<p>If you actually cared to read my whole argument, you would see that I mentioned Asians. </p>
<p>The first line:</p>
<p>"I think what Jonathan1 meant was that the NBA is 90% black and no one cares, but why is it wrong for colleges to be 90% white or asian."</p>
<p>I don't see how one group of people should have a inherent advantage over another at birth, which is what AA advocates. There are whites that aren't upper class and make even less money than minorities, but are screwed because of AA. The U.S. Government makes the erroneous assumption that all white people have long lineages in America and that their great-great-grandparents were rich American slave owners. </p>
<p>I live in NYC and the families of most of the white people I know (including yours truly) did not set foot into the U.S. until the turn of the 20th century or later. There was a little something called "the melting pot" that many people forget about. These people who came from poor backgrounds in Europe are often included in the slave-owning stereotype of white people. Obviously, this isn't true if many of the immigrants came from poverty. How could they afford slaves if they barely had enough money for themselves?</p>
<p>Sports, although primarily a numbers game, has some unquantifiable aspects as well. Athletes like Walter Payton and Derek Jeter put up great numbers, but will always be beloved for the class and dignity they brought to their respective sports. Conversely, athletes like Albert Belle and Terrell Owens, although very talented, will always be defined by the stupid acts they did. Why do you think Kirby Puckett got into the Hall of Fame? It wasn't just because of his stats. They are actually kind of low for a Hall of Fame outfielder. However, he was beloved for the great enthusiasm he had and being a great clutch player. These attributes cannot be defined by numbers.</p>
<p>As for me being a racist, I don't see how, especially since I have cousins that are half-black and other cousins that are half-filipino.</p>
<p>What about Babe Ruth who was a fat hedonistic womanizer? Ty Cobb, abject racist who often sharpened the spikes on his shoes and aimed for the groins of second basemen. And since when did having non-white family members and being racist become mutally exclusive? I hate it when people use that "arguement". </p>
<p>Albert Belle is not in the Hall of Fame not because he was a douche, but because he had a very bad relationship with the press (apparently, worst in history from what I've read), most of which make up Hall of Fame voters, it's purely political in his case. Owens, when all is said and done will probably make the Hall of Fame, just like Michael Irvin will even though they're both huge jackasses and are despicable human beings, they just won't make it in on the first ballot for those reason. As for Albert Belle, I don't know. He supposedly had one of the worst relationships with the press in recent memory.</p>
<p>Derek Jeter and Walter Payton did not become icons because they were affable people. They won championships, broke records, and put up monsters stats. There are plenty of nice guys in sports, but they're not idolized like Jeter or Payton precisely because they don't have the numbers or rings.</p>
<p>Again, in order to equate sports with academics, you need to come up with an easily quantifiable quality that indicates a good college, not high school, student. Is it grades? SATs? Number of EC's? And if so, is that what the point of college is, to be purely academic?</p>
<p>Just for this reason: Football and Hockey are sports MADE for roughness, fighting and so on. People usually like to see in those sports a huge tackle, a pancake and so on, but basketball is not that type of sport. It is a sport more closely linked to finesse skill then power strength, and so when one big fight happens in the NBA, it has a lot more repurcussion than in the NFL, NHL, where some fights are more normal. Still, when there is something extra-ordinary in the other 2 there are always the appropriate punishment, see Albert Haynesworth.</p>
<p>You questioned my racial persuasions, so before do another post, I want to establish that I am not a racist. My elementary school was almost 3/4 black and I spent grades kindergarten through 8th grade there. Many of my friends in the school were black. The color of their skin never bothered me. If a person is a good person, I don't care waht race they are. </p>
<p>ICrisis, Ty Cobb and Babe Ruth played in a much different era than we know today. At that time, Ruth's off-the-field antics weren't as well known because the media isn't the feeding frenzy that it is today. Most of the things that were reported were legend. As much as I admire the Babe, there's no way he ate 24 hot dogs between double-headers. The Babe did some good things too. He would visit sick kids in hospitals and sign baseballs for people. I just can't see Albert Belle doing this. As for Cobb, his racism wasn't met with such criticism because many more people were racists at that time. Segregation was still prevalent.</p>
<p>The way I see college admissions is that an applicant should be as complete as possible. He/she would have high test scores and GPA, outstanding EC's, good essays and recommendations, uniqueness, and possibly great athletic ability. This would be the college equivalent of a "5-tool player." If a kid has a 2300 SAT and a high GPA, but did no kind of EC's and another kid has a 2150 SAT slightly lower GPA, but has amazing EC's, I would pick the 2150 kid because he/she is good at everything. Picking the 2300 kid would be like signing a quarterback with a rocket arm that has no touch. The 2150 kid might have a slightly weaker arm, but has pinpoint accuracy. </p>
<p>Where does race fit into the equation? The answer is that it shouldn't. All of the previous attributes of applicants (SAT, GPA, EC's) are accomplishments earned by an applicant. Race isn't earned. It is just an advantage or disadvantage some people get at birth. Therefore, it is unfair to base an admission decision on something that is not earned. Allowing race to be in the picture would be like having two people run a race and giving one of them a head start. It isn't fair.</p>
<p>Actually Albert Belle would often go out of his way to sign stuff for fans and he donated a lot of money and set up a number of scholarships throughout his career. Of course, he also chased down kids who egged his house and got into altercations with fans, the media and was charged for stalking a prostitute...</p>
<p>But Albert Belle is a really interesting character, he was an intensely private person who did not like to talk about himself and was deeply focused on baseball but he also had a real bad temper as well.</p>
<p>Using AA to establish a sports team would lead to instant fan revolt because not even white people would rather watch a winning black basketball team than a losing white one. Using AA to build a college class, while not ideal, does not lead to the same kind of disaster.</p>
<p>A good article by Michael Wilbon, about how the NBA is "blackest" of all the North American professional sports, and why there is more public intolerance for violence in basketball than in football, baseball, or hockey.</p>
<p>I am not saying that AA should be used in sports. The best players should play and that's that. Why can't it be the same with college? Why do we have to skew the playing field so that minorities have an advantage over Whites and Asians? It isn't because they are disadvantaged, as the government would like you to believe. My cousin got a free ride to Rensselaer Poly Tech with a 1300/1600 SAT score. She isn't poor or disadvantaged. Her family income is in the 6 figure range. However, she is half-black and obviously, she checked black off as her race on her application. RPI's school average SAT score is 1320/1600. My cousin got a full ride to a school with an SAT that is below the school's average. Think about this. This would be like giving someone a free ride to Penn State University with an 1200/1600 SAT. You can't honestly say that race didn't play a factor in my cousin's scholarship. If you still aren't convinced, her roommate is black and also got a free ride with even lower SAT scores. My cousin openly admits that AA is the reason that she got a free ride. </p>
<p>AA supporters, tell me how this is fair? How is it fair that minorities get this kind of charity just based on their race alone. You can't say that she grew up in the hood and that her parents barely make any money. She lives in a suburban area of NYC and her parents make more than enough $. Her family is actually better off financially than many white or Asian people I know. Yet if she had identical stats and EC's to them, she would ge accepted over them based solely on her race.</p>
<p>I'm not stereotyping minorities as being inferior students to their white and Asian peers. The salutatorian of my 8th grade class was a very smart black girl who currently attends a magnet school. She was admitted into this school based on her academic achievement, which is how it should be. She earned her way in without accepting any "minority" sympathy. If the government keeps lowering the standards for minorities, they will always be stereotyped as underachievers who only got into a college because of their skin color. If the government were to do away with AA, I think you would see a greater level of achievement in the minority population because they would have to work to get into that top college. They wouldn't have the AA wagon to coast in on. This greater level of achievement amongst URMs might even cause whites and Asians to work harder because they would have to compete against a newly motivated minority population. In my opinion, you would see many more people like the black girl from my 8th grade class if AA was abolished.</p>
<p>Don't blame the public, or ESPN, or call everyone racists because fighting in the NBA is a much bigger scandal than it is in the NHL. Blame the leagues. Fighting in the NBA is a "crime" because the NBA wants it that way. Fighting is winked at or even encouraged in the NHL because the NHL wants it that way. MLB and NFL are somewhere in between.</p>
<p>Decades ago fighting used to be more common in the NBA. But the commisioner at the time put his foot down and said No More and started handing out huge fines and suspensions. Before that it was just an ejection and maybe a modest fine and/or a one game suspension. As I recall the incident that broke the camel's back was when Rudy Tomjanovich got his face smashed to a pulp and spent over a year or in and out of hospitals getting his shattered face bones put back together. Ever since then an NBA fight has been a Big Deal -- not because any given player is black or white, but because it's the NBA and the NBA treats it like a Big Deal.</p>
<p>And you don't have to be black to be labeled as an NBA thug. Bill Laimbeer, Swen Nater, and Greg Kite, to name a few, were white guys who were euphemistically labeled "enforcers." Larry Bird was known to get into the occasional fight too. Today nearly all the enforcers are black because nearly all the players are black. </p>
<p>I'm not saying that racism doesn't exist in sports. Of course it does. It's just that things aren't always that simple. Today, its far too easy to label any controversy involving minorities as "racist," when the reality may be far less clear-cut than that.</p>