The front page of today’s New York Times prominently features a touching sports story about underdogs doing well, “In South Africa, Yachting Erases a Racial Barrier.” It chronicles the unlikely story of a group of black and mixed race kids (7 out of the 24 crew members) who have been having remarkable success in the generally lily-white sport of yachting. Their boat has a financial backer, shipping company magnate Salvatore Sarno, and they are headed for the next America’s Cup race in Valencia in 2007.
Sports is a mighty engine of inspirational tales. Here’s another: an iconoclastic shipping tycoon mounts Africa’s first challenge in the 153-year-old America’s Cup series. Lacking deep-pocketed sponsors, he buys a secondhand yacht that finished out of the money two Cups ago.
He recruits a motley crew capped, improbably, by a group of black and mixed-race young men, some of them from South Africa’s toughest townships, some of whom were hardly shaving when they climbed into their first boats. The pros write off the South Africans’ outmoded tub and their diverse crew.
And then, more improbably still, they begin to finish races ahead of some of the best yachtsmen on earth.
It is a striking story, but (never one to lose focus) here’s what struck me most:
Mr. Sarno, a Durbanite with a melodious Italian accent, is the first to say that Team Shosholoza is giving its nonwhite crewmen a chance, and nothing more. Like the whites on the crew, each sailor must prove himself worthy of contesting an America’s Cup or be bumped aside by someone better.
“Sometimes people ask me, ‘You’re taking black crew on for political reasons?’ ” he said. “Ridiculous. Not true.”
In the U.S., of course, Mr. Sarno would be considered a racist by many for his devotion to individual merit, but he recognizes that the race is to the swift, not the recipients of preferential treatment.
For once the NYT itself seems to agree. Michael Wines, the article’s author, quotes a (white) veteran sailor and team strategist who stated that “the black crewmen had earned their stripes.”
“I think a lot of people on the team were completely skeptical and said that we can try them for a while and they won’t make the cut,” he said. “And obviously that hasn’t happened. They’ve risen to the occasion.”
Adds Wines: “That is unsurprising; sailing skill is unrelated to skin color.”
True, but is any skill related so skin color? If not, why is individualistic, merit-based colorblindness good enough for South African yachting but not good enough for American colleges or fire departments?
Its patently obvious that sailing is unrelated to race. Generally speaking, all sailors begin on a ‘level’ playing field, bringing little else to the start line other than their athleticism.
Pure athleticism is determined not by environmental or socio economic factors out of the athletes’ control, but rather (at least primarily) by the innate ability of their bodies to perform at exceedingly high levels. The same cannot be said for entrants into our university and college systems. Theoretically, I must agree that all of us may begin, at birth anyway, on a level playing field, but the average 18 year old black college applicant and the average 18 year white applicant, having experienced the various uncontrollable socio economic realities of their upbringing (realities too numerous to name), cannot logically be collapsed into one conclusive category. Argue that this view is disparaging to minorities if you want, but its a reality, one which the various policies which you’ve espoused to bemoan at least attempt to address.
In the absence of such policies, how do you propose the various inequalities and unconscionable disparities in our societies institutions be corrected? Or is your stance one of reaction rather than action? Aren’t these policies, if nothing else, short term means to a rather justified end?
I have yet to encounter real substantive dialogue about how we can really fix what’s wrong with race in our country. Maybe it can’t be . . .
There is no average 18 year old black college applicant or average 18 year old white college applicant. The creature doesn’t exist. Kids who grew up in side-by-side houses in the same neighborhood have different experiences and different destinies.
My daughter is a white almost-18-year-old who is college-bound. She has white 18-yr-old friends who are college-bound and white 18-yr-old friends who are not. Who’s average?
Since we are unaccustomed to thinking in the abstract, let me clarify. By ‘average’ I’m referring to what we may term a statistically significant sample or cross section of an applicant pool or category, as measured against another. Thoughts?
Its patently obvious that sailing is unrelated to race.
I’m not so sure that sailing is any more unrelated to race than is, say, biochemistry. The same sorts of social conditions that prevented blacks from having much experience with yachts also prevented them from having the sorts of opportunities and experiences that led others to careers in biochemistry.
Preventing individuals from developing their talents because of their race was evil. Treating different individuals as though they have talents they don’t because of their race is no solution to the prior evil.
I think you could make more useful groups than race. Since we’re talking about 18-year-old college applicants, black kids who are in the very rigorous honors program in my daughter’s school have more in common with her than with black kids in some of our inner-city schools whose average test scores are in the 30th percentile, at least in terms of experiences relevant to going to college.
Very well said Mr Rosenberg, and I agree. However, the key is to remove those developmental hindrances and obstacles that you alluded to at an early enough stage so that when one is ready to enter into our society as an a dult, she can truly be viewed and judged as one that has lived up to her full potential. If that cannot be done (and I am immensely and genuinely saddened by my view that it cannot), what other practical way is there to achieve these notions of equality that we argue over?
Must there not be a paradigm shift before we achieve equilibrium?
Man, comment spam is really getting weird these days. Do you get doggy spam just for using the word “underdog”?
Phil, are you making the blanket statement that black teenagers can’t be viewed and judged the same way white teenagers can? I know some black parents who would be mortally offended by that statement.
Firstly, kudos on the spam issue.
What I was referring to, Laura, was the removal of all possible race based barriers that a child may face so that when they’re judged along with their a dult peers, they can be judged by the content of their . . . , or at least judged as the product of a system where race is absolutely irrelevant. Such a utopia will never exist.
My point is simple. I recognize that my view may be a minority one here and I do not offer it combatively or antagonistically. I’m certainly no geneticist, but I believe that us humans are more or less ‘programmed’ to either doubt, dislike, fear or hate that or those that are not like us. Common intuition has led us to develop certain ‘checks’ to suppress such tendencies. The law is such a ‘check’. The policies at issue here are such ‘checks’.
My age and immaturity may very well be the reasons why I hold these views, but I see no other way around the issue.
‘There is no average 18 year old black college applicant or average 18 year old white college applicant’
Among a given dimension, there will be a distribution and thus an arithmetic mean.
Yes, if that dimension is measurable in a quantitative way. I suppose one could look at the “average skin color” of college applicants by looking at the reflective spectra and averaging for each wavelength… then mix back.
Of course, the resulting spectrum could be very odd, giving one a skin color that doesn’t exist in the real world.
(I’m not making any point about discrimination here, just the sloppy use of the word “average”).
John writes:
>>>Preventing individuals from developing their talents because of their race was evil. Treating different individuals as though they have talents they don’t because of their race is no solution to the prior evil.”
Very nice statement, John. I agree with both sentences. The second sentence, however, does not describe affirmative action, unless you’re claiming that all individuals aided by affirmative action don’t have the same talents as those who do not.
–Cobra
First, Cobra, let me introduce you to some elementary logic…
John states that race does not imply talent. You take this to mean something which is not logically equivalent, that lack of talent implies a certain race. In other words, it is clear that the only thing being said is that race is no indicator of talent. Period.
As to the debate on the term “average”, I agree whole heartedly with those that say there is no average; at least, that is to say, the mean of the population of college applicants of given variables is not helpful in this debate. I believe the point that Laura is trying to make, and it is a good one, is that socioeconomic status is a much better indicator of “life obstacles” than race, and black kids can come from a rich family, and white kids can come from a poor one. Beyond that, though, there’s no real conclusive way to determine “advantage” as those that pose the life obstacle theory try. A rich white male (perhaps the most maligned image on today’s college campus) could have still faced “life obstacles” separate from socioeconomic status, and equally plausible a poor person could’ve had advantages in certain life areas beyond socioeconomic status. If we take the life obstacles argument, then college admissions standards become increasingly arbitrary.
I would have liked to argue with Cobra, but I couldn’t figure out what he said.
Phil – I appreciate your comments and in fact do not think that you are in a minority here — at least not in your belief in removing all race-based obstacles to opportunity. To repeat, my points are that racial preferences are wrong — they reward and punish on the basis of race — and they don’t even correct or respond to the conditions that many point to in attempting to justify them. That is, if black kids have been disproportionately deprived of the opportunity to learn how to sail, it does nothing to change that fact to sign on some young black yachtsmen as compensation for past injustice. Better would be to provide sailing camps for underprivileged kids.
Cobra – No, I don’t think every recipient of affirmative action is unqualified. I do think the great preponderance of them are less qualified than people who don’t receive preferences (if they weren’t, they wouldn’t need the preference), especially at elite schools where the difference in SAT averages is often 200 points are more.
“Common intuition has led us to develop certain ‘checks’ to suppress such tendencies. The law is such a ‘check’. The policies at issue here are such ‘checks’.”
Phil, I’m going to disagree with you here in a way that some people may regard as excessively trivial and others as fairly meaningful. I don’t think it’s common intution, I think it’s conscience. Morals. Right v. wrong. The difference this makes is that law and policies are not the only checks (I know you didn’t say they are) and they aren’t even the primary checks; it’s individual people’s consciences telling them what they need to do. I know what Cobra will say, and he’s right: people are all too ready to override what they know to be right and wrong when it benefits them financially or some other way. That’s not a white thing, that’s human nature. But without the consciences of people of strong character and integrity telling them that helping white people while hurting blacks is wrong, we’d still have Jim Crow. Heck, we’d still have slavery. So I don’t think that the laws and policies are the only solutions and I don’t think they’ll be with us forever. At least, I hope not.
‘Of course, the resulting spectrum could be very odd, giving one a skin color that doesn’t exist in the real world.’
why? we have skin color from very dark to very white and all sorts in between. At least on this point, there certainly is an average, it would be somewhere in between.
Averages get problematic when we’re measuring incommesurables.
“But without the consciences of people of strong character and integrity telling them that helping white people while hurting blacks is wrong, we’d still have Jim Crow.”
When do we stop pretending that it’s 1955? There is no constituency for a return to Jim Crow, no matter how often Cobra wants to pretend otherwise.
The real question, which Cobra keeps avoiding, is the reality that it’s all available for black men if they want it. These discussions get very tiresome when they focus on these long-distance, theoretical issues. The reality is that a good education and job is available for any black man who wants it. I know this because black women grasped this reality a long time ago and ran with it. Middle management in the fields in which I am involved has been dominated by black women for two decades.
I think it would be very good to address this widening divide between black women and men, instead of pretending that this divide does not exist.
The problem you are all skirting is the self-destructive behavior of black men, of which Cobra is a great example. He’s complaining endlessly about theoretical wrongs to an entire race, while he’s evidently completely uninterested in the limitless opportunities out there for him. And, he’s learned from white liberals that invoking guilt about the past gets him stuff. THIS IS THE SELF-DESTRUCTIVE BEHAVIOR THAT IS DESTROYING BLACK MEN! Can I put it any more bluntly?
Just went out with a very beautiful black woman last night, who spent the first hour, as usual, complaining about the kind of behavior exemplified by Cobra’s endless excuse-mongering and getting-over.
Firstly I doubt seriously the existence of this great chasm between black men and women and secondly it humorous to me to see that so many people adhere to this ‘indictment’of blacks as self destructive behavior mongers. C’mon. Are you really telling me that thats the real reason behind [list all racial imparities here]?
Let’s rewind and address this “logic” issue.
Andrew writes:
>>>First, Cobra, let me introduce you to some elementary logic…
John states that race does not imply talent. You take this to mean something which is not logically equivalent, that lack of talent implies a certain race. In other words, it is clear that the only thing being said is that race is no indicator of talent. Period.”
The statement John posted read as follows:
>>>Treating different individuals as though they have talents they don’t BECAUSE OF THEIR RACE is no solution to the prior evil.”
Now, maybe John’s point wasn’t to imply that preference recipients were “untalented”, but that is PRECISELY how this sentence reads. Andrew, maybe you read a different sentence than I did. Maybe, John used a modifying phrase that I didn’t pick up on. To John’s credit, he follows up with this statement several posts down.
>>>Cobra – No, I don’t think every recipient of affirmative action is unqualified. I do think the great preponderance of them are less qualified than people who don’t receive preferences (if they weren’t, they wouldn’t need the preference), especially at elite schools where the difference in SAT averages is often 200 points are more.”
John clarified his earlier comment from an absolute to a more maleable one, but he still reinforces his belief that most recipients of racial preferences aren’t as qualified as those who don’t receive them. In this case, “qualification” is defined only as SAT scores at elite universities. I have posted many times about the SAT issue, and won’t repeat myself here. Obviously, my definition of qualification isn’t neccessarily the same as John’s, and that’s perfectly fine. But saying I need an “introductory lesson in logic” for interpreting that sentence the way I did, well…that’s your opinion. We all have one.
Stephen,
Don’t change ONE THING about yourself. Not ONE. I wouldn’t want to have you any OTHER way.
Phil writes:
>>>Firstly I doubt seriously the existence of this great chasm between black men and women and secondly it humorous to me to see that so many people adhere to this ‘indictment’of blacks as self destructive behavior mongers. C’mon. Are you really telling me that thats the real reason behind [list all racial imparities here]?”
You’ll find this blog quite interesting in many aspects. I believe that there are several regular posters in here who are honestly against Affirmative Action on PRINCIPLE. If you go back through the archives you can see some of these reasoned arguments. These posters I have great respect for because they will at least acknowledge the PROBLEMS that still exist for underrepresented minorities.
I am FOR Affirmative Action because it is still neccessary in what I believe is a racist and sexist America. I provide volumes of statistics, analysis, research, and documents that steel my viewpoints.
Then…there is a third category of posters, led by my friend Stephen.
It all makes for an fascinating read, Phil.
–Cobra
Cobra, Phil,
But it is true that Black women are doing better than Black men are. They get into college and graduate from college at much higher rates; they’re incarcerated at much lower rates; they’re far less likely to die of violence; &c. Of course, you could say the same about white women vs. white men, but the disparities aren’t nearly as bad, IIRC.
Phil, leave race out for a moment and talk gender. Men die on average several years younger than women. They get murdered several times more often. They commit suicide several times more often. They are incarcerated several times more often. They’re killed while at work several times more often.
Now, I am not interested so much in whether there are genetic predispositions to this or that; and I’m perfectly willing to believe that men die disproportionately in all sorts of ways for reasons that have nothing to do with genes. But if you think that the toll of male murder victims has nothing whatever to do with male behavior, or that the toll of male work fatalities has nothing to do with male behavior, or the male rate of incarceration has nothing to do with male behavior, then you’re dreaming. Men are disproportionately murdered because they are disproportionately involved with violent criminals, either consorting with them or trying to stop them; they’re disproportionately killed on the job because they overwhelmingly staff most of the most dangerous jobs; and they’re the large majority of prisoners because they do the large majority of crime carrying stiff sentences.
Statistical disparities like this are terribly complicated, because there are any number of factors in play. When it comes to male life expectancy &c., no one seems sure how much it’s safe — politically safe, I mean — to ascribe to nature and how much to nurture.
OK Michelle. Lets be politically ‘unsafe’. This is a blog right? Question: How much do YOU ascribe to ‘nature’ and ‘nurture’ with respect to unconscionable racial disparities in our institutions? Are you implying what I think you’re implying? I seriously have no idea what you’re talking about.
Phil,
The honest fact is that I don’t know what is an “unconscionable racial disparity.” Look, I was a mechanical engineering undergraduate at UC/Berkeley. I was in classes where there were several times more men than women — and where Asian-Americans outnumbered all other racial groups by nearly as high a proportion. The dearth of women in engineering was considered then, as it is now, a problem that has to be solved. The dearth of white students in engineering was not considered a problem at all, nor is it now.
So . . . is this “unconscionable”?
Before I went to Cal, I was a violin student in the prep. div. of the Juilliard School. I would estimate that 80% of the students there were Asian-American. This is not the demographic make-up of the greater NYC area, let alone the state or the country.
Is this “unconscionable”?
My point is just that there are vast racial disparities that no one seems to think “unconscionable.” Now Cobra knows, as you possibly don’t, that I do realize that Blacks have been cruelly held back, that Black health has been neglected (I would say neglected absurdly in favor of women’s health, when women are already outliving men by several years on average), &c. [Cobra, I apologize for the &c. — it wasn’t that I couldn’t think of anything else to put there, but that I thought of too much.]
Now, Phil, I basically didn’t say a damn thing about racial differences in my post from beginning to end. My point was just that most of the reasons men die earlier than women can be tied neatly to things men do. Men get murdered by being in the company of murderous people; they get killed on the job by doing dangerous work; they get locked up by doing the sort of things that generally do get you locked up; and they stay in prison longer because they do the sorts of things that occasion longer sentences.
Are these disparities that require explanation? Or are they the sorts of disparities that arise innocently, like the Asian-Americian majority in my engineering classes or the Asian-American majority at Juilliard (or, for that matter, the large female majority among entering college students)? You tell me, Phil: When is a race or gender disparity provably innocent? Is that even possible?
That was my post about common intuition v. conscience.
Cobra, I’m going to take a leaf from actus’ book here. The average SAT score of black high school graduates is lower than the average SAT score of white high school graduates. So do we assume that that condition is going to go on forever, i.e., that that’s the best black kids can do, or do we figure out if there are changes SOCIETY can make to bring up those test scores? Because if you just keep adding points for black kids, or whatever you do to make up for the disparity, then you never have to solve the problem. Question two is, when the happy day arrives that black kids’ average score is the same as or higher than white kids’ average, ditto GPAs and performance in extracurriculars and so forth, will you still want AA in college and university admissions?
Michelle writes:
>>>But it is true that Black women are doing better than Black men are. ”
I’ll grant you that. And I’ll also further the point that it’s predictable.
You and I may disagree about who controls power in this society, but to many employers, a black woman is preferable.
>>>The level of promise can easily be overstated. First, it’s harder to help poor black men get jobs than poor black women, in part because many employers perceive women to be more trainable, a better employment risk.”
http://www.newamerica.net/index.cfm?pg=article&DocID=1150
There are so many factors to address in the different attitudes on education and acheivement in black America, I can’t begin to do it justice here, but I would ask you a question:
What would be your idea of “success” in America, and do the standards vary from your own personal example to this discussion at hand?
–Cobra
Laura writes:
>>>So do we assume that that condition is going to go on forever, i.e., that that’s the best black kids can do, or do we figure out if there are changes SOCIETY can make to bring up those test scores? Because if you just keep adding points for black kids, or whatever you do to make up for the disparity, then you never have to solve the problem.”
Well, first Laura, I think we should define the problem. If the problem is that after 11 years of education, blacks don’t perform as well on standardized tests as whites on average, many would consider that the “problem”. Since whites on average, don’t score as highly on standardized tests as Asian Americans (as Michelle or Leo will quickly point out) would you consider that fact ALSO a problem? There are many factors that bubble into this issue, and I don’t want to avoid the tough part. I believe, as Cosby, and nearly every black minister I’ve ever met that education should be the priority in the home growing up…before television, sports, games, and other distractions. But that’s not a racially exclusive strategy. That being said, I actually AGREE WITH YOU on an earlier post, where you stated that the public school systems had to be saved, because to a poor, single mother working to keep food on the table, a substandard public school is just another obstacle to overcome.
>>>Question two is, when the happy day arrives that black kids’ average score is the same as or higher than white kids’ average, ditto GPAs and performance in extracurriculars and so forth, will you still want AA in college and university admissions?”
That’s assuming we can fix question 1, but if it does happen, we MAY still need some preference programs to ensure that the system provides an honest attempt at a representative student body. Remember, the original need for Affirmative Action wasn’t because minorities weren’t qualified. It was because they were denied opportunity.
–Cobra
OK, folks, I’m going to introduce a bit of sense to this again.
Quit worrying about why so many black men are screwing up and demand that they live up to the same standards you demand of white men. This is sort of a form of “tough love.” It’s a good thing to do.
Demand that black men renounce gang violence and refuse to indulge in the romanticizing of said violence. And, it is also a form of tough love to refuse to allow them to get away with a handicap in competition. It’s good for them to have to compete fairly against everybody else. Cobra is wrong is his obviously belief that he can’t hack it.
He could. He just needs to stop making excuses, chuck the racial paranoia, and work and study hard. I mean at something beyond his racism scholarship.
“That being said, I actually AGREE WITH YOU on an earlier post, where you stated that the public school systems had to be saved, because to a poor, single mother working to keep food on the table, a substandard public school is just another obstacle to overcome.”
The answer to this is: Don’t encourage single motherhood. Read Thomas Sowell and you’ll be astonished to discover that before the civil rights movement of the 1960s, black children were more likely to grow up in traditional families with mom and dad at home than white children.
Don’t let Cobra peddle that white guilt thing to you. The consequences are disastrous for blacks. This destruction of the black family can be laid squarely at the door of guilty white liberals who demanded the welfare policies that led to this disaster.
“Since whites on average, don’t score as highly on standardized tests as Asian Americans (as Michelle or Leo will quickly point out) would you consider that fact ALSO a problem?” No, actually I don’t, but then I’m not pushing for AA for white people on their college admissions. If the top schools admitted solely on qualifications, and they turned out to be 80% Asian, so be it. I’m serious.
So even if black students applying to U of Michigan had the same range, median, and average test scores and GPAs as white kids; and even though U of Mich went to the mat to try to give black kids extra points, thus showing that they absolutely are not holding black kids back because of their race; you still would think that those black kids, WITH THE SAME TEST SCORES AND ACADEMIC QUALIFICATIONS, ought to get extra points for admissions because they’re black. Is that right?
Laura,
The short answer? Yes. There are more forces at work in America than simply merit.
–Cobra
Then you are perpetuating racism in America and we have no common ground on this issue.
> sailing skill is unrelated to
> skin color.”
> True, but is any skill related
> to skin color?
Yes. The “skill” of providing diversity.
Laura writes:
>>>Then you are perpetuating racism in America and we have no common ground on this issue.”
Not really. What I’m doing is keeping hope alive. What I’m proposing is making sure, inspite of American racism, people have a chance…a foot in the door. In a perfect world, I would NEVER advocate preference programs. We do NOT live in a perfect world.
–Cobra
Cobra says,
“There are so many factors to address in the different attitudes on education and acheivement in black America, I can’t begin to do it justice here, but I would ask you a question:
What would be your idea of “success” in America, and do the standards vary from your own personal example to this discussion at hand? ”
–Cobra
cobra,
Whether this is an imperfect or a perfect world , it is not a justification for a preference. There may be many things that are Unconscionable in this world, but not a single thing needs a preference unless that recipient of a preference is in a dire need or in a terrible disadvantage compared to his/her competitors.
Shall we give preference to medical research for men because they have shorter lives than women? Do men need preferences in college because the female sex had overtaken them in enrollment? Too many Asians in the EECS department of bERkeley ( that happens to be the case in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Dept. at Berkeley )?. Too many black females entering college compared to black males? Asians have become the largest racial group in the freshman class of CUNY BAruch College in NYC, too many of them, what to do?, what to do? SERena and Venus Williams heading the US Open? where is Capriati? Where is Davenport? What do you want us to do Cobra? Chop off these ” Excess
numbers “? Too many blacks in the NBA and the NFL? Yet too few black college coaches? Let’s juggle the numbers, chop off the number of black players, increase the number of black coaches ? Is it really “unconscionable “?, unacceptable ? I guess all of these white, Asian, black and Hispanic people made the lives of preferentialists like you uncomfortable? Oh yes, blacks cannot swim? Really? Anthony Nesty of Surinam won an Olympic MEdal , he is black. I bet if we instituted a swimming program like East Germany did and put only blacks in it, blacks will put to shame the records of white folks like Mark Spitz, matt biondi and Michael Phelps, eh? Should we institute affirmative programs for whites at the EECS dept. in Berkeley , at CUNY BAruch, in the NFL or NBA ? Well why not? we have race preferences programs for blacks in the public universities, should we do the same thing in music and the arts? Alicia Keys is making too much money ? Should we put a stop to it?
How about BEyonce or Jessica Simpson? NOt that I care for the last 3, I don’t, but to insure affirmative programs for all of the above instances would spell disaster for everybody be they black, white or Asian.
The south African sailing team needs AA? Rig a marlin to the Comet or Tornado class of sailing boats and it will speed faster than a bullet. Life is so bad in public schools that we whites in San Francisco all moved to the private schools. Well Cobra, let me tell you about thee story of life in High schools in San Francisco. In San Francisco, white graduates make up about 80% of the Asian high school graduate population. In other words , if there were 10,000 Asian high school grads in FRisco last year, there would be about 8000 white high school grads.
However, if you visited San Francisco high schools like Washington, Lincoln or Lowell or Galileo, you would not think that whites attend SAn Francisco public high schools at all. Why? because they had basically abandoned the public schools for private schools. In other words , the white kids chose to attend Lick _ wilmerding ( very expensive ), SAcred Heart, Ignatius, Riordan etc. over the public high schools. Has this abandomenment of public high schools really helped whites? I doubt it. Last year 106 Asians from San Francisco County enrolled at Berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. This is in contrast to only 24 whites from San Francisco County who enrolled at berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. It seems that paying for expensive private school tuition has not helped whites that much as far as entry to Berkeley is concerned. AS you can see race preferences in the guise of affirmative action are like paying private school tuition, it is no guarantee of success. Or is it true that cultural values are of greater importance than private school tuition. ?
Cobra says,
“There are so many factors to address in the different attitudes on education and acheivement in black America, I can’t begin to do it justice here, but I would ask you a question:
What would be your idea of “success” in America, and do the standards vary from your own personal example to this discussion at hand? ”
–Cobra
cobra,
Whether this is an imperfect or a perfect world , it is not a justification for a preference. There may be many things that are Unconscionable in this world, but not a single thing needs a preference unless that recipient of a preference is in a dire need or in a terrible disadvantage compared to his/her competitors.
Shall we give preference to medical research for men because they have shorter lives than women? Do men need preferences in college because the female sex had overtaken them in enrollment? Too many Asians in the EECS department of bERkeley ( that happens to be the case in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Dept. at Berkeley )?. Too many black females entering college compared to black males? Asians have become the largest racial group in the freshman class of CUNY BAruch College in NYC, too many of them, what to do?, what to do? SERena and Venus Williams heading the US Open? where is Capriati? Where is Davenport? What do you want us to do Cobra? Chop off these ” Excess
numbers “? Too many blacks in the NBA and the NFL? Yet too few black college coaches? Let’s juggle the numbers, chop off the number of black players, increase the number of black coaches ? Is it really “unconscionable “?, unacceptable ? I guess all of these white, Asian, black and Hispanic people made the lives of preferentialists like you uncomfortable? Oh yes, blacks cannot swim? Really? Anthony Nesty of Surinam won an Olympic MEdal , he is black. I bet if we instituted a swimming program like East Germany did and put only blacks in it, blacks will put to shame the records of white folks like Mark Spitz, matt biondi and Michael Phelps, eh? Should we institute affirmative programs for whites at the EECS dept. in Berkeley , at CUNY BAruch, in the NFL or NBA ? Well why not? we have race preferences programs for blacks in the public universities, should we do the same thing in music and the arts? Alicia Keys is making too much money ? Should we put a stop to it?
How about BEyonce or Jessica Simpson? NOt that I care for the last 3, I don’t, but to insure affirmative programs for all of the above instances would spell disaster for everybody be they black, white or Asian.
The south African sailing team needs AA? Rig a marlin to the Comet or Tornado class of sailing boats and it will speed faster than a bullet. Life is so bad in public schools that we whites in San Francisco all moved to the private schools. Well Cobra, let me tell you about thee story of life in High schools in San Francisco. In San Francisco, white graduates make up about 80% of the Asian high school graduate population. In other words , if there were 10,000 Asian high school grads in FRisco last year, there would be about 8000 white high school grads.
However, if you visited San Francisco high schools like Washington, Lincoln or Lowell or Galileo, you would not think that whites attend SAn Francisco public high schools at all. Why? because they had basically abandoned the public schools for private schools. In other words , the white kids chose to attend Lick _ wilmerding ( very expensive ), SAcred Heart, Ignatius, Riordan etc. over the public high schools. Has this abandomenment of public high schools really helped whites? I doubt it. Last year 106 Asians from San Francisco County enrolled at Berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. This is in contrast to only 24 whites from San Francisco County who enrolled at berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. It seems that paying for expensive private school tuition has not helped whites that much as far as entry to Berkeley is concerned. AS you can see race preferences in the guise of affirmative action are like paying private school tuition, it is no guarantee of success. Or is it true that cultural values are of greater importance than private school tuition. ?
Cobra says,
“There are so many factors to address in the different attitudes on education and acheivement in black America, I can’t begin to do it justice here, but I would ask you a question:
What would be your idea of “success” in America, and do the standards vary from your own personal example to this discussion at hand? ”
–Cobra
cobra,
Whether this is an imperfect or a perfect world , it is not a justification for a preference. There may be many things that are Unconscionable in this world, but not a single thing needs a preference unless that recipient of a preference is in a dire need or in a terrible disadvantage compared to his/her competitors.
Shall we give preference to medical research for men because they have shorter lives than women? Do men need preferences in college because the female sex had overtaken them in enrollment? Too many Asians in the EECS department of bERkeley ( that happens to be the case in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Dept. at Berkeley )?. Too many black females entering college compared to black males? Asians have become the largest racial group in the freshman class of CUNY BAruch College in NYC, too many of them, what to do?, what to do? SERena and Venus Williams heading the US Open? where is Capriati? Where is Davenport? What do you want us to do Cobra? Chop off these ” Excess
numbers “? Too many blacks in the NBA and the NFL? Yet too few black college coaches? Let’s juggle the numbers, chop off the number of black players, increase the number of black coaches ? Is it really “unconscionable “?, unacceptable ? I guess all of these white, Asian, black and Hispanic people made the lives of preferentialists like you uncomfortable? Oh yes, blacks cannot swim? Really? Anthony Nesty of Surinam won an Olympic MEdal , he is black. I bet if we instituted a swimming program like East Germany did and put only blacks in it, blacks will put to shame the records of white folks like Mark Spitz, matt biondi and Michael Phelps, eh? Should we institute affirmative programs for whites at the EECS dept. in Berkeley , at CUNY BAruch, in the NFL or NBA ? Well why not? we have race preferences programs for blacks in the public universities, should we do the same thing in music and the arts? Alicia Keys is making too much money ? Should we put a stop to it?
How about BEyonce or Jessica Simpson? NOt that I care for the last 3, I don’t, but to insure affirmative programs for all of the above instances would spell disaster for everybody be they black, white or Asian.
The south African sailing team needs AA? Rig a marlin to the Comet or Tornado class of sailing boats and it will speed faster than a bullet. Life is so bad in public schools that we whites in San Francisco all moved to the private schools. Well Cobra, let me tell you about thee story of life in High schools in San Francisco. In San Francisco, white graduates make up about 80% of the Asian high school graduate population. In other words , if there were 10,000 Asian high school grads in FRisco last year, there would be about 8000 white high school grads.
However, if you visited San Francisco high schools like Washington, Lincoln or Lowell or Galileo, you would not think that whites attend SAn Francisco public high schools at all. Why? because they had basically abandoned the public schools for private schools. In other words , the white kids chose to attend Lick _ wilmerding ( very expensive ), SAcred Heart, Ignatius, Riordan etc. over the public high schools. Has this abandomenment of public high schools really helped whites? I doubt it. Last year 106 Asians from San Francisco County enrolled at Berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. This is in contrast to only 24 whites from San Francisco County who enrolled at berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. It seems that paying for expensive private school tuition has not helped whites that much as far as entry to Berkeley is concerned. AS you can see race preferences in the guise of affirmative action are like paying private school tuition, it is no guarantee of success. Or is it true that cultural values are of greater importance than private school tuition. ?
Cobra says,
“There are so many factors to address in the different attitudes on education and acheivement in black America, I can’t begin to do it justice here, but I would ask you a question:
What would be your idea of “success” in America, and do the standards vary from your own personal example to this discussion at hand? ”
–Cobra
cobra,
Whether this is an imperfect or a perfect world , it is not a justification for a preference. There may be many things that are Unconscionable in this world, but not a single thing needs a preference unless that recipient of a preference is in a dire need or in a terrible disadvantage compared to his/her competitors.
Shall we give preference to medical research for men because they have shorter lives than women? Do men need preferences in college because the female sex had overtaken them in enrollment? Too many Asians in the EECS department of bERkeley ( that happens to be the case in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Dept. at Berkeley )?. Too many black females entering college compared to black males? Asians have become the largest racial group in the freshman class of CUNY BAruch College in NYC, too many of them, what to do?, what to do? SERena and Venus Williams heading the US Open? where is Capriati? Where is Davenport? What do you want us to do Cobra? Chop off these ” Excess
numbers “? Too many blacks in the NBA and the NFL? Yet too few black college coaches? Let’s juggle the numbers, chop off the number of black players, increase the number of black coaches ? Is it really “unconscionable “?, unacceptable ? I guess all of these white, Asian, black and Hispanic people made the lives of preferentialists like you uncomfortable? Oh yes, blacks cannot swim? Really? Anthony Nesty of Surinam won an Olympic MEdal , he is black. I bet if we instituted a swimming program like East Germany did and put only blacks in it, blacks will put to shame the records of white folks like Mark Spitz, matt biondi and Michael Phelps, eh? Should we institute affirmative programs for whites at the EECS dept. in Berkeley , at CUNY BAruch, in the NFL or NBA ? Well why not? we have race preferences programs for blacks in the public universities, should we do the same thing in music and the arts? Alicia Keys is making too much money ? Should we put a stop to it?
How about BEyonce or Jessica Simpson? NOt that I care for the last 3, I don’t, but to insure affirmative programs for all of the above instances would spell disaster for everybody be they black, white or Asian.
The south African sailing team needs AA? Rig a marlin to the Comet or Tornado class of sailing boats and it will speed faster than a bullet. Life is so bad in public schools that we whites in San Francisco all moved to the private schools. Well Cobra, let me tell you about thee story of life in High schools in San Francisco. In San Francisco, white graduates make up about 80% of the Asian high school graduate population. In other words , if there were 10,000 Asian high school grads in FRisco last year, there would be about 8000 white high school grads.
However, if you visited San Francisco high schools like Washington, Lincoln or Lowell or Galileo, you would not think that whites attend SAn Francisco public high schools at all. Why? because they had basically abandoned the public schools for private schools. In other words , the white kids chose to attend Lick _ wilmerding ( very expensive ), SAcred Heart, Ignatius, Riordan etc. over the public high schools. Has this abandomenment of public high schools really helped whites? I doubt it. Last year 106 Asians from San Francisco County enrolled at Berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. This is in contrast to only 24 whites from San Francisco County who enrolled at berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. It seems that paying for expensive private school tuition has not helped whites that much as far as entry to Berkeley is concerned. AS you can see race preferences in the guise of affirmative action are like paying private school tuition, it is no guarantee of success. Or is it true that cultural values are of greater importance than private school tuition. ?
Cobra, in reading these posts I simply cannot understand why some folks just don’t see what is clearly right in front of their eyes. May be they don’t want to see it. Maybe they’re unable to see it, or properly comprehend it. Whatever it is, I do know this: this whole discussion is futile. Useless from the start. If a person can’t immediately grasp what is meant by ‘unconsionable racial disparites’, and instead goes on to suggest tangential hypotheticals and cite immaterial statistics, then we MUST be operating and arguing points premised on very different basic assumptions. For example, I understand that the question may have been posed rhetorically, but in response to one of your earlier posts, someone asked whether ‘too many Black players in the NBA and NFL’ was unconsionable. Are you serious?
That being said, I quit.
Though my despair deepens with each new day, I will keep hope alive. Good luck.
Cobra says,
“There are so many factors to address in the different attitudes on education and acheivement in black America, I can’t begin to do it justice here, but I would ask you a question:
What would be your idea of “success” in America, and do the standards vary from your own personal example to this discussion at hand? ”
–Cobra
cobra,
Whether this is an imperfect or a perfect world , it is not a justification for a preference. There may be many things that are Unconscionable in this world, but not a single thing needs a preference unless that recipient of a preference is in a dire need or in a terrible disadvantage compared to his/her competitors.
Shall we give preference to medical research for men because they have shorter lives than women? Do men need preferences in college because the female sex had overtaken them in enrollment? Too many Asians in the EECS department of bERkeley ( that happens to be the case in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Dept. at Berkeley )?. Too many black females entering college compared to black males? Asians have become the largest racial group in the freshman class of CUNY BAruch College in NYC, too many of them, what to do?, what to do? SERena and Venus Williams heading the US Open? where is Capriati? Where is Davenport? What do you want us to do Cobra? Chop off these ” Excess
numbers “? Too many blacks in the NBA and the NFL? Yet too few black college coaches? Let’s juggle the numbers, chop off the number of black players, increase the number of black coaches ? Is it really “unconscionable “?, unacceptable ? I guess all of these white, Asian, black and Hispanic people made the lives of preferentialists like you uncomfortable? Oh yes, blacks cannot swim? Really? Anthony Nesty of Surinam won an Olympic MEdal , he is black. I bet if we instituted a swimming program like East Germany did and put only blacks in it, blacks will put to shame the records of white folks like Mark Spitz, matt biondi and Michael Phelps, eh? Should we institute affirmative programs for whites at the EECS dept. in Berkeley , at CUNY BAruch, in the NFL or NBA ? Well why not? we have race preferences programs for blacks in the public universities, should we do the same thing in music and the arts? Alicia Keys is making too much money ? Should we put a stop to it?
How about BEyonce or Jessica Simpson? NOt that I care for the last 3, I don’t, but to insure affirmative programs for all of the above instances would spell disaster for everybody be they black, white or Asian.
The south African sailing team needs AA? Rig a marlin to the Comet or Tornado class of sailing boats and it will speed faster than a bullet. Life is so bad in public schools that we whites in San Francisco all moved to the private schools. Well Cobra, let me tell you about thee story of life in High schools in San Francisco. In San Francisco, white graduates make up about 80% of the Asian high school graduate population. In other words , if there were 10,000 Asian high school grads in FRisco last year, there would be about 8000 white high school grads.
However, if you visited San Francisco high schools like Washington, Lincoln or Lowell or Galileo, you would not think that whites attend SAn Francisco public high schools at all. Why? because they had basically abandoned the public schools for private schools. In other words , the white kids chose to attend Lick _ wilmerding ( very expensive ), SAcred Heart, Ignatius, Riordan etc. over the public high schools. Has this abandomenment of public high schools really helped whites? I doubt it. Last year 106 Asians from San Francisco County enrolled at Berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. This is in contrast to only 24 whites from San Francisco County who enrolled at berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. It seems that paying for expensive private school tuition has not helped whites that much as far as entry to Berkeley is concerned. AS you can see race preferences in the guise of affirmative action are like paying private school tuition, it is no guarantee of success. Or is it true that cultural values are of greater importance than private school tuition. ?
Cobra says,
“There are so many factors to address in the different attitudes on education and acheivement in black America, I can’t begin to do it justice here, but I would ask you a question:
What would be your idea of “success” in America, and do the standards vary from your own personal example to this discussion at hand? ”
–Cobra
cobra,
Whether this is an imperfect or a perfect world , it is not a justification for a preference. There may be many things that are Unconscionable in this world, but not a single thing needs a preference unless that recipient of a preference is in a dire need or in a terrible disadvantage compared to his/her competitors.
Shall we give preference to medical research for men because they have shorter lives than women? Do men need preferences in college because the female sex had overtaken them in enrollment? Too many Asians in the EECS department of bERkeley ( that happens to be the case in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Dept. at Berkeley )?. Too many black females entering college compared to black males? Asians have become the largest racial group in the freshman class of CUNY BAruch College in NYC, too many of them, what to do?, what to do? SERena and Venus Williams heading the US Open? where is Capriati? Where is Davenport? What do you want us to do Cobra? Chop off these ” Excess
numbers “? Too many blacks in the NBA and the NFL? Yet too few black college coaches? Let’s juggle the numbers, chop off the number of black players, increase the number of black coaches ? Is it really “unconscionable “?, unacceptable ? I guess all of these white, Asian, black and Hispanic people made the lives of preferentialists like you uncomfortable? Oh yes, blacks cannot swim? Really? Anthony Nesty of Surinam won an Olympic MEdal , he is black. I bet if we instituted a swimming program like East Germany did and put only blacks in it, blacks will put to shame the records of white folks like Mark Spitz, matt biondi and Michael Phelps, eh? Should we institute affirmative programs for whites at the EECS dept. in Berkeley , at CUNY BAruch, in the NFL or NBA ? Well why not? we have race preferences programs for blacks in the public universities, should we do the same thing in music and the arts? Alicia Keys is making too much money ? Should we put a stop to it?
How about BEyonce or Jessica Simpson? NOt that I care for the last 3, I don’t, but to insure affirmative programs for all of the above instances would spell disaster for everybody be they black, white or Asian.
The south African sailing team needs AA? Rig a marlin to the Comet or Tornado class of sailing boats and it will speed faster than a bullet. Life is so bad in public schools that we whites in San Francisco all moved to the private schools. Well Cobra, let me tell you about thee story of life in High schools in San Francisco. In San Francisco, white graduates make up about 80% of the Asian high school graduate population. In other words , if there were 10,000 Asian high school grads in FRisco last year, there would be about 8000 white high school grads.
However, if you visited San Francisco high schools like Washington, Lincoln or Lowell or Galileo, you would not think that whites attend SAn Francisco public high schools at all. Why? because they had basically abandoned the public schools for private schools. In other words , the white kids chose to attend Lick _ wilmerding ( very expensive ), SAcred Heart, Ignatius, Riordan etc. over the public high schools. Has this abandomenment of public high schools really helped whites? I doubt it. Last year 106 Asians from San Francisco County enrolled at Berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. This is in contrast to only 24 whites from San Francisco County who enrolled at berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. It seems that paying for expensive private school tuition has not helped whites that much as far as entry to Berkeley is concerned. AS you can see race preferences in the guise of affirmative action are like paying private school tuition, it is no guarantee of success. Or is it true that cultural values are of greater importance than private school tuition. ?
Cobra says,
“There are so many factors to address in the different attitudes on education and acheivement in black America, I can’t begin to do it justice here, but I would ask you a question:
What would be your idea of “success” in America, and do the standards vary from your own personal example to this discussion at hand? ”
–Cobra
cobra,
Whether this is an imperfect or a perfect world , it is not a justification for a preference. There may be many things that are Unconscionable in this world, but not a single thing needs a preference unless that recipient of a preference is in a dire need or in a terrible disadvantage compared to his/her competitors.
Shall we give preference to medical research for men because they have shorter lives than women? Do men need preferences in college because the female sex had overtaken them in enrollment? Too many Asians in the EECS department of bERkeley ( that happens to be the case in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Dept. at Berkeley )?. Too many black females entering college compared to black males? Asians have become the largest racial group in the freshman class of CUNY BAruch College in NYC, too many of them, what to do?, what to do? SERena and Venus Williams heading the US Open? where is Capriati? Where is Davenport? What do you want us to do Cobra? Chop off these ” Excess
numbers “? Too many blacks in the NBA and the NFL? Yet too few black college coaches? Let’s juggle the numbers, chop off the number of black players, increase the number of black coaches ? Is it really “unconscionable “?, unacceptable ? I guess all of these white, Asian, black and Hispanic people made the lives of preferentialists like you uncomfortable? Oh yes, blacks cannot swim? Really? Anthony Nesty of Surinam won an Olympic MEdal , he is black. I bet if we instituted a swimming program like East Germany did and put only blacks in it, blacks will put to shame the records of white folks like Mark Spitz, matt biondi and Michael Phelps, eh? Should we institute affirmative programs for whites at the EECS dept. in Berkeley , at CUNY BAruch, in the NFL or NBA ? Well why not? we have race preferences programs for blacks in the public universities, should we do the same thing in music and the arts? Alicia Keys is making too much money ? Should we put a stop to it?
How about BEyonce or Jessica Simpson? NOt that I care for the last 3, I don’t, but to insure affirmative programs for all of the above instances would spell disaster for everybody be they black, white or Asian.
The south African sailing team needs AA? Rig a marlin to the Comet or Tornado class of sailing boats and it will speed faster than a bullet. Life is so bad in public schools that we whites in San Francisco all moved to the private schools. Well Cobra, let me tell you about thee story of life in High schools in San Francisco. In San Francisco, white graduates make up about 80% of the Asian high school graduate population. In other words , if there were 10,000 Asian high school grads in FRisco last year, there would be about 8000 white high school grads.
However, if you visited San Francisco high schools like Washington, Lincoln or Lowell or Galileo, you would not think that whites attend SAn Francisco public high schools at all. Why? because they had basically abandoned the public schools for private schools. In other words , the white kids chose to attend Lick _ wilmerding ( very expensive ), SAcred Heart, Ignatius, Riordan etc. over the public high schools. Has this abandomenment of public high schools really helped whites? I doubt it. Last year 106 Asians from San Francisco County enrolled at Berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. This is in contrast to only 24 whites from San Francisco County who enrolled at berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. It seems that paying for expensive private school tuition has not helped whites that much as far as entry to Berkeley is concerned. AS you can see race preferences in the guise of affirmative action are like paying private school tuition, it is no guarantee of success. Or is it true that cultural values are of greater importance than private school tuition. ?
Cobra says,
“There are so many factors to address in the different attitudes on education and acheivement in black America, I can’t begin to do it justice here, but I would ask you a question:
What would be your idea of “success” in America, and do the standards vary from your own personal example to this discussion at hand? ”
–Cobra
cobra,
Whether this is an imperfect or a perfect world , it is not a justification for a preference. There may be many things that are Unconscionable in this world, but not a single thing needs a preference unless that recipient of a preference is in a dire need or in a terrible disadvantage compared to his/her competitors.
Shall we give preference to medical research for men because they have shorter lives than women? Do men need preferences in college because the female sex had overtaken them in enrollment? Too many Asians in the EECS department of bERkeley ( that happens to be the case in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Dept. at Berkeley )?. Too many black females entering college compared to black males? Asians have become the largest racial group in the freshman class of CUNY BAruch College in NYC, too many of them, what to do?, what to do? SERena and Venus Williams heading the US Open? where is Capriati? Where is Davenport? What do you want us to do Cobra? Chop off these ” Excess
numbers “? Too many blacks in the NBA and the NFL? Yet too few black college coaches? Let’s juggle the numbers, chop off the number of black players, increase the number of black coaches ? Is it really “unconscionable “?, unacceptable ? I guess all of these white, Asian, black and Hispanic people made the lives of preferentialists like you uncomfortable? Oh yes, blacks cannot swim? Really? Anthony Nesty of Surinam won an Olympic MEdal , he is black. I bet if we instituted a swimming program like East Germany did and put only blacks in it, blacks will put to shame the records of white folks like Mark Spitz, matt biondi and Michael Phelps, eh? Should we institute affirmative programs for whites at the EECS dept. in Berkeley , at CUNY BAruch, in the NFL or NBA ? Well why not? we have race preferences programs for blacks in the public universities, should we do the same thing in music and the arts? Alicia Keys is making too much money ? Should we put a stop to it?
How about BEyonce or Jessica Simpson? NOt that I care for the last 3, I don’t, but to insure affirmative programs for all of the above instances would spell disaster for everybody be they black, white or Asian.
The south African sailing team needs AA? Rig a marlin to the Comet or Tornado class of sailing boats and it will speed faster than a bullet. Life is so bad in public schools that we whites in San Francisco all moved to the private schools. Well Cobra, let me tell you about thee story of life in High schools in San Francisco. In San Francisco, white graduates make up about 80% of the Asian high school graduate population. In other words , if there were 10,000 Asian high school grads in FRisco last year, there would be about 8000 white high school grads.
However, if you visited San Francisco high schools like Washington, Lincoln or Lowell or Galileo, you would not think that whites attend SAn Francisco public high schools at all. Why? because they had basically abandoned the public schools for private schools. In other words , the white kids chose to attend Lick _ wilmerding ( very expensive ), SAcred Heart, Ignatius, Riordan etc. over the public high schools. Has this abandomenment of public high schools really helped whites? I doubt it. Last year 106 Asians from San Francisco County enrolled at Berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. This is in contrast to only 24 whites from San Francisco County who enrolled at berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. It seems that paying for expensive private school tuition has not helped whites that much as far as entry to Berkeley is concerned. AS you can see race preferences in the guise of affirmative action are like paying private school tuition, it is no guarantee of success. Or is it true that cultural values are of greater importance than private school tuition. ?
Cobra says,
“There are so many factors to address in the different attitudes on education and acheivement in black America, I can’t begin to do it justice here, but I would ask you a question:
What would be your idea of “success” in America, and do the standards vary from your own personal example to this discussion at hand? ”
–Cobra
cobra,
Whether this is an imperfect or a perfect world , it is not a justification for a preference. There may be many things that are Unconscionable in this world, but not a single thing needs a preference unless that recipient of a preference is in a dire need or in a terrible disadvantage compared to his/her competitors.
Shall we give preference to medical research for men because they have shorter lives than women? Do men need preferences in college because the female sex had overtaken them in enrollment? Too many Asians in the EECS department of bERkeley ( that happens to be the case in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Dept. at Berkeley )?. Too many black females entering college compared to black males? Asians have become the largest racial group in the freshman class of CUNY BAruch College in NYC, too many of them, what to do?, what to do? SERena and Venus Williams heading the US Open? where is Capriati? Where is Davenport? What do you want us to do Cobra? Chop off these ” Excess
numbers “? Too many blacks in the NBA and the NFL? Yet too few black college coaches? Let’s juggle the numbers, chop off the number of black players, increase the number of black coaches ? Is it really “unconscionable “?, unacceptable ? I guess all of these white, Asian, black and Hispanic people made the lives of preferentialists like you uncomfortable? Oh yes, blacks cannot swim? Really? Anthony Nesty of Surinam won an Olympic MEdal , he is black. I bet if we instituted a swimming program like East Germany did and put only blacks in it, blacks will put to shame the records of white folks like Mark Spitz, matt biondi and Michael Phelps, eh? Should we institute affirmative programs for whites at the EECS dept. in Berkeley , at CUNY BAruch, in the NFL or NBA ? Well why not? we have race preferences programs for blacks in the public universities, should we do the same thing in music and the arts? Alicia Keys is making too much money ? Should we put a stop to it?
How about BEyonce or Jessica Simpson? NOt that I care for the last 3, I don’t, but to insure affirmative programs for all of the above instances would spell disaster for everybody be they black, white or Asian.
The south African sailing team needs AA? Rig a marlin to the Comet or Tornado class of sailing boats and it will speed faster than a bullet. Life is so bad in public schools that we whites in San Francisco all moved to the private schools. Well Cobra, let me tell you about thee story of life in High schools in San Francisco. In San Francisco, white graduates make up about 80% of the Asian high school graduate population. In other words , if there were 10,000 Asian high school grads in FRisco last year, there would be about 8000 white high school grads.
However, if you visited San Francisco high schools like Washington, Lincoln or Lowell or Galileo, you would not think that whites attend SAn Francisco public high schools at all. Why? because they had basically abandoned the public schools for private schools. In other words , the white kids chose to attend Lick _ wilmerding ( very expensive ), SAcred Heart, Ignatius, Riordan etc. over the public high schools. Has this abandomenment of public high schools really helped whites? I doubt it. Last year 106 Asians from San Francisco County enrolled at Berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. This is in contrast to only 24 whites from San Francisco County who enrolled at berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. It seems that paying for expensive private school tuition has not helped whites that much as far as entry to Berkeley is concerned. AS you can see race preferences in the guise of affirmative action are like paying private school tuition, it is no guarantee of success. Or is it true that cultural values are of greater importance than private school tuition. ?
Cobra says,
“There are so many factors to address in the different attitudes on education and acheivement in black America, I can’t begin to do it justice here, but I would ask you a question:
What would be your idea of “success” in America, and do the standards vary from your own personal example to this discussion at hand? ”
–Cobra
cobra,
Whether this is an imperfect or a perfect world , it is not a justification for a preference. There may be many things that are Unconscionable in this world, but not a single thing needs a preference unless that recipient of a preference is in a dire need or in a terrible disadvantage compared to his/her competitors.
Shall we give preference to medical research for men because they have shorter lives than women? Do men need preferences in college because the female sex had overtaken them in enrollment? Too many Asians in the EECS department of bERkeley ( that happens to be the case in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Dept. at Berkeley )?. Too many black females entering college compared to black males? Asians have become the largest racial group in the freshman class of CUNY BAruch College in NYC, too many of them, what to do?, what to do? SERena and Venus Williams heading the US Open? where is Capriati? Where is Davenport? What do you want us to do Cobra? Chop off these ” Excess
numbers “? Too many blacks in the NBA and the NFL? Yet too few black college coaches? Let’s juggle the numbers, chop off the number of black players, increase the number of black coaches ? Is it really “unconscionable “?, unacceptable ? I guess all of these white, Asian, black and Hispanic people made the lives of preferentialists like you uncomfortable? Oh yes, blacks cannot swim? Really? Anthony Nesty of Surinam won an Olympic MEdal , he is black. I bet if we instituted a swimming program like East Germany did and put only blacks in it, blacks will put to shame the records of white folks like Mark Spitz, matt biondi and Michael Phelps, eh? Should we institute affirmative programs for whites at the EECS dept. in Berkeley , at CUNY BAruch, in the NFL or NBA ? Well why not? we have race preferences programs for blacks in the public universities, should we do the same thing in music and the arts? Alicia Keys is making too much money ? Should we put a stop to it?
How about BEyonce or Jessica Simpson? NOt that I care for the last 3, I don’t, but to insure affirmative programs for all of the above instances would spell disaster for everybody be they black, white or Asian.
The south African sailing team needs AA? Rig a marlin to the Comet or Tornado class of sailing boats and it will speed faster than a bullet. Life is so bad in public schools that we whites in San Francisco all moved to the private schools. Well Cobra, let me tell you about thee story of life in High schools in San Francisco. In San Francisco, white graduates make up about 80% of the Asian high school graduate population. In other words , if there were 10,000 Asian high school grads in FRisco last year, there would be about 8000 white high school grads.
However, if you visited San Francisco high schools like Washington, Lincoln or Lowell or Galileo, you would not think that whites attend SAn Francisco public high schools at all. Why? because they had basically abandoned the public schools for private schools. In other words , the white kids chose to attend Lick _ wilmerding ( very expensive ), SAcred Heart, Ignatius, Riordan etc. over the public high schools. Has this abandomenment of public high schools really helped whites? I doubt it. Last year 106 Asians from San Francisco County enrolled at Berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. This is in contrast to only 24 whites from San Francisco County who enrolled at berkeley for the fall 2004 freshman class. It seems that paying for expensive private school tuition has not helped whites that much as far as entry to Berkeley is concerned. AS you can see race preferences in the guise of affirmative action are like paying private school tuition, it is no guarantee of success. Or is it true that cultural values are of greater importance than private school tuition. ?
Phil,
You see the opposition we face. I don’t blame you for opting out. There are times people say I bang my head against the wall here. But, I guess that’s just the masochist in me that never gives up. Also the fact that people who fought before me didn’t give up in the face of attack dogs, fire hoses, Jim Crow, lynchings, and slavery tells me I can’t stop speaking truth to power in the inconsequential blogosphere or anywhere else.
I respect you, Phil. Carry on the good fight, brother.
–Cobra
“What I’m proposing is making sure, inspite of American racism, people have a chance…a foot in the door.”
Oh, please. In my hypothetical, the black students would have the same academic qualifications as white students, applying to U of M that went all the way to the SC trying to keep their black race preferences, and you still think the black students need extra points to make sure they get a foot in the door. I think you have a poorer opinion of black people’s abilities to go after what they want than I do.
Speaking truth to power? On this blog? What the heck are you talking about? I live in a city that will never again have a white mayor or majority white city council or school board. Never. I hear the city mayor on the black radio stations talking about “our people” and, buddy, city taxpayer though I am, he’s not talking about me. OK, maybe it’s payback time, fair enough. If it bothers me, I’m free to leave. But for you to suggest that I have power? Ha ha ha ha.
Phil,
Whatever it is, I do know this: this whole discussion is futile. Useless from the start. If a person can’t immediately grasp what is meant by ‘unconsionable racial disparites’, and instead goes on to suggest tangential hypotheticals and cite immaterial statistics, then we MUST be operating and arguing points premised on very different basic assumptions.
Phil, I hope you are still reading this thread. No, I really don’t know which racial disparities are “unconscionable.”
I was trying to understand, and to get others to help me understand.
Look, I live in an exceptionally multiracial corner of a multiracial country. I see “racial disparities” all over the place. I see Latinos concentrated in some work, Chinese-Americans concentrated in other work. For that matter, I see men concentrated in some work, and women concentrated in other work.
Now, please try to understand. My objection is this: When a group that has been discriminated against comes out ahead, there is no problem. When a group that has not been discriminated against comes out ahead, there is a problem.
So the low fraction of women majoring in the hard sciences and engineering is a crisis; the fact that many more women than men go to college is not. The low number of women in top engineering schools is a problem; the low number of white students in the same classes is not. The underrepresentation of Latinos is a problem; the overrepresentation of Asian-Americans is not.
Now, I am a white woman with an engineering degree from UCB, and I remember well the sense of being, as it were, doubly outnumbered. But I would never have characterized the dearth of women or of whites in the MechE program as an “unconscionable disparity.” That’s because I knew my fellow students, and knew absolutely that they were there for the same reason I was: because we could do the work.
Phil, Cobra knows (as I’ve said it many times) that I don’t think the situation of Blacks and Native Americans is comparable to that of other minorities, or to that of women vs. men. There is a debt there; the debate is about how to pay it. And to me racial preferences seem about the worst possible way, just as gender preferences would have been the worst possible way for that problem.
Michelle writes:
>>>Phil, Cobra knows (as I’ve said it many times) that I don’t think the situation of Blacks and Native Americans is comparable to that of other minorities, or to that of women vs. men. There is a debt there; the debate is about how to pay it. And to me racial preferences seem about the worst possible way, just as gender preferences would have been the worst possible way for that problem.”
Michelle, you are a very perplexing poster here, at least for me. We agree on so many things about the social realities of America, past and present, yet we always get to the fork on the road on preferences. I believe that it is the best solution out there given the state of race relations in America today, because it works. Qualified minorities are being hired, admitted and promoted to an extent that they were not before the preferences existed, and the fruit of that progress has resulted in a higher standard of living. Also, think about it…as satanic as many in here believe Affirmative Action to be, the miniscule percentages in corporate leadership, college enrollment, and employment would lead me to believe that it’s not ENOUGH, as opposed to “too much.”
What perplexes me about your posts in particular, is that you acknowledge there has been and to some begrudged extent, still continues to be a problem, but the SOLUTION seems to evade you. Now, maybe I haven’t read between the lines enough in your posts, but what is your ALTERNATIVE that could help confront a generational pandemic of discrimination?
Laura:
>>>If it bothers me, I’m free to leave. But for you to suggest that I have power? Ha ha ha ha.”
Well, my posts may be in response to other blogger’s statements, as trivial as they may seem, but the fact is that anything posted here courses through the internet. Your statements and mine are accessible through Google and other search engines, and can be read by anybody on the planet. That makes our words far more prolific than letters to the editor of your local paper, or talk radio callers.
The downside of this, is that I’m sure I’ve raised a few flags in Washington, and Al “Torqamada” Gonzales probably has some files in there somewhere.
Leo writes:
>>>Whether this is an imperfect or a perfect world , it is not a justification for a preference. There may be many things that are Unconscionable in this world, but not a single thing needs a preference unless that recipient of a preference is in a dire need or in a terrible disadvantage compared to his/her competitors.”
Why have you modified your stance, Leo? I thought ‘NOTHING JUSTIFIES PREFERENCES?” You actually had the moral high ground for months on this blog, but if you’re making exceptions on CLASS, instead of race, then you’re down here with me and the rest of the “preferentialists.”
–Cobra
So while you’re pretending to converse with us, you’re really aiming your verbal jousts at Al “Torqamada” Gonzales. My feelings are hurt. But I’ll send you care packages in the Gulag.
Cobra, I’ll have to get back to you later with a fuller explanation; I haven’t the time to write it now. But let me illustrate it this way: Suppose two kids are applying for college; suppose their parents are poor immigrants who arrived here speaking little or no English. Suppose their grades and test scores are identical. Suppose one is named Maria Jiminez, and the other is named Kiet Truong. Can you give me any reason why one of these kids gets an extra boost and the other does not? Is this fair? Is this right? You tell me.
Michelle writes:
>>>Suppose one is named Maria Jiminez, and the other is named Kiet Truong. Can you give me any reason why one of these kids gets an extra boost and the other does not? Is this fair? Is this right? You tell me.”
Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit. Of course, you also know that a Bush or a Kennedy would’ve gotten a boost over either candidate, right? Or a member of the Walton, Hilton, or Hearst families. That’s apparently OK with the posters (save Leo) here because those families fit the profile of the acceptible, homogenized American success template.
So your questions about “fairness” and “right and wrong” are all relative to the subject you’re evaluating. As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-)
Laura writes:
>>>So while you’re pretending to converse with us, you’re really aiming your verbal jousts at Al “Torqamada” Gonzales. My feelings are hurt. But I’ll send you care packages in the Gulag.”
http://www.thecobraslair.com/images/WOOD-SHAMPOO-STREAM-OF.gif
Bushamerica is a scary place, Laura. Given the cartoons I draw, it’s just a matter of time before I hear that ominous knock on my door…or that black helicopter flying over head.
Be afraid….be very afraid.
–Cobra
Michelle:
Suppose one is named Maria Jiminez, and the other is named Kiet Truong. Can you give me any reason why one of these kids gets an extra boost and the other does not? Is this fair? Is this right? You tell me.
cobra:
The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit.
Really? How do you know? There are all sorts of reasons why there aren’t as many Jiminezes in certain colleges as you think there should be, but discrimination by admissions officers is not one of them.
These admissions officers, after all, have been virtually unanimous in demanding that they be allowed to contine discriminating IN FAVOR of Jiminez. But for some wacky reason (or lack of any reason) you think that if they were prevented from discriminating in favor, they would all rush as soon as they could to discriminate against? Wacky may be too kind a word for tihs opinion.
Solzhenitsyn wrote about a man who was sentenced to 8 years of hard labor because he doodled a picture of a pig on a piece of newspaper that also had a picture of Stalin on it. The other zeks thought he deserved his punishment for being so stupid. S himself wrote disparagingly about “the man with the mustache” in private letters to a friend and that was his downfall. If you’re looking for persecution for your expressions, I’m afraid you were born at the wrong time in the wrong country.
Cobra,
I guess I may be more of an optimist than you are about America. I just find it extremely hard to believe that the very same people fighting tooth and nail for the continuation of the use of preferences would suddenly turn around and start discriminating against black applicants just because they now have to be color-blind.
In fact, I think your objection to color-blindness is a bit odd because it still means that racial discrimination against minorities is till banned.
You give me the impression that the chances are 50/50 I’ll be in a concentration camp tomorrow, the 13th, 14th (and 19th) Amendments and the Civil Rights Acts be damned. That’s what I take away from all the Chomsky inspired tracts you post here.
Either way, I also take issue with your attribution of every single advancement in the Black community to racial preferences. Even prior to the institutionalization of racial preferences (strangely enough, by Richard Nixon) Black people were moving on up. Maybe I’m wrong, but I’m getting the impression that you believe that the Black community was stagnant, and not producing any doctors, lawyers, engineers, etc. until racial preferences came to save us.
Maybe, it’s because I’m a conservative, but the evidence I’ve seen suggests that while the Civil Rights Acts fully opened the doors to progress in the black community, LBJ’s Great Society programs came by and put shackles around the Black community’s feet (even though they looked like nice shoes at the time).
When it comes right down to it, the reason why there are so many disparities in numbers is because of the quality of K-12 education so many black children get. So long as so many black kids are graduating high school barely literate and totally hopeless at math or the sciences, there is no way those numbers will equalize, no matter how many extra points you give black applicants. If you can’t do math, you cannot be an engineer, an accountant or even a competent store clerk.
If the CBC spent just a quarter of the time it spends screaming for preferences on actually doing something for K-12 education in the inner-city instead of shilling for the teachers unions, we’ll be able to have the black engineers, doctors, lawyers, bankers, etc. in the numbers we all hope for even if all racial preferences are banned.
PS: In case you didn’t pick it up, I am Black too. And after reading a lot of your posts on Ward Connerly, Clarence Thomas, etc. I guess I also satisfy your definition of a “race traitor.” You’re entitled to the opinion, in fact, it is your right.
But, you know, I couldn’t possibly care any less. When I was born, there was no tattoo on my forehead, stomach or rear end saying; Property of Jesse Jackson, Bill Clinton, DNC, NAACP or even Property of the Left. No divinely sent bolt of lightning has struck me for voting for Republican so I am positive God intended for me to make up my own mind on these issues.
In other words, I owe nobody any allegiance because I am a Black man. I have every right to believe whatever I choose and I will still be black whether you like it or not. Whether the subject is taxes, abortion, school choice, the Second Amendment, gay marriage, welfare, and yes, even racial preferences, I can come to a conclusion 100% diametrically opposed to yours on each of these issues and I will still be Black, and EVERY BIT as concerned with uplifting the Black community as you could ever claim to be.
Ma’asallaam
Cobra,
[me:] “Suppose one is named Maria Jiminez, and the other is named Kiet Truong. Can you give me any reason why one of these kids gets an extra boost and the other does not? Is this fair? Is this right? You tell me.”
Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit.
And then later:
As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-)
Well, in the first place, I think I owe an apology to Kiet Truong, who was a student of mine several years ago, and whose name I used in the argument above. I had no right to make him into an ethnic example, and I was additionally remiss in putting him into a situation where Cobra could (inadvertently) turn him into a woman.
I was, I admit, curious whether Cobra would jump to the conclusion that “Kiet Truong” was female just because “Maria Jiminez” evidently was; and for that matter that “Kiet Truong” was the child of two Asian parents, and “Maria Jiminez” the child of two Latino parents. In fact there was nothing in my hypothetical that excluded “Kiet Truong”‘s mother being Guatemalan, or “Maria Jiminez”‘s mother being Cambodian.
But let’s return to Cobra’s assumed scenario: one Asian kid, one Latino kid. Cobra, do you seriously think that there is admissions discrimination against Latinos today? I rather think there is such discrimination against Asians, actually, but surely not against Latinos.
And do you seriously think there isn’t racism against Asians in the wider society? And if that is a reason for preferences for Latinos (who also suffer from societal racism; I’ve certainly seen a lot of it here in Marin), isn’t it also a reason for preferences for Asian-Americans? Only they never seem to get any. Interesting, is it not?
Martin A. Knight writes:
>>>In other words, I owe nobody any allegiance because I am a Black man. I have every right to believe whatever I choose and I will still be black whether you like it or not. Whether the subject is taxes, abortion, school choice, the Second Amendment, gay marriage, welfare, and yes, even racial preferences, I can come to a conclusion 100% diametrically opposed to yours on each of these issues and I will still be Black, and EVERY BIT as concerned with uplifting the Black community as you could ever claim to be.”
I would never question your physical characteristics, Martin…in so much as I can tell from an anonymous weblog. You claim to be black. I will take you at your word. However…..
I find some interesting contradictions in your posts. Let’s review your last paragraph. You say you “owe NOBODY any alliegence because I am a black man”, yet in the last sentence you claim to be “EVERY BIT as concerned about uplifting the black community as you (Cobra) could ever claim to be.” Seems to me, that if you’re concerned about uplifting the apparently monolithic state of African America, especially as much as I do, then you DO OWE an “ALLEGIENCE.” You, by your OWN WORDS have made a MISSION STATEMENT that shows absolutely NONE of the “color-blindness” that you seem to endorse at the beginning of your piece. If your goal is to SPECIFICALLY “uplift the black community”, you have not only conceded that it is in a “lower position” than you believe it should be in comparison to other communities, but that you have placed it in a HIGHER PRIORITY level than your concerns with those afforementioned other communities.
Don’t get me wrong, Martin. The PAGES I’ve written on this blog demonstrate MY desire to “uplift the black community,” as well, except, I display with facts, statistics, studies, and collegiate research the anti-black discrimination that opposes us. I know through studying history, sociology and current events WHICH group has actively placed blacks and other minorities INTO THE POSITION THAT THEY NOW NEED TO BE UPLIFTED FROM.
Do I have to spell it out for you, Martin? No, you seem like an intelligent guy. I’m sure you know who they are.
Next passage in question:
>>>Either way, I also take issue with your attribution of every single advancement in the Black community to racial preferences. Even prior to the institutionalization of racial preferences (strangely enough, by Richard Nixon) Black people were moving on up. Maybe I’m wrong, but I’m getting the impression that you believe that the Black community was stagnant, and not producing any doctors, lawyers, engineers, etc. until racial preferences came to save us.”
Of course I would NEVER make, or have ever made such a statement. However, here we go again. In a LEGALLY SEGREGATED society, (you know, America for most of it’s existance?) neccessity was the mother of not only invention, but entreprenuerial motivation and professional advancement. Now, like I said, you seem like an intelligent brother. I don’t think I have to cut and paste black American history sites in this post as I do for my friends in the white anti-affirmative action camp. Segregation meant black economic advancement had to be insular and autonomous. The kool-aid drinkers at the “Cult of Color-blindness” would have you believe that since legal segregation is “over”, there’s no NEED for
preferences in contracts and business grants and loans because it’s a new day, and white conservative males who’ve monopolistically hoarded wealth and power in this nation for two centuries will now freely SHARE the bounty of America with all people in the spirit of brotherhood!
If you believe that, I’ve got some front row tickets to Elvis’s next concert to sell you.
>>>When it comes right down to it, the reason why there are so many disparities in numbers is because of the quality of K-12 education so many black children get. So long as so many black kids are graduating high school barely literate and totally hopeless at math or the sciences, there is no way those numbers will equalize, no matter how many extra points you give black applicants. If you can’t do math, you cannot be an engineer, an accountant or even a competent store clerk.”
What are you suggesting in this statement? Are you placing the blame on schools, parents, or the black kids themselves? There are some on YOUR SIDE who have suggested or inferred that since the ‘average” SAT score for blacks is lower than that for whites and Asians that they are…how should I put this….INFERIOR. Do you, believe we are “INFERIOR”, my brother? What is your response to the posters on this blog who happily march out that information as a justification for exclusionary treament for blacks by college admission officers? Are you marching along with the conservative stormtroops out to “destroy the public education system” instead of trying to improve it? Are you going to believe the conservative talk radio comedians who spew out the ridiculous notion that white parents who viciously attacked black bussing will now welcome those SAME black students into their kid’s private schools because of vouchers? Who’s zooming who, Martin?
>>>If the CBC spent just a quarter of the time it spends screaming for preferences on actually doing something for K-12 education in the inner-city instead of shilling for the teachers unions, we’ll be able to have the black engineers, doctors, lawyers, bankers, etc. in the numbers we all hope for even if all racial preferences are banned.”
Well, Martin, I’d buy that if the CBC actually controlled Congress. As you can see from this article, the US Senate (only 5 blacks in history) and the US House of Representatives is firmly in non-black hands.
>>>Washington, D.C. – Today, during a ceremony at the Library of Congress, U.S. Representative Melvin L. Watt (D-NC) was sworn in as Chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) for the 109th Congress. Surrounded by family, friends, and his CBC colleagues, Congressman Watt stated that the 43 Members of the CBC will
Cobra,
It is statements like this one:
I know through studying history, sociology and current events WHICH group has actively placed blacks and other minorities INTO THE POSITION THAT THEY NOW NEED TO BE UPLIFTED FROM
that make it very hard for me to talk to you. Do you really think Asian immigrants don’t suffer discrimination? Do you really think that Asian immigrants haven’t historically suffered discrimination? You don’t, do you? So why the hell don’t they deserve the same preferences you would think appropriate for African or Mexican or Central or South American immigrants?
Michelle writes:
>>>that make it very hard for me to talk to you. Do you really think Asian immigrants don’t suffer discrimination? Do you really think that Asian immigrants haven’t historically suffered discrimination? You don’t, do you? So why the hell don’t they deserve the same preferences you would think appropriate for African or Mexican or Central or South American immigrants?”
My response in the last post was to Martin A. Knight, who is a black man who claims to want to “uplift the black community as much as I do” He wasn’t addressing Asian American issues, and neither did I. I will put the same question to you as I did before. Fire up some statistics on recent Asian American discrimination by whites in power and I will let you know whether they deserve preferences or not.
–Cobra
Cobra,
The quote I took from your post addressed “blacks and other minorities.” If Asian-Americans aren’t “other minorities,” what are they?
I don’t see what statistics are relevant here. What is it you want? Proof that Asian-Americans are victims of hate crimes? (They have been.) That Asian owners of small businesses have been the targets of harassment, death threats, arson, opportunistic looting? (Well, lots of evidence there, but as it doesn’t involve Asian-Americans being victimized by “whites in power,” I gather it’s totally irrelevant to you.)
Cobra, if you really believe that Asian immigrants (and I mean immigrants and their children from the Indian subcontinent, East Asia, and Southeast Asia) do not suffer any sort of prejudice in the United States, just say so. And if you think, on the contrary, that they do suffer prejudice, explain why they should not be granted preferences.
I would never question your physical characteristics, Martin…in so much as I can tell from an anonymous weblog. You claim to be black. I will take you at your word.
Thanks. I take you at your word too. After all, the possibility exist, you are some guilt-wracked white hippie college student from Ann Arbor.
I find some interesting contradictions in your posts …
Ahh … semantics. But even then, you’re putting words in my mouth. Just because I’m saying that I am dedicated to the uplifting of the black community doesn’t mean that I am indifferent to other ethnic communities in America.
I know through studying history, sociology and current events WHICH group has actively placed blacks and other minorities INTO THE POSITION THAT THEY NOW NEED TO BE UPLIFTED FROM.
I don’t believe in group guilt, talk less of multi-generational group guilt. What I find interesting in your posts is that you claim that Asian Americans have somehow not been subjected to racism.
… and white conservative males who’ve monopolistically hoarded wealth and power in this nation for two centuries will now freely SHARE the bounty of America with all people in the spirit of brotherhood!
I take issue with your use of the word “conservative” but I’ll let that slide. I know you’re on the Left but “share the bounty”? C’mon, unless you believe that wealth is a zero-sum game (i.e. the richer I get the poorer you get) this really makes no sense. I can MAKE MY OWN wealth … I need not ask them to share their wealth with me.
What are you suggesting in this statement? Are you placing the blame on schools, parents, or the black kids themselves?
Read the statement again. I wasn’t cryptic. I said the education recieved by too many black children is seriously messed up. Uninvolved parents feature as part of the problem, not to mention the sad state of the black family due to Left-Wing welfare policies … but mostly, I blame the piss-poor quality of the education (which the Teachers’ Unions are largely responsible for) recieved by a great deal of black children.
As for inferior? Hah! Have you seen the papers every Nigerian high-school senior has to take before he/she can graduate and go on to University? You wouldn’t believe how tough they are. And the vast majority do very well despite a chrnonic lack of equipment (sometimes even desks). Yet I will be shocked if 2 out of 10 Ivy League College seniors can handle them. And last time I checked, 99.99% of Nigerian high school seniors are black. Hell, the Dunbar High School in DC, from the 1870s down to the 1950s posted up results that competed with the best all-white schools in the city. This was during segregation at its worst.
So, as far as I am concerned, there is nothing inherent in blackness that stops a black kid from learning math and chemistry. I personally believe that there is no test you can create that is inherently impossible for black children to excel at, at a level commensurate with that of whites, Asians, etc. History proves it.
The question now becomes, why, now that there is far more money for education, now that discrimination is legally verboten, are we having problems educating black children? One thing you should remember is that racial preferences only helps a miniscule amount of black students. The rest simply fail out of the system. But the teachers unions can point to the thirty black students admitted to Harvard and claim they’re doing their job.
The problem arises when the black student (who was top of his senior class but scored 200 points less than the average of his classmates on the SATs because of union protected sub-standard teaching), who wants to be an engineer, comes face to face with college level math. “Constructivist math” (i.e. where 2+2=5 can be correct) won’t work. Either he buckles down and struggles to overcome years of bad teaching in a few semesters, he changes his major to Comparative Lit. or he drops out.
What is your response to the posters on this blog who happily march out that information as a justification for exclusionary treament for blacks by college admission officers?
Exclusionary? Look, I am a Computer Systems Engineering major. If an applicant’s level of math knowledge is 8th grade, even if he was the best in Math in his class, he simply cannot do that major, and it shows in the SATs. I am not unsympathetic to this situation, but to admit this applicant, no matter his race, when you know that it is 85-15 that he will NOT graduate is unfair to both the applicant and Applicant B who has shown he could handle the work but was EXCLUDED on account the former.
Are you marching along with the conservative stormtroops out to “destroy the public education system” instead of trying to improve it?
Personally, I don’t give a damn about the “system”. I care about the kids. If it means that the entire American public school system is to be privatized and run by Harley riding Hindu priests, so long as it is affordable and it actually educates, I will be fine. By the way, when the Left says “improve” with regard to schools, it usually means throwing more money at the problem, which the teachers unions would promptly use to get more members (administrators, consultants, sexperts, etc.) and then use the added muscle to ask for more, right after making it even harder to get rid of bad teachers.
Are you going to believe the conservative talk radio comedians who spew out the ridiculous notion that white parents who viciously attacked black bussing will now welcome those SAME black students into their kid’s private schools because of vouchers?
This ain’t the 1970s, my friend. Those “SAME black students” are all grown up. Whether you want to admit it or not, things have changed. White people still are the majority in this country. If you honestly believe that all white people have an inner Hitler just dying to come out, then I have to wonder at your sanity. Because, if that was so, Jim Crow would be back in a flash.
Well, Martin, I’d buy that if the CBC actually controlled Congress. As you can see from this article, the US Senate (only 5 blacks in history) and the US House of Representatives is firmly in non-black hands.
Oh so you’re saying that the CBC is not firmly in the NEA’s pockets, even while all their children go to private schools? Your point has nothing to do with what I have said. Find me a single CBC member who has offered an opinion on improving education that differs from that of the NEA and AFT. And even if they are not a majority, they can still offer bills and amendments. Find me one bill or amendment to a bill that deals with education in any innovative way. Just one.
Connerly and Thomas have made millions of dollars and the highest seats of power respectively, by doing the bidding of white conservative think tanks and puppet-masters. Their goals are OBVIOUSLY NOT ALLIGNED WITH YOURS, in “uplifting the black community.” They chose to uplift THEMSELVES, to the detriment of other African Americans.
I reserve the right to decide whether or not their goals are aligned with mine. In fact, where do you get off deciding that only the course of action you ascribe to is valid? And everybody who disagrees with you is a sell-out? When was debate banned in the black community? Thomas and Connerly’s beliefs are far more aligned to mine … and I still believe I am every bit as concerned with uplifting the black community as you are. And you know what? So are they.
“If you honestly believe that all white people have an inner Hitler just dying to come out, then I have to wonder at your sanity. Because, if that was so, Jim Crow would be back in a flash.”
That’s our buddy Cobra, in a nutshell.
Martin, Cobra doesn’t care about the poor K-12 education and hence low SAT scores among black students. He clearly stated that even if black kids had the same scores as white kids and thus applied to universities on an equal footing, he would still want racial preferences. So why bother to fix the education system?
Cobra says,
“Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit. Of course, you also know that a Bush or a Kennedy would’ve gotten a boost over either candidate, right? Or a member of the Walton, Hilton, or Hearst families. That’s apparently OK with the posters (save Leo) here because those families fit the profile of the acceptible, homogenized American success template.
So your questions about “fairness” and “right and wrong” are all relative to the subject you’re evaluating. As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-) ”
Leo Cruz says to Chetly Zarko and Jennifer Gratz ” hey, I’m still waiting for your blanket condemnation of all kinds of preferences at UM Ann _Arbor,that is what impending MCRI ballot language should talk about not just a ban on race preferences, what’s going on Jenny and Chet, a good dosage of cowardice and hypocrisy on the part of your group and the leftist BAMN and Union for a United Michigan ? Shame on all of you ”
Leo Cruz
Cobra,
Did you read my response about “African Town ” ? Sounds to me that the African – American vendors that were born in this country are no different from the white corporates types that you despise who want exemptions, subsidies, tax breaks and every other kind of gov’t help to get a leg up over the competition eh? They regarded their fellow black vendors from Africa as unwanted competiton. Cobra, Cobra, you seem to forget that as always human nature is at work.
Is the domination of Asian -Americans at the EECS DEPT at berkeley, unacceptable? unconsionable ? Too many Chinese at CuNY BAruch ? Is that unacceptable? unconscionable? Too many blacks at the NFL and NBA, is that Unconscionable? why the hell are the Williams sisters the dominant players in the US OPen, why not white folks like Capriati or Davenport ? is that unconsionabele? Alicia keys making too much money or Jessica Simpson ? Unconscionable ? Maybe ? Oh well, Cobra they made life inconvenient for you I guess because they dominate their professions or calling out of proportion to their percentage in the population. Are you telling me all of the people mentioned above cheated or took advantage of others
to get to where they are now? Maybe some of them did, but the majority of them certainly did not. There are all kinds of reasons why people excel in something,not all the priveleges received by the BUshiess, Waltons, Hearsts, kennedys or the Brokaws, Fish and Schulzeberger families justifies race preferences. Yes indeed , those whites who support alumni legacy preferences are loathsome lowlifes that belong to the gutter, that does not in any way support race preferences. I had never modified my stance on preferences, I had always said that the only valid preferences are preferences for the poor, read all of my previous posts. Would hiring 5 untrained blacks to an EMT position in Boston help the survival of the black population in Boston , even if it was done to repair the damage of unfair hiring in the past? Are public high schools really that bad that blacks face a hopeless life going public high schools? I told you about the situation in San Francisco. The majority of white kids over there spent a lot of money going to private schools like Lick – Wilmercing etc. Did that help them? Not much really, a smaller percentage of them were accepted and enrolled at Berkeley, compared to Asians a majority of whom graduated from public high schools. Raines high school In jacksonville, Florida is known as a high school powerhouse in producing football players. Half of the linebacker formation of the Philadelphia Eagles are graduates of that high school. The school has an AP math teacher. My understanding is that having an AP Math class covers CAlCULUS AB . That kind of coverage is far more extensive than what it being covered in the Math portion of the SAT. Yet the best academic students at Raines prefer to transfer to other schools because of the low standardized test scores in that school. Whose problem is that?
Cobra says,
“Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit. Of course, you also know that a Bush or a Kennedy would’ve gotten a boost over either candidate, right? Or a member of the Walton, Hilton, or Hearst families. That’s apparently OK with the posters (save Leo) here because those families fit the profile of the acceptible, homogenized American success template.
So your questions about “fairness” and “right and wrong” are all relative to the subject you’re evaluating. As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-) ”
Leo Cruz says to Chetly Zarko and Jennifer Gratz ” hey, I’m still waiting for your blanket condemnation of all kinds of preferences at UM Ann _Arbor,that is what impending MCRI ballot language should talk about not just a ban on race preferences, what’s going on Jenny and Chet, a good dosage of cowardice and hypocrisy on the part of your group and the leftist BAMN and Union for a United Michigan ? Shame on all of you ”
Leo Cruz
Cobra,
Did you read my response about “African Town ” ? Sounds to me that the African – American vendors that were born in this country are no different from the white corporates types that you despise who want exemptions, subsidies, tax breaks and every other kind of gov’t help to get a leg up over the competition eh? They regarded their fellow black vendors from Africa as unwanted competiton. Cobra, Cobra, you seem to forget that as always human nature is at work.
Is the domination of Asian -Americans at the EECS DEPT at berkeley, unacceptable? unconsionable ? Too many Chinese at CuNY BAruch ? Is that unacceptable? unconscionable? Too many blacks at the NFL and NBA, is that Unconscionable? why the hell are the Williams sisters the dominant players in the US OPen, why not white folks like Capriati or Davenport ? is that unconsionabele? Alicia keys making too much money or Jessica Simpson ? Unconscionable ? Maybe ? Oh well, Cobra they made life inconvenient for you I guess because they dominate their professions or calling out of proportion to their percentage in the population. Are you telling me all of the people mentioned above cheated or took advantage of others
to get to where they are now? Maybe some of them did, but the majority of them certainly did not. There are all kinds of reasons why people excel in something,not all the priveleges received by the BUshiess, Waltons, Hearsts, kennedys or the Brokaws, Fish and Schulzeberger families justifies race preferences. Yes indeed , those whites who support alumni legacy preferences are loathsome lowlifes that belong to the gutter, that does not in any way support race preferences. I had never modified my stance on preferences, I had always said that the only valid preferences are preferences for the poor, read all of my previous posts. Would hiring 5 untrained blacks to an EMT position in Boston help the survival of the black population in Boston , even if it was done to repair the damage of unfair hiring in the past? Are public high schools really that bad that blacks face a hopeless life going public high schools? I told you about the situation in San Francisco. The majority of white kids over there spent a lot of money going to private schools like Lick – Wilmercing etc. Did that help them? Not much really, a smaller percentage of them were accepted and enrolled at Berkeley, compared to Asians a majority of whom graduated from public high schools. Raines high school In jacksonville, Florida is known as a high school powerhouse in producing football players. Half of the linebacker formation of the Philadelphia Eagles are graduates of that high school. The school has an AP math teacher. My understanding is that having an AP Math class covers CAlCULUS AB . That kind of coverage is far more extensive than what it being covered in the Math portion of the SAT. Yet the best academic students at Raines prefer to transfer to other schools because of the low standardized test scores in that school. Whose problem is that?
Cobra says,
“Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit. Of course, you also know that a Bush or a Kennedy would’ve gotten a boost over either candidate, right? Or a member of the Walton, Hilton, or Hearst families. That’s apparently OK with the posters (save Leo) here because those families fit the profile of the acceptible, homogenized American success template.
So your questions about “fairness” and “right and wrong” are all relative to the subject you’re evaluating. As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-) ”
Leo Cruz says to Chetly Zarko and Jennifer Gratz ” hey, I’m still waiting for your blanket condemnation of all kinds of preferences at UM Ann _Arbor,that is what impending MCRI ballot language should talk about not just a ban on race preferences, what’s going on Jenny and Chet, a good dosage of cowardice and hypocrisy on the part of your group and the leftist BAMN and Union for a United Michigan ? Shame on all of you ”
Leo Cruz
Cobra,
Did you read my response about “African Town ” ? Sounds to me that the African – American vendors that were born in this country are no different from the white corporates types that you despise who want exemptions, subsidies, tax breaks and every other kind of gov’t help to get a leg up over the competition eh? They regarded their fellow black vendors from Africa as unwanted competiton. Cobra, Cobra, you seem to forget that as always human nature is at work.
Is the domination of Asian -Americans at the EECS DEPT at berkeley, unacceptable? unconsionable ? Too many Chinese at CuNY BAruch ? Is that unacceptable? unconscionable? Too many blacks at the NFL and NBA, is that Unconscionable? why the hell are the Williams sisters the dominant players in the US OPen, why not white folks like Capriati or Davenport ? is that unconsionabele? Alicia keys making too much money or Jessica Simpson ? Unconscionable ? Maybe ? Oh well, Cobra they made life inconvenient for you I guess because they dominate their professions or calling out of proportion to their percentage in the population. Are you telling me all of the people mentioned above cheated or took advantage of others
to get to where they are now? Maybe some of them did, but the majority of them certainly did not. There are all kinds of reasons why people excel in something,not all the priveleges received by the BUshiess, Waltons, Hearsts, kennedys or the Brokaws, Fish and Schulzeberger families justifies race preferences. Yes indeed , those whites who support alumni legacy preferences are loathsome lowlifes that belong to the gutter, that does not in any way support race preferences. I had never modified my stance on preferences, I had always said that the only valid preferences are preferences for the poor, read all of my previous posts. Would hiring 5 untrained blacks to an EMT position in Boston help the survival of the black population in Boston , even if it was done to repair the damage of unfair hiring in the past? Are public high schools really that bad that blacks face a hopeless life going public high schools? I told you about the situation in San Francisco. The majority of white kids over there spent a lot of money going to private schools like Lick – Wilmercing etc. Did that help them? Not much really, a smaller percentage of them were accepted and enrolled at Berkeley, compared to Asians a majority of whom graduated from public high schools. Raines high school In jacksonville, Florida is known as a high school powerhouse in producing football players. Half of the linebacker formation of the Philadelphia Eagles are graduates of that high school. The school has an AP math teacher. My understanding is that having an AP Math class covers CAlCULUS AB . That kind of coverage is far more extensive than what it being covered in the Math portion of the SAT. Yet the best academic students at Raines prefer to transfer to other schools because of the low standardized test scores in that school. Whose problem is that?
Cobra says,
“Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit. Of course, you also know that a Bush or a Kennedy would’ve gotten a boost over either candidate, right? Or a member of the Walton, Hilton, or Hearst families. That’s apparently OK with the posters (save Leo) here because those families fit the profile of the acceptible, homogenized American success template.
So your questions about “fairness” and “right and wrong” are all relative to the subject you’re evaluating. As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-) ”
Leo Cruz says to Chetly Zarko and Jennifer Gratz ” hey, I’m still waiting for your blanket condemnation of all kinds of preferences at UM Ann _Arbor,that is what impending MCRI ballot language should talk about not just a ban on race preferences, what’s going on Jenny and Chet, a good dosage of cowardice and hypocrisy on the part of your group and the leftist BAMN and Union for a United Michigan ? Shame on all of you ”
Leo Cruz
Cobra,
Did you read my response about “African Town ” ? Sounds to me that the African – American vendors that were born in this country are no different from the white corporates types that you despise who want exemptions, subsidies, tax breaks and every other kind of gov’t help to get a leg up over the competition eh? They regarded their fellow black vendors from Africa as unwanted competiton. Cobra, Cobra, you seem to forget that as always human nature is at work.
Is the domination of Asian -Americans at the EECS DEPT at berkeley, unacceptable? unconsionable ? Too many Chinese at CuNY BAruch ? Is that unacceptable? unconscionable? Too many blacks at the NFL and NBA, is that Unconscionable? why the hell are the Williams sisters the dominant players in the US OPen, why not white folks like Capriati or Davenport ? is that unconsionabele? Alicia keys making too much money or Jessica Simpson ? Unconscionable ? Maybe ? Oh well, Cobra they made life inconvenient for you I guess because they dominate their professions or calling out of proportion to their percentage in the population. Are you telling me all of the people mentioned above cheated or took advantage of others
to get to where they are now? Maybe some of them did, but the majority of them certainly did not. There are all kinds of reasons why people excel in something,not all the priveleges received by the BUshiess, Waltons, Hearsts, kennedys or the Brokaws, Fish and Schulzeberger families justifies race preferences. Yes indeed , those whites who support alumni legacy preferences are loathsome lowlifes that belong to the gutter, that does not in any way support race preferences. I had never modified my stance on preferences, I had always said that the only valid preferences are preferences for the poor, read all of my previous posts. Would hiring 5 untrained blacks to an EMT position in Boston help the survival of the black population in Boston , even if it was done to repair the damage of unfair hiring in the past? Are public high schools really that bad that blacks face a hopeless life going public high schools? I told you about the situation in San Francisco. The majority of white kids over there spent a lot of money going to private schools like Lick – Wilmercing etc. Did that help them? Not much really, a smaller percentage of them were accepted and enrolled at Berkeley, compared to Asians a majority of whom graduated from public high schools. Raines high school In jacksonville, Florida is known as a high school powerhouse in producing football players. Half of the linebacker formation of the Philadelphia Eagles are graduates of that high school. The school has an AP math teacher. My understanding is that having an AP Math class covers CAlCULUS AB . That kind of coverage is far more extensive than what it being covered in the Math portion of the SAT. Yet the best academic students at Raines prefer to transfer to other schools because of the low standardized test scores in that school. Whose problem is that?
Cobra says,
“Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit. Of course, you also know that a Bush or a Kennedy would’ve gotten a boost over either candidate, right? Or a member of the Walton, Hilton, or Hearst families. That’s apparently OK with the posters (save Leo) here because those families fit the profile of the acceptible, homogenized American success template.
So your questions about “fairness” and “right and wrong” are all relative to the subject you’re evaluating. As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-) ”
Leo Cruz says to Chetly Zarko and Jennifer Gratz ” hey, I’m still waiting for your blanket condemnation of all kinds of preferences at UM Ann _Arbor,that is what impending MCRI ballot language should talk about not just a ban on race preferences, what’s going on Jenny and Chet, a good dosage of cowardice and hypocrisy on the part of your group and the leftist BAMN and Union for a United Michigan ? Shame on all of you ”
Leo Cruz
Cobra,
Did you read my response about “African Town ” ? Sounds to me that the African – American vendors that were born in this country are no different from the white corporates types that you despise who want exemptions, subsidies, tax breaks and every other kind of gov’t help to get a leg up over the competition eh? They regarded their fellow black vendors from Africa as unwanted competiton. Cobra, Cobra, you seem to forget that as always human nature is at work.
Is the domination of Asian -Americans at the EECS DEPT at berkeley, unacceptable? unconsionable ? Too many Chinese at CuNY BAruch ? Is that unacceptable? unconscionable? Too many blacks at the NFL and NBA, is that Unconscionable? why the hell are the Williams sisters the dominant players in the US OPen, why not white folks like Capriati or Davenport ? is that unconsionabele? Alicia keys making too much money or Jessica Simpson ? Unconscionable ? Maybe ? Oh well, Cobra they made life inconvenient for you I guess because they dominate their professions or calling out of proportion to their percentage in the population. Are you telling me all of the people mentioned above cheated or took advantage of others
to get to where they are now? Maybe some of them did, but the majority of them certainly did not. There are all kinds of reasons why people excel in something,not all the priveleges received by the BUshiess, Waltons, Hearsts, kennedys or the Brokaws, Fish and Schulzeberger families justifies race preferences. Yes indeed , those whites who support alumni legacy preferences are loathsome lowlifes that belong to the gutter, that does not in any way support race preferences. I had never modified my stance on preferences, I had always said that the only valid preferences are preferences for the poor, read all of my previous posts. Would hiring 5 untrained blacks to an EMT position in Boston help the survival of the black population in Boston , even if it was done to repair the damage of unfair hiring in the past? Are public high schools really that bad that blacks face a hopeless life going public high schools? I told you about the situation in San Francisco. The majority of white kids over there spent a lot of money going to private schools like Lick – Wilmercing etc. Did that help them? Not much really, a smaller percentage of them were accepted and enrolled at Berkeley, compared to Asians a majority of whom graduated from public high schools. Raines high school In jacksonville, Florida is known as a high school powerhouse in producing football players. Half of the linebacker formation of the Philadelphia Eagles are graduates of that high school. The school has an AP math teacher. My understanding is that having an AP Math class covers CAlCULUS AB . That kind of coverage is far more extensive than what it being covered in the Math portion of the SAT. Yet the best academic students at Raines prefer to transfer to other schools because of the low standardized test scores in that school. Whose problem is that?
Cobra says,
“Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit. Of course, you also know that a Bush or a Kennedy would’ve gotten a boost over either candidate, right? Or a member of the Walton, Hilton, or Hearst families. That’s apparently OK with the posters (save Leo) here because those families fit the profile of the acceptible, homogenized American success template.
So your questions about “fairness” and “right and wrong” are all relative to the subject you’re evaluating. As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-) ”
Leo Cruz says to Chetly Zarko and Jennifer Gratz ” hey, I’m still waiting for your blanket condemnation of all kinds of preferences at UM Ann _Arbor,that is what impending MCRI ballot language should talk about not just a ban on race preferences, what’s going on Jenny and Chet, a good dosage of cowardice and hypocrisy on the part of your group and the leftist BAMN and Union for a United Michigan ? Shame on all of you ”
Leo Cruz
Cobra,
Did you read my response about “African Town ” ? Sounds to me that the African – American vendors that were born in this country are no different from the white corporates types that you despise who want exemptions, subsidies, tax breaks and every other kind of gov’t help to get a leg up over the competition eh? They regarded their fellow black vendors from Africa as unwanted competiton. Cobra, Cobra, you seem to forget that as always human nature is at work.
Is the domination of Asian -Americans at the EECS DEPT at berkeley, unacceptable? unconsionable ? Too many Chinese at CuNY BAruch ? Is that unacceptable? unconscionable? Too many blacks at the NFL and NBA, is that Unconscionable? why the hell are the Williams sisters the dominant players in the US OPen, why not white folks like Capriati or Davenport ? is that unconsionabele? Alicia keys making too much money or Jessica Simpson ? Unconscionable ? Maybe ? Oh well, Cobra they made life inconvenient for you I guess because they dominate their professions or calling out of proportion to their percentage in the population. Are you telling me all of the people mentioned above cheated or took advantage of others
to get to where they are now? Maybe some of them did, but the majority of them certainly did not. There are all kinds of reasons why people excel in something,not all the priveleges received by the BUshiess, Waltons, Hearsts, kennedys or the Brokaws, Fish and Schulzeberger families justifies race preferences. Yes indeed , those whites who support alumni legacy preferences are loathsome lowlifes that belong to the gutter, that does not in any way support race preferences. I had never modified my stance on preferences, I had always said that the only valid preferences are preferences for the poor, read all of my previous posts. Would hiring 5 untrained blacks to an EMT position in Boston help the survival of the black population in Boston , even if it was done to repair the damage of unfair hiring in the past? Are public high schools really that bad that blacks face a hopeless life going public high schools? I told you about the situation in San Francisco. The majority of white kids over there spent a lot of money going to private schools like Lick – Wilmercing etc. Did that help them? Not much really, a smaller percentage of them were accepted and enrolled at Berkeley, compared to Asians a majority of whom graduated from public high schools. Raines high school In jacksonville, Florida is known as a high school powerhouse in producing football players. Half of the linebacker formation of the Philadelphia Eagles are graduates of that high school. The school has an AP math teacher. My understanding is that having an AP Math class covers CAlCULUS AB . That kind of coverage is far more extensive than what it being covered in the Math portion of the SAT. Yet the best academic students at Raines prefer to transfer to other schools because of the low standardized test scores in that school. Whose problem is that?
Cobra says,
“Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit. Of course, you also know that a Bush or a Kennedy would’ve gotten a boost over either candidate, right? Or a member of the Walton, Hilton, or Hearst families. That’s apparently OK with the posters (save Leo) here because those families fit the profile of the acceptible, homogenized American success template.
So your questions about “fairness” and “right and wrong” are all relative to the subject you’re evaluating. As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-) ”
Leo Cruz says to Chetly Zarko and Jennifer Gratz ” hey, I’m still waiting for your blanket condemnation of all kinds of preferences at UM Ann _Arbor,that is what impending MCRI ballot language should talk about not just a ban on race preferences, what’s going on Jenny and Chet, a good dosage of cowardice and hypocrisy on the part of your group and the leftist BAMN and Union for a United Michigan ? Shame on all of you ”
Leo Cruz
Cobra,
Did you read my response about “African Town ” ? Sounds to me that the African – American vendors that were born in this country are no different from the white corporates types that you despise who want exemptions, subsidies, tax breaks and every other kind of gov’t help to get a leg up over the competition eh? They regarded their fellow black vendors from Africa as unwanted competiton. Cobra, Cobra, you seem to forget that as always human nature is at work.
Is the domination of Asian -Americans at the EECS DEPT at berkeley, unacceptable? unconsionable ? Too many Chinese at CuNY BAruch ? Is that unacceptable? unconscionable? Too many blacks at the NFL and NBA, is that Unconscionable? why the hell are the Williams sisters the dominant players in the US OPen, why not white folks like Capriati or Davenport ? is that unconsionabele? Alicia keys making too much money or Jessica Simpson ? Unconscionable ? Maybe ? Oh well, Cobra they made life inconvenient for you I guess because they dominate their professions or calling out of proportion to their percentage in the population. Are you telling me all of the people mentioned above cheated or took advantage of others
to get to where they are now? Maybe some of them did, but the majority of them certainly did not. There are all kinds of reasons why people excel in something,not all the priveleges received by the BUshiess, Waltons, Hearsts, kennedys or the Brokaws, Fish and Schulzeberger families justifies race preferences. Yes indeed , those whites who support alumni legacy preferences are loathsome lowlifes that belong to the gutter, that does not in any way support race preferences. I had never modified my stance on preferences, I had always said that the only valid preferences are preferences for the poor, read all of my previous posts. Would hiring 5 untrained blacks to an EMT position in Boston help the survival of the black population in Boston , even if it was done to repair the damage of unfair hiring in the past? Are public high schools really that bad that blacks face a hopeless life going public high schools? I told you about the situation in San Francisco. The majority of white kids over there spent a lot of money going to private schools like Lick – Wilmercing etc. Did that help them? Not much really, a smaller percentage of them were accepted and enrolled at Berkeley, compared to Asians a majority of whom graduated from public high schools. Raines high school In jacksonville, Florida is known as a high school powerhouse in producing football players. Half of the linebacker formation of the Philadelphia Eagles are graduates of that high school. The school has an AP math teacher. My understanding is that having an AP Math class covers CAlCULUS AB . That kind of coverage is far more extensive than what it being covered in the Math portion of the SAT. Yet the best academic students at Raines prefer to transfer to other schools because of the low standardized test scores in that school. Whose problem is that?
Cobra says,
“Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit. Of course, you also know that a Bush or a Kennedy would’ve gotten a boost over either candidate, right? Or a member of the Walton, Hilton, or Hearst families. That’s apparently OK with the posters (save Leo) here because those families fit the profile of the acceptible, homogenized American success template.
So your questions about “fairness” and “right and wrong” are all relative to the subject you’re evaluating. As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-) ”
Leo Cruz says to Chetly Zarko and Jennifer Gratz ” hey, I’m still waiting for your blanket condemnation of all kinds of preferences at UM Ann _Arbor,that is what impending MCRI ballot language should talk about not just a ban on race preferences, what’s going on Jenny and Chet, a good dosage of cowardice and hypocrisy on the part of your group and the leftist BAMN and Union for a United Michigan ? Shame on all of you ”
Leo Cruz
Cobra,
Did you read my response about “African Town ” ? Sounds to me that the African – American vendors that were born in this country are no different from the white corporates types that you despise who want exemptions, subsidies, tax breaks and every other kind of gov’t help to get a leg up over the competition eh? They regarded their fellow black vendors from Africa as unwanted competiton. Cobra, Cobra, you seem to forget that as always human nature is at work.
Is the domination of Asian -Americans at the EECS DEPT at berkeley, unacceptable? unconsionable ? Too many Chinese at CuNY BAruch ? Is that unacceptable? unconscionable? Too many blacks at the NFL and NBA, is that Unconscionable? why the hell are the Williams sisters the dominant players in the US OPen, why not white folks like Capriati or Davenport ? is that unconsionabele? Alicia keys making too much money or Jessica Simpson ? Unconscionable ? Maybe ? Oh well, Cobra they made life inconvenient for you I guess because they dominate their professions or calling out of proportion to their percentage in the population. Are you telling me all of the people mentioned above cheated or took advantage of others
to get to where they are now? Maybe some of them did, but the majority of them certainly did not. There are all kinds of reasons why people excel in something,not all the priveleges received by the BUshiess, Waltons, Hearsts, kennedys or the Brokaws, Fish and Schulzeberger families justifies race preferences. Yes indeed , those whites who support alumni legacy preferences are loathsome lowlifes that belong to the gutter, that does not in any way support race preferences. I had never modified my stance on preferences, I had always said that the only valid preferences are preferences for the poor, read all of my previous posts. Would hiring 5 untrained blacks to an EMT position in Boston help the survival of the black population in Boston , even if it was done to repair the damage of unfair hiring in the past? Are public high schools really that bad that blacks face a hopeless life going public high schools? I told you about the situation in San Francisco. The majority of white kids over there spent a lot of money going to private schools like Lick – Wilmercing etc. Did that help them? Not much really, a smaller percentage of them were accepted and enrolled at Berkeley, compared to Asians a majority of whom graduated from public high schools. Raines high school In jacksonville, Florida is known as a high school powerhouse in producing football players. Half of the linebacker formation of the Philadelphia Eagles are graduates of that high school. The school has an AP math teacher. My understanding is that having an AP Math class covers CAlCULUS AB . That kind of coverage is far more extensive than what it being covered in the Math portion of the SAT. Yet the best academic students at Raines prefer to transfer to other schools because of the low standardized test scores in that school. Whose problem is that?
Cobra says,
“Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit. Of course, you also know that a Bush or a Kennedy would’ve gotten a boost over either candidate, right? Or a member of the Walton, Hilton, or Hearst families. That’s apparently OK with the posters (save Leo) here because those families fit the profile of the acceptible, homogenized American success template.
So your questions about “fairness” and “right and wrong” are all relative to the subject you’re evaluating. As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-) ”
Leo Cruz says to Chetly Zarko and Jennifer Gratz ” hey, I’m still waiting for your blanket condemnation of all kinds of preferences at UM Ann _Arbor,that is what impending MCRI ballot language should talk about not just a ban on race preferences, what’s going on Jenny and Chet, a good dosage of cowardice and hypocrisy on the part of your group and the leftist BAMN and Union for a United Michigan ? Shame on all of you ”
Leo Cruz
Cobra,
Did you read my response about “African Town ” ? Sounds to me that the African – American vendors that were born in this country are no different from the white corporates types that you despise who want exemptions, subsidies, tax breaks and every other kind of gov’t help to get a leg up over the competition eh? They regarded their fellow black vendors from Africa as unwanted competiton. Cobra, Cobra, you seem to forget that as always human nature is at work.
Is the domination of Asian -Americans at the EECS DEPT at berkeley, unacceptable? unconsionable ? Too many Chinese at CuNY BAruch ? Is that unacceptable? unconscionable? Too many blacks at the NFL and NBA, is that Unconscionable? why the hell are the Williams sisters the dominant players in the US OPen, why not white folks like Capriati or Davenport ? is that unconsionabele? Alicia keys making too much money or Jessica Simpson ? Unconscionable ? Maybe ? Oh well, Cobra they made life inconvenient for you I guess because they dominate their professions or calling out of proportion to their percentage in the population. Are you telling me all of the people mentioned above cheated or took advantage of others
to get to where they are now? Maybe some of them did, but the majority of them certainly did not. There are all kinds of reasons why people excel in something,not all the priveleges received by the BUshiess, Waltons, Hearsts, kennedys or the Brokaws, Fish and Schulzeberger families justifies race preferences. Yes indeed , those whites who support alumni legacy preferences are loathsome lowlifes that belong to the gutter, that does not in any way support race preferences. I had never modified my stance on preferences, I had always said that the only valid preferences are preferences for the poor, read all of my previous posts. Would hiring 5 untrained blacks to an EMT position in Boston help the survival of the black population in Boston , even if it was done to repair the damage of unfair hiring in the past? Are public high schools really that bad that blacks face a hopeless life going public high schools? I told you about the situation in San Francisco. The majority of white kids over there spent a lot of money going to private schools like Lick – Wilmercing etc. Did that help them? Not much really, a smaller percentage of them were accepted and enrolled at Berkeley, compared to Asians a majority of whom graduated from public high schools. Raines high school In jacksonville, Florida is known as a high school powerhouse in producing football players. Half of the linebacker formation of the Philadelphia Eagles are graduates of that high school. The school has an AP math teacher. My understanding is that having an AP Math class covers CAlCULUS AB . That kind of coverage is far more extensive than what it being covered in the Math portion of the SAT. Yet the best academic students at Raines prefer to transfer to other schools because of the low standardized test scores in that school. Whose problem is that?
Cobra says,
“Simple. The people handling admissions have a history of not treating people like Jiminez fairly, as well as the reality of a current society that follows suit. Of course, you also know that a Bush or a Kennedy would’ve gotten a boost over either candidate, right? Or a member of the Walton, Hilton, or Hearst families. That’s apparently OK with the posters (save Leo) here because those families fit the profile of the acceptible, homogenized American success template.
So your questions about “fairness” and “right and wrong” are all relative to the subject you’re evaluating. As far as Kiet Truong is concerned, if you can demonstrate some current examples and statistics on racial discrimination against her ethnic group in America today, I’d be all for extending preferences. I’m terribly consistant in that respect. :-) ”
Leo Cruz says to Chetly Zarko and Jennifer Gratz ” hey, I’m still waiting for your blanket condemnation of all kinds of preferences at UM Ann _Arbor,that is what impending MCRI ballot language should talk about not just a ban on race preferences, what’s going on Jenny and Chet, a good dosage of cowardice and hypocrisy on the part of your group and the leftist BAMN and Union for a United Michigan ? Shame on all of you ”
Leo Cruz
Cobra,
Did you read my response about “African Town ” ? Sounds to me that the African – American vendors that were born in this country are no different from the white corporates types that you despise who want exemptions, subsidies, tax breaks and every other kind of gov’t help to get a leg up over the competition eh? They regarded their fellow black vendors from Africa as unwanted competiton. Cobra, Cobra, you seem to forget that as always human nature is at work.
Is the domination of Asian -Americans at the EECS DEPT at berkeley, unacceptable? unconsionable ? Too many Chinese at CuNY BAruch ? Is that unacceptable? unconscionable? Too many blacks at the NFL and NBA, is that Unconscionable? why the hell are the Williams sisters the dominant players in the US OPen, why not white folks like Capriati or Davenport ? is that unconsionabele? Alicia keys making too much money or Jessica Simpson ? Unconscionable ? Maybe ? Oh well, Cobra they made life inconvenient for you I guess because they dominate their professions or calling out of proportion to their percentage in the population. Are you telling me all of the people mentioned above cheated or took advantage of others
to get to where they are now? Maybe some of them did, but the majority of them certainly did not. There are all kinds of reasons why people excel in something,not all the priveleges received by the BUshiess, Waltons, Hearsts, kennedys or the Brokaws, Fish and Schulzeberger families justifies race preferences. Yes indeed , those whites who support alumni legacy preferences are loathsome lowlifes that belong to the gutter, that does not in any way support race preferences. I had never modified my stance on preferences, I had always said that the only valid preferences are preferences for the poor, read all of my previous posts. Would hiring 5 untrained blacks to an EMT position in Boston help the survival of the black population in Boston , even if it was done to repair the damage of unfair hiring in the past? Are public high schools really that bad that blacks face a hopeless life going public high schools? I told you about the situation in San Francisco. The majority of white kids over there spent a lot of money going to private schools like Lick – Wilmercing etc. Did that help them? Not much really, a smaller percentage of them were accepted and enrolled at Berkeley, compared to Asians a majority of whom graduated from public high schools. Raines high school In jacksonville, Florida is known as a high school powerhouse in producing football players. Half of the linebacker formation of the Philadelphia Eagles are graduates of that high school. The school has an AP math teacher. My understanding is that having an AP Math class covers CAlCULUS AB . That kind of coverage is far more extensive than what it being covered in the Math portion of the SAT. Yet the best academic students at Raines prefer to transfer to other schools because of the low standardized test scores in that school. Whose problem is that?
Martin writes:
>>>As for inferior? Hah! Have you seen the papers every Nigerian high-school senior has to take before he/she can graduate and go on to University? You wouldn’t believe how tough they are. And the vast majority do very well despite a chrnonic lack of equipment (sometimes even desks). Yet I will be shocked if 2 out of 10 Ivy League College seniors can handle them. And last time I checked, 99.99% of Nigerian high school seniors are black. Hell, the Dunbar High School in DC, from the 1870s down to the 1950s posted up results that competed with the best all-white schools in the city. This was during segregation at its worst.”
You’re preaching to the choir, Martin. If you’ve read any of my posts you’d know that I defiantly challenge any of your white conservative compatriots who suggest that blacks are intellectually inferior. However, if you would observe some of your friends in the white nationalism tinged new conservative moverment, like:
Dinesh D’souza:
In 1995, D’Souza came out with “The End of Racism: Principles for a Multiracial Society.” The book argues that low-income Black people are basically “pathological” and that white racism isn’t really racism at all, just a logical response to this “pathology.”
D’Souza maintains racism will only end when
“…blacks as a group can show that they are capable of performing competitively in schools and the work force…If blacks can close the civilization gap, the race problem in this country is likely to become insignificant.”
The book would have made interesting reading on the Middle Passage, that early example of European “civilization.” And in fact, D’Souza also writes that slavery itself was not a racist institution, merely “economic.”
He further states that segregation was designed
“…to assure that [Blacks], like the handicapped, would be…permitted to perform to the capacity of their arrested development”
http://www.mediatransparency.org/people/dinesh_dsouza.htm
I’m sure you know what opinion white conservative followers of Charles Murray’s “The Bell Curve” think of you, right? You are aware that he is sponsored by white conservative donors from the Bradley Foundation, right?
If you unaware with what Mr. Murray believes about us, then take a look at this interview:
MR. MURRAY: If you take the mean on most tests of cognitiveability that have been given, including up to recent times, there’sabout a 15-point difference between blacks and whites. I would hastento add there is also a —
MR. WATTENBERG: In IQ score, there is a — if whites —
MR. MURRAY: Yeah.
MR. WATTENBERG: Yeah, if whites average 100, blacks average 85.
MR. MURRAY: That’s roughly — that’s the ball park.
MR. WATTENBERG: And that means, as I recall your numbers, that 80– that 16 percent of blacks —
MR. MURRAY: Are at or above the white mean.
MR. WATTENBERG: Right.
MR. MURRAY: Now —
MR. WATTENBERG: And, therefore, 84 percent are below the white average.
MR. MURRAY: Yeah. Having said that, there are a whole bunch of other things that ought to be said along with it. And this is not inorder to run for cover; it’s in order to be realistic of one of the things that ought to be said. What that means is that there are blacks along the entire range of intelligence from bottom to top, and there are whites along the entire range of intelligence from bottom to top. It means that IQ is one important aspect of a person’s abilities — it sure isn’t the only one — and if you add in all the other things like determination and imagination and humor and sensitivity — you can go through the whole list of human qualities. The reason I’m saying all this is, Ben, that we’re dealing with very explosive stuff here —
MR. WATTENBERG: You sure are.
MR. MURRAY: — and when we said you can face all these facts without running screaming from the room, one of the things that bothers us is that people are all too eager to run screaming from the room. Are there things that — does this have implications for some aspects of society? Yeah, it does. There are a whole bunch of things that it has absolutely no implications for whatsoever. For example, it has absolutely no implications, as far as I can tell, for the way that any individual white and any individual black should interact with each other. Because when you approach an individual, you aren’t approaching a mean and a standard deviation, you’re approaching somebody with his own bundle of qualities.
MR. WATTENBERG: Yeah, but you’re also — if you believe your concept —
MR. MURRAY: Mmm-hmm.
MR. WATTENBERG: — you are also approaching someone who, in the back of your mind you are saying, is, ‘I’ve never met this person before, but on average, he is 15 points less smart than the white guy walking alongside him.’
MR. MURRAY: And that’s one of the things that bothers —
MR. WATTENBERG: And that is called — I mean, heretofore, when people said that, they were labelled racists.
MR. MURRAY: Yep.