Are you in favor of Affirmative Action?

[Planeia]

It's easy for us to say, 'cuz you know, we're Hispanic. Now put yourself in a white person's shoes, hell a person who could be facing poverty too but just happens to be white (or Asian). Could you imagine getting denied a doctorate from MIT because "too many of your people are getting them, let these other people have a chance"? Do you know how racist that is in itself?

How many people have you heard getting that type of information in their admission letters to graduate programs at MIT.

A better question: do you know how many people are accepted at MIT?

I'm speaking metaphorically and using that as an example, they're obviously not gonna say that to you, but that's their reasoning.

And it's less than 10% of applicants.

...Yes, I'm counting

[Greater Weselton]

Your applications are considered more important. I am Latino and I am offended by affirmative action.

So? You're getting all bent out of shape for an advantage the system has given you that otherwise would not be possible and you'd be discriminated against if such an opportunity would not exist?

I wouldn't be discriminated against. I want all races to be equal under the law.

[Sebastianbourg]

Your applications are considered more important. I am Latino and I am offended by affirmative action.

So? You're getting all bent out of shape for an advantage the system has given you that otherwise would not be possible and you'd be discriminated against if such an opportunity would not exist?

How about we implement a system where the most qualified (not necessarily determined through grades) are given priority?

[Nasal Bondage]

If you have done any extensive research into the college process in the US, you would know that it is completely true. And while colleges may not outright say "we racially profile to favor minority students," many of them do everything but downright state it.

So you DON'T have any sources to back up your claims? Okay, you're making shit up then. Got it.

CollegeBoard has two scholarships on its PSAT form. Two. One is for anyone, and it's based solely on your performance on the PSAT. The other is just for black students. In case you don't know, CollegeBoard is the company that pretty much covers all college admissions and tests in the US. They don't have any other scholarships.

That's nice. What does that have to do with anything I posted? CollegeBoard doesn't make up the entirety of scholarships in the country.

I really don't know how you haven't seen the racial options. I'm not sure where you live, but if you've ever taken a PSAT, AP test, SAT, or almost any other major test here in the US, and you paid attention to the registration forms, you would know.

I've taken all of them AND the ACT. Never did i see what you're talking about. Maybe it changed since I took them before I entered college, but I doubt it.

Here's the source that backs up my made-up shit, about discrimination against Asians in particular. It's long, but you can get the gist of it by reading the first page or two.
http://priceonomics.com/post/4879428301 ... nst-asians

No, it doesn't make up the entirety of scholarships in the country. But CollegeBoard is the one organization that every highschooler in American knows about, and those are the two scholarships that everyone who takes the PSAT (at least in recent years) knows about.

I've taken those tests, some as recently as earlier this year. And I saw it right there, and discussed it with my friends who also took the tests.

[Soldati Senza Confini]

So? You're getting all bent out of shape for an advantage the system has given you that otherwise would not be possible and you'd be discriminated against if such an opportunity would not exist?

How about we implement a system where the most qualified (not necessarily determined through grades) are given priority?

Because then you'd destroy the purpose college is for?

Here's something that better explains my response:

Well, I'm not saying any of the things you accuse me saying. Your response is largely irrelevant to the point. Since only a limited number of students can be accepted, why should it not be done on the basis of merit? Rather than race or gender?

Because society has an interest in educating more than just its finest students?

My response is not irrelevant to the point; my response IS the point. You appear to blithely assume that the purpose of higher education is to create and perpetuate a strict meritocratic hierarchy; thus, only the best students should be admitted to the best institutions, and poorer students should be relegated to poorer institutions, so that everybody ends up in "their" place and stays there. That is, to be sure, one POSSIBLE way for society to be organized; but it is hardly the only way, and we cannot simply take for granted the notion that it is necessarily or automatically the BEST way.

Academia is, along with the Church, the last surviving medieval institution. It's an institution founded on and infused with the spirit of Renaissance humanism: The notion that a classical education can improve people — and by improving them thus improve society at large.

Thus the question: Who is education for? In the meritocratic view, it is for the best of the best, and ONLY for the best of the best; we test and sort society into classes, and then we assign to each class resources both on the basis of what we feel we need actualize the potential of that class and because the better classes have, by being better, "earned" those resources (Gattaca, anyone?). But in the humanist view, education is for EVERYBODY, and by educating everyone, we lift up the whole of society.

More than that, though, humanists believe that it is EXPERIENCE that rounds the student; the fuller the experience we give each pupil, the better our results. The meritocrat pits students against students in a kind of academic deathmatch, driving the losers off the ladder of progress and into the ranks of the great unwashed masses and then rewarding the winners with the chance at still higher achievement; the meritocratic mind sees this process of winnowing out the wheat from the chaff both ideal and morally right. To these people, the best seats at the best universities are the natural reward of success, and should be handed out accordingly — both to incentivize future competition and to perpetuate the system.

The humanist, however, understands that the academic experience is about more than books and lectures; part of it lies in the fellowship of academia, in the environment of the college town, in the camaraderie of students. This is why American universities aggressively seek foreign students and try to give their domestic students a change to study abroad; this is why these universities set aside a certain number of slots for out-of-State students, why they slant the admissions process towards admitting students from across their home State, across the country, and around the world. This is why American universities seek to build ties with other universities, and encourage fraternization within the student body. Every university wants good students; but more than that, every university wants to create within its confines a miniature copy of the world.

Exposing students to peers of all races, creeds, nationalities, religions, regions, and classes expands the horizons of every student who is a part of the student body; thus, it's not JUST about educating the individual student, and it's certainly not about educating only the BEST students: Rather, it's about educating EVERY student. It's about lifting up and expanding the minds and horizons of the whole student body, in order to create out of that student body a mass of highly educated and well-rounded adults. It's why universities don't just teach a trade or a profession; it's why they still teach Ovid, Aristophanes, and Shakespeare. You should come out of college feeling yourself a full participant in Western Civilization; indeed, universities are the ultimate vehicle of the great educational project that began with the Jesuits: To Westernize the world.

It's ironic that, at the moment when that project has reached its apex, forces are seeking to tear it down. Support for the meritocratic model is growing, because there is within global society an increasing desire to see meritocracy made humanity's ultimate philosophy. Bring on the academic deathmatch; it can accompany the social and economic deathmatches that increasingly becoming the foundation of our modern world. Climb the ladder and rule or die; that is the Darwinian imperative that is supposed to animate our every waking action in a world given over to complete and unfettered competition in all things, from business to learning to sex to religious belief.

But remember: The meritocratic ideal is not the only possible ideal, and it can't even be proven to be the best ideal. As you crush the life out of the last two medieval institutions on Earth — education and faith — and make them all about relative success, standing, and money — remember that there was once an ideal in which we viewed all souls, all people, and all things as sacred. You can go ahead and piss all over it if you wish, if only to show your disdain for it.

But do not forget that it once existed. The dead, after all, should at least be remembered.

Read it, and understand it.

[Geilinor]

Here's the source that backs up my made-up shit, about discrimination against Asians in particular. It's long, but you can get the gist of it by reading the first page or two.
http://priceonomics.com/post/4879428301 ... nst-asians

That's because Asian-Americans have the highest incomes, and those statistics show that low-income applicants get about a 100 point bonus.

[Mavorpen]

Here's the source that backs up my made-up shit, about discrimination against Asians in particular. It's long, but you can get the gist of it by reading the first page or two.
http://priceonomics.com/post/4879428301 ... nst-asians

1. I asked for a source that universities openly have stated or admitted they discriminate against Asians and whites.
2. This isn't evidence of discrimination against Asians. Asians make up a SIGNIFICANTLY disproportionate amount of applicants, and that's why the rejection rate is inflated and makes it seem as though Asians are being rejected because they are Asian. There's NO evidence of that occurring.
3. You're under the assumption that colleges are ONLY looking for individuals who get perfect scores on the ACT or SAT. They aren't. To argue otherwise is ignorant of college admissions.

No, it doesn't make up the entirety of scholarships in the country. But CollegeBoard is the one organization that every highschooler in American knows about, and those are the two scholarships that everyone who takes the PSAT (at least in recent years) knows about.

Again, has jack shit to do with my factual claim that there is a scholarship for every major ethnicity and nationality.

I've taken those tests, some as recently as earlier this year. And I saw it right there, and discussed it with my friends who also took the tests.

I don't care about your anecdotes.

[Terra Sector Union]

I am against AA and this is from someone who would be considered a PoC.

What the US government needs to do is stop identifying race in anything and help future Americans lose their racial/ethnic identity to conform into some homogenized American mega-ethnicity. This is Unity right here. Assimilation.

AA is just another form of segregation and division of America.

[Soldati Senza Confini]

I am against AA and this is from someone who would be considered a PoC.

What the US government needs to do is stop identifying race in anything and help future Americans lose their racial/ethnic identity to conform into some homogenized American mega-ethnicity. This is Unity right here. Assimilation.

AA is just another form of segregation and division of America.

And, until people learn to realize that other people are just people and their color doesn't matter AA is important and necessary.

[Fanosolia]

How about we implement a system where the most qualified (not necessarily determined through grades) are given priority?

Because then you'd destroy the purpose college is for?

Here's something that better explains my response:

Because society has an interest in educating more than just its finest students?

My response is not irrelevant to the point; my response IS the point. You appear to blithely assume that the purpose of higher education is to create and perpetuate a strict meritocratic hierarchy; thus, only the best students should be admitted to the best institutions, and poorer students should be relegated to poorer institutions, so that everybody ends up in "their" place and stays there. That is, to be sure, one POSSIBLE way for society to be organized; but it is hardly the only way, and we cannot simply take for granted the notion that it is necessarily or automatically the BEST way.

Academia is, along with the Church, the last surviving medieval institution. It's an institution founded on and infused with the spirit of Renaissance humanism: The notion that a classical education can improve people — and by improving them thus improve society at large.

Thus the question: Who is education for? In the meritocratic view, it is for the best of the best, and ONLY for the best of the best; we test and sort society into classes, and then we assign to each class resources both on the basis of what we feel we need actualize the potential of that class and because the better classes have, by being better, "earned" those resources (Gattaca, anyone?). But in the humanist view, education is for EVERYBODY, and by educating everyone, we lift up the whole of society.

More than that, though, humanists believe that it is EXPERIENCE that rounds the student; the fuller the experience we give each pupil, the better our results. The meritocrat pits students against students in a kind of academic deathmatch, driving the losers off the ladder of progress and into the ranks of the great unwashed masses and then rewarding the winners with the chance at still higher achievement; the meritocratic mind sees this process of winnowing out the wheat from the chaff both ideal and morally right. To these people, the best seats at the best universities are the natural reward of success, and should be handed out accordingly — both to incentivize future competition and to perpetuate the system.

The humanist, however, understands that the academic experience is about more than books and lectures; part of it lies in the fellowship of academia, in the environment of the college town, in the camaraderie of students. This is why American universities aggressively seek foreign students and try to give their domestic students a change to study abroad; this is why these universities set aside a certain number of slots for out-of-State students, why they slant the admissions process towards admitting students from across their home State, across the country, and around the world. This is why American universities seek to build ties with other universities, and encourage fraternization within the student body. Every university wants good students; but more than that, every university wants to create within its confines a miniature copy of the world.

Exposing students to peers of all races, creeds, nationalities, religions, regions, and classes expands the horizons of every student who is a part of the student body; thus, it's not JUST about educating the individual student, and it's certainly not about educating only the BEST students: Rather, it's about educating EVERY student. It's about lifting up and expanding the minds and horizons of the whole student body, in order to create out of that student body a mass of highly educated and well-rounded adults. It's why universities don't just teach a trade or a profession; it's why they still teach Ovid, Aristophanes, and Shakespeare. You should come out of college feeling yourself a full participant in Western Civilization; indeed, universities are the ultimate vehicle of the great educational project that began with the Jesuits: To Westernize the world.

It's ironic that, at the moment when that project has reached its apex, forces are seeking to tear it down. Support for the meritocratic model is growing, because there is within global society an increasing desire to see meritocracy made humanity's ultimate philosophy. Bring on the academic deathmatch; it can accompany the social and economic deathmatches that increasingly becoming the foundation of our modern world. Climb the ladder and rule or die; that is the Darwinian imperative that is supposed to animate our every waking action in a world given over to complete and unfettered competition in all things, from business to learning to sex to religious belief.

But remember: The meritocratic ideal is not the only possible ideal, and it can't even be proven to be the best ideal. As you crush the life out of the last two medieval institutions on Earth — education and faith — and make them all about relative success, standing, and money — remember that there was once an ideal in which we viewed all souls, all people, and all things as sacred. You can go ahead and piss all over it if you wish, if only to show your disdain for it.

But do not forget that it once existed. The dead, after all, should at least be remembered.

Read it, and understand it.

Let me tell you. The humanist college sounds great. Though I do wonder how one like that would function now a days? Well once we remove the meritocractic elements from it that is. Not to get too off topic, I'm just curious.

[Nasal Bondage]

I am against AA and this is from someone who would be considered a PoC.

What the US government needs to do is stop identifying race in anything and help future Americans lose their racial/ethnic identity to conform into some homogenized American mega-ethnicity. This is Unity right here. Assimilation.

AA is just another form of segregation and division of America.

And, until people learn to realize that other people are just people and their color doesn't matter AA is important and necessary.

Let's use a program that emphasizes race until people realize that race doesn't matter.

Brilliant.

[New Comfederate States of America]

Even though I'm Native American... No. I oppose affirmative action.

[Republic of Coldwater]

Even though I'm Native American... No. I oppose affirmative action.

Ethnicity should not stop one's opposition to discrimination and deterrence to other ethnicities.

[Mavorpen]

And, until people learn to realize that other people are just people and their color doesn't matter AA is important and necessary.

Let's use a program that emphasizes race until people realize that race doesn't matter.

Brilliant.

Why yes, recognizing that discrimination based on race exists and having a law that focuses on that and actively tries to address it is brilliant.

[Salus Maior]

No, because despite its claims it does not help with equality.

Just lowers the standards for people based on skin color, which by definition is racist.

[Soldati Senza Confini]

Let me tell you. The humanist college sounds great. Though I do wonder how one like that would function now a days? Well once we remove the meritocractic elements from it that is. Not to get too off topic, I'm just curious.

A humanist college is exactly what we have in our colleges nowadays, or we are really close to it.

A humanist college doesn't admit students based only on their scores and abilities and ONLY on their scores and abilities. The humanist understands that diversity in the world is what makes the world go round. Hume got it best with his thesis-antithesis-synthesis triad, Erasmus, Petrarch and others before him also got the one trait of humanism and education: to bring about a diversity of thought and, through understanding, achieve a better way of doing things than what we have known before.

If you only accept American, rich, white kids in an institution you will only have American rich white kids' solutions to problems. They won't be able to solve their own conflicts, they will not know how to deal with dissenting thought, and it is highly questionable if they will not think that American white rich people are superior than others (which they will since they will never encounter people who are average, who are poor, who are not necessarily smart within their academic confines).

Sheltering the student from the world and throwing them in a moshpit of MENSA-level Geniuses does not, in fact, improve the student; placing them in a sandbox with other kids who are different than him is going to. This is why college applications slant through that, that is why there is foreign exchange programs and transfer programs, that is why they accept people from community colleges or technical schools, that is why they accept the kid who barely passed his or her classes back in high school, that is why they accept the black, the white, and the asian as well as the Christian, the hindu, and the atheist; that is also why there is such a diversity between 20-50 degree programs within an university and different colleges within them (College of Arts and Humanities, College of Science, College of Medicine, and so on and so forth), because we all benefit from looking at things from the perspective from the scientist, the artist, the humanist, the medical doctor, the black person, the white person, the hispanic, the atheist, the Christian, the Hindu, the Asian, and so on and so forth.

We are always trying to perfect this, we are always trying to come up with better ways to increase diversity. One of the ways that this is also achieved is through the University's degrees and library materials. However, that is not the only way, and is not necessarily the best way. The fact of the matter is that the humanist college is the reality of many colleges today, not the meritocratic model that people think it is. It is not a perfect humanist model, but it is the best we have until we can find a better way to run such an institution with the goal to educate people and expose them to a difference of creeds, religious beliefs, national identities and racial identities.

Our experiences are more valuable than our degree to the people who graduate out of college, and this is what is amiss in high school students who have adapted themselves to a meritocratic system where the teacher rewards the better students and does nothing for the average. Humanist education doesn't start at the university level, it starts since childhood, and that is what many people in the U.S. miss the point - that the purpose of an education is not a job, it is to get educated; and that is the goal of a college or a university, to admit a diverse pool of people, and to enhance the student experience. Hence, a humanist university is a misnomer as much as how would a humanist education would work, and my answer is: a humanist education works only if you are taught to think like a humanist since you are a child, meaning you are taught how to respect other individuals and to actively engage in challenging your own thoughts through any means necessary and expose yourself to a variety of ideas and experiences that enriches your life. You can try to teach it to a meritocrat, but they will sneer at you and call you both old-fashioned and outdated.

[Soldati Senza Confini]

No, because despite its claims it does not help with equality.

Just lowers the standards for people based on skin color, which by definition is racist.

How does it lower the standards for people based on skin color?

[Salus Maior]

No, because despite its claims it does not help with equality.

Just lowers the standards for people based on skin color, which by definition is racist.

How does it lower the standards for people based on skin color?

Like with college entry and such.

[Soldati Senza Confini]

How does it lower the standards for people based on skin color?

Like with college entry and such.

Why does people who earn Bs and Cs at colleges would lower the standard of academic institutions and why should we have schools full of 180+ IQ geniuses?

[Fanosolia]

Let me tell you. The humanist college sounds great. Though I do wonder how one like that would function now a days? Well once we remove the meritocractic elements from it that is. Not to get too off topic, I'm just curious.

A humanist college is exactly what we have in our colleges nowadays, or we are really close to it.

A humanist college doesn't admit students based only on their scores and abilities and ONLY on their scores and abilities. The humanist understands that diversity in the world is what makes the world go round. Hume got it best with his thesis-antithesis-synthesis triad, Erasmus, Petrarch and others before him also got the one trait of humanism and education: to bring about a diversity of thought and, through understanding, achieve a better way of doing things than what we have known before.

If you only accept American, rich, white kids in an institution you will only have American rich white kids' solutions to problems. They won't be able to solve their own conflicts, they will not know how to deal with dissenting thought, and it is highly questionable if they will not think that American white rich people are superior than others (which they will since they will never encounter people who are average, who are poor, who are not necessarily smart within their academic confines).

Sheltering the student from the world and throwing them in a moshpit of MENSA-level Geniuses does not, in fact, improve the student; placing them in a sandbox with other kids who are different than him is going to. This is why college applications slant through that, that is why there is foreign exchange programs and transfer programs, that is why they accept people from community colleges or technical schools, that is why they accept the kid who barely passed his or her classes back in high school, that is why they accept the black, the white, and the asian as well as the Christian, the hindu, and the atheist; that is also why there is such a diversity between 20-50 degree programs within an university and different colleges within them (College of Arts and Humanities, College of Science, College of Medicine, and so on and so forth), because we all benefit from looking at things from the perspective from the scientist, the artist, the humanist, the medical doctor, the black person, the white person, the hispanic, the atheist, the Christian, the Hindu, the Asian, and so on and so forth.

We are always trying to perfect this, we are always trying to come up with better ways to increase diversity. One of the ways that this is also achieved is through the University's degrees and library materials. However, that is not the only way, and is not necessarily the best way. The fact of the matter is that the humanist college is the reality of many colleges today, not the meritocratic model that people think it is. It is not a perfect humanist model, but it is the best we have until we can find a better way to run such an institution with the goal to educate people and expose them to a difference of creeds, religious beliefs, national identities and racial identities.

Our experiences are more valuable than our degree to the people who graduate out of college, and this is what is amiss in high school students who have adapted themselves to a meritocratic system where the teacher rewards the better students and does nothing for the average. Humanist education doesn't start at the university level, it starts since childhood, and that is what many people in the U.S. miss the point - that the purpose of an education is not a job, it is to get educated; and that is the goal of a college or a university, to admit a diverse pool of people, and to enhance the student experience. Hence, a humanist university is a misnomer as much as how would a humanist education would work, and my answer is: a humanist education works only if you are taught to think like a humanist since you are a child, meaning you are taught how to respect other individuals and to actively engage in challenging your own thoughts through any means necessary and expose yourself to a variety of ideas and experiences that enriches your life. You can try to teach it to a meritocrat, but they will sneer at you and call you both old-fashioned and outdated.

I guess that explains how got the entry level program I took, or even have those entry level programs at all, and why I liked college drastically better than high school. I think i've got some stuff to think about. Thank you for the explanation.

[Ifreann]

So what you're saying is that you're going to ignore what other people say and live in your own world devoid of facts.

This is a discussion forum. If you don't want to discuss, and instead just circle jerk around your own opinions, this isn't the place for it.

No, that's not what I said. I said I do not consider it the best way of getting rid of bias towards whites in society. It might that as a Briton I don't fully understand how racism and discrimination in the US work though.

It isn't meant to eliminate any bias towards white people in society. It's meant to keep any such bias from keeping people out of employment or education. Someone said earlier that affirmative action was treating the symptoms, not curing the disease, and they're kinda right. Because that's what it's meant to do. It's a bandage to keep us from bleeding out in the back of the ambulance, to keep people's lives from being worsened by racism while we try to eliminate it.

[Soldati Senza Confini]

...Kay? I've never seen any evidence of these people, but okay.

Oh, believe me, they're out there. Of course, I might be seeing things through a jade-tinted vision where everybody seems to swerve to the left or the right regarding these sorts of things, but I can certainly tell you from personal experience that I've seen those die-hard supporters.

Yea, I'll admit that AA isn't perfect, but what is being suggested, a meritocratic society, isn't much better.

[Chervyshka]

Affirmative action has always seemed unfair to me. It's not my fault I was born white and I don't see why a black or Hispanic (although many Hispanics are actually white) person's college application should be treated with preference over mine. The injustices of the past are not mine to pay. I know I will be called a racist by so many people on here but I just want to express my opinion and see what others have to say about it.

Are you in favor of Affirmative Action?

Why or why not?

Also, if you're not from the U.S. does your country have its own version of Affirmative Action?

No.
You are not racist. It should be based off of academics and merit of character.

[Mavorpen]

Affirmative action has always seemed unfair to me. It's not my fault I was born white and I don't see why a black or Hispanic (although many Hispanics are actually white) person's college application should be treated with preference over mine. The injustices of the past are not mine to pay. I know I will be called a racist by so many people on here but I just want to express my opinion and see what others have to say about it.

Are you in favor of Affirmative Action?

Why or why not?

Also, if you're not from the U.S. does your country have its own version of Affirmative Action?

No.
You are not racist. It should be based off of academics and merit of character.

Which is exactly why we have affirmative action.

[Soldati Senza Confini]

Affirmative action has always seemed unfair to me. It's not my fault I was born white and I don't see why a black or Hispanic (although many Hispanics are actually white) person's college application should be treated with preference over mine. The injustices of the past are not mine to pay. I know I will be called a racist by so many people on here but I just want to express my opinion and see what others have to say about it.

Are you in favor of Affirmative Action?

Why or why not?

Also, if you're not from the U.S. does your country have its own version of Affirmative Action?

No.
You are not racist. It should be based off of academics and merit of character.

Like I've said before, why should colleges just be interested in tossing students into a moshpit of MENSA-Level Genius white kids?