Again you struggle with your own straw men. Have fun.
The justification for affirmative action is the hugely diproportionate amount of discrimation and prejudice that blacks have to deal with, not some inherent inferiority you keep trying to prop up as our main argument.
Consider college admissions. Suppose that admission officers have these pieces of information:
The Hmong lived in Laos, where their culture was semi-literate and composed of slash-and-burn shifting agricultural in the mountains. They fought on the side of the US during the wars of Indochina, and after Laos became Communist, many fled to the U.S. Not having a lot of experience with urban and market-based socieities, they have not prospered as much as immigrants from countries like Confucian and merchantile Taiwan.
Suppose that
A) High school GPA, classes taken, and SAT scores are strongly predictive of what a student would major in, their college GPA, and their chance of graduation.
B) Hmong generally have lower SAT scores than Taiwanese Americans.
C) After high school GPA, classes taken, and SAT scores are taken into account, Hmong and Taiwanese have equal rates of graduation.
Can we then conclude that the SAT is culturally biased against the Hmong (relative to the Taiwanese)? The purpose of the SAT is not to determine someone’s Verbal/Math intelligence, but rather to determine how well they will do in college. So, in this case, I would argue that affirmative action for the Hmong relative to the Taiwanese is rascist. Using transcripts and SAT scores alone is the non-rascist policy.
Suppose though, we change C) to
C’) Hmong students have a superior college performance than Taiwanese students with the same transcripts and SAT scores.
In this case, we might say that the transcripts and SAT are undermeasuring the abilities of the Hmong, and are thus biased against them. In this case, an affirmative action program that preferentially admitted Hmong would be non-rascist. I’m agnostic whether a ‘color blind’ admissions process that didn’t take ethnicity into account would be rascist or not.
Finally, if C’) were instead
C’’) Hmong students have a inferior college performance than Taiwanese students with the same transcripts and SAT scores.
Then, paradoxically, I would claim (with much queasiness and uncertainty) that it would be non-rascist to have an affirmative action program that preferentially admitted Taiwanese students.
In a related point, I would guess that many struggling students switch majors in college. Instead of dropping out or getting a degree in Electrical Engineering with a 2.0 GPA, they get a degree in Business Administration with a 3.5 GPA.
I would guess that if affirmative action admits students who are not as well-prepared (whether due to their lack of Confucian culture or due to growing up in crappy schools), we will see these students tending towards ‘softer’ majors.
And their inability to deal with it without special treatment, as others have successfully done.
You deny that this is your argument. Fine then - what do you give as the reason that, for instance, Jews have overcome thousands of years of discrimination and abuse to succeeed in the American mainstream, but blacks cannot?
Sigh. Read the cites. Chinese were prevented from forming businesses requring capital (and owning farmland) in the first place.
Let’s compare Chinese and blacks one more time.
Distinguishing racial characteristic preventing assimilation? Check.
Social prejudice? Check.
Jim Crow laws? Check.
Ghettoization? Check.
Racial violence? Check. Granted that blacks were here longer and in greater numbers, so no doubt there were more lynchings, but I can dig up the “anti-foreigner” bias of the KKK and other nativist groups if you like.
Family disruption? Check, although the Chinese had it legally enforced on them well after slavery ended.
Completely different language and culture? Chinese, yes, blacks, no.
Comparable current socio-economic status? No.
And it is this last that seems to be so hard for AA supporters to explain. Chinese, who suffer all the disadvantages of blacks, Hispanics, American Indians, and Jews combined, don’t seem to need AA.
Or at least not receive it.
Regards,
Shodan
Shodan, the Chinese in the U.S. have certainly faced substantial obstacles and prejudices. I don’t deny the validity of your list. But in some ways that discrimination is qualititatively different from that faced by Blacks in the U.S.
As exasperating as certain stereotypes must be, in some cases they may result in less harm being done to one’s opportunities. For example, in school, Chinese kids are considered one of “the model minority.” I’ll warrant that from kindergarten on, most Asian kids are generally judged to be smarter, more capable, holding higher aspirations, etc, than other minorities. Maybe even than the average kid in generally. This probably effects how they are treated and encouraged–even by the most conscientious teacher.
Of course that stereotype of being smart, obedient, and studious also leads to problems and frustrations for Asian kids. They are not always well-served by it. But when it comes to how stereotypes effect educational opportunity, encouragement, and teacher attitudes, it’s a fair bet they’re better off than black kids.
Interesting observations in this thread.
AND
Could it be that doing so does not best serve the agenda of those who want to make blacks out to be nothing but a gang of jive-talking, basketball-trotting, rap music-listening, welfare-receiving, free ride-seeking, weed-smoking thugs who are out to steal Bobby Joe’s place at Harvard Law?
Where do yet get this strange claim about capital? (Which is quite possibly irrelevant since the Chinese were quite efficient in providing intracommunity financing through their hans). And the law prohibiting sale of property to non-citizens was not implemented until 1913, after the majority of the Chinese-owned land had already been purchased. The Webb-Hartley bill limited leases to three years (a burden, but not an insurmountable one) and prohibited further purchases by aliens without forcing property already owned to be surrendered.
From your other citation:
Then
Your attempt to portray the racial viiolence suffered by the two groups as equal is absurd. More blacks were lynched because they’d been here longer? You need to read some actual history; the long tradition of black lynching did not really begin until after the Civil War. There is no comparable experience. (Compare San Francisco in 1906 to Tulsa in 1921.)
You’re grasping at straws in order to declare equivalent that which was different.
Tom and Shodan… you do realize this is the exact argument The Man wants you to have while he steals all the money, rapes the land and poisons the water well?
The inter-group conflicts between Chinese-Black Americans serves to distract those groups from uniting and actually getting to the root of the problem of racist attitudes in America.
Which is mainly us white men.
Both groups certainly should express and learn about each other’s past. But it should be done in a way to strengthen their bond to fighting that good fight.
All groups in or from America, except for assimilated White Middle to Upper Class Males, have been stomped into the ground.
Now what?
The history is there. Let’s not fight about it (unless some idiot denies it). I respect both of your positions and conceed that you guys are both right. Chinese and Blacks have suffered in America.
Did you also know that in WW2 many Chinese, Philipinos and other Asian groups wore pins that said, “I’m not a Jap” ? Messed up isn’t it?
Fight against prejudice, discrimination and prejudice, not over who’s wrongs were worse. The oppressed groups in America can fight about that forever. It still won’t solve anything. It will just make inter-group conflict that much worse. And then the racists can say, “See I told you those insert epithet here were anrgy degenerates!”
How can an entire board of so-called enlightened people keep tripping up over such obvious and simple fact! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! The way some people talk it’s like they think we just all came over here one day and started demanding special treatment out of nowhere, while all the rest of the good immigrant groups stayed quiet and worked. BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! THEREFORE, COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! EVER! Why is that so hard for people to remember? Ah, well, perhaps repetition will help:
BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE! BLACK PEOPLE ARE NOT AN IMMIGRANT GROUP! COMPARING BLACKS TO IMMIGRANTS DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE!
With just this? No. Or rather not unless we declare all (or at least many) other factors equal, which is a lot more assumptions then you claim to be making.
In fact such a declaration would make the example meaningless since it doesn’t occure IRL.
Example:
The higher SAT scores could simply reflect the disproportionate ability of Taiwanese families to pay for SAT prep classes; classes that have a defined and significant positive effect on scores but no measurable effect on success in college.
Further you haven’t defined how wide the margin is. A very large margin would be much stronger evidence of cultural bias.
Lastly, SAT scores are not very good predictors of success in college as a whole (they are somewhat decent predictors of freshman GPA). This raises the question – what good will come of assuming something which is quite probably false.
The stated purpose may be but intent and accomplishment are not the same. In fact it does a better job of measuring vocabulary and math skills then it does of success in college so I’m not sure what your point is.
I’d say the real purpose of the SAT is to make money for the College Board but that might come across as cynical.
What’s a rascist? KIDDING!
What if we also knew:
(D) The Hmong have suffered a long history of severe racial discrimination, oppression and prejudice at the hands of society which continues today such that the Hmong have systematically been:
(1) denied adequate and equal education (impacting said Test Scores)
(2) kept in squalor (impacting ability to pay for superior private education and those test preps)
Is it then fair to say that a pro-hmong affirmative action policy is , in fact, not “racist” but rather designed to counter the pan-cultural barriers the Hmong are confronted with in their pursuit of the american dream?
And further that such a goal is superior to tacit acceptance of such discrimination, prejudice and oppression.
Well, the Nigerians at my workplace are most definitely immigrants. So was the Jamaican at the last job where I worked, and my neighbors down stairs are Kenyans. Obviously many blacks * are * immigrants. And I note that many indentured servants came in chains against their will, so blacks are not as unique in that respect as they imagine.
The two questions are different. Same subject, different questions.
I looked for 20 minutes and can’t find census numbers for this either. It doesn’t even matter, though. Treat the question as a hypothetical if you wish. “If other groups such as Asians or Jews are more financially successful than whites, do we need government intervention to even out the playing field?”
My position is that AA will never even out the playing field. It makes the problem worse, not better.
Further, it is not the role of the federal government to force employers to hire certain groups of people. The government has no right to force a landlord to advertise an apartment to certain groups of people. The government has no business forcing a college to admit larger amounts of certain groups of people based on race, or anything else.
Affirmative action is wrong, and it doesn’t work. Now, start responding to my questions.
So, if blacks earned as much as whites, we would still need to protect them with Affirmative Action?
It’s about money. And it’s about discrimination. Not just one or the other.
Debaser, in a show of good faith I will answer your (hypothetical) question. Specifically, you ask if whites are not doing as well financially as other groups (you use Asians and Jews), should the government step in and even the playing field. My apologies in advance for how long this is going to get.
I suspect that this is at the heart of our difference of opinion. In a nutshell, what I believe is that government at its best behaves like a sort of referee, making sure that the playing filed is level. I also believe that when the playing filed is level, all groups of humans have the same basic potential. In practical terms, I am 100% behind the government forbidding institutions from not including folks on the basis of race/ethnicity/sexual-orientation etc.
Now, as far as the specifics of affirmative action are concerned, I don’t think that I really have an answer. See, it is one thing for the government to simply prohibit discrimination. As I have stated, I believe that this is a proper thing for the government to do. The problem with that is that discrimination can be a very hard thing to prove, especially if you are already part of a disadvantaged group and do not have the resources for a long fight in court. So, what do you do?
Is affirmative action the way to go with this? I really don’t know. What I do know is that it at least is acknowledging that a problem exists and then attempting to correct the problem. It also seems to me that the folks “on the other side of the aisle” seem to think that by doing nothing that the problem will simply go away. I would take some convincing to come around to this point of view.
Chances are that we are going to have to agree to disagree, because unless I am misunderstanding it seems to be your take that we should simply do nothing and then wait for the problem to go away by itself. I am willing to entertain the notion that the solutions that have been implemented to date for poverty and racism are not working out as planned, but I would want to hear alternative solutions. So far, what I hear is all stated in the negative.
Binarydrone, I think we are closer to agreement on this issue than you might think.
I agree that the playing field should be level. I also agree with the government forbidding most institutions from not including folks on the basis of race/ethnicity/sexual-orientation, etc.
(Exceptions do apply. I don’t think we need to allow men into an all women’s gym, or homosexuals into the boy scouts, etc.)
But, I am with you on the gist of the point here.
If Harvard Law school gets a new dean who just don’t like black people and stops admitting them action should be taken to stop him.
However, the only fair way to go about this is to tell society that race isn’t a factor. Never a factor.
So, our racist hypothetical dean cannot deny admission to anyone based on race. But also, we shouldn’t be admitting less qualified students based on race.
You see, a racist university not admitting blacks is using race as a factor and they shouldn’t be. The intentions here are hatred and bigotry and the result is racism.
An affirmative action university setting quotas and lowering standards to admit more blacks is using race as a factor and they shouldn’t be either. The intentions here are good but the result is the same: racism.
The only message we should be sending is for everyone to ignore race. This will, given enough time, even the playing field and allow merit to be more of a factor in the success of individual acheivement.
People shouldn’t be treated any better or worse as a result of thier race.
If by this you mean that I don’t think racist discrimination is different when applied to some groups but not to others, you are correct. Racism is racism.
But the logic of affirmative action pushes towards the attitude that it has to be different, depending on how the injured group reacts. Thus it is necessary to minimize racist actions against groups that succeed, and focus heavily on actions against groups that did less well. So race riots and Jim Crow is not so bad for Chinese, because they overcame it. But it is horrificly crippling for blacks because they can’t.
So blacks and Jews and Chinese all suffered discrimination, violence, and institutionalized racism. Jews overcame it (by and large - obviously it still occurs). Chinese did as well, despite suffering from disadvantages that Jews did not. Blacks did not.
And the underlying assumption of AA is that blacks can’t, and it is this that I find racist.
Regards,
Shodan
I agree with the first sentence.
I think the second sentence is too absolute. On those occasions where it can be shown that groups have been deliberately excluded from participation in the market, what is the objection to an order to provide those same people the information that they are no longer excluded?
Which goes along with my challenge to the OP: AA is NOT only quotas and lowered bars, which I oppose. It includes affirmative actions taken to level the field–which include the seeking out of people who may not be aware that they are no longer excluded. The gross claims that all AA is racist (ignoring for a moment that white women are the primary beneficiaries) are simply ways to avoid dealing with the historical reality–much like re-writing history to minimize real differences in events or their effects.
Race riots and the California equivalent of Jim Crow were “not as bad,” (your words) not because the Chinese overcame it, but because they were objectively lesser in scale, in scope, and in material effect. There were fewer riots, far fewer lynchings (and those were not frequently directed toward civic leaders as they were against blacks in the South), Chinese property was not destroyed wholsale in multiple events over a period of 70 years, and Chinese were not deliberately driven from their homes.
When one group of racist white leaders attempted to move the Chinese from San Francisco, they were opposed by the Chinese Consul and by other white San Franciscans who responded to offers from the white-controlled municipal governments of Seattle and Los Angeles to accept the displaced Chinese San Franciscans as a boon to their economies. When whites burned out the black Tulsa financial district, no offer was extended by anyone to help them re-establish their businesses (or even to find them alternative housing).
The peoples were treated differently. Claiming that the Chinese were simply better at overcoming “the same” opposition when the opposition to blacks was much more extreme is silly.
Shodan:
And the underlying assumption of anti-AA is that any black in a high-status position is a AA beneficiary and thus, undeserving. I find that racist. Particularly since black people are not the only ones who benefit from the program. When a significant chunk of the beneficiaries are not even ethnic minorities–but are indeed, white–and yet all eyes go to the blacks (once again), I kind of see why AA still has a place in today’s society. What, exactly, is up with that shit?
I went to one of the toughest undergrads in the country. An engineering school that has a reputation of NOT being a party school because of the hard-ass curriculum. The ratio of men to women was 3 to 1 when I went there 5 years ago. AA was used to pull more females into the male-dominated majors. It was also used to pull in underrepresented ethnic groups like…you guessed it!..black people. Now even though both gender and race were factors in the admission process, and even though there were probably more white women AA beneficiaries than black ones of either gender, which group do you think took more flak for taking a seat that a more “deserving” person should have had?
If you guessed black people again, well then you must be one smart cookie.
What is up with that shit?
Replying to Crook’d Dope:
Thanks for your sane, rational, and well-written reply.
If you’re willing, for now, I’d like to confine the discussion of AA to two groups which do not have a long history legacy in the US. For there are (at least) three rationales for AA. The first is an argument that AA is necessary to correct for some kind of mismeasurement of potential. (The argument I attempted to address in my first post.) The second is that AA is some kind of policy necessary for social justice due to the past and current injustices against blacks or Amerinds. (Your point D.) The third would be some kind of argument that racial diversity is a public good for the non-AA student population.
The case of blacks and Amerinds is both more complicated and more persuasive than that for other groups. So, if AA were invalid for the simpler case of the Hmong, it could still be valid for the more complex and stronger case for blacks and Amerinds. On the other hand, if AA is valid for the Hmong, it is then also valid for others.
Okay then. Suppose we have three types of data on our applicants:
A) Educational data (transcripts, tests, activities, letters of recc, etc.)
B) non-racial socioeconomic data (parent’s education, income, geographic location, etc.)
C) Sex and Self-reported Sexual Orientation Data
D) Self-reported Religious Data
E) Self-reported Race/Ethnic Data
My claim is this:
It’s only valid to use data for admissions (temporarily leaving aside reparataions-type arguments and diversity-as-public-good type arguments) that have predictive power for how well the student will perform at college.
Therefore, we develop some measure of student college performance (SCP). Maybe it 's GPA, maybe it’s how much money they contribute back to the colledge as alumni, maybe it’s how many Google references they produce 10 years after graduation. Maybe it’s some combination of all the above.
Anyway, we run some regressions, trying to explain SCP=f(A), SCP=f(A,B), SCP=f(A,B,C), SCP=f(A,B,C,D). We look at the amount of variance in SCP explained by different combinations (R-sqrd, in stat parlance), and in particular, at how much this increases as we add each incremental set of variables.
I feel perfectly fine accepting A as a criterion of admission. It bears a direct (but imperfect) relationship to the educational mission of a college. (Unlike, say, height.) It is the type of data that is very strongly related to the student’s inclinations and efforts–it has much to do with their autonomous self-definition. Suppose lower type A is correlated with lower SCP. (Hopefully, this is non-contentious.)
I feel a little less fine about accepting type B data as a criterion of admission. It bears an indirect (but plausible) relationship to the educational mission of a college. It is not the type of data that corresponds to autonomous choice and self-definition. Here we are in some sense rewarding or penalizing students for factors they had no control over. But, at least, we’re rewarding or penalizing them for factors that someone (say, their family) had some control over.
Suppose people with ‘lower’ type B data also have lower type A data. Suppose that our regression discovers that, holding type A data constant (this is what regression does), lower type B predicts higher SCP. That is, suppose being poorer, given the same GPA, indicates increased college GPA (say). Then we can say that the GPA (or whatever) underestimates poor students’ potential. Therefore, ‘economic AA’ would seem to be appropriate. If, on the other hand, we find that lower B, holding A constant, predicts lower SCP, then GPA (or whatever) overestimates poor students’ potential. Therefore, ‘reverse economic AA’ would seem justifiable. If B has no predictive power, then ‘class blind’ admissions would seem just.
Consider sex and sexual preference. Here we have a variable that most men and women, and most heteros and homos consider immutable. I’m deeply nervous about using characteristics that are immutable in college admissions. It seems to reward or penalize people for things no one had any control over. But even this would seem (ignoring the reparations issue, though not the diversity issue) preferable to using religion. The Constitution frowns on showing preference or prejudice based on religion. The Constitution doesn’t say anything policies based on sex or sexual preference. Yet.
But even so, at least religion is something we can choose. The constitution not only frowns on the government showing preference or prejudice based on race, but race is not something we can choose–leaving aside people of mixed descent and post-modernist wiseasses.
Therefore, it behooves us, IMHO, to be very leery of using race or religion as a factor in something like college admissions.
There is no meaningful way to quantify this. How do you tell that groups are being excluded from the market?
My condo is currently for sale. It’s in Lowell, MA. I haven’t advertised it in the local newspaper, the Lowell Sun. I’ve decided my money is better spent in the Boston papers and classified real estate listing advertisers.
I’ve made this decision for a couple of reasons. My condo is selling for 160K and a comparible one in Boston would be at least twice that. It’s only a 45 minute or so train ride into Boston from Lowell. Comparable housing size-wise is available in Lowell for much cheaper than my unit. However, my unit is a unique loft space in a very desireable location downtown.
Since I am selling, and not renting, it’s obvious that I don’t care who buys the unit. However, even if I was trying to rent it, I would probably use the same strategy of advertising to people from out of town who might be frustrated with the expensive Boston lofts market.
What metric could the government use to judge that I am using a perfectly valid strategy for selling/renting my condo vs. a racist who doesn’t advertise the listing in Lowell simply due to the high minority population?
It’s impossible to do so fairly. Any government program that tries to even the playing field this way is just going to cost me money to advertise in an area where I feel there isn’t as much demand for a luxury condo. As the seller, I am motivated to do what’s best for me financially. That’s how capitalism works. Anyway, if a racist was deliberately not renting to minorities, a program like this isn’t going to stop him/her. If anything, being forced to advertise in certain areas would just entrench peoples beliefs that there is some inherent inferiority of people that they are forced to market to.
(BTW, this is not a hypothetical scenario. It’s exactly true.)