SC upholds UT Affirmative Action.

[Starbuck1975]

I'm not sure what any of this has to do with the basic concept of ethics/justice presented. Sure the natives deserve recompense, too, as they get in part with AA. Notice the same people still don't think they even deserve fair treatment, per response to Justice/internal dept's land use settlement some years back.

I think it is because you frame the concept of ethics and justice as an absolute. Part of the problem is because the application of ethics and justice largely depends on who is in power.

Take your Holocaust example. Do you think the Germans would be paying any reparations had they won the war, or had forced the Allies to a stalemate?

 

[agent00f]

I think it is because you frame the concept of ethics and justice as an absolute. Part of the problem is because the application of ethics and justice largely depends on who is in power.

Take your Holocaust example. Do you think the Germans would be paying any reparations had they won the war, or had forced the Allies to a stalemate?

I'm only explaining what justice/ethics means here. Whether any party, like you or the germans, chooses to act ethically in any way is irrelevant to that.

 

[glenn1]

I'm not sure why you keep talking about Asians here. Werepossum makes a good point, AA targets demographics that are underperforming. FWIW, college racial make up is in-line with population demographics. This means all races are being equally represented. This is great news.

I'd like to take this opportunity to ask what is merit? Is it a numerical score? Depends on the mission of the university. If a university only looked at SAT/ACT and transcripts then they could fill their schools with a homogenous group, but most don't want that. The mission statement of many universities is not just to round up everyone with the high scores because that is not representative of the country or the world and it misses the creativity and insight that new world perspectives can bring to higher education. Here is Harvard's mission statement:



Having a diverse and well rounded student body is key to their mission, so the application process reflects that. This is what "holistic" means. Its a pulled back view of the applicant and what they have to offer, not just data from their HS or test scores.



Hypothetical people aren't what these programs target. That sounds like a great inspirational story, but for the vast majority of poor/undereducated minorities that is a fantasy. A kid with their dad in jail and their mom on crack is more worried about eating than studying for the ACT/SAT. I'd be surprised if "Tyrone" ever graduated high school.

However, is it fair that Tyrone worked so damn hard but some white suburban kid with the perfect life scored 1 point higher, so he gets to slide into school over Tyrone? That is why scores do not truly reflect the applicant's merit and the admissions team will take into account Tyrone's story, his letters of recommendation, and his determination. The school's outreach program may have gotten Tyrone to apply where he may not have. That is the power of AA.

Which is why I need to reiterate what AA is. I already said arbitrarily adding points to a minority applicant is disallowed, quotas are disallowed, and using race as a tiebreaker is disallowed. Most AA programs use outreach to meet their diversity targets. The more minority applications they get the bigger the pool they have to choose from compared to overrepresented races. This just means whites and asians have more competition.

Yeah, you "forgot" to mention literally the ONLY REASON that Harvard would care about Tyone's backstory about how he 'worked so hard' and all that crap is because he was black. If he was white or Asian he would have been another anonymous pile of application materials among thousands.

And for what? So they can serve as the "muscle" during demonstrations so other students can enjoy the "diversity"? So the white folks can observe from afar the self-segregation of the tokens of progressive noble oblige and largesse? It sure as hell isn't because the universities actually believe in blacks when it comes to hiring them for their own senior executives. Every single ivy league President is white. The President of the University of California system is white as is the Chancellor of every single school with the exception of UC Santa Barbara where it's an Asian dude. The Board of Regents for almost any university you can find will be overwhelmingly white except for a couple AA tokens of their own. When it counts the people who are the supposed champions of AA in universities don't believe in using it themselves even the slightest fucking bit, why do you think that is?

 

[Darwin333]

I disagree the assertion of because if you are xxxxx then you suffered xxxxxx then you could not do xxxxx because of xxxx and xxxxxx and xxxxxxx and then <insert more excuses>.

I think the assertion is that if you are xxxxx then you suffered xxxx and it makes it harder then other people to do xxxxx because of xxxxx and xxxxx....

Now I will say that I am not a big fan of AA but there is somewhat of an argument to be made that if two people with the exact same scores but one of those had to work much harder under much worse circumstances then that person is indeed better qualified. Again, to my knowledge AA doesn't really take this into consideration, if a white kid from suburbia has the exact same qualifications as a black kid that grew up dirt poor in the ghetto with absurdly substandard ghetto schools then I'd say he worked much harder then the white kid to achieve those same qualifications. On that basis alone he, imho, is more deserving of the spot.

 

[Darwin333]

Yeah, you "forgot" to mention literally the ONLY REASON that Harvard would care about Tyone's backstory about how he 'worked so hard' and all that crap is because he was black. If he was white or Asian he would have been another anonymous pile of application materials among thousands.

And for what?

What does it matter? Shouldn't the fact that Tyrone worked harder than the other applicant be enough to satisfy you regardless of the reasons Harvard picked him? Personal responsibility, hard work and all that jazz...

 

[Jaskalas]

What does it matter? Shouldn't the fact that Tyrone worked harder than the other applicant be enough to satisfy you regardless of the reasons Harvard picked him? Personal responsibility, hard work and all that jazz...

They're doing it to meet a racial quota.
But thanks to Subyman for pointing out they're not allowed to call it that, or publish an exact number target. Now it's about the "feels" of diversity. AKA, a quota without a hard number. Gee, that makes your racial discrimination so much better when you put the feels behind it.

 

[werepossum]

America is not a closed system. You have people representing a broad spectrum of races, ethnicities and cultures constantly entering the stream. My grandparents immigrated to this country and faced bigotry, although admittedly it was not systemic hence their ability to rise above it.

I don't think anyone can reasonably deny the atrocities of slavery or segregation or even manifest destiny. I personally feel we should do more to correct what this nation did to native Americans.

I don't see affirmative action as the correcting much of anything. However I do respect the SCOTUS ruling on it.

It's an indirect solution. If more blacks are allowed to slip ahead of slightly more qualified whites and Asians, then we have more affluent black families and thus within the next generation more black children have the same advantages as does the average white child. It's a very discriminatory system, but so far it's the best we can afford.

They're doing it to meet a racial quota.
But thanks to Subyman for pointing out they're not allowed to call it that, or publish an exact number target. Now it's about the "feels" of diversity. AKA, a quota without a hard number. Gee, that makes your racial discrimination so much better when you put the feels behind it.

Black children are statistically much more likely to be born into poverty, raised in poverty, and raised in single-parent homes, all of which are (again, statistically) factors mitigating against success. This isn't blacks suddenly getting lazy, it goes all the way back to Jim Crow and slavery, so affirmative action is simply fighting the effects of racial discrimination with more racial discrimination.

I'd love to replace it with a direct solution where we provide intensive tutoring to poor and otherwise at-risk minority children who then compete head-to-head, along with intensive therapy for their parents to turn them all into Tiger Moms (and dads, grandmothers, aunts, etc.) But I don't think we can afford such a system (for political reasons), never mind competently operate it. An indirect solution like affirmative action is our only other option for fixing our past mistakes.

 

[agent00f]

I think the assertion is that if you are xxxxx then you suffered xxxx and it makes it harder then other people to do xxxxx because of xxxxx and xxxxx....

Now I will say that I am not a big fan of AA but there is somewhat of an argument to be made that if two people with the exact same scores but one of those had to work much harder under much worse circumstances then that person is indeed better qualified. Again, to my knowledge AA doesn't really take this into consideration, if a white kid from suburbia has the exact same qualifications as a black kid that grew up dirt poor in the ghetto with absurdly substandard ghetto schools then I'd say he worked much harder then the white kid to achieve those same qualifications. On that basis alone he, imho, is more deserving of the spot.

Think of what kind of society we live where if X robs Y, we carefully consider if Y deserves to be compensated. There's no controversy over whether some crime has been committed, or its consequences/aftermath.

That's why the no-AA arguments are so ridiculous, like we protected the criminals responsible for so long it's past some statute of limitations (in that case who's culpable?), or we can't force X to pay Y back because that'd just be Y robbing X.

 

[glenn1]

Think of what kind of society we live where if X robs Y, we carefully consider if Y deserves to be compensated. There's no controversy over whether some crime has been committed, or its consequences/aftermath.

That's why the no-AA arguments are so ridiculous, like we protected the criminals responsible for so long it's past some statute of limitations (in that case who's culpable?), or we can't force X to pay Y back because that'd just be Y robbing X.

Only X and Y have both been dead for 100+ years and we're deciding to give compensation to any random people who share some resemblance to X. "Here you go, since you have skin tone like X, here's some free preferential treatment even though you're rich, not related to X, and from a different continent, but otherwise a progressive person will feel guilty if we don't pick you over the white guy."

 

[agent00f]

Only X and Y have both been dead for 100+ years and we're deciding to give compensation to any random people who share some resemblance to X. "Here you go, since you have skin tone like X, here's some free preferential treatment even though you're rich, not related to X, and from a different continent, but otherwise a progressive person will feel guilty if we don't pick you over the white guy."

There are still people alive who lived under segregation and redlining and such. Racists need very selective memories because the bulk of their history is so inconvenient.

 

[Paratus]

Only X and Y have both been dead for 100+ years and we're deciding to give compensation to any random people who share some resemblance to X. "Here you go, since you have skin tone like X, here's some free preferential treatment even though you're rich, not related to X, and from a different continent, but otherwise a progressive person will feel guilty if we don't pick you over the white guy."

Besides the government destroying wealth and inheritance for multiple generations of a subset of its citizens. Redlining was still going on in the 80's

During the heyday of redlining, the areas most frequently discriminated against were black inner city neighborhoods. For example, in Atlanta in the 1980s, a Pulitzer Prize-winning series of articles by investigative-reporter Bill Dedman showed that banks would often lend to lower-income whites but not to middle- or upper-income blacks.[7] The use of blacklists is a related mechanism also used by redliners to keep track of groups, areas, and people that the discriminating party feels should be denied business or aid or other transactions. In the academic literature, redlining falls under the broader category of credit rationing.

2016-1980 = 36 years. So no, they aren't all dead.

 

[werepossum]

Besides the government destroying wealth and inheritance for multiple generations of a subset of its citizens. Redlining was still going on in the 80's

2016-1980 = 36 years. So no, they aren't all dead.

His point is still valid though because it's group-based, not individual-based. Your preference is in no way related to any offense committed against you or your direct ancestors, just your shared melanin level. You either have the complexion for the connection, or you don't.

I still support it because it seems to me to be the least evil of the practical alternatives.

 

[buckshot24]

Besides the government destroying wealth and inheritance for multiple generations of a subset of its citizens. Redlining was still going on in the 80's



2016-1980 = 36 years. So no, they aren't all dead.

Yet you are for programs that have decimated the black family over the last 50 years. Leave the black family alone already! If anybody should pay reparations it should be the left.

 

[agent00f]

His point is still valid though because it's group-based, not individual-based. Your preference is in no way related to any offense committed against you or your direct ancestors, just your shared melanin level. You either have the complexion for the connection, or you don't.

I still support it because it seems to me to be the least evil of the practical alternatives.

Of course ideally only the racists responsible for individual action/damages to specific black persons are punished, but as mentioned before they managed to weasel out of it (with a lot of help from same sort of folks here I might add), so it was left to the rest of a just & civil society to assist the victims.

 

[Paratus]

Yet you are for programs that have decimated the black family over the last 50 years. Leave the black family alone already! If anybody should pay reparations it should be the left.

What's that photocopy man?

 

[buckshot24]

What's that photocopy man?

Why do you keep advocating programs that have decimated the black family?

 

[agent00f]

What's that photocopy man?

Buckshot literally thinks black people were better off before desegregation, similar to how some used to think they were better off under slavery.

 

[buckshot24]

Buckshot literally thinks black people were better off before desegregation, similar to some used to think they were better off under slavery.

Desegregation has nothing to do with it. The black family has been decimated after 50 years of "helping" them.

 

[agent00f]

Desegregation has nothing to do with it. The black family has been decimated after 50 years of "helping" them.

Just a brief recount of history. A democrat federally mandated desegregation, which upset many who then rallied to the modern GOP. You know, to oppose desegregation. Their argument to this day is that things were better beforehand, as evident through you.

Again, this was nothing new, a republican federally mandated emancipation, which upset many who then rallied to the democratic party at that time. Similarly their argument was things were better before.

 

[buckshot24]

Just a brief recount of history. A democrat federally mandated desegregation, which upset many who then rallied to the modern GOP. You know, to oppose desegregation. Their argument to this day is that things were better beforehand, as evident through you.

Again, this was nothing new, a republican federally mandated emancipation, which upset many who then rallied to the democratic party at that time. Similarly their argument was things were better before.

How do you explain the disintegration of the black family? You're inputing desegregation into this discussion not me. I don't think the black person is better off being segregated. I think the black family is better off without all the "help" liberals have been giving them for 50 years. Segregation, I repeat, has nothing to do with it.

 

[agent00f]

How do you explain the disintegration of the black family? You're inputing desegregation into this discussion not me. I don't think the black person is better off being segregated. I think the black family is better off without all the "help" liberals have been giving them for 50 years. Segregation, I repeat, has nothing to do with it.

No, I'm explaining where the argument you parrot comes from. Obviously if things better 50 years ago, then the GOP weren't wrong about the coloreds (not much more than a generation ago).

So clearly liberals providing better education and jobs to black people resulted in broken families, and not the conservative "law & order" police state or such targeted at black communities.

Granted none of that makes any sense, because making any sense would collapse the interconnected web of delusions necessary to keep up this historically racist charade.

 

[buckshot24]

No, I'm explaining where the argument you parrot comes from. Obviously if things better 50 years ago, then the GOP weren't wrong about the coloreds (not much more than a generation ago).

I'm not parroting anything.

So clearly liberals providing better education and jobs to black people resulted in broken families, and not the conservative "law & order" police state or such targeted at black communities.

Do you live on this planet? Liberals haven't done any of those things. If you want to argue that it is the cops who have broken up the black family we can have that discussion. It is hard to imagine that blacks weren't targeted during segregation, why did the black family remain intact during this horrible racist period but not now? What has changed?

Granted none of that makes any sense, because making any sense would collapse the interconnected web of delusions necessary to keep up this historically racist charade.

It doesn't make sense because the points you've made don't make sense.

 

[agent00f]

I'm not parroting anything.

It's rather unbelievable that someone like yourself just happened to come up with an ideology which completely matches american conservatism.

Do you live on this planet? Liberals haven't done any of those things.

This very thread is conservatives complaining about liberals sending more black kids to college.

If you want to argue that it is the cops who have broken up the black family we can have that discussion. It is hard to imagine that blacks weren't targeted during segregation, why did the black family remain intact during this horrible racist period but not now? What has changed?

The conservative-backed police crackdown is far worse now than under segregation. Take a moment to let that sink in. Trivial prison stats bear this out; there simply can't be such a staggering prison population (larger than literal police-states) without great concerted effort.

Whereas segregated black people knew their place, apparently afterward they had to be shown their place.

It doesn't make sense because the points you've made don't make sense.

Many now parrot the belief that crippling racism not long ago miraculously ended with federally mandated desegregation (there was no way it was going to pass a vote even with the large black vote). It's the idea which magically shields them from racism. That's how they can support the same policies (eg. "state rights" was the right of a state to segregation) without being racist.

So it's understandable why the point that this racism never went anywhere (esp with that generation) don't make sense to them.

 

[Paratus]

Why do you keep advocating programs that have decimated the black family?

Please provide any evidence for this assertion. I'll wait.

 

[Svnla]

I think the assertion is that if you are xxxxx then you suffered xxxx and it makes it harder then other people to do xxxxx because of xxxxx and xxxxx....

Now I will say that I am not a big fan of AA but there is somewhat of an argument to be made that if two people with the exact same scores but one of those had to work much harder under much worse circumstances then that person is indeed better qualified. Again, to my knowledge AA doesn't really take this into consideration, if a white kid from suburbia has the exact same qualifications as a black kid that grew up dirt poor in the ghetto with absurdly substandard ghetto schools then I'd say he worked much harder then the white kid to achieve those same qualifications. On that basis alone he, imho, is more deserving of the spot.

See what I said in post #134 and a few ones before that. I already addressed what you said about a candidate that had to work much harder under much worse circumstances. See what I wrote about "Tyrone" and his hard work and dedication.

As I said before, I rather follow MLK words of judge others by their contents/characters than the colors of their skin.