^^@notigering “Truth is that at the end of the day the heartbreak kids I know do just fine on whatever school they end up attending…”
What’s the big deal? well, Rosa Parks was told the same thing— what’s the big deal? why cannot you just sit a couple rows back, the bus will get you where you are going, the seat is reserved for certain skin color…
After all its about people being treated as an individual, not as a racial group. And as someone said earlier one’s race is a protected trait from discrimination under the constitution.
“Would you find acceptable consideration of race/ethnicity in the context (possibly in combination with SES and 1G) of whether an applicant had a disadvantaged starting line, so that s/he would be more meritous than an applicant of similar achievement who had an advantaged starting line? Note that such consideration could apply to some applicants of any race/ethnicity (e.g. if a white applicant came from a background where s/he was disadvantaged by anti-white racism, s/he would be given such consideration) but would not be given automatically only on the basis of being any particular race/ethnicity. But it could be a component of a theoretical pure-applicant-merit admission process that is not pure-stats.”
@ucbalumnus - this is reasonable for sure and probably the way it should work, but the issue is how is similar achievement defined by a college?
“I get poor white kids being disadvantaged in many ways but by “anti-white” racism? What would be an example of that??”
You can’t imagine that a white kid living in a neighborhood that is predominately non-white might have a rough time, get picked on, beat up, etc.? Why is it only imaginable that white people can be racists? Ever heard of the knock out game? All the videos that I’ve seen involve white people being knocked out.
Also, in the LA area there has been historically a lot of hispanic vs black animosity and violence. That is racism too, but just not involving whites.
I did not say it was common, but in a country of 300,000,000+ people, some unusual situations occur, and I wanted to make it clear that such situations would not be excluded from this type of consideration, even if they are rare.
But it is true that anti-white racism exists, even if it is not that common, or rare in a position where someone could apply it to cause a significant disadvantage to a white person.
I’m sure it’s been mentioned before in this thread but colleges want diversity beyond AA and helping groups that have historically lagged behind others. It’s been shown that putting people in heterogeneous environments improves their thinking, creativity, work ethic, etc as opposed to being in homogeneous environments. It’s not all about AA.
Oh I can do more than imagine it, that was me, personally, as a kid. Despite the bullying/fights/social stigma younger OhMom went through, I don’t see it as having held me back in any way that would affect college admissions. I was born abroad - only white kid, then moved to a neighborhood and attended a school where I was again (just about) the only white kid - for most of my childhood. Even young, I was aware that I had advantages my classmates didn’t have in the city as a whole (and beyond).
Lots of kids are picked on for one reason or another. Possibly it makes for an interesting essay, but an admissions preference? I can’t see it, no.
Anyone can be racist. But white people by and large control the levers of power in this country and that makes that racism far more potent. Me getting picked on, beat up or called whitey as a kid doesn’t change that fact.
Racism is one thing, racism with the power of the entire society behind you is quite another.
If your theory is those other preferences exist because colleges want more white, non-Hispanics on campus, that may be your opinion, but I don’t believe that’s remotely true.
Read the Supreme Court cases, especially some of the Thomas opinions, or don’t. It makes no difference to me.
Especially high SES white non-Hispanics. There’s significant overlap between the two, of course. And it’s the rare college that will say that is their intent so all we can do is look at the results and ask ourselves why they continue the policies if the intent is something different than what is being produced.
However, in the case of attracting higher SES, some schools will admit that adding certain sports is how they hope to achieve that goal:
Hmm. I wonder what “suburban” could possibly be a euphemism for…actually we don’t have to guess:
For most colleges, the key thing in women’s lacrosse or other similar sports is not that the players are white, it is that these suburban kids are willing to pay significant amounts of tuition to attend mediocre private schools in a part of the country with a declining population and income base. There are 67 D2 and 216 D3 women’s teams. The D2 schools give small sports scholarships, while the D3 schools give none, and the vast majority of these schools are not difficult to get into academically. Sports at this level are another form of student amenity to draw in additional tuition dollars, not some program to help whites or anyone else actually get into college.
I think that view is a bit naive. Look at who is actually being recruited?
The overlap between “can pay” and “white” and “plays lacrosse” is huge. And not only in “mediocre private schools”. It’s as true in the Ivies and NESCAC as it is there.
Did you even read the article you linked? The colleges are very up front that they are looking to attract more full-pay students who want to play sports beyond a club level.
Of course I did @Zinhead . They’re very upfront that they want to attract “suburban” students who play lacrosse. Who are overwhelmingly white and middle-high income (Full pay). I said so right in my post.
@OHMomof2 - You are arguing they are being recruited because they are white. They are being recruited because they are willing to pay full tuition to play a team sport.
@dragonmom3 - nothing is bad about middle class (using that term is deceptive because what they mean is “full pay” - so pretty high income actually) white students.
But if you think colleges should admit only the best applicants, or believe colleges should give a leg up to disadvantaged students, or admit more high-stats Asian (or any race) applicants, it’s a problem.