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Despite my best efforts, I cannot see the world in the eyes of a redemptive liberal or grievance elite unless I want to shock myself.
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I donât think you are being honest here, and that this is why you fail. The reason I donât think you are being honest is that several of us have told you plainly that we feel no sense of guilt or anything like it, and yet you still insist on claiming the source of our desire to fix our problems is the need for âredemptionâ. It will be impossible for you to find common ground, perchance to join with those with whom you disagree, if you continue with this sort of willful and invincible ignorance.</p>
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I believe slavery and segregation were terrible sins. Yet, I do not feel that reparations must be paid through racial preferences. I have no white guilt in that sense. The reparations should be paid through equal treatment, not preferential treatment.
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Here again, we see only more invincible ignorance. The treatment is not preferential because the preferences already exist against blacks â and this is quite obvious. Were we to look around today, we would see blacks generally at the bottom of our countryâs socio-economic ladder while other groups have come and prospered. Were we able to look around twenty years ago, we would see the same thing. This would be true were we able to look around fifty years ago, or one hundred years ago, or two hundred years ago, or three hundred years ago, or even nearly four hundred years ago, stretching back to 1619. The one constant here is that blacks have been bitterly suppressed for their entire American experience while other groups have been given preferences.</p>
<p>The only fair treatment here is to suppress other groups in the same way and for the same amount of time, while giving the same preference to blacks that they have all enjoyed. Of course that would be immoral. What race-sensitive policies aim to do is take into account an individualâs barriers so that if despite them he is discovered to have performed as well as others, he will not be lost to statistical chances. He is special, and there is no doubt about it. He is also well qualified to attend whatever school he can. Since he is already qualified quantitatively, there is no harm done in making it surer that he does not get lost in a statistical swamp.</p>
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Previously, we had a discussion about Johnny. I was very interested in finding ways that would increase the number of students who were as academically focused as Johnny, but you were very interested in finding the existing students like him so that he would eventually serve as a role model and create more.
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Câmon guy. You canât be serious here. Reread those posts and you will see that at EVERY turn I also supported increasing the number of students who were as focused as Johnny. But I am also a lot more aware than you are of the pressures that exist in the poor black community. I know that you can most efficiently increase that number by implementing your ideas and by implementing mine.</p>
<p>When Johnny works as hard as Asians and whites at his work, and when because of his circumstances he has to work even harder than most Asians and whites just to get to the same level of performance, and when Asians and whites are going to elites by the truckload while the Johnnys in our country keep getting overlooked because the statistical odds are against them, it creates a disincentive in kids who live in the black communities. Asians and whites get to see truckloads of people like them excelling, while those blacks you claim to want to help get to see almost none. This is despite the fact that there are black kids working even harder than the whites and Asians who celebrate every year. It just creates yet another downward pressure that makes the job harder.</p>
<p>A more efficient approach is to help the low performing kids perform better, while pointing them to Johnny so that they can see the sorts of effects their hard work can produce. If there are no Johnnys, well, it just makes everything that much more difficult to achieve.</p>
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From what I remember, you consistently supported finding the existing students with potential and giving them preferential treatment as a sort of boost.
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I consistently supported it only because you consistently refused to hear what I was saying. I continually have to state, restate, clarify and re-clarify things with you, which just increases the illusion of consistency here. You claim the treatment I advocate is preferential when I claim preferences already exist against URMs. Can we really deny this? I canât, not when I am looking around and seeing it everyday, not when I myself feel itânot when I have always felt it.</p>
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I did not see how your plan directly affected the 90% group. Your plan heavily relied on the good will of the talented tenth.
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This is false. I only dealt with a part of the plan because that is the part you are attacking. But I have been very clear with you that I also support your ideas. I think we need a comprehensive support of these students so that we do no harm to any of them. It will be hard to help the bottom 90% of blacks when they can see no hope of continuing their success beyond grade school. The distractions in the communities are just too many. But let them see what it is all about, and the job gets easier â not easy â but easier.</p>
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So, yes, I apologize because you are interested in helping the remaining 90%, albeit in an indirect way. I'm more interested in directly helping them.
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LOL. I live, teach, and suffer here. The last I checked, there were no Asians working with me to give direct help.</p>
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And, for the n-th time, that's why I support programs like AVID. I'm not saying it is perfect, but I do like its idea. Much more so than racial preferences. Sir, I'm just really glad that you express views which place you in an extreme minority.
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LOL. Okay. Well, you just keep âsupportingâ AVID. What I find is that people who attack race-sensitive policies while claiming to support other helpful programs, really support nothing but themselves. Support doesnât take place just because one SAYs one likes something. It takes place when one puts life behind it. In truth, if you are like 99% of anti-AA folks I have seen, you in fact DO NOT support AVID. And if you really do support it, then youâve expressed views that truly are in the extreme minority.</p>