can not afford to take longer than 4 years, and probably can’t afford even 4 years anyway.</p>