Zone1 Let's Talk About "Merit"

[OKTexas]

You're making the OP's point. Those kids are not getting in due to "merit" they're getting in because their parents are wealthy mega Donar alumni.

Kind of like affirmative action admissions, right. Both leave more qualified people going to lesser schools because of internal quotas at the ivy league schools.

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[toobfreak]

I was just reading about some technology company that said it was trying to improve diversity since that would improve the products.

I've yet to ever see an instance where diversity was an advantage except maybe in investments. I would only ask that if diversity is such a good thing then why are companies and the government always trying to CENTRALIZE all of their operations?

Isn't centralization the exact OPPOSITE of diversity?

 

[OKTexas]

Yes, one is a business decision - and perfectly legal since it doesn’t discriminate according to skin color. The kids of black alumnae who donate get the same advantage.

But using skin color as a factor in admissions IS racist, and I expect the SCOTUS to announce their decision soon that colleges cannot adjust admissions procedures for the purpose of limiting one race and benefitting another.

See post #44.

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[Lisa558]

You're making the OP's point. Those kids are not getting in due to "merit" they're getting in because their parents are wealthy mega Donar alumni.

But who says that some of this wealthy alumni aren’t the black AA admits from 40 years ago?

And besides, that’s just business. If they Ivies didn’t admit the kids of wealthy alumni, in exchange for big donations, they’d have to find that money elsewhere - and the $50,000 a year tuition would double. That means more middle-class kids, black and white, would not be able to afford it.

 

[Lisa558]

See post #44.

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The posts jump from 20 to 45.

 

[OKTexas]

The posts jump from 20 to 45.

You need to refresh your page, I can see it just fine.

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[Lisa558]

You need to refresh your page, I can see it just fine.

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OK, got it….and true point.

One of the “comebacks” I get when I point out that a bright white student with excellent grades and scores is rejected from a top school - so that a black with lesser grades and scores can go instead - is that the white kid can still go to college, just not at the top school.

My answer is: well, why can’t the black kid go to the lesser school for which he would have qualified, instead of the better school? It’s not as if he can’t go to college at all.

 

[JoeB131]

Universities benefit by admitting the legitimate children of rich parents. Universities do not benefit by lowering standards to admit the illegitimate children of poor and often criminal black parents, unless those illegitimate blacks are good at basketball and football.

Is the purpose of a university to benefit the university, or to benefit society by increasing knowledge and education?

If the former, why bother having classes at all. Just step right up with a bag of money! We'll print you a degree!

If it is about the latter, then they should only be doing it on the basis of merit. Which means the legacies should get in line just like everyone else.

Now, this isn't a moot conversation, because frankly, this is what the whole Varsity Blues scandal was about, greasing the wheels for the undeserving.

So if the purpose of a university is indeed about promoting a greater good, then affirmative action is a moral imperative, to correct the wrongs of the past.

 

[JoeB131]

In a television program about sub Saharan Africa I actually heard a high status black man say, "They say it was better with the white man and he should come back."

I'm sure that the quislings that benefited from Colonialism would think that.

 

[JoeB131]

Really? By merit, do you mean qualification? Like better grades and that sort of thing? Show me where a lot of "whites" are entering college NOT based on merit? Because many colleges have already admitted picking students NOT based on merit, passing over better qualified students picking others instead based on racial and political agendas. Why don't we talk about that?

But that's the point... 43% of white admissions to Harvard fall into the category of Athletics, Legacies, Dean's Interest, and Children of Staff (ALDC)

A new statistic reveals the startling privilege of white kids admitted to Harvard

Ivy League admissions are far from a meritocracy.

qz.com

A new study notes that in the six admissions cycles between 2014 and 2019, 43% of white students admitted to Harvard were either legacies, recruited athletes, children of faculty and staff, or students on the Dean’s Interest List—a list of applicants whose relatives have donated to Harvard, the existence of which only became public knowledge in 2018. By contrast, no more than 16% of admitted students who were African-American, Asian-American, or Hispanic fell into one of those favored categories.

 

[JoeB131]

OK, got it….and true point.

One of the “comebacks” I get when I point out that a bright white student with excellent grades and scores is rejected from a top school - so that a black with lesser grades and scores can go instead - is that the white kid can still go to college, just not at the top school.

My answer is: well, why can’t the black kid go to the lesser school for which he would have qualified, instead of the better school? It’s not as if he can’t go to college at all.

As a proud graduate of a "not top" school (The University of Illinois at Chicago, which was specifically set up for city kids who couldn't get into Urbana, which is the U of I's crown jewel) I have no problem with the fact that most black college students will indeed end up at "lessor schools".

However, because we have given an outsized importance to these elite schools in terms of influence in government and business, then they NEED to representative of the society as a whole.

 

[toobfreak]

because we have given an outsized importance to these elite schools in terms of influence in government and business, then they NEED to representative of the society as a whole.

And if half of all people have an IQ below 85, then by your reasoning, half of all Harvard students should be morons.

Just the opposite, Ivy League schools are ivy league schools BECAUSE they get the BEST students and give the BEST educations, and are steered into the most important jobs so need to REPRESENT THE BEST, not representative of society as a whole.

 

[JoeB131]

Okay, rapid fire, swatting down the stupid.

OK, give them all of yours first, show us the receipt, and then we will talk.

All of my what, exactly? WHat thing do you think that is being taken away from either of us by giving blacks equal opportunity?

I've lost job opportunities to Affirmative Action. You know what, I got other job opportunities.

All from long ago. Whiney people of all ethnicities need to let the past go. THEY weren't victimized. The people who were victimized are now, for the most part long dead, and many of them succeeded in bettering their lives in spite of the terrible things they suffered.

And, they never cried about it. They DID things about it.

Um, here's the thing. I can honestly say that my grandfather and even my father experienced some discrimination for being German American in a period when Germans weren't all that popular. But here's the thing. Nothing singles me out as being of German ancestry today (Even my surname doesn't because we pronounce it differently than in the Old Country) and Germans are really not subject to discrimination today.

Today, blacks still suffer discrimination and they can't really hide that they are black.

We’ve also spent untold trillions on the black community, not just taxpayer money on social welfare the last century, but also private donations, affirmative action, scholarships, media, political movements, all doing things to ”help the black community“ and yet they are still the lowest IQ, least educated, highest unemployed, poorest, most obese and unhealthy, most addicted to drugs, most violent, most criminal group in America.

Which tells me we didn't spend enough.

Why are American Negroes more affluent and in better health than Negroes in every black majority, black run countries in Sub Saharan Africa and the Caribbean?

Would American Negroes be better off if all the whites left? How?

Are you serious, Grand Kleagle? If you are going to ask that, you might as well ask why White people in America are better off than they are in Eastern Europe.

 

[JoeB131]

Agree. We have to stop pretending that diversity for diversity’s sake will improve a product or service. I was just reading about some technology company that said it was trying to improve diversity (translation: hire more black people) since that would improve the products. My question is why? Why wouldn’t hiring the best, brightest, most innovative people regardless of race be the way to improve the products?

Wow, Lisa, what an inflated opinion you have of yourself.

The reality is, most of us don't effect the quality of a product in any way. The product is still the product.

But more equality in the society does improve the society.

What annoys me about your shrill posts is that you whine forever about what a bad deal Jews have gotten in the past. And you are right... they have. You are lucky to be living in a country with religious freedom, where you can believe in any backwards superstition you want and won't have to worry that someone who believes in another backwards superstition will discriminate against you.

The same should apply to skin tone.

 

[Hector12]

Is the purpose of a university to benefit the university, or to benefit society by increasing knowledge and education?

If the former, why bother having classes at all. Just step right up with a bag of money! We'll print you a degree!

If it is about the latter, then they should only be doing it on the basis of merit. Which means the legacies should get in line just like everyone else.

Now, this isn't a moot conversation, because frankly, this is what the whole Varsity Blues scandal was about, greasing the wheels for the undeserving.

So if the purpose of a university is indeed about promoting a greater good, then affirmative action is a moral imperative, to correct the wrongs of the past.

Negroes do not tend to be less intelligent than whites and Orientals because of "the wrongs of the past," but because human evolution has not prepared most of them for the demands of civilization.

 

[MarathonMike]

IM2confused has conflated the offspring of wealthy alumni getting admissions to Ivy League schools to them being White. That is ludicrous, the obvious reason most of them are White is that decades ago, most Ivy League attendees were White. It's not a skin color issue, it is a M-O-N-E-Y and fame issue. That's how Malia Obama got into Harvard.

 

[Hector12]

I'm sure that the quislings that benefited from Colonialism would think that.

High status African Negroes benefited from independence. It does not seem that other African Negroes did.

 

[JoeB131]

Negroes do not tend to be less intelligent than whites and Orientals because of "the wrongs of the past," but because human evolution has not prepared most of them for the demands of civilization.

Sadly, that other thread where you tried this evolution nonsense got locked.

You keep repeating this racist garbage, but I don't think you understand the concept of Darwinian evolution at all.

Homo Sapiens has been around for 390,000 years, and we've only had "Civilization" for the last 6000 or so. So when did this evolution take place, exactly?

I could probably toss your sissy ass out in a forest and you wouldn't last a week. I might do okay, because the Army gave me a lot of training, but I wouldn't want to put that to the test at my age.

 

[Lisa558]

As a proud graduate of a "not top" school (The University of Illinois at Chicago, which was specifically set up for city kids who couldn't get into Urbana, which is the U of I's crown jewel) I have no problem with the fact that most black college students will indeed end up at "lessor schools".

However, because we have given an outsized importance to these elite schools in terms of influence in government and business, then they NEED to representative of the society as a whole.

Why do they NEED to be representative of society as a whole? Why can’t they be representative of the most qualified students regardless of color instead of rejecting whites who are better students than the 2/3rds of blacks accepted? Doing so is racist, and punishes whites for their skin color.

It’s every bit as offensive as when the Ivies institutes anti-Jew quotas.

 

[Hector12]

Sadly, that other thread where you tried this evolution nonsense got locked.

You keep repeating this racist garbage, but I don't think you understand the concept of Darwinian evolution at all.

Homo Sapiens has been around for 390,000 years, and we've only had "Civilization" for the last 6000 or so. So when did this evolution take place, exactly?

I could probably toss your sissy ass out in a forest and you wouldn't last a week. I might do okay, because the Army gave me a lot of training, but I wouldn't want to put that to the test at my age.

Correct my arithmetic if you need do.

Let's say that an average century has four generations. A thousand years has 40 generations. Six thousand years has 240 generations. An animal breeder will tell you that all kinds of things can be done with 240 generations.

That explains why whites and Orientals have higher IQ averages than Negroes, and much higher averages than Australian Aborigines, Pygmies of central Africa, and the San Bushmen of south east Africa.

Save your threats of violence for those who are impressed by them.