Posted on 08/09/2017 10:20:55 AM PDT by Kaslin
Affirmative action is once again in the news. This time because of a leaked Justice Department memo indicating possible action regarding complaints from Asian-American groups that Harvard University is discriminating against Asian-Americans in its admissions policies.
As this story was breaking, Harvard released news that, for the first time in history, the majority of its incoming freshman class will not be white. Per the story, 50.8 percent of Harvard's class of 2021 will not be white.
Here's Harvard's spokesperson: "To become leaders in our diverse society, students must have the ability to work with people from different backgrounds, life experiences, and perspectives. ... Harvard's admissions process considers each applicant as a whole person, and we review many factors, consistent with the legal standards established by the U.S. Supreme Court."
As the law stands today, although quotas and other quantitative approaches to considering race in admissions policies are prohibited, universities may consider race as a factor in admissions toward the goal of diversity.
I agree with the Supreme Court and Harvard about the importance of diversity. But we differ about what kind of diversity we're looking for and whether the law should mandate it.
Do we have diversity in a class of students whose hues cover the full spectrum of the rainbow, whose ethnic roots span the globe, but who are taught one way of thinking and chastised if they don't toe the line?
It's not news that university faculties are skewed heavily to the political left. Harvard is no exception.
Per analysis done by the university newspaper, the Harvard Crimson, over the three-year period from 2011 to 2014, 84 percent of political contributions from Harvard faculty, instructors and researchers went "to federal Democratic campaigns and political action committees."
At Harvard Law school it was 98 percent and at Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences, which includes Harvard College, it was 96 percent.
Does this pronounced faculty bias make its way into the classroom?
Yes, according to Harvard University Professor of Government Harvey Mansfield, a Republican. "The only debate we get here is between the far-left ... and the liberals," says Mansfield. "It gives students a view that a very narrow spectrum of opinion is the only way to think."
Per findings of the Harvard Public Opinion Project, done at Harvard's Institute of Politics, 51 percent of college students say they "feel comfortable sharing my political opinions at my college without fear of censorship or negative repercussions."
Barely more than half of students feel comfortable expressing their political sentiments on campus -- that doesn't sound to me like an environment where priority is given to diverse thought and discussion.
And according to this survey, 21 percent of Republican students, compared to 8 percent of Democrat students, said they do not feel comfortable expressing themselves.
I have enough personal experience speaking on university campuses to know that embracing diversity and tolerance doesn't include conservative thinking.
No, I am not advocating affirmative action for conservatives. I am advocating education based on the premise of the uncompromising pursuit of truth. This will produce humility, mutual respect, ideals, excellence and diversity.
When education becomes about politics and indoctrination, when politicized university administrators decide what the world should look like and choose to create a world in their image, rather than in the image of God, no one, even those who suffer from the legacy of racial injustice, are served.
There are, unfortunately, still many parts of our society where the legacy of racial injustice limits opportunity. Let's discuss how to stop it and how to open the doors for every American to reach their God-given potential.
But undermining equal treatment for all and compromising standards of excellence in the pursuit of knowledge is not one of those ways.
Hmmm, I wonder what the percentage will be at graduation?
Sadly, that is, to a dismaying percentage of faculty, the pursuit of something that does not exist. Even at Harvard, whose motto is "Veritas". To STEM students Pi is 3.1415 because it is; to everyone else it is 3.1415 because it's a social construct, infinitely negotiable and a sign of an oppressive patriarchy. What suffers from this grotesque nihilism isn't just Pi, it's education itself.
What people think of other people of “minority” characteristics, and what those people of “minority” characteristics think they are thinking, can often be quite different.
If you go into the world convinced that every quarter will only hate you, you go in like a dog that’s already been beaten.
The ultimate answer to this sad situation is a renewed faith in God — not in people’s religious systems, which are often very shortsighted, but in the God who transcends them all.
I agree with the Supreme Court and Harvard about the importance of diversity.”
BS. It’s flat out excuse for discrimination against whites, males, and often, Asians. Screw that. There is no “merit” in the phony notion of “strength thru ‘diversity’”
The law clearly said, the Constitution clearly said, NO PERSON . . .and that’s been prostituted by politicians, courts, and academia. None of whom is ever threatened by it.
Time to END it . . .plain and simply, if you won’t compete, you dont belong. And if you agree with it, then you are a bigot. You are discriminating on the basis of characteristics that were meant to be irrelevant, and are irrelevant.
There are mathematical truths, then there are theological propositional and illustrational truths.
The latter may sound more nebulous, but they are the most important thing around. They are the ultimate reasons why we should be doing anything.
The SCOTUS side-step in the Bakke case. Quotas are unconstitutional.....unless they aren't.
This is an attempt to fiat secular society or government to do things that are on a church level.
The result is socialism or at best a church that is tainted from within by Caesar’s peculiar concerns.
The quota always is implied — as the point of achievement of “diversity” at which all this other activity is now considered superfluous.
And we could talk till our voices are hoarse about this putting the cart before the horse. Establish a race-blind excellence, and you’ll have the most diverse draw to it possible under the conditions.
I don’t want to play.
Find someone else to troll
Nonsense. God is truth, there are no adjectives involved. Now please quit hijacking the thread.
>students must have the ability to work with people from different backgrounds, life experiences, and perspectives.
That means if Abdul or Shanaia wants to rape or rob you then you must submit. ESAD harvard.
I wonder if they are taking more in the entrants group to compensate. It’s cheaper to teach the lower level courses because they are mostly large lecture halls. A bit different in the science where they break into labs but those are run by TA.
Does this all the time. Will post replies to successive posts until there is a nibble.
I have no time for that nonsense
Affirmative Racism is at least as bad as opening the borders and creating sanctuary zones.
California is gone; never to return to being a true American state. Conservatives living there are leaving in droves understandably. Who wants to live in a foreign country unintentionally? Been there done that there and it sucked.
Well who pissed in your Cheerios, suddenly hurtling you into the level of boss?
There is no nonsense. Truths come in various varieties. People know that PI = whatever is not the same as God is love. Apparently YOU don’t know it, however, and have become hostile.
And I see vast projection in your statements. YOU are trying to bully the thread. YOU show it by YOUR actions. I haven’t told you to get out of the thread, only to stop the bullshit.
God is not the philosopher’s god that you are most manifestly claiming to think around. God is love, is not the same as PI = 3 point whatever.
Its no secret that Ivies are highly ideological, and that they love the “diversity” card. Black, Latino, Muslim - you are immediately pushed into their consideration. They will admit to “seeking diversity” but do not admit to the outright discrimination they are practicing. The Ivies have been relying on political and PR protection from America’s other elites for decades now.
The main victims of this discrimination are Americans of Chinese and Korean background. Caucasians are hurt too.
The Ivies will not admit it, but if they applied race-blind admissions criteria, they would likely get almost no blacks and few latinos.
Take it to the Religion forum. I’m not playing your game.
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