<p>Just Browsing, how do you know that?</p>
<p>And let me backtrack, how do you know that an Asian living in the ghetto and a URM living in the ghetto have profoundly different experiences?</p>
<p>saro,</p>
<p>If not down to a number, then what exactly are "anti-AAers" after? That is what I am trying to get you to pin down for me. Is it a process that includes every single factor OTHER THAN race? If so, why exclude race when we include so many other things that an applicant can't control? What is your rationale for that?</p>
<p>And no, I do not think the URM automatically gets the spot because of his/her skin color. Obviously, schools only want students who are likely to succeed at that school. (High attrition rates do not bode well for those annual rankings!)</p>
<p>Can we not celebrate the fact that Asians (on the whole) are amazingly good at scoring well on tests? (Or is that also considered racist?) Can we not also appreciate that URMs may bring some value other than high test scores to a campus community?</p>
<p>
[quote]
AA keeps asians down...
[/quote]
You sure can’t tell from the numbers flowing into the schools. Doesn’t seem like they are down at all.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Probably because asians are a minority, a very small one. We have no real voting power, but of course, the second I hit 18, I will vote against AA (assuming that the anti-AA candidate isn't too evil).
[/quote]
Well, if you are American, this is your right. The Klan and Neo-Nazis will be voting right along with you. Were I Asian, I would think about this before having a selfish knee-jerk reaction against something that still effectively allows Asians upward mobility.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The Chinese built the railroad and were historically treated like crap in all of America.
[/quote]
Indeed, but most Chinese, most Asians in general in this country, are not descendants of the railroad builders. They are largely newcomers, and many come from professional classes. Even the railroad workers for the most part came here as entrepreneurs (and without the black labor that made America what it became, a "Chinese railroad" would have made no sense at all. It would not have even been possible). The Chinese came here to sell labor. While sordid treatment and denial of natural rights did occur to many Chinese individuals (which is true of individuals of all races), the Chinese largely entered into their arrangements willingly, with the hope of making a buck.</p>
<p>None of this is true of blacks. The vast majority of African-Americans in America are descendants of slaves, slaves who did not come here willingly, who were not from professional classes, who instead of having an entrepreneurial spirit, were beaten and kept from prospering of their own labor. This happened under American law. They were deliberately kept from reading , from learning math, from the sciences – and this lasted for centuries, while other groups continued to develop.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Most of our experiences are far harder than the "effects of slavery" on modern African Americans. Just 30 years ago, my parents were forced into virtual slavery in some random farm to "learn the ways of the common folk" since they were supposedly of bourgeois descent (my great great grandfather owned land).
[/quote]
America has no obligation to any of this, since America never caused it. China is to blame. Your folks came to America to escape China. They wished to come to a better country and they did this, as entrepreneurs, seeking a better life here. Obviously they found it. Blacks never came here with this sort of opportunity. They were created here, deliberately, as a slave class – and they were brutally conditioned and ridiculed as a slave class. For many centuries they were forced by law to remain in the slave class. America's obligations are to blacks here.</p>
<p>
[quote]
After managing to enter an university after Mao's death in 76, my dad were recruited by a western university in 79. My mom used to work minimum wage at McDonalds until my dad managed to find a job that paid a living wage (postgrad pay was terribly low in Rochester back then).
[/quote]
They could have always returned to the People’s Republic of China if their treatment was too harsh. Blacks did not even have THIS option, and they do not have it today because almost no black person knows his country of origin. Blacks are a mixture of different African and European nations today. Many of them are also part Asian, and Native American. They have no country other than America. Your parents had a choice. Unlike blacks, they could have gone back to where they came from. Obviously your parents thought the treatment here was better than their treatment in their own country. Like all other immigrants coming to this land, EXCEPT BLACKS, your parents knew they could endure their hardship, continue to work, save, and eventually make an investment in themselves, and then prosper. Blacks did not have this possibility when they came here. Neither did their children, etc. They are suffering the result of this mistreatment to this very day.</p>
<p>
[quote]
A friend of mine, his dad used to work at 7-11 in downtown Toronto for a similarly low wage and was robbed twice on the job by individuals who suffer from the "stigma of slavery", and yet we are discriminated as mindless study machines with "all the breaks" while our african and white counterparts have reaped the luxuries of america.
[/quote]
AA does not aim to address the problems in Canada. This is America. AA was designed to help address an American issue.</p>
<p>
[quote]
So what if race is not the only factor? Nonetheless, it is a factor that is unfair to Chinese.
[/quote]
What is unfair is that blacks were held down by law, in slavery, and for multiple centuries, while people of other races have come here and prospered. That is more than just “unfair”. It is tragic. The Chinese, of all Asians, aren’t exactly suffering this sort of history in America.</p>
<p>
[quote]
It is a false diversity based on skin color. So far, most of the blacks in the Ivy league are from elite backgrounds, rather than truly poor black Americans. Of course, once in a while, they will admit a poster boy or girl.
[/quote]
This is heartless. Were the situation reversed and Asians had incurred the sort of treatment blacks have incurred, I would be fighting hard to get as many Asians into the Dream as I could. Even if I disagreed with certain policies, I would not be so heartless as to trash the few Asians who are trying to join the rest of the country. I would attack only the policy.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I seriously doubt the "stigma of slavery" is that severe in comparison to what most Chinese have experienced.
[/quote]
Had the founders of America passed laws that openly treated your people as only 3/5ths of a human, and had they enforced laws declaring you unfit for freedom, and had half your country fought to enshrine your nonhuman status forever in law, then you would have reason to doubt the harshness of American treatment of other groups relative to the Chinese.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I will definitely do something about this in the future.
[/quote]
So will the Neo-Nazis. They are working at least as hard as you will be – and toward the same end.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Just Browsing, how do you know that?</p>
<p>And let me backtrack, how do you know that an Asian living in the ghetto and a URM living in the ghetto have profoundly different experiences?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Affirmative Action is much more complex. In general colleges take personal experiences into account, and part of that is race.</p>
<p>
[quote]
If not down to a number, then what exactly are "anti-AAers" after? That is what I am trying to get you to pin down for me. Is it a process that includes every single factor OTHER THAN race? If so, why exclude race when we include so many other things that an applicant can't control? What is your rationale for that?
[/quote]
I don't want to speak for anti-AAers as a whole because I'm sure there are others who view things differently. You said it yourself, I'm after a system that does not consider race. </p>
<p>Why? Because being of a certain race in itself has no merits. I don't think a person is going to contribute more to the community simply because he or she is a certain skin color.</p>
<p>Again, stop bringing in extraneous arguments. The existence of such considerations are not justification for AA in themselves. That argument could work for many other outrageous things (Why not consider height as well? How about BMI - I hear that's mostly genetic too?).</p>
<p>
[quote]
Can we not celebrate the fact that Asians (on the whole) are amazingly good at scoring well on tests? (Or is that also considered racist?) Can we not also appreciate that URMs may bring some value other than high test scores to a campus community?
[/quote]
Certainly we don't have to. I've never said anything about SAT scores being all-mighty.</p>
<p>So again, what does a person whose skin color is black bring to a community that a person whose skin color is yellow can't (assume the exact same environment)?</p>
<p>
[quote]
So again, what does a person whose skin color is black bring to a community that a person whose skin color is yellow can't (assume the exact same environment)?
[/quote]
He can bring the community and all America a true and final repair of the legacy of slavery. Instead of thinking himself shut out of the American Dream, he will think himself an integral part of it. His children will think likewise, and over generations the history will lose its power. Asians obviously cannot provide this, since it didn’t happen to them.</p>
<p><a href="assume%20the%20exact%20same%20environment">quote</a>?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>You can't make that assumption though. People treat people differently based on the color of their skin in general, therefore the environments could never be the same. It is because of these different environments that affirmative action exists.</p>
<p>
Mmmhmm. How would you answer that with the races switched around? If neither brings anything special, then does it particularly matter which of them gets in? How would you decide- a coin toss?</p>
<p>"So again, what does a person whose skin color is black bring to a community that a person whose skin color is yellow can't (assume the exact same environment)?"</p>
<p>Saro,</p>
<p>I think you have identified the "brick wall" in this AA debate. No matter what anyone tells you (and nobody does it better than Drosselmeier), you will forever think that the life experiences of every race are exactly the same. </p>
<p>"AA" (your term, not mine, because I don't believe schools take any special "affirmative" measures here. They just consider everyone's race - hence the issue is acheiving racial diversity, not AA), assumes that people of different races bring different life experiences to the table. And in this year of 2007, that is still rightly so.</p>
<p>Drossel,
You're good at envoking idealistic images with your words.</p>
<p>But let me get this straight. You're saying events hundreds of years ago should still be factored into the admissions process?
My ancestors were discriminated against when they first came to the US too - people cheated them and treated them like 2nd-class citizens. I'm feeling left out of the American dream.</p>
<p>Just_Browsing,
So how about height? I'm sure short people get treated differently. Let's add in fat people too. I'm sure they got teased as kids.</p>
<p>warblersrule86,
I would rather go by a coin toss than race.</p>
<p>Bay,
Call me naive, but I feel that in this day and age, race has a minimal impact on the lives of people of all races (or at least Asians and URMs face relatively equal amounts of discrimination). You're right it is 2007. I think 2007 is the right time to begin the healing. Dwelling on the past simply slows down the process.</p>
<p>
[quote]
So how about height? I'm sure short people get treated differently. Let's add in fat people too. I'm sure they got teased as kids.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>That is very different. There are few "short people" stereotypes and prejudices.</p>
<p>Saro,</p>
<p>Actually, I would venture to guess that a school would consider an applicant's height and weight as a consideration if the applicant made an issue of it their essay, for example.</p>
<p>And yes saro, you are naive. But I hold out hope that you will be enlightened.</p>
<p>Bay,
Race is a field, and it's considered even if it isn't mentioned in your essay. Let's put it this way, how would you feel if being short or fat could hurt you in the admissions process, and if it was something that was mandatory? Adcoms know Asian surnames even if they don't check the Asian box?</p>
<p>Enlighten me. How are you so certain one's life is so profoundly impacted by one's own race? </p>
<p>I'm going to assume that you haven't pulled a Michael Jackson (or reverse) and traveled back in time to relive your life. Why are you so certain of this?</p>
<p>Just_Browsing,
What about fat and skinny people? How about pale people? Myopic?</p>
<p>There is nothing idealistic about my words. I have seen the possibilities with my own eyes.</p>
<p>
[quote]
But let me get this straight. You're saying events hundreds of years ago should still be factored into the admissions process?
[/quote]
Because slavery was so intense in how it held down blacks, blacks today lag behind other groups economically and educationally. Affirmative action programs were originally created to ameliorate the problems created by slavery and the public segregation that came directly out of slavery and that lasted right up into the 1970’s – by American law. If AA is abandoned, we are still left with the problem. And it is a problem that Asians obviously don’t have, since they came here of their own will. Their “discrimination” is nothing more than a cost of business. They could have decided the cost was too great, and gone elsewhere. With blacks, America deliberately used weapons to FORCE an entire group of people to remain in bondage. It is an entirely different matter.</p>
<p>
[quote]
My ancestors were discriminated against when they first came to the US too - people cheated them and treated them like 2nd-class citizens too. I'm feeling left out of the American dream.
[/quote]
Two things: 1. See above. 2. Since your race and experience will be taken into account right along with blacks and Hispanics, whites and everyone else, you may very well be among the Asians chosen to represent the point of view of those whose ancestors have endured their special sort of discrimination.</p>
<p>
[quote]
What about fat and skinny people? How about pale people? Myopic?
[/quote]
No one has ever enslaved fat folks by American law. So the government has no obligation to deal with the effects of the centuries long legal mistreatment of fat folks.</p>
<p>
[quote]
What about fat and skinny people? How about pale people? Myopic?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Honestly, its probably important to go to school with people of all different body types.....</p>
<p>But that is going to happen naturally without any effort from admissions committees.</p>
<p>Drossel,
You're saying that blacks often start with less than zero in the USA (the lag). Well, what about Asian immigrants? They come here with less than zero as well, they have NO grasp of the language, and only the clothes on their back. And business? That's a pretty euphemistic way of saying escaping from genocide, wars, oppression, and starvation.</p>
<p>Also, what about hispanics?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Two things: 1. See above. 2. Since your race and experience will be taken into account right along with blacks and Hispanics, whites and everyone else, you may very well be among the Asians chosen to represent the point of view of those whose ancestors have endured their special sort of discrimination.
[/quote]
First, I'd have to write my essays on that topic for schools to recognize that. URMs just check a box. How fair is that? The second problem is, I want to be judged by who I am! My accomplishments, my character, and my skills. I don't want to get in because my ancestors did something or that. I'd like to think that most people would want to be judged as individuals as well.</p>
<p>
[quote]
No one has ever enslaved fat folks by American law. So the government has no obligation to deal with the effects of the centuries long legal mistreatment of fat folks.
[/quote]
Don't mix up my arguments. (S)he claims that your experiences are shaped by countless things and as such we should factor in race as well. Would you argue that a fat person's experiences are different from a fit person's?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Would you argue that a fat person's experiences are different from a fit person's?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Yes, see my above post.</p>
<p>Just_Browsing,
That was my reply to Drossel.</p>
<p>Why do you assume that it's going to happen naturally without any effort from admissions committees? One could argue that myopic, fat, and/or skinny people are more likely to be academically accomplished/have higher SAT scores than fit people. So maybe they're more prevalent in good schools?</p>
<p>One could argue that..... but it wouldn't be true.</p>
<p>It is true though that the average scores for African-Americans are lower than the average scores for Asian-Americans.</p>