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On the College website, I read the headline "Amherst Files Amicus Brief in Supreme Court Diversity Case." Though I was not surprised that the College would support the respondent in Fisher v. University of Texas, I was appalled to see that the College prided itself in leading a coalition of so-called elite institutions in supporting the discriminatory practice of affirmative action.
In supporting the University of Texas in this case, President Carolyn "Biddy" Martin has emphasized the "educational importance of dialogue among individuals of diverse backgrounds and experiences." However, what President Martin seems to misunderstand are the actual day-to-day experiences of students on campus. Affirmative action does not inspire dialogue, but rather silences it by justifying prejudices against minority students.
Prior to coming here, I wasn't labeled as a minority — I was simply Katrin. The fact that I am a Cuban immigrant had not been the defining feature of my identity, but as soon as I stepped on campus, it altered the way faculty and students interacted with me. My first advising meeting at the College left me confused; instead of discussing my academic interests and goals, my adviser felt the need to discuss my ethnic background and to ask about my outsider's opinion of the American political system, a perplexing question considering I had lived in Florida since I was six. This would be the first of many such interactions. One particularly memorable situation occurred later that year when a floormate of mine, angered by events earlier in the day, screamed out in frustration that the College should accept fewer minority students since many were "idiots." Perhaps remembering all the help I had given him in a class we shared that semester, he then turned to me and said that I was the exception, I wasn't one of those students, and I actually deserved to be here. Though his words hurt me at the time, in retrospect, I can understand him. He was wrong is assuming that minority students are not as intelligent as other students, but that incorrect assumption was based on the fact that affirmative action practices do allow for more flexible evaluations of minority applicant's credentials. This creates a system in which some applicants' shortcomings are excused without proof of extenuating circumstances, thus creating an undue burden for other applicants competing for admission.
While I could make the argument that affirmative action programs are hurtful to white and Asian students, the truth is that it is most hurtful to the very students it attempts to help. It creates an atmosphere in which highly-accomplished minority students question themselves, wondering whether they would have been accepted had race not been part of the admissions process. There is value in understanding the circumstances that have influenced the lives of students, but it is not okay to assume that an applicant's racial-ethnic identity defines their experience.
Affirmative action robs minority applicants of agency by positing on them the label of "Other." It creates the assumption that because a student is part of an underrepresented minority group, he must have different perspectives on issues of academic significance than students that make up the majority. Affirmative action rests on the false assumption that diversity of race creates diversity of thought and that a lack of racial diversity mandates a lack of intellectual diversity. This assumption is insulting to the students of the College because it assumes 1) that we are unable to divorce ourselves intellectually from our personal experiences in order to think critically about issues, and that 2) we, as members of specific racial groups, are homogenous masses that need to be jolted with personal stories completely different from our own in order to fully engage in intellectual exchanges.
Contrary to the College's expressed belief that diversity enriches student life, a walk around campus proves otherwise. In Valentine, for example, it is easy to identify which three tables are the international student tables, that the predominantly white jocks sit in the back and that Korean students have an affinity for chatting amongst themselves. The College has developed a self-segregating culture. Getting people of different backgrounds together does not automatically lead to positive interactions. For engaged communities to be created, members must feel that they have something of value in common. But when admissions policies put an emphasis on race and ethnicity, they implicitly suggest members of different racial-ethnic groups have very little, if anything, of value in common. In other words, by insisting on diversity for diversity's sake, the College has created pockets of minority students within the larger white population rather than a community of collaborative learning.
In writing this article, I have purposefully avoided the use of statistical data in favor of anecdotal and observational data. I have not done this because of a lack of data supporting my argument; in fact, research has repeatedly proven the failure of affirmative action programs by showing that acceptances into institutions of higher learning do not ensure success for minority students since many drop out as a result of academic and social stresses. The reason I chose to include these personal stories was to provide a human face to this problem, to show that this is not something that happens far, far away in other colleges and universities, but right here in Amherst. It is for this same reason that I chose not discuss the multitude of other problems caused by affirmative action (like creating incentives for minority applicants to cheat the system or reinforcing skewed power relationships by supporting the idea of the White Man's Burden). However, I encourage you not to take me at my word, but to look up the information on your own and to discuss this issue. My hope in writing this has been to create enough of a student voice that it cannot be ignored, that President Martin and the Board of Trustees may be forced to reevaluate their commitment to affirmative action so that the next time there is a Fisher v. University of Texas before the Supreme Court, they file in favor of the petitioner rather than the respondent.
I wonder if they would have let a Caucasian male write this article....
And please don't feel victimized by a lot of people voicing their opinion against you. Gaining sympathy will get you nowhere.
You're trying to universalize your experience, which I'm not particularly fond of.
If you feel insecure that you got into college because of your minority status and not because of your accomplishments then you have a problem. Also, admissions here at Amherst go out of their way to search for minority students who have achieved a lot and would make it into Amherst if they knew more about it. There are only 465 spots in a class and over 8600 applicants, there's no way they are goin to admit less qualified students because of their minority status. Infact, they don't. Everyone who's here worked hard to be here. Whether or not they'll believe that or not is up to them. And whether anyone believes he's smarter than minorities doesn't change facts if the minorities are still doing as well as everyone else
There are many problematic issues that need to be addressed here, but one that hasn't been touched is the idea of "deserving" to be at Amherst. What defines "deserving" admission to Amherst and other highly-ranked private institutions? Is it intelligence? What defines intelligence? Are we speaking of interpersonal intelligence? Musical intelligence? There are many forms of intelligence.
The larger point I wish to drive home is that, in today's society in which college attendance has become increasingly normalized, there are more "highly qualified" (to use previous commenters' language) applicants than there are spots, both at Amherst and other institutions. Not nearly all 'deserving' applicants will get acceptance letters. If you listened to the Admissions Office NPR talk from last year, you'll remember that chance plays a role, as the applications are at such a high level and the nuances of what aspects of an application to prioritize are not standardized. The reasoning behind decisions is complex and cannot be boiled down to a single variable. Policies like racial and economic affirmative action (or legacies, or athletics, etc.) MIGHT play into decisions, but they are not alone. Keep this in mind.
When "That's the big d" says: "there's no way they are goin to admit less qualified students because of their minority status" and "recent alum" follows with "... the nuances of what aspects of an application to prioritize are not standardized", both seem to wish us to believe that college diversity quotas at Amherst and elsewhere do not exist and everyone is admitted according to their unique qualities and nothing more.
But we know that such quotas do exist -- and colleges strive mightily to boost minority admissions in order to achieve what they deem to be an ideal student body composition. And no matter what kind of rhetorical fig leaf you wish to drape over it, discrimination based on race and ethnicity versus academic proficiency occurs on a regular basis, and as the original post, "a non-liberal" and many studies suggest, this is not always or necessarily a good thing for all concerned.
I read and discussed this article with another alumnus of a class between 1965 and 1970. He paused the question: Is this guy better off attending the University of Maryland instead of Georgetown? In other words, does he deserve a chance?
One of the harshest realities to hit me after graduating from Amherst is how 'grey,' read complex, the world is compared to the black/white, problem/solution view that I had in college. As a student, you sit in front of your computer and write a 10 page paper, complete with full citations and a bibliography, describing a problem and offering the perfect solution for it. Then based on a litany of factors, not the least of which is grade inflation, you receive an A from your Professor. Bam! I am great! I can provide the best solution to racial discrimination in the US education system and the world should stop in its tracks and take notice...I'm going to go out there and achieve so much in my life because I know it all now!
Well, its great to have such levels of self-confidence in your own abilities to change the world. Matter of fact, Amherst by its mere location, saves you the mental trauma of facing the "really grey" challenges that face the world today. Some take years to come to this reality, others never get there. But lucky for this young sophomore at Georgetown, he's come of age at a time AND PLACE, where he has the opportunity to straighten out his life's path.
Dear Katrin, the personal problems you've listed above aren't caused by affirmative action, they're minority problems. Dear Katrin, at the end of the day, even if Amherst College decided to snuff out affirmative action, you would still be a minority. You would still be Katrin (Cuban). You would still have to work harder to prove yourself against people who question the academic abilities of Latinos, African-Americans, minorities on a prestigious campus, you would still be asked about how you're adjusting, you would still be asked to speak for minorities everywhere by your professors. I just wanted to let you know that I'm glad that you started this discussion on affirmative action, so that your sentiments and the sentiments of others could be questioned, challenged, answered. But the language you use, the accusation you use against AC minorities--"supporting the idea of the White Man's Burden"--is disgusting, and absolutely harmful. Supposedly you're speaking out because you want minority students to be able to feel more secure on campus. But you have really undid yourself: think of all the adjusting new students who already question whether or not they deserve to be here. If they're a minority student, a sophomore has just publicly pulled their academic credibility into question. I hope you reassess for whom your speaking and what you're speaking against.
It is interesting that you wrote this article, considering that, as a commenter above pointed out, many students at Amherst and other predominately white institutions, myself and yourself included, came here through QuestBridge, which is certainly geared toward boosting low-income students of color when it comes to the application process. And, as you and I both know, QuestBridge is not easy to get into. The application is considerably longer and more detailed than the Common App, so its not as though one becomes a finalist simply because they are poor and a person of color. I certainly don't doubt my intellectual abilities even though I got in because of affirmative action, because I know I had to work harder and smarter to get here. Yet now, you take issue with the idea that you might have gotten into college because of your race and socioeconomic background. So is the problem with affirmative action now that Amherst isn't a happy, diverse little place where everyone sings songs and loves each other? Because that would certainly not be because of affirmative action. It is ultimately up to the student body and the administration to create a visibly diverse and accepting campus, and at the point at which any student feels as though others ONLY were admitted because of their race and their class, that is a long ways away. Along this line, it is surprising to me that you say you have never been defined by your race or class. I'm not you, and can't tell you you're wrong, but I will say that the fact that Amherst has such a huge diversity problem is proof that people are still labeled, categorized by, and often excluded as a result of their race, and this is certainly not a problem unique to Amherst.
Furthermore, that is a huge only. It wasn't too long ago where a certain college president began a diversity initiative to increase the number of students of color on campus and had alumni writing to say that they would no longer financially support an institution as a result of increased diversity. I wish I lived in the dreamworld in which I, on paper a low-income Black woman, could get into a college like Amherst without a affirmative action like-policy, when in reality the people at the top (mostly upper-class white men, let's be real) wouldn't look at me twice, as proven not only by the actions of the alumni but by my daily experience as a Black woman on Amherst's campus. I also wish I lived in the post-racial dreamworld where my racial and socioeconomic background didn't define me. I don't believe that affirmative action was created or is necessary as a form of reparations, but because racism and racial bias didn't magically disappear at the end of the civil rights movement, as exemplified by your story. It's one thing to say that some students don't deserve to be at Amherst College because they aren't as intelligent, but it is another thing entirely to racialize that claim. The fact that there are people who believe that the minority population at Amherst was accepted because of their race, and otherwise wouldn't have been accepted is proof in itself that policies like affirmative action are necessary. It is not affirmative action that has silenced people of color due to prejudice, but in reality people who have deemed people of color unworthy of their elite education. That would exist with or without affirmative action, and is what should be attacked.
Lastly, this is a problematic paragraph--
"Affirmative action robs minority applicants of agency by positing on them the label of "Other." It creates the assumption that because a student is part of an underrepresented minority group, he must have different perspectives on issues of academic significance than students that make up the majority. Affirmative action rests on the false assumption that diversity of race creates diversity of thought and that a lack of racial diversity mandates a lack of intellectual diversity. This assumption is insulting to the students of the College because it assumes 1) that we are unable to divorce ourselves intellectually from our personal experiences in order to think critically about issues, and that 2) we, as members of specific racial groups, are homogenous masses that need to be jolted with personal stories completely different from our own in order to fully engage in intellectual exchanges."
Why should I divorce myself from my personal experience to think critically about issues? Perhaps it is because I realize that my personal experiences give me a perspective on issues that the majority has never (bothered to) conceptualize that I find this problematic. Divorcing my intellectual beliefs from my personal experiences only serves to further the silencing of myself and those who have had experiences similar to mine. Which feeds into why your second point is incredibly problematic--the whole point of a school like Amherst is for its students to think critically about the entire world, and the world is not a homogenous place. I have encountered a number of students who grew up in homogenous families in homogenous towns and attended homogenous schools, and if it weren't for a policy like affirmative action that forced them to encounter someone like me in real life, would be living with the beliefs and assumptions engendered by their homogenous lives. Yes, that leads to a host of other problems, such as myself being subject to awkward, borderline offensive questions, but that is not the fault of affirmative action.
At any rate, I am glad that you wrote this article, because at least you are addressing problems with race and diversity at Amherst. I hope it has sparked a very necessary conversation about race and diversity at Amherst outside of the internet, but in considering how many students are living in the same post-racial dreamworld that validates the idea that affirmative action is detrimental, I doubt it has.
"... colleges strive mightily to boost minority admissions in order to achieve what they deem to be an ideal student body composition. And no matter what kind of rhetorical fig leaf you wish to drape over it, discrimination based on race and ethnicity versus academic proficiency occurs on a regular basis"
It is NOT discrimination because it is NOT based on race INSTEAD of academic ability. YES, the college goes out of its way to find more minority students. The point is that they go out of their way to find the QUALIFIED minority students whom one would have difficultly locating without very nuanced methods of admissions. You have to be qualified in order to attend Amherst, regardless of your racial or ethnic or financial situation. If two applicants are equally qualified for admission, that is the only situation in which something like race, ethnicity, or socioeconomic status could be a deciding factor in an admissions decision.
Maybe the discrimination of which you speak takes place at some other school or place of work, but it's probably at a minority of institutions. Stop applying it to Amherst.
"The point is that they go out of their way to find the QUALIFIED minority students whom one would have difficultly locating without very nuanced methods of admissions."
You can use all the "nuance" you like as justification, but colleges want their student body composition tombe as close as possible to the demographics of society at large. if that means skewing the admissions qualifications t admit more "underrepresented minorities", then high achieving Asians and others will just have to suck it up.
my point is that admission is not based solely on merit, at Amherst or anywhere for thatmatter, and the statistics show that certain racial and ethnic groups are admitted despite having much lower qualifications on average than their peers.
You may agree with AA or disagree. I'm fine either way. But if you do agree with it, and its underlying principles, then at least have the intellectual courage to own it, warts and all.
you can't cut off assigning race meaning once it gets hard for the majority. To do so ignores the reality of what our country is and what it is is a country that has bought into this fiction of race and it ignores that we are still living in a largely segregated society and that largely segregated society was created through various policies, laws which foster racial tensions that still exist with or without affirmative action. To say that after years of minorities feeling contempt for their status as a subclass in society, when all of the sudden whites feel that this classification based on race breeds contempt, then, and only then, it shouldn't be tolerated is laughable.
I see that some people have started to attempt to justify affirmative action by saying essentially that "we are not living in a post-racial dream world yet, people of color still get discriminated against somehow by the privileged whites, and anyway the minorities and people of color who get admitted here aren't unqualified to be here anyway." To that I have three main points to make:
1. The fact that the phrase "People of Color" (POC) has started to be thrown about freely disgusts me. Do you know who gets affected most negatively by affirmative action? Not the rich whites. Nope. It's Jews and Asians. Jews, who have been historically discriminated against in all parts of the world. Asians, who (looking at my arms now) have yellow skin color. And if perhaps Jews are not much discriminated against anymore due to them often being indistinguishable (physically speaking) from whites, and the fact that there are many Jewish people in positions of power and many organizations which support Jewish causes, it's hard to make a case that Asians are in such a good position as well. Asians have historically been discriminated against (Chinese Exclusion Act, Rock Spring Massacre, LA 1871 Massacre), and even today there is the so-called "Bamboo-Ceiling" in the hierarchy power-structure of companies. So my question is, why do Asians have to feel the brunt of AA?
2. Concerning the claim that "minorities who come here through AA are not less qualified", well let's put it this way: it is certainly true that there are a huge number of applicants who are "qualified" and "deserving" to be in Amherst, even among minority applicants. As mentioned above, Quest Bridge and various outreach efforts help this, such that the admissions office can reach the "talented tenth" of the minority population. And there is an amount of randomness as well. But what is happening now is this: if you are a non-Asian, non-Jewish minority, you need to be at least part of the top 10% in the country to stand a chance of getting in. Nobody said that's easy. It's an achievement in itself, and you certainly will be more than able to study and succeed in Amherst. However, if you are Asian, you probably need to be in the top 5% to get in. Being simply talented is not enough – you have to be super talented. Because for all the impressive items on your CV – sports, music, grades, great essay, competitions, etc. – say, if you happen to "flunk" your SAT, there is probably a fellow Asian who has a CV similar to yours but with a higher SAT score. And since it would be unthinkable to admit both Asians, you'll get rejected. Knowing this, if you look at the mirror and find that you have yellow skin and slanted eyes, you realize that you have to work twice as hard as non-Asian minorities. This is what I call racial injustice. And it's affecting Asians. Not the kids of Mitt Romney.
Ultimately AA hurts Asians, Jews, and poor whites. And in most cases it helps rich upper-class blacks, Latinos and Hispanics the most. The rich upper-class SWPL whites are always still on the top because 1) More often than not they are legacies, or their parents are major donors, and 2) They have the means to get into private school and other facilities, by definition.
And to the person who asked me why I am not as much opposed to AA by socioeconomic status, it's the simple fact that while it's easy to show that a rich person has many privileges, connections, and facilities not available to the poor person, it's hard to show that the poor Asian, or even the poor white, have it easier than the poor black. We are not living in the 1950s anymore. I find it hard to justify why a poor black student who is working several hours a day while going to school to support his/her family is given an inherent advantage over a poor Asian student who is also working several hours a day to support his/her family.
3. Concerning the lack of post-racial dream world: What makes you think that AA will be able to make us closer to that reality, instead of bringing us even further from it? All Daniel Diner could say was that the solution is "increased understanding and tolerance". But as I have said, this is like saying that the solution to debt is more money. The question is how to get increased understanding and tolerance. And judging from the reactions from all over the US, a large segment of the population is not getting more tolerant after seeing AA in action.
Well said.
"Not a liberal", why are you still here ranting about how affirmative action is devastating to Asians?
Not only do you sound like you have an identity problem, you sound like you really wanted to go Ivy league, couldn't, and ended up at Amherst. And now, you're blaming affirmative action for that. Newsflash, buddy: Amherst was my top choice, but I would be lying if I said I wasn't also aiming for an Ivy. I didn't get in. Neither did quite a few people I know. I'm Black, and graduated in the top 10% of my class, and was accepted to Amherst regular decision (not through any type of program) because I do not qualify as lower income.
I think it's time for you to examine the chip on your shoulder. You got into this school, didn't you? It's time to let those rejection letters go.
I am "still ranting" because my point is expressly relevant. Affirmative action hits an ethnic groups (Asians) which are technically minorities in this society. Affirmative action is hence racial discrimination against Asians because if I am Asian, I have to "join the Asian rat race", so to speak, in order to compete for that limited quota of "maximum Asians allowed" in a university.
To be honest, Ivy Leagues were not my first choice. LACs like Williams and Amherst were always my first choices, because they offered more flexibility of double majoring and taking "weird" courses. Plus with larger classes in Ivy League I knew it would be much more difficult to distinguish myself. And I love this school - I've accomplished and done many things which I think would be impossible to do in Harvard, for example. So this is not sour grapes. And even if it were, it doesn't affect the argument. It's a fact that Asians and Jews are still being discriminated against in admissions everywhere. In California, after Proposition 209 was passed, the number of Asians shot up at places like UC Berkeley to over 50%. Why? Not because they cheated the system, or that the universities suddenly changed to considering only test scores. But because they genuinely deserved to be there.
Now I understand the benefits of having a maximum quota on a certain ethnic group(s) - I enjoy its benefits too, such as being able to interact with different kinds of people. However, you can't say the same thing to an Asian who has spent most of his/her life studying like mad but still got rejected from all their applications. An injustice is an injustice, and it does not become nullified because of a "greater good".
Also, if this article sparked anyone's interest about using race as an admissions factor or if you want to learn more about it there is a symposium online in which a bunch of different people (academics, lawyers, activists, etc.) have posted opinions about the case which Katrin mentions in her first paragraph (Fisher v UT Austin) that is coming up at the Supreme Court next term. The link is here: http://www.scotusblog.com/category/special-features/fisher-symposium/
'not a liberal,' I have stepped out of this debate because anything I add would just be redundant - it seems as though wiser, more knowledgable people have now replaced the trolls.
However, I will make a few last points to you.
1. Please stop pretending to be victimized because of your opinions. No one is going to oppress you because you're speaking what's on your mind, which happen to run contrary to the views traditionally held at Amherst. Speaking out against the status quo is actually rather popular here, in case you haven't noticed. When I published my religion article last year, I actually went against common opinion. You mentioned that my status as section editor somehow shielded my opinion, elevating it in some way. This is nonsense - I believe that most of the Student staff disagreed with me.
2. Please stop misrepresenting my arguments and stop being a troll. I have extended ample courtesies to you at the expense of my own arguments. Comparing me to an antebellum slave owner because I am sympathizing with your perceived situation isn't fair and it certainly isn't making you seem any more intelligent.
3. Jews and Asians aren't given Affirmative Action in college admissions because we don't need it - our ethnic groups are overrepresented in academia, not underrepresented. AA is a corrective measure. Did you know that it was first implemented for women and members of the middle class? It worked quite well and was discontinued after it was no longer necessary. We aren't complaining about it having been used in those instances, why cry now that it is being used for other disenfranchised groups? Recognize, however, that I am not claiming that Asians and Jews aren't discriminated against in society - that would obviously be foolish. But our traditions have put so much emphasis on the importance of education, that the discrimination does not visibly impact our educational achievement. Corrections for the remaining discrimination require solutions different than AA.
3. Bigotry is fought with understanding and open-mindedness. I don't think this merits any controversy. You write that "a large segment of the population isn't getting more tolerant after seeing AA in action." You are right. That's because we've executed a policy change without ensuring that the appropriate social change goes along with it. This doesn't mean that the policy is doomed - it just means that more needs to be done in the way of social change accompanying it.
4. College admissions isn't a system of pure meritocracy and we aren't obliged to make it one for many reasons, including that there is no objective way of judging merit. Anthony Marx was before your time - it's a shame you missed him. One of the things he used to like to repeat is that a 1250 SAT score from some inner-city kid with no resources and a repressive neighborhood is obviously more impressive than a 1300 from a suburban kid with all the resources in the world. I favor socio-economic AA over one that's purely racially-based, but I sympathize with the argument for staying with the latter one. Those belonging to the races that AA helps really are being disenfranchised academically. The process is just difficult to quantify.
First of all, "not a liberal", if you are going to quote me, quote me correctly. The "quote" you have presented doesn't even exist in what I wrote--if you were summarizing my argument, you don't use quotation marks and you correctly identify and replicate the tone of my argument. That's response writing 101. I'm Black and low-income and I still know that.
I use the term "people of color" because it is neutral--I believe the term minority has a negative connotation as it is in opposition to the "majority"=white people, and is regardless no longer correct because people of color make up the majority of the population of the U.S. If you want to argue about why my use of "people of color" disgusts you, write an opinion piece and I'll be happy to discuss it there. Regardless, you don't get to dismiss my argument on the basis of my use of "people of color".
As Dan pointed out above, Asians and Jews have historically not been underrepresented in academia, whereas Latin@s and Blacks have. I don't need to go into that further. In terms of admissions, if you listen to the piece NPR did about Amherst's admissions process, it is actually a lot more holistic that a list of extracurriculars and test scores. That's the entire point of the essay. If there's an Asian student who only played volleyball in high school, was an A and B student, and got a 29 on the ACT, but wrote an stellar essay, they would probably get in over both of those students because the admissions committee saw them as a complete, interesting person that they want to admit to Amherst, as opposed to a list of statistics. And, if the other two students didn't get accepted, it probably wouldn't be because the Asian quota was already full, but because they weren't interesting applicants. You really don't have to to be a perfect student in order to write a good essay about yourself. It's no longer about being perfect--granted, in order to get into a school like Amherst you still have to be above average, but perfect is really an unattainable goal.
Affirmative action, however, is necessary to ensure that those students who are historically underrepresented--perhaps that term is more to your liking?--are at the very least considered in the admissions process and are accepted on the basis of their entire admissions package, as opposed to being ignored off the bat solely because of their race. Without affirmative action, I could write a stellar essay to cap off my awesome admissions package, but the admissions panel would never read it because the white guy at the top would see that I was Black and throw my application out. Once again, I'm not you, and I can't tell you how you feel, but it sounds like you have internalized the idea that Asians have to be perfect at all times to do anything and if they aren't they aren't going anywhere, and it makes you angry that Blacks and Latin@s don't have to try as hard to get farther. Which is not only not true concerning Asians as the "model minority" (which is a flawed social perception), but is replicating the idea that Blacks and Latin@s couldn't have gotten farther based on their own merit (another flawed social perception), and arguably offensive on both sides.
Ultimately affirmative action does not hurt Asians or Jews, as exemplified by the fact that these groups are still quite represented in academia across the board in spite of its existence. It does not hurt poor whites, because they still have a hugely important factor going for them--they're white. Without affirmative action policies in place, the white guy at the top has the ability to choose to admit the poor white kid over the poor Black kid on the basis of race, even though the poor white kid might not be as qualified. Even so, programs like QuestBridge can also be beneficial towards poor white students because one of the main selection criteria is socioeconomic status. Yes, white people are vastly overrepresented in academia, but the poor white student still didn't get the same access to different experiences and opportunities that the rich white student did. That's not to say that they are not at a huge advantage by being white, but they are still disadvantaged, and programs exist to help them. Furthermore, upper class members of historically underrepresented groups are just as disadvantaged by their race as lower class members are. Without a program like affirmative action in place, the rich white guy at the top will have the option to ignore the Black student because they are Black, regardless of whether they are rich or poor. Arguing otherwise makes no sense. This goes along with the idea that poor whites are just as privileged as rich whites when it comes to educational access, because they are white.
All of this is a result of the fact that racism still exists, proof of the fact that we aren't living in the post-racial dreamworld some thought we were. Maybe you have lived the same charmed life that Katrin did that you were able to escape the realities of socially ingrained racial division, that you can't see why being poor and Black or poor and Latin@ is worse than being poor and white or poor and Asian. On a very basic level, society dislikes and is less accepting of Blacks and Latin@s than it is of Asians and whites. This is the problem that needs to be corrected. You're right--we aren't living in the 1950's, therefore it is ridiculous that a racial hierarchy still exists. Affirmative action is a policy that forces white people to accept Blacks and Latin@s when they wouldn't be accepted otherwise on the basis of the fact that they are Black and/or Latin@. It lets people like me get my foot in the door of a school that 30 years ago would not have accepted us. It forces rich white people to interact with people like me, because the reality of life is that we exist and are unavoidable. The problem is that that interaction is still a negative one. I honestly don't understand what is complicated about this equation--affirmative action wasn't created to make white people more tolerant of people like me, it was created to force white people to have to interact with people like me. The fact that they are still not tolerant is not a problem with affirmative action, it is a problem with white people and society. There are people at Amherst who don't believe I deserve to be there because I am Black and therefore not as intelligent as they are, and they would think that with or without affirmative action. THAT is the problem. Not having affirmative action exacerbates that problem, because then said white people never have to interact with me to learn otherwise. No, affirmative action will not lead to my post-racial dreamworld--that's not its purpose. In reality, a post-racial society will never exist, but it is a problem that some people like to believe it does, thereby negating the specificity and difference in my experience as a Black woman. This is akin to the idea of not shooting the messenger--don't get mad at affirmative action because it didn't make white people like and respect you, get mad at white people for not liking or respecting you.
I appreciate the way EA contrasted the "model minority" concept with the "lacking merit" perceptions so often directed at many Blacks & Latin@s. I am also optimistic to them write "don't get mad at affirmative action because it didn't make white people like and respect you, get mad at white people for not liking or respecting you." Racism in America is a problem constructed and reproduced by white people. I am a lower-income white male who benefitted greatly from the experiences and knowledge of women (and other people) of color at Amherst College thanks to Affirmative Action. In turn, I encourage more white people speak up and defend Affirmative Action because all of us have been afflicted by the poisonous air of American racism due to the legacy of racial segregation in America. But more importantly, I encourage white people to speak up, defend Affirmative Action, and to stand behind and support people of color who continue to speak out against the injustices they bear and suffer in America. This issue goes well beyond Amherst as many have stated.
I agree with another point EA made. The notion that we should divorce ourselves from our personal experience to think critically about issues is an induction to the kind of cultural ignorance that tries to impose itself from a place of power and privilege. Such dispassionate and fallaciously "objective" approaches to learning are not monolithic. Nor are all other methods of learning less "scientific" or "backwards". The imposition of such detached thinking in all areas of education often silences, disadvantages, and stigmatizes legitimate experiential knowledge in favor of a different "more scientific" or "academically rigorous" method as if the adjectives themselves established credibility. Thank you EA for pointing out the problem that because some people believe a post-racial (or color-blind) world exists, this contributes to "negating the specificity and difference in [EA's] experience." I believe the negation EA speaks of is felt by many people, including myself, and presents a fundamental problem in formal education today. One result of negating the experiential differences is related to growing up in a racist society driven by the economic contradictions inherent in a capitalism economic system. Why is it only now that so many from Amherst College have been driven here, posting responses to an op-ed piece written by a person of color struggling with issues of race and merit/credibility, who is vocally in opposition to a policy fought for by a mass movement of people of color (and their white allies), and arguing about who "deserves" an Amherst education? I hope these exchanges inspire others to bring the issues into the public and even outside of Amherst's intellectual incubation bubble.
I actually wrote a longer post responding to Daniel Diner's points (which also answer most of your arguments), but it seems to have gotten lost through the connection. So I'll rewrite some of it again. And when I was using quotes, I was not quoting your words. I was summarizing what has been said by you and several other commenters. Quote marks are not always used to express direct quotations.
"Once again, I'm not you, and I can't tell you how you feel, but it sounds like you have internalized the idea that Asians have to be perfect at all times to do anything and if they aren't they aren't going anywhere, and it makes you angry that Blacks and Latin@s don't have to try as hard to get farther. Which is not only not true concerning Asians as the "model minority" (which is a flawed social perception)…"
The "model minority" may be a flawed social perception which is untrue, but it's certainly one which college admission officers are taking for granted to be true, and that's the root of the problem. It is undeniable that as an Asian you are held to a higher standard than others – because for the fact that you dislike overrepresentation of ANY ethnic group in academia/business world in general, even non-white ethnic groups, and the fact that more Asians are qualified in the applicant pool than other ethnic groups. So as I said, you have 100 top Asians competing for 5 spots, and perhaps 50 top blacks competing for another 5 spots.
"…but is replicating the idea that Blacks and Latin@s couldn't have gotten farther based on their own merit (another flawed social perception), and arguably offensive on both sides."
It's not that I'm arguing that blacks and Latinos could not have "gotten further based on their own merit" – I'm saying that they just did not and do not do as well as Asians, which is a simple objective fact. It may be unsurprising if blacks and Latinos have done worse than whites, but if we went back in the 1950s, at the beginning of the Civil Rights movement, we would expect Asians, blacks, and Latinos to "advance up the ladder" at the same rate. That didn't happen. Why? A lot of different reasons. I don't disagree that perhaps blacks were in a worse position to start off, and that contributed, too. But that alone is not enough to explain the disparity – if "initial circumstances" is all what matters, why are Asians above whites now then? As Diner alluded to, it probably has something to do with culture – that Asians stress a lot of importance on educational achievement, more so than other ethnic groups.
"As Dan pointed out above, Asians and Jews have historically not been underrepresented in academia, whereas Latin@s and Blacks have."
And what is wrong with overrepresentation, if it was achieved through fair means? Why are you punishing the hard worker instead of trying to motivate the average worker? Why do you have to hurt others by forcing social equality? You want equality of outcome, not equality of opportunity. And in my view that is blatantly wrong, especially as the inequality of outcome in this case (Asians vs. blacks and Latinos) is achieved not through discrimination and cheating the system, but through fair means. What should be done instead is to inspire and motivate the black and Latino communities such that they will also place a similar importance on education, and thus have a good chance of succeeding like Asians and Jews have.
"In terms of admissions, if you listen to the piece NPR did about Amherst's admissions process, it is actually a lot more holistic that a list of
extracurriculars and test scores. That's the entire point of the essay."
I don't deny that there is a significant element of subjectivity and randomness in the admissions process. However, that does not nullify the fact that there is an element of objectivity. This is shown in the fact that there are quite a handful of people who get admitted to multiple top colleges, although they clearly are not the next Albert Einstein. Basically once you reach a certain critical threshold, which is not measured merely in terms of grades and test scores but also extracurriculars, community service, and even the essay, you have a very large chance of getting in. I'm saying that this threshold, fuzzy and subjective it may be, is clearly higher for Asians than for blacks and Latinos.
"If there's an Asian student who only played volleyball in high school, was an A and B student, and got a 29 on the ACT, but wrote an stellar essay, they would probably get in over both of those students because the admissions committee saw them as a complete, interesting person that they want to admit to Amherst, as opposed to a list of statistics."
"And, if the other two students didn't get accepted, it probably wouldn't be because the Asian quota was already full, but because they weren't interesting applicants."
And the reason why they weren't interesting is probably because there were too many people like themselves already in the list of accepted students - in other words, too many Asians. Too many Asians in the library! :D
Seriously, you're almost contradicting yourself in your comment. On the one hand you're trying to say that Asians aren't really discriminated against because they're Asian, and on the other hand you do affirm that blacks and Latinos do deserve to be given a lift because they are underrpresented and historically discriminated against. It's not hard to see that if you do the latter, you have to commit the former, directly or indirectly. Attempting it to spinning it to "Asians are on average, not any more 'interesting' than others" (and I am NOT trying to quote you, by the way) is laughable, in a cute sort of way. Again, the admissions process is a combination of being "interesting" and being "competent". If the latter were really completely absent then there would be no SAT scores required, no high school grades required. Basically, the more "competent" you are, the greater the chance that your "interesting" side will be considered. If you're "incompetent", then no matter how "interesting" you are, you're not going to be considered. Now for the umpteenth time I'm saying that the "bar of competency" for Asians is higher than blacks, latinos, even whites - which is an objective fact, for example as seen that Asians on average have to score about 200 points higher on the SAT to get in. It is in that way that I feel Asians experience unjustifiable discrimination in the admissions process. If there were no AA, it does not mean that we evaluate everyone based on grades and test scores alone - it just means that everyone is held to same "bar of competency", as we also evaluate the other parts of their application.
The only way you can try to argue that Asians are not actually discriminated against (and this doesn't necessarily bear directly on the question of whether it's "fair" or not - but the mere fact that their race becomes a factor against them) is to argue that Asians are on average, less interesting than Black and Latinos, which explains why in the end their surplus of competency doesn't give them a significant boost, but merely nullifies this. Now it's easy to show that Asians are objectively more "competent" in terms of SAT scores and grades, but I can't see a way in which you can show that a group of 100 Asians are objectively less "interesting" as people than a group of 100 blacks, for example. Except if you want to go with a common steretype - that Asian students are quiet, studious, reserved, nerdy, don't party as much as others - and so they are just mechanical studying drones with no soul and no heart. Yeah, that works.
"You really don't have to to be a perfect student in order to write a good essay about yourself. It's no longer about being perfect--granted, in order to get into a school like Amherst you still have to be above average, but perfect is really an unattainable goal."
Please, don't turn it into the strawman argument that I think Asians have to be "perfect" in order to get into a school like Amherst. Of course nobody can be "perfect". But the fact is, Asians have to be better than others in order to stand the same chance of getting in.
"Affirmative action, however, is necessary to ensure that those students who are historically underrepresented--perhaps that term is more to your liking?--are at the very least considered in the admissions process and are accepted on the basis of their entire admissions package, as opposed to being ignored off the bat solely because of their race. "
You portray it as if it's an AA vs. racial discrimination against blacks situation. That's incorrect. You are projecting a kind of secret widespread white-black racial prejudice that would probably apply in the 1950s, but not today. The majority of people in positions of power in academia are liberal-left-leaning, not covert white supremacists, even if they are white. Are you trying to insinuate that without AA, our admissions committee would somehow be unable to restrain a depth of racial hatred and prejudice against blacks inside themselves which has so far been suppressed by AA? I think that to be way over the top. Without AA, people would be admitted or rejected based on the content of their application and not their race, and not whether their existence will fulfill the "diversity quota" or not. And the fact is that there are many Asians being dismissed and ignored off the bat solely because of their race - they are immediately stereotyped with something along the lines of "Oh, he/she's just another quiet, reserved, hard-working Asian, not very interesting probably" - and this is something which has actually been documented to occur, when Harvard's admissions process was investigated in the late 80's/early 90s. I highly doubt that this has been unique to Harvard.
"The fact that they are still not tolerant is not a problem with affirmative action, it is a problem with white people and society. "
I disagree with you, as I think the problem is both ways. It's not as if the black community is currently in a perfect, pristine state which is waiting for white tolerance and accepting. No, there are quite a few problems with the black community which is at best only indirectly the fault of whites. This creates prejudice among whites, which in turn prevents blacks from rising in the social ladder and improving their lot. So I view it as a cycle of prejudice-problems-prejudice.
The direction of the commenting disturbs me. The simple reality here is that many people do not understand, firstly, what affirmative action is, and secondly, the persistence of discrimination in society today.
First and foremost, its important to understand the historical basis of affirmative action in the United States. Affirmative Action has always served two goals in the United States, goals which seem counter to one another but which functioned largely in cooperation. On one hand, affirmative action's original nominal goal was not to repay minorities for past injustices but in fact to more accurately account for inequalities in education that had led to only a certain group of students being accepted to top colleges. These steps began in the early 1900s with the creation of meritocratic systems, such as standardized testing, that served the purpose of bringing highly achieving middle class students, mostly white, into colleges and universities which had up until then been mostly composed of the upper class. However, as we have admitted since then, this meritocratic system was not enough, as it did not account for disparities in education in different schooling systems, and thus was still biased by the upper and upper middle classes who could afford higher education. Affirmative action was implemented as a means to counter this and as something which could counter the notion of what was considered a standard of intelligence in society. In other words, affirmative action operates under the principal that common standards of intelligence in schooling are ineffective at truly understanding student intelligence, but instead measure a combination of student intelligence and opportunity through higher quality schooling. It isn't meant to repay minorities, the thought of which is actually rather offensive and demeaning to the understanding of the effect hundreds of years of enslavement can have, and in fact this argument runs the risk of leading to ignorance in the form of making statements to the effect of affirmative action being a repayment for past injustices, as if those injustices do not have any effect on modern day societies. Secondly, it is important in this regard to note that affirmative action was implemented for middle class and even poor whites and women (who have historically received the most significant benefit from affirmative action). I'd be interested in seeing what students would feel like the ratio of men to women at Amherst was massively disproportionate, and in fact if many secondary schools in America were still segregated based on gender, leading to women receiving inferior education to males and not being admitted into college. People would not argue that women are inherently less intelligent than men, something they also argue for blacks and whites, and yet at the same time they still seem okay with arguing that affirmative action should be eliminated and students in higher education should be primarily white, even if they don't admit that.
The second reason efforts like affirmative action and meritocratic efforts like the SAT were implemented into society is more problematic and disturbing, and yet it is ultimately what gets to the heart of why people are still non-receptive to affirmative action. In part, affirmative action, as with other efforts before it, was and is an effort to hide the fact that there are still huge imbalances in education throughout the country and to hide the fact that the system was uninterested in working to solve this problem. Society has moved past the point where it would be acceptable to have no minority students in colleges, as this would be seen as the result of obvious discrimination. However, maintaining that same system and allowing a small number of minorities into colleges hides the reality that the system still heavily favors individuals of privilege and opportunity. In other words, letting a few students from historically underrepresented areas into colleges hides the reasons why they are still underrepresented and the fact that there is virtually no effort to counter these. It hides the reality that education in poor neighborhoods, both white and black as many schools have begun incorporating increased class affirmative action as well, is vastly inferior to education for middle class students, and even worse when compared to students who can afford private high schools. 100 years ago, there was no meritocracy, something which made it difficult to hide discrimination in college acceptance. In today's world, which champions meritocracy at seemingly every opportunity, we have created an image of our society in which the best and the brightest achieve the highest, rather than simply those who have the most money. The downside of this is that it has created this view of the nation grounded in this individualist mindset, which in turn has disguised the inequalities still inherent in the system. Under this rhetoric, we have created standards to accurately measure who does and does not belong in college, and thus we find it more difficult to accept that methods like affirmative action need to exist. Related to race, this idea is usually referred to as color-blindness, which champions the notion that race no longer matters in society. This is a lovely idea, something I'm sure no one on this forum would disagree with, but simply pretending as though we have already gotten this far is causing more harm than it is help. In order to get to the point where race doesn't matter, we have to consider race and the very real realities that there is discrimination still existent in society which questions meritocratic ideals. This is why debates about affirmative action being reverse discrimination are pointless. I support affirmative action, and I'll be the first to admit that it is reverse discrimination. It discriminates based on race, but believing that such discrimination is inherently bad because it is counter to American individualist democratic ideas of equality of opportunity hides the fact that these ideals are myths to begin with. We have created a faux sense of equality of opportunity in this nation, and doing so has made us comfortable and kept us from really working to create true equality. Affirmative action discriminates based on race, yes, but it does so in the name equality and does so to counter already existent inequalities. The pervasiveness of this reverse discrimination rhetoric reveals exactly how racism and discrimination have persisted in society, in a veiled color-blind way and under the guise of equality, but persistent nonetheless.
Finally, another significant problem is the way in which supporters of affirmative action feel the need to argue that it isn't discrimination. Truly, this individualist rhetoric has ingrained itself for all then. This too reflects the very problem with affirmative action, and the extent to which I agree with the original article. Affirmative action is problematic, not because it exists but because of people's reactions to it. It does not brand people as "black" or "Hispanic" except in the minds of the people who misinterpret it; minorities had already been branded their minority status at birth in this society anyway, it simply occurred in a more subtle way and affirmative action acts to make it more obvious to the extent that we feel like we would realize that race still matter sand that people are still branded. The problem is that we haven't done this. Affirmative action historically was never meant to be a lasting policy. It was meant as a start that was supposed to be accompanied with other more extensive initiatives to combat inequality. The problem with affirmative action is that we have stopped there. Now I believe that the benefits of simply having affirmative action still outweigh not having affirmative action, but I agree that only having affirmative action does create problems. Comparably, I would say that having a first black president creates a similar problem: it allows people to believe we are post-racial and as though we have become more equal than we have, and in turn with education back away from further initiatives. We do have a black president, but it is still far more difficult for a black person to become president than a white person, and as we have seen, a black president is still susceptible to criticism never thrown at a white president. Likewise, when minorities are criticized as the beneficiaries of affirmative action, this is not because of affirmative action but because of the racist beliefs that affirmative action meant to combat but have proven ineffective at doing. Many schools justify stopping at affirmative action because they feel as though its beneficiaries will return to their homes and use their education to benefit others who did not have the opportunity for such education. Reports continually show this doesn't happen, not because of the students, but because of the culture of the society we live in, which still continues to value individualism to the point where the beneficiaries of affirmative action, as with anyone, are not immune to changing their priorities and focusing on the success they can achieve by being at college. Unfortunately, society does not value helping those who lack opportunity, and thus doing so does not often coincide with the monetary opportunities schools like Amherst promise. What we need to do is allow the diversity we have on campuses to change the culture of schools like Amherst, something we like to think has already happened but which has not occurred in full. Thus, minority students are Amherst often arrive here and change themselves in order to adapt because they feel they must in order to succeed, rather than the school changing. We still live in a culture which values similar standards of privilege; affirmative action simply allows a small number of people of different groups to attain that privilege. What this does not do is help the majority of those lacking in opportunity, and this is what needs to be done. Efforts like investing in lower class neighborhoods and schools and providing better housing and jobs for many people need to be matched with policies like affirmative action. Housing segregation (de facto if not de jure) is still rampant in America, for instance, and affirmative action, while technically allowing some minorities to attain higher cultural capital and thus sometimes move into more integrated neighborhoods, does not substantially accomplish anything to combat the rampant segregation on the whole. And naturally, housing segregation leads to fewer opportunities for minorities on the whole, as well as other realities such as racial profiling, and even furthermore it allows society to justify the disparities in achievement for different races by continuing to believe that blacks on the whole do not work as hard as whites. Affirmative doesn't challenge this belief, as even if people acknowledge some blacks as hard working, they can call these people credits to their race and still continue to believe exactly the same, that blackness is tied to laziness as a whole. These beliefs are what hamper affirmative action by making people think that high-achieving blacks don't deserve that achievement. Eliminating affirmative action will allow people to continue thinking the same way, because it is the combination of racial-stigmatization and a color-blind rhetoric that lead to these beliefs. What we need to focus on is attacking these things, something affirmative action began but did not finish.
"Not a liberal", you just said a number of incredibly problematic things. Just because you are Asian and therefore also part of a group of people that have been and are discriminated against does not mean you get to dismiss the realities of those different from you. The reality is that Blacks and Latin@s are treated differently and generally regarded as worse than Asians. If you can't accept that fact, there is no point in having this discussion with you because we will never agree. Although, the ultimate problem is that racism and classism still exist at all--the argument about who has it worse is rather petty, and I don't even like the fact that I am engaging in it right now, because the problem is that people are discriminated against at all. Regardless, like I stated earlier, you have made a number of contradictory and offensive points. I could refute them, but I am not going to waste my time trying to convince you of something you fundamentally do not believe or wish to accept. I will simply say this: there is concrete proof of discrimination against historically underrepresented groups in the fact that they are historically underrepresented through no fault of their own, further exemplified in the fact that yes, racism still exists. And at the point at which those that are underrepresented are not gaining access into the same spheres as everyone else, their voices and experiences are systematically silenced. That is a huge problem. Based on the rather problematic and offensive points you are arguing (I have better things to do then to underline them for you), two of your beliefs are clear to me: one, anti-Black and anti-Latin@ racism no longer exists--if you really believe this, then I envy your partially naive perception of the world. Two, even though they are overrepresented in academia, Asians have it worse than everyone else because everyone thinks they're so smart, and affirmative action makes this worse. If this were true, and affirmative action negatively affected Asians worse, there would be less Asians in academic spheres. This is not the case. Note that this is not a concession, but an acceptance of the fact that the basis of your argument is inherently flawed based on your notions of reality, and an acceptance of the fact that nothing I say and no amount of time I devote to arguing with you is going to change that. It's like that sometimes--I'm keeping it moving.
Jake, while I don't see affirmative action as a form of discrimination because of the fact that it is necessary, I agree that it is a rather small and ineffective measure. Not because it is a form of reverse racism, but because it does nothing to combat the very problematic notions that made it necessary in the first place. But, as many including you have said, that wasn't its purpose. It seems like far too many people on this article are angry at affirmative action because it didn't lead to the post-racial dreamworld I keep coming back to. And, while I don't think that is attainable (discussion for another time), the problem is not affirmative action, but racism and classism, both of which still exist. Not a liberal, while I've already accepted that you don't think discrimination occurs against races other than your own, even the discrimination you point to against Asians in higher education is not the fault of affirmative action, but of racist beliefs against Asians. Katrin's original unhappiness with her experience at Amherst is not because of the affirmative action that she benefited from to get here, but from racist and potentially classist beliefs held against her. The fact that there are so many people arguing otherwise only serves to highlight the huge problem that exists at Amherst and in society at large of privilege and its cousin, post-racial thought, and the resulting inability to be honest about racism and classism, and not just against Blacks and Latin@s.
EA, it is probably impossible for us to agree on many fundamental things. However, many of your points and allegations against me are equally inaccurate and false. And some of your allegations can easily be clarified using reasoning and logic, which I will attempt to demonstrate here.
"The reality is that Blacks and Latin@s are treated differently and generally regarded as worse than Asians."
I don't disagree with you completely regarding this. But 100 years ago the perception of Asians was much worse than it is now. Perhaps at that time it was little better than the perception of blacks and Latino. And yet today it has somewhat "improved" – i.e. at least some of the stereotypes are positive, in a way. The question is why? Was there some kind of white conspiracy to gradually artificially create a more positive, "model minority" perception of Asians? I don't think so. I think that a large part of that changing perception has to do with what Asians have done in the last 50 years. It's true that sometimes no matter what you do, people will discriminate against you and treat you differently. But at other times what you try to do to "prove yourself" helps to mitigate those negative, racist assumptions, at least partially. I think this is the fundamental point of disagreement. You believe that the negative perception of blacks is entirely the fault of stubborn white bigotry. I, on the other hand, think that that is only part of the explanation.
"…like I stated earlier, you have made a number of contradictory and offensive points. I could refute them, but I am not going to waste my time trying to convince you of something you fundamentally do not believe or wish to accept."
Right. FYI, many of your points have been equally offensive (and contradictory, which I have shown in the previous comment) to me as well. However, I choose not to stress that feeling of being offended, because I want to keep the dialogue going. That's the problem with many liberals – once someone says that they are offended, the dialogue seems to just halt, with the "offender" undoubtedly being the one at fault. That is for me a very disappointing aspect of dialogue whenever I debate with liberals.
"I will simply say this: there is concrete proof of discrimination against historically underrepresented groups in the fact that they are historically underrepresented through no fault of their own, further exemplified in the fact that yes, racism still exists."
How can you give "concrete proof" that they are currently underrepresented "through no fault of their own"? Did someone suddenly decide to change their stereotypes about Asian 50 years ago and start hiring them en masse for positions in academia? The reality is, every time a faculty hiring position opens, especially in subjects like the sciences, the number of black and Latino applicants is very low. Even if there are some good aspiring young black scientists, they are more likely to be recent African immigrants rather than descendants of blacks who were brought here as slaves. Is it the fault of the hiring committees that there are always not enough black applicants?
The reality is that even when controlled for socio-economic status, blacks underperform compared to Asians. And it's ridiculous to blame ALL of that due to "positive perception of Asians" as demonstrated below:
We have the situation that
1) Perception of blacks and Latinos < Perception of Asians < Perception of whites
Yet the results are
2) Results of blacks and Latinos < Results of whites < Results of Asians.
Seeing this one must conclude that there is more than simply social perception which determines success or lack of it. Unless, of course, you reject 1) and say that Asians are more privileged than whites, a claim which I would honestly laugh out loud at.
"And at the point at which those that are underrepresented are not gaining access into the same spheres as everyone else, their voices and experiences are systematically silenced. That is a huge problem."
There are paths to success, and there are paths to representation. I'm telling you that the legions of white people in positions of power in America are probably not covert racists. Note that I'm not telling you that everyone is treated fairly, either, but I believe that there is no wide-scale, conspiratorial "systematic silencing" of black people who want to ascend up the social ladder. Perhaps there might be in some parts of America which where racism is still rampant. But to say that Massachusetts is full of racists? Ridiculous. People are not hiring a large number Asian and white professors because someone decided to throw out the loads of black applications. Every time there is an outstanding applicant for a position who is an underrepresented minority, hiring committees cry with joy because they now have a legitimate way to increase their diversity.
"Based on the rather problematic and offensive points you are arguing (I have better things to do then to underline them for you), two of your beliefs are clear to me: one, anti-Black and anti-Latin@ racism no longer exists--if you really believe this, then I envy your partially naive perception of the world."
No, I do not believe that – you are grossly misrepresenting and oversimplifying my points. I believe that anti-Black and anti-Latino racism does still exist. The main difference between you and I is the extent to which it exists, and the extent to which its effects can be nullified by the self-determined efforts of Blacks and Latinos themselves. And I also believe that Blacks, Latinos, and Asians are not completely free of prejudice and racism within their own ranks. I don't care whether this prejudice is justified as a reaction to historical white racism or not, but it's an unfortunate fact that there are no ethnic groups which are completely non-racist.
"Two, even though they are overrepresented in academia, Asians have it worse than everyone else because everyone thinks they're so smart, and affirmative action makes this worse. If this were true, and affirmative action negatively affected Asians worse, there would be less Asians in academic spheres."
Nope. You are committing a fundamental error of reasoning there, and you have utterly and completely failed to understand my argument. Yes, there are less Asians in the academic spheres than there should be . Affirmative action negatively affects Asians more, because of the simple fact that Asians, as a group, have more qualified people among their ranks than other ethnic groups, but the number of success spots for Asians is purposely limited to their proportion in the population. If there was no affirmative action, Asians would have an even higher representation in colleges and other venues, higher than even today. This is supported by facts such as that after Proposition 209 (which had the effect of banning race from being considered as a factor in college admissions) was passed in California in the mid-1990s, the proportion of Asians in places like UC Berkeley immediately shot up to over 50%. Was that because the whites controlling the admissions decided to suddenly favor Asians and throw out all the black applications? No. It was because there had always been more qualified Asians than other ethnic groups, and Proposition 209 got rid of the injustice which led them being unable to taste the fruits of their hard work, which I believe is more or less proportional to their qualifications.
"The fact that there are so many people arguing otherwise only serves to highlight the huge problem that exists at Amherst and in society at large of privilege and its cousin, post-racial thought, and the resulting inability to be honest about racism and classism, and not just against Blacks and Latin@s."
These kinds of statements are chilling to me, because it highlights the seeming fact that many liberals think "dialogue" is not really "dialogue" – in other words, "dialogue" is not "discourse", "trading of opinions and beliefs", or "debates", but instead, "dialogue" is a covert term for "reeducation", "correction" and "indoctrination". You regard "post-racial thought" as some kind of "problem" which needs to be "solved", instead of something to be debated and for us to have intellectual conversations over. That is I think something extremely offensive and not productive at all for a community of diverse opinions. If you keep on insisting to "correct" people of similar opinions as me instead of arguing with them, then forget about "having discussions about race and class at Amherst." It's utter hypocritical nonsense to have "dialogue" when it is the situation that every time your honest opinion doesn't toe to some party line, you have to be "educated", "corrected", and "informed out of ignorance".
I'm honest, and I disagree with you about what racism is, how widespread it is, and which strategies are the best (and justified) to deal with it. I think I am not unique in that opinion. Get used to that. Accept the fact that you can't just call everyone who disagrees with you "privileged" or implying they are bigoted and then shut down the discussion by saying you "have better things to do".
That's called "diversity of opinions", EA. That's something you should learn more about.
Keep fighting the good fight, "not a liberal". Your points are respectful, logically presented and well taken.
Something to add to the conversation:
Statistics actually show that minority students reap far more benefits when attending an elite college or university. When comparing equally qualified white students who go to elite universities and less prestigious schools (for financial or other reasons), there is very little difference in graduation rate, or postgraduate success between the students. However, when minority students are in the same position, the students who attend elite universities graduate at a much higher rate and have much higher incomes later in life than their (equally qualified) counterparts who attend other schools.
If Amherst is self-segregating, then that is a problem with the culture at Amherst, not with affirmative action. Affirmative action gives opportunities to those who wouldn't have them otherwise, and means that elite college campuses are representative of the nation as a whole.
1) First, just to clarify, everyone seems to be assuming that there is some kind of "quota"-based affirmative action, which is illegal. My understanding is that, at most, you get a "check" for being a person of color. Just as the child of a wealthy family that has attended Amherst for 3 generations gets a "check." As a fellow (white) student once said, "legacies are affirmative action for white people."
2) This essay raises a whole slew of questions about the purpose of education and educational institutions. Somehow a number of the comments seem to suggest that there is a way for a college administrator to tell in advance how "smart" someone is, and how well they will do at Amherst, from their high school grades and applications. So, to all those people who are claiming that Amherst is letting in minorities who aren't "smart" enough, who is more impressive -- the person who was in the top 95% of SAT scores despite having non-English speaking parents and attending a public schools where the roof is leaking and the windows have bullet holes, or the person who is in the top 98% and had private tutors? The problem, of course, is that some admissions systems see race as an easy substitute for a socio-economic analysis, but that seems to be a consequence of this country's continuing focus on race, rather than class.
3) Having said that, the people I went to Amherst with were, to me at least, still some of the smartest and most interesting people I have met, despite perhaps not having the best high school educations or grades. The fact that someone may not have done as well as you in high school does not mean they are incapable of doing better than you when given the proper attention.
4) The author seems to assume that doing away with affirmative action will stop people from treating her differently, or stop "the predominantly white jocks" and the "Korean students" from "self-segregating." The optimism is nice, but I would point out that there wasn't affirmative action for much of this country's history, and yet those groups weren't exactly best buds pre-affirmative action. There also isn't affirmative action in public high schools, but unless things have really changed since I was in high school, there are "self-segregated" groups there too.
5) On a final, admittedly snarky, note, I find it interesting that the author, her floormate, and various commentators all assume that they got into Amherst on their merits, while the "others" are only there because of affirmative action. Perhaps greater exposure to the "others" will help fix that.
1) First, just to clarify, everyone seems to be assuming that there is some kind of "quota"-based affirmative action, which is illegal. My understanding is that, at most, you get a "check" for being a person of color. Just as the child of a wealthy family that has attended Amherst for 3 generations gets a "check." As a fellow (white) student once said, "legacies are affirmative action for white people."
2) This essay raises a whole slew of questions about the purpose of education and educational institutions. Somehow a number of the comments seem to suggest that there is a way for a college administrator to tell in advance how "smart" someone is, and how well they will do at Amherst, from their high school grades and applications. So, to all those people who are claiming that Amherst is letting in minorities who aren't "smart" enough, who is more impressive -- the person who was in the top 95% of SAT scores despite having non-English speaking parents and attending a public schools where the roof is leaking and the windows have bullet holes, or the person who is in the top 98% and had private tutors? The problem, of course, is that some admissions systems see race as an easy substitute for a socio-economic analysis, but that seems to be a consequence of this country's continuing focus on race, rather than class.
3) Having said that, the people I went to Amherst with were, to me at least, still some of the smartest and most interesting people I have met, despite perhaps not having the best high school educations or grades. The fact that someone may not have done as well as you in high school does not mean they are incapable of doing better than you when given the proper attention.
4) The author seems to assume that doing away with affirmative action will stop people from treating her differently, or stop "the predominantly white jocks" and the "Korean students" from "self-segregating." The optimism is nice, but I would point out that there wasn't affirmative action for much of this country's history, and yet those groups weren't exactly best buds pre-affirmative action. There also isn't affirmative action in public high schools, but unless things have really changed since I was in high school, there are "self-segregated" groups there too.
5) On a final, admittedly snarky, note, I find it interesting that the author, her floormate, and various commentators all assume that they got into Amherst on their merits, while the "others" are only there because of affirmative action. Perhaps greater exposure to the "others" will help fix that.
the supreme court will probably decide this all soon enough, don't worry.
Upper middle class minorities tend to come from 1) good homes and 2) good schools, which tend to make them 3) good students able to be admitted to places like Amherst.
The author of the original story mainly seems upset that she's still lumped with the (poor) minorities instead of the generic upper-middle-class where she belongs. Boo hoo.
Race doesn't matter much anymore. Class matters.
Move to NYC. You think anyone cares when they're looking for an apartment whether their neighbors are white, asian, jewish, black, latino, etc? Please. They care about the schools and the crime rate, both of which are directly correlated to the neighborhood's median income.
Race is easy to fix with band-aids like AA. Class is not. If you really want to solve the problem, forget about these band-aids and fight for Johnson's "War on Poverty." Eliminate private schooling and level funding for public schools. Think that's radical? Then that's a pretty good indication of how insular and superficial this whole debate about AA has become, because that's the only thing that's going to make any difference.
And shifting racial AA to socioeconomic status AA, like the supreme court is likely to propose, ain't gonna solve anything. The problem lies in class divisions, which are growing wider every day.


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For close to 40 years now, Morley Torgov, 84, has lived two distinctly different lives, juggling law with writing.
By day, from about 9:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. five days a week, he practises general commercial law in his downtown Toronto office, handling corporate work, working on real estate contracts and drawing up wills and trusts.
"Once I get home, my law office may as well be on another planet," he said. "It's not hard to disengage from law. I can compartmentalize my life."
At night, after dinner and a drink with his wife, Anna Pearl, and on Saturday and Sunday mornings as well, he assumes his other identity as a novelist, spinning elaborate plots and creating complex characters.
"I won't tell you how many hours I spend daydreaming," he said, suggesting that his professional career may be an adjunct of his love affair with the written word.
Torgov, a lawyer since the mid-1950s, published his first book, A Good Place to Come From, in 1974. A memoir of growing up Jewish in Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., it struck gold, having won the 1975 Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour.
He rewrote A Good Place to Come From six or seven times, thereby setting a precedent for himself. "The only way to write is to edit yourself mercilessly," he said.
In 1983, six years after the publication of his second book and first novel, The Abramsky Variations, he won his second Leacock prize for The Outside Chance of Maximilian Glick, which was adapted for the screen and television as a feature film and a CBC series, Max Glick.
Torgov's next novel, St. Farb's Day, (1990), was nominated for a Leacock award, as was his young adult novel, Stickler and Me (2002).
The novel he wrote between these books, The War to End all Wars (1998), was in part based on his father's experiences as a soldier in the Russian army from 1914 to 1917 in World War I.
"I started off aiming at a Jewish audience," he said in an interview in his mid-town home. "But after my fifth book, I didn't want to focus on Jewish topics any more. I'd been there and done, had come to the end of the line and felt I had to branch out."
So, in a leap of faith, Torgov decided to reinvent himself and become a crime novelist. In 2008, the first of his Inspector Hermann Preiss detective novels, Murder in A-Major, appeared.
As he describes him, Preiss is an articulate, clever and sophisticated 40- something German who has transcended his miserably humble origins and worked his way up the greasy ladder of success.
And as its title may suggest, Murder in A-Major is musically infused, turning on a plot to drive the composer Robert Schumann insane and involving his wife, Clara, his protégé Johannes Brahms and a fellow composer, Franz Liszt.
The second novel in the Hermann Preiss mystery series, The Mastersinger from Minsk (Dundurn) is due to be published on June 16 and concerns no less a figure than the composer Richard Wagner and a scheme to murder him on the day of the première of his opera, Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg.
To Torgov, Wagner is one of the greatest geniuses of all time, his antisemitism notwithstanding. As he put it, "He has always fascinated me. He was a marvellous musician, but a deplorable human being, a quintessential scumbag."
Torgov is currently working on his third Hermann Preiss novel, the tentative title of which is Key Witness. Franz Liszt and P.T. Barnum, the American circus impresario, are the central characters in a book that unfolds in New York.
As he pointed out, the Hermann Preiss series is steeped in historical facts and based on extensive research.
Being old school, he gathers his material from books rather than on the Internet. Amazingly enough, two of the books he still dips into were presented to him as bar mitzvah gifts in 1940.
The Preiss series is set in the 1850s and 1860s, one of the richest and most productive eras in the annals of classical music, when rivalries between composers were sharp and even vicious.
Torgov turned to the crime genre for commercial and personal reasons.
"Detective stories are popular, so I jumped on the bandwagon," he explained. "But I've always been interested in classical music. I started taking piano lessons at the age of six or seven."
Torgov was born in 1927, three years after his father, a Ukrainian immigrant, arrived in Canada and the year he set down roots in Sault Ste. Marie, where he owned two retail clothing stores.
"He wanted me to become a doctor, but my goal was to be a journalist," Torgov recalled. "Law was really a compromise. I had to make a buck."
Not enamoured of its cold winters and remote location, Torgov was glad to leave Sault Ste. Marie, which had 35 to 40 Jewish families in a population of 25,000 when he departed in 1947 to study at the University of Chicago.
Recalling his hometown, he mused, "It was a good place to get out of. It was too confining. I couldn't wait to leave."
As a young man, Torgov disliked the routine and outdated language of the law. "But the older I got, the more confidence I had in my profession."
He has no intention of retiring. "They'll have to carry me out of my office," he said, noting that his law practice has kept him intellectually sharp and in touch with friends and acquaintances.
Writing has fulfilled him, even if royalties have not always met his hopes or expectations. Yet he has no desire to devote himself solely to his pastime. "I couldn't sit in a garret writing all day," added Torgov.
Oddly enough, Murder in A-Major, translated into French, Greek and Korean, has sold more copies in South Korea than in any other country.
"Sales in Canada have been fair. Not as much as I wanted," he said.
His most commercially successful books have been The Outside Chance of Maximilian Glick and A Good Place to Come From, both of which have gone through several hardcover and softcover editions. Although not quite as popular, St. Farb's Day, a novel revolving around a Jewish lawyer, was the recipient of the Toronto Book Award.
Since 1984, Torgov has donated 15 batches of his literary working papers – drafts of books, memorabilia and correspondence – to the Ontario Jewish Archives. "Its efforts at storage and preservation have been marvellous," he said. "It's a first-rate organization."

subset: commoncrawl


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websplashpeter necesitaba un nuevo diseño de logotipo y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 276 diseños de 73 diseñadores freelance.
Furious Tribe
Hey Guys! Great designs so far.
REMEMBER: Keep it simple!
The best logos are often the most simple
HERE ARE EXAMPLES OF SIMPLE LOGOS WE LOVE: http://logopond.com/gallery/
Furious Tribe is an up and coming advertising agency that is already making its mark in the irish markets and wishes to expand on a more global scale.
The audience we wish to attract are potentially large brands e.g. Coco Cola, Kellogs, Cadburys etc.
Hey Guys! Great designs so far.
REMEMBER: Keep it simple!
The best logos are often the most simple
HERE ARE EXAMPLES OF SIMPLE LOGOS WE LOVE: http://logopond.com/gallery/
We want a logo that shows Furious Tribe to be a young, hip innovative company with lots of ideas and tons of desire. We want something slick that will make us cutting edge.
Please just use the name Furious Tribe in your logo design.
We are willing to take all styles but here are some guidlines to give a better idea of what we are looking for:
1) We want the logo to obviously include "Furious Tribe" with an image,symbol or shape that you feel defines our company
2) We want to logo to play off the words furious and tribe, e.g. you could show and angry face/angry bomb or a symbol or shape that represents anger. My advice is to try focus more on the anger than the tribe but if you can add a hint of a tribe element that would be great.
3) Try not to use too many colours, remembering less can mean more. Try to use colours that work together that would make you think fo anger e.g. red and black and grey,blue and black
4) Dont use any crazy fonts, try to still with San Serif type fonts if you can.
4) Dont be afraid to be adventurious and have fun as an advertising agency logo should show new ideas and imagination.
5) Please try not to be too abstract as we want people to understand the logo straight away.
Descubre cómo funciona un concurso de diseño u obtén más información sobre nuestros servicios de diseño de logo.


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Rogue trader who conned the elderly jailed
Following a joint investigation by Devon, Somerset and Torbay Trading Standards and NTS Regional Investigation Team two men are facing prison after defrauding elderly victims out of £108,000.
John Carroll aged 26 of Cricklade, Wiltshire was sentenced to 38 months in prison at Exeter Crown Court on Tuesday 23 May. His accomplice John Rice, 21 from Swansea, pleaded guilty to money laundering and was jailed for 12 weeks.
Carroll carried out substandard and overpriced work, he would often give clients an initial quote which would escalate due to 'extra' problems he encountered when carrying out the work.
Rice had no dealings with the victims and was not involved in the building work but was responsible for laundering £28,950 of Carroll's money through his accounts.
The Judge ordered an investigation to determine if either of the defendants held assets that could be seized and then used to compensate his victims.
The full press release is available on the NTS website.


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Game of Thrones exclusive photos: "Dany has Jon Snow right where she wants him!"
See two exclusive photos of Game of Thrones cast members as you've never seen them before. Here's Emilia Clarke (Daenerys Targaryen) playing with co-star Kit Harington (Jon Snow), as well as flirtatious Wildling scout Ygritte (Rose Leslie) wielding her bow and arrow. It's a sneak peak of Entertainment Weekly's cover story that goes behind the scenes of the HBO fantasy hit's eagerly anticipated third season, on newsstands Friday!