Orange Juice Blog’s budget does not allow us to replicate this experiment on Orange County, which by the way is TOTALLY “post-racial,” but perhaps our good friends at the Weekly will try it.
As the Supreme Court today took what will probably end up being a big bite out of affirmative action in education — when they tell and appellate court that approved of such a plan to “go back and apply strict scrutiny” they’re in effect saying “are you sure you’re sure?”, strict scrutiny being a doctrine of necessity for government action that is notoriously hard to satisfy — I guess that it’s a good time for our national (or at least our little corner of it) conversation about race. (To be fair, my black friend — yes, he’s both! — who blogs for “Above the Law” likes the decision more than I do. Of course, he went to Harvard; whaddaya expect?)
The argument is made that we’ve transcended racism and are now a color-blind society, undoing any need for racial preferences. Here, take a look at this:
Now this is just, as we’d say, “illustrative evidence.” We would need to know more about how they did this little experiment before putting much faith in the result. Maybe they ran 10 trials with each person, and 9 times out of 10 each of the white “thieves” got hassled and the black “thief” didn’t — but they chose to show the one exception in each case. I tend to doubt that, though. (This would be an excellent study to replicate in OC, by the way, except for the too-high probability that the black actor would get shot. Of course, we’d have to have a Mexican actor in one example too, but that would demand serious combat pay.)
Here’s one problem with legal approaches to racial discrimination: they rarely come down in legal codes sent from on high like voting bans and Nuremberg Laws. Mostly, it’s just people doing what people do — what they have learned to do in a racially hyper-aware society. And that’s why anyone who doesn’t want to look at the outcome of the process, rather than just its rules, doesn’t really want the fight against discrimination to succeed.
As a former professor, how do you feel racial diversity in college acceptance has benefitted this country ?
Some ways include: bringing different historical and personal perspectives into government and top-level non-government positions (much as has happened with women), giving people the benefits of mingling with and becoming tolerant with those unlike them (extremely important in an increasingly interconnected world), making it more likely that we have some people who have the experience and inclination to deal with minority communities, snuffing out the prejudice that would otherwise prevent racial diversity, and challenging the fiction that two candidates can be rightfully compared on their intrinsic merit when one spent 500 hours prepping at Stanley Kaplan to prepare for standardized tests and the other had to share schoolbooks with a fellow student and had classes with teachers with twice the student load or more.
I don’t think racism should be a part of college admissions. The average SAT scores of black students at Berkeley is 800. That means they turn away white and yellow that have near perfect SAT scores solely based upon their racial makeup.
The same thing happens at UCI. Yellow students are turned away at UCI because according to their racist policies, they have too many of that color. They will accept a white student over a yellow one with the same qualifications.
A fair way to do it would be to go color blind and not judge people based on the color of their skin or their gender etc.
I think it’s also fair to have citizens of other countries (regardless of race) pay more since they don’t normally pay as many taxes as Americans do.
You either fight for racism or fight against it. Too bad the democratic party still fights for it (from jim crow style laws in the south to socially engineered racism today).
*Reparations? The Voting Rights Act of 1965? The Bakey Decision? Allowing a certain number of unqualified students with low SAT’s? Allowing a certain number of
Minority Students in State Colleges?
It sort of goes like this: Many minority students have been disenfranchised over the years by being sent to underachieving high schools and even grade schools. You add to this to the foreign students that are allowed into the University System based upon their inflated tuition schedules.and pretty soon the competition is overwhelming.
OK, take the best students….they say. In that case all that would be in the University System would be Asian Students from Korea, China and Malaysia.
Back in the bad old days; if someone was a third generation Californian…..they could
go to college without paying tuition. That lasted until Wilson Riles was named Superintendent of Public Instruction in California back in the 60’s. The Academic standards really took a lunch….when they had to get great football and track participants for University Sporting programs. As you might imagine, most University Basketball Players….never graduate from the schools they attend. How can they even stay enrolled if all their classes are walk overs? It’s a business.
The good news is that many black students have been able through the assistance of dedicated parents, friends, Federal Grant Money and Non-Athletic Scholarships….to actually go to a good school and graduate. Without the Federal and State programs.
there is little doubt….they would have never made that happen. How long should these programs continue? Sadly, we have to leave that to the courts and our legislature.
So, it’s ok for UCI to turn someone away as long as their skin color is yellow?
I would have to agree to disagree with using race as a factor in college admissions.
Two wrongs don’t make a right. Pulling up past racism doesn’t help anyone. Look at how Jews and Arabs pull up past injustices to justify their violent behavior. Another example is how white, black, brown, etc. supremacists only focus on racial injustices to incite more fear and hatred for their followers. All it does is breed more hate and racism.
“So, it’s ok for UCI to turn someone away as long as their skin color is yellow?”
You mean like on The Simpsons?
If you want to start discussion at that basic level, you’ll have to wait for the remedial class, where we talk about remedial measures.
“Not digging up the past” is a favorite motto among people who have committed atrocities.
haha, that’s absolutely wrong. Ghandi was the most peaceful person around and believed an eye for an eye will make the world go blind. I get it, you live on hate and prejudice. We can agree to disagree.
The Simpsons might do ok at UCI because they probably haven’t met their quota yet for cartoon characters. However, UCI’s racist policies have made it more difficult for east asians.
How long should society be racist and factor in color? I’m guessing hateful judgmental people will answer indefinitely.
The Olympics has it right. When athletes compete in the next Olympic games, the people who win gold will win because they are the best, not because of the color of their skin. Even though some sports are dominated by certain races, it’s still 100 percent fair and as it should be!