I have a real problem with the gov't getting involved to force a private university to admit anyone, qualified or otherwise. It's like saying that they have "right" to be educated by a for-profit business. Would you want to be forced to hire someone to work for you based on their experience? There are other criteria. How much experience does Biden have in running anything, let alone a private university?

This sets a bad precedent for future lawsuits. Next they're coming to kick the door down for LGBT or whatever they are called now. It's obviously different if the university is supported by taxpayer money. In those cases, have at whatever wackadoodle idea pops in Biden's melon. He can be the next Yimmeh Cahteh. Give away the store.

I agree with you, Rusnak. Now, why aren't Asians considered minorities at universities and quality for the grants and such? That horse siht about per capita based on population. I suppose they don't btich hard enough? If they did, their numbers are so little it never gets heard. Their parents will just work 12 hours, turn themselves inside out to make a few more bucks to invest in their kid's future without making a sound. Its called hard work and so many have forgotten about it.

The Asian group suing Harvard lost.

Again, "better qualified" is subjective, especially in college admissions. And the Supreme Court has ruled that private colleges and universities can narrowly discriminate using race as a factor in determining admissions. Haven't read the ruling. I am, for the record, completely against that practice. But I can stand by a broad definition of better qualified for admissions purposes. Because grades alone don't make a whole student. And probably because I myself was a poster child for the whole package having worked 40 hours a week during junior and senior years of high school so I could pay for college myself. What's funny is I applied to Brandeis (80% Jewish, non-sectarian) two weeks after the deadline and was accepted 2 weeks later so the joke always was they needed to fill the Catholic quota. But what is really interesting is I was discrimated against not being Jewish. My 2 other roommates said in no uncertain terms that I should not be there. We got along great! Fun times. That said I still have very dear friends that I talk with regularly from 35 years ago. But being discriminated against is not super fun. At all.

Anyway, the point is Harvard CAN say that Asian kids who excel in X but don't have Y and Z at all are LESS qualified than Black kids who are not so great in X but excellent in Y and Z.

The elephant in the room is, Can flipside systemic racism be used to correct over 2 centuries of system racism? Does social engineering work?

I understand the philosophy especially since "Cycles" are one of my favorite topics to think about. Racism doesn't just end. Oppression is a learned cognitive dissonance passed down from generation to generation with significant environmental influence.

How do you break that cycle? Create a "positive" version of racism to effect social change?

The jury is out on that one and will be for some time.

I have a friend who is an attractive half-Black woman. I had to work up the nerve to tell her to not break into Black accent during important communication with influential Whites. I think it's important to fit in "while in Rome" so to speak. That's just the way it is.

Another wife of a very very very wealthy individual gave my Punjabi buddy some good advice: lose the Turbin lest you look like a religious fanatic amongst captains of industry. I introduced him to some pretty influential people. He has a lot of ambition for a 20-something.

Oppressing's one group to try to remedy a past oppression by someone else seems pretty darned stupid. Treating Asians poorly now because other minorities' grandparents were treated poorly seems to simply create racism and more bigotry. Stopping racism and bigotry is the answer, not institutionalizing it.

Stopping racism and bigotry is a great idea. Sort of like stopping the sun from rising.

Platitudes aren't going to stop racism.

But institutionalizing reverse discrimination is probably not the answer but points are awarded for at least trying to create a level playing field. And don't forget part of stopping racism is creating diversity.

One of the greatest challenges in stopping racism is softening centuries, actual centuries, of cultural identity.

Just look at our good friend rusnak's post for two great examples of this. Would his two friends receive the same respect if they didn't take is (good IMHO) advice?

But in doing so you are smudging cultural identity.

Quite the Catch 22.

So the question becomes, would Asian Tiger Moms lower their standards to those of White Moms so their kids could get into Harvard? Not a gamble I would take if I were one.

Yes, racism is a little complex.

I read the list of 25 things this morning with a fresh set of eyes.

It has many elements in common with Islam which has three parts;

1. the religion (Koran)

2. the set of laws (Sharia)

3. the governance (political/economic)

Thank you for posting this information Shaun.

I made a comment earlier that I was never a bully nor ever followed one, but also said asking others what they think may surprise you.

The matter of perspective is paramount in the discussion.

If a lot of Asians and African Americans are claiming there is racism, then maybe we should listen.

Is some of this perception of racism a self-imposed group paranoia?

To some degree it might be.

I've seen the fear in a person's eyes (20 year old Black guy) when for the first time surrounded by others not of their own race. The fear was real, to the point of panic and disorientation.

Did anyone in the crowd even look sideways at this person? No, and the crowd was as multicultural as any you could imagine.

When people are pre-programmed to an expectation (racism in this case), that expectation can be self-fulfilling unfortunately, and in contradiction to what the eyes and ears actually input into the brain.

Individual racism barely budges the needle for WHITE society.....................

rusnak I encourage you to place yourself in a situation where you are the only white person for miles around and outside of the normal safe tourist zones.

Report back how comfortable you felt.

Is what you felt individual racism or just plain old fear of feeling vulnerable?

Did you feel eyes upon you, a sense of being stared at?

Would that be racism or paranoia?

I cannot control what someone else is feeling by what's in my mind or heart.

However, they can control what they are feeling by what's in their mind and heart.

Tiger Wood's parents pushed him into golf.............

Venus and Serena Williams parents pushed them into tennis................

Floyd Mayweather's father pushed him into boxing..........

My father pushed me into the steel mill (a horrible 5-months), but I escaped to college, and did not go into the military like my brother and cousin, and also declined an offer to box after I ducked a punch thrown at me in a bar.

Parenting is important, but not the whole story.

Sometimes a young person can step outside of the cast system imposed on them by parents and society, other times these mechanisms are the path to success.

Who's to say what is right, and what is wrong?

You know how often I've heard "I would never have guessed, you speak so well" when people find out I'm half black.

They say it like it's supposed to be a compliment and I will admit when I was much younger I took it as that until I grew up and realized that it's actually an insult. That people believe blacks are somehow genetically incapable of speaking "white"

That's just the way it is? Yeah, because people like you continue to perpetuate it.

If you can't appreciate the message because you don't approve of the accent that's your problem and a pretty ****ing stupid one to have to boot.

There is a business accent that is accepted business culture.
Rusnak's point is solid.

What about strong country accents?
Same rule would apply.

I can speak a lot of different ways, some, I wouldn't do in business.

Business it helps to have a clear and concise standard, no need to repeat as something was unfamiliar.
Makes sense to me.

When I call to get tech support, there are accents I am capable of I DO NOT USE.
Because the person on the other end, would be struggling.

HUmans do tend to try to identify patterns.
Person has a cowboy hat and boots, smells of cow manure, talks a certain way.
They meet person 2 like this, person 3 like this.
They expect person 4 to also be like that.

Stomach monkey, don't take it as an insult, it is just them being honest that you didn't fit their percieved pattern.
The trick to intelligence to be able to fit exceptions into your world view.
The people that said that were being open and honest.

And revealing far more about themselves than they thought at the time.

They said the quite part out loud.

My father was very good friends with Vic Miles, popular and well known NY CBS News anchor.

Vics parents were Jamaican so he grew up speaking with that accent. It was amusing hanging out with him on the weekends and hearing him being him in his "non news appropriate" voice.

I always found it ironic that for him to be as notable a celebrity in his market as he was he had to pretend to be someone else.

I get it, still doesn't make it right.

Mi Nana es de Puerto Rico. She has a very heavy Spanish accent. I have encountered similar attitudes towards my grandmother. Wow, your grandson speaks English so well..

I usually answered... Yo hablo bien espanol tambien..

Its odd, in SoCal I can get by anywhere with my Spanish, even though I dont really look Latino. Up here in the PNW, I've encountered MANY Latinos talking sh t, thinking I didnt understand.

I usually answered... Yo hablo bien espanol.. pendejo

As someone with a lot of accents they are ALL ME.
To me, it is strange that most people are unwilling to even try a different accent.
It is a choice, my choice.
When I fall into a "neutral" accent, people express that same surprise that I'm from South Carolina.
I prefer their openness and honesty.
I'd rather a friend that is rough and wears it than one that is rotten and hides it.

My mom was from western Ar Kansas.
When she went to college, roomates contiually kept telling her how to have a more neutral accent
She learned.

Why would you try to sound like someone you arent? I dont know how.

I think in different accents, not just speak.
Different subject matters I find I am better at working with by changing how my mind is processing it.

Are we talking about an accent or piss poor english?

I don't know, ask a Brit about what you speak.

There are hundreds of variants of "English".

Which is the only correct one?

If you yourself are not speaking that one then ask yourself, are you speaking with an accent, or is your English piss poor.

Most folks try to fit in to their environment. Changing the way you speak is not that much different than changing what you wear if you're at the beach or in the office or at a ball game.

If I speak to folks for which English is not their primary language, I'll try to tailor my speech to use less slang, be a little slower and more clear with better enunciation and pronunciation. I've had folks speak to me with thick accents and using slang from their group that I did not understand. That goes for rednecks, country folks, black folks, folks from New Jersey, etc.... If we all (all of those folks listed) want to interact, then we all have to step away a bit from our group/local speech patterns and try to speak a more neutral American English. It's not just Asians or black folks or hispanics that change how they speak when they speak to other people. There are white folks that do the same because they have local/regional/cultural variations in how they speak vs a more neutral American English.

I suspect folks in the UK/England, Scotland, etc... run into the same thing. Cockney, Geordie, Scouse, etc... probably have to try to speak closer to RP (received pronunciation) or BBC English when they communicate with folks from other areas. And that's without even getting outside of England, I'm sure that there are variations around Scotland and Ireland that are hard for other folks to understand, and that's before folks from Scotland, Ireland, England and Wales try talking to each other.

Trying to minimize your accent and speech patterns isn't a sign of trying to be someone that you aren't. It's not really much different than picking a language to speak when dealing with people from another country. It seems like it because the base language is the same, but for some folks, multiple folks speaking English with thick accents may be as unintelligible as if they were speaking another language. Some folks have a good ear for picking that sort of thing and others just don't.

I suspect it's the same reason why some folks never lose an accent while others can lose an accent. I also knew a girl from Texas that went and lived in the UK and when she came back several years later, both her and her daughter had picked up a British accent. I used to work with a young guy that was from Vietnam, IIRC, who's English was as good or better than average with practically no accent and he'd been in the country <10 years. I've also interviewed a guy that was from another country, but had been in the US for >40 years, and his accent was so thick that I sometimes had to ask him to repeat himself. And I usually find it very easy to understand people even if they have strong accents.

My wife, if she's speaking to someone with a strong accent (regardless of the accent) has a hard time understanding because of the accent.

This is true and valid when we are talking about clarity of communication.

I speak Swabisch, I also speak proper German.

Since I present in all ways as an American it's advantageous for me to communicate in Swabisch when I'm in Germanic countries because it immediately lets my audience know I'm a hommie from Stuttgart because you don't learn Swabisch any other way than having grown up with it.

My counterparts in Munich used to laugh at me not because I spoke it but because it was just strange to them to hear it coming from me.

But no one ever judges my quality or perceives me in a different light over it.