Anti-achievement at its finest: Acceptance by 20 colleges called "obnoxious"

The BBQ Pit
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Link to article: [D.C. Fox 5 anchors slam teen who received 20 full rides to college.](D.C. Fox 5 anchors slam teen who received 20 full rides to college.)

So a Texas teen named Michael Brown discovers he’s been accepted by all 20 schools he applied to, including prestigious Ivy Leagues. The kid has an astronomical GPA and a near perfect SAT score…clearly the guy is winning in the academic department. Great accomplishment, right?

Well, the story is covered by some newscasters who choose to harp about how “obnoxious” it is that by getting into so many schools, he took spots from “someone else who worked really hard.” Instead of saying something congratulatory, their immediate reaction is to criticize him using truly WTF? logic. The has led many people (including the student) to speak out.

Of note is that the student is a black male and the anchors are white women. I, like others, don’t think it’s a coincidence they said these things about a student with his racial background, because “taking a spot from someone else” is a charge pretty much every black person who attends competitive college has to defend themselves against in some shape or form. Rarely do whites have to put up with this; the default assumption is that they belong to any school they attend. Even if they are mediocre students. Argue what you want, but Michael Brown is not mediocre by any metric and yet he’s still getting treated like he has taken rather than earned something.

And it is sad that him applying to 20 schools (instead of 4 or 5 which one newscaster insisted was better) was portrayed as arrogant, attention-seeking behavior. In all probability, he picked 20 because he was uncertain that he’d get into his preferred schools. In other words, a lack of arrogance likely guided his decision to apply widely. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was his parents that insisted he do this, because that’s what my mother did to me. She didn’t want me to miss out on opportunities unnecessarily. But instead of pausing to consider the possibility Michael Brown approached the college application process with the cautious, risk averse mindset of someone who doesn’t assume the world is his oyster, the news anchors found it easier to spin it as the complete opposite. Uppity, in other words.

What was behind all this commentary? Was this privilege blinding them to other possible points of view? Was this them assuming (like many stupid people do) that black people don’t have to work hard to get into college; they can just apply and get in anywhere and of course, the kid would know this so he just wanted to waste his money in applying to a bunch of schools so he could have bragging rights? I’m struggling to understand why they couldn’t keep a check on their biases and just say what is always expected for stories like this. “Wow, what an amazing accomplishment. I bet his parents are so proud. Now back to you, Bob, for the weather.”

Michael Brown has asked for an apology. It’ll be interesting to see whether he gets it. My guess is not.

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I find this to be the most shocking part of that story.

:wink:

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That link is broken for me, but it sounds like a very clear example of privilege (and just plain stupidity) in action. Also an example of the many, many ways in which young black folks often can’t win. Newsflash to reporters – students don’t know going in which schools they’ll get accepted into. They apply to multiple schools to make sure they get into at least one, and hopefully more than one, so they’ll have multiple options.

EDIT: Here’s a link that worked for me. One of the anchors apologized, but apparently the other did not:

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I’m sure they saw the criticism and boycott of Laura Ingraham for mocking David Hogg for not getting in to UCLA, so they figured they’d take the opposite approach. And now they’re being criticized for that, too. When will you liberals make up your mind?

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Thanks for the link iiandyiiiii.

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To hell with “Doctor” Laura. She deserves all the heat she got, and MORE. It’s called free speech (which goes both ways).

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Fox News: New day, new low.

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I really don’t understand this: he took spots from “someone else who worked really hard.”

So he’s accepted to 20 schools, but surely it doesn’t mean that he goes to every single one of them. He goes to one and the others just replace him with the next in line, right ?
It’s not like there’s 19 empty places now ?

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Since when does getting accepted take someone else’s spot?
Pretty sure the only spot he’s going to take is the one at the school he chooses.
“We had room for 1,000 incoming students this year so we accepted 1,000 applications. Only 100 chose to enroll and now our attendance is suffering. What the hell are we doing wrong?”

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This is weapons-grade stupid.

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I think they were complaining about wait list times.

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It’s stupid - he’s not “taking” a spot from anyone else. He can only go to one school at a time, the other 19 schools will just take the next candidate in line.

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The anchor who didn’t apologize wrote this reply on twitter: “the whole point of our social circle segment is to talk about topics where we have differing opinions.” Meaning, they probably argue for the sake of it to bring in ratings, or why I don’t watch television news.

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I don’t think it was arrogant or attention-seeking, but are you kidding? A black kid with outstanding grades and a stellar SAT can get into any university he wants. They will trample each other in the effort to convince him to go to their school.

Of course he applied to 20 schools. Which one will give him the best offer? He’d be crazy not to.

Regards,
Shodan

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I don’t like Laura Ingraham either, but I think you’re confusing her with Laura Schlessinger. (Who’s also a bitch)

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Any denser it’d go critical. Nuclear stupidity. People have been killed by the stupidon cascade from a prompt critical stupidity chain reaction. Not the stupids, of course,

I would weep for humanity, but I refuse to include those meat puppets in that category.

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Thanks for demonstrating yet another way in which young black folks can’t win – the myth that successful black people didn’t earn their position.

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I was initially thinking that applying to 20 schools was excessive (not wrong or obnoxious, just maybe unnecessary), but the fact that he’s likely to get specific and different scholarship offers from different schools makes it totally reasonable.

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I don’t think that is what he meant at all.

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Full scholarships to all of them. Money was definitely a concern for the family, so that was both impressive and welcome news. Certainly, there will be other associated costs that may factor, but certainly congratulations are in order. His current plans are for law school, so it’s good the family will be able to save some money ahead of that.