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BTW, I'm the one who created the Krugman Cat Index ( http://www.yoders.net/nr/?ffid=5&kit=8235 ) animation. And yes, I have no life. It's been very well received over at National Review Online.

"I hope this will go a long way to furthering my goal: Making the abuse of Paul Krugman's cat the standard euphemism for the material well-being of our society." - Jonah Goldberg ( http://www.nationalreview.com/thecorner/03_10_26_corner-archive.asp#018875 )


Jeremy Yoder
jeremy@yoders.net

Boy, everyone seems to be off in a huff.

There could be strong feelings floating around about this subject, no?

:-\

I just want to note that originally, my opinion on affirmative action was partially formed by a piece by Shelby Steele (who is Black) and by conversations with friends of mine who are minorities. From Steele's and their perspective, there is certainly "self doubt" in how they are treated in college admissions as to whether they were there because of their race or because they were qualified, regardless of their academic qualifications.

If anyone's interested, I really recommend Shelby Steele's "A Dream Deferred: The Second Betrayal of Black Freedom in America."

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060931043/ref=rm_item

One of its more interesting point is that in his view, Affirmative Action is just a cheap way for whites to assuage their guilt about past racism.

What were they insinuating?

Hey! I wasn't debating. It's not an insinuation. It's just satire.

"Imaginary Friends: How to Write a Diversity Essay"
http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/wood200309300825.asp

:-D

That's why these issues aren't particularly relevant, and why the norace.org website isn't an adequate protest of affirmative actoin.

BTW, I'm certainly game to the idea that this might not be an "adequate" protest. I just thought I'd give it a try. You wanna give me any pointers? :-D Since your bio says you're a "analyst/lobbyist," I'm sure you'd have some pretty good ideas. So, hypothetically speaking (and even though you're for affirmative action but against racial quotas), what would be a better way?

Second, I'm not the one trying to get students to risk their college careers in order to make a misguided moral statement.

Miguided? Maybe. Moral? Yes.

Also, I wanted to comment on the liberal media thing. Yes, that's certainly something to overcome. I'd certainly take an even a negatively slanted story in the national media, but that probably won't even happen unless I get some conservative outlets on the web and on TV to take interest. I've written off a few emails a couple of days ago, and I should probably send out more. Anybody have any ideas on how to promote this thing?

The letter of protest is sort of an optional thing. The site provides it to them at the end, as sort of some cover if administrators give them problems.

I have my doubts as well over whether this will get much participation. It is certainly a big deal to protest this in such a way. I just thought, "I'll never know unless I give it a shot." So, this is sort of a "'shot' in the dark."

As far as my research can tell (which is far from exhaustive), it varies quite a bit from school to school. Some highschool transcripts reveal race (but students are legally entitled to see their transcripts). Federal Student aid applications ask for race, and schools ask to see those. In the FAQ section, I recommend leaving race blank on the FAFSA, so as not to be getting into federal trouble, but it's up to the student.

Also, there are probably quite a few other things that could reveal race about which a student must be careful.

The hope is that they'll get admitted, then cause a stir when they get there that will hopefully lead to some publicity of the issue if they handle it right.

BTW, I've had inquiries from several people who are minorities about signing on. They support the idea, but are worried about marking themselves as "white" or "asian" because their chances then won't be as good. In the FAQ, I mention this. It's all up to one's conscience.

Woah. I. Am. In. Awe.

Finally someone in here who is making a serious argument to make up for my lack of coherency!

Feeeeeel the wrath of Javelinaaaaaaaa!

(Sorry, Javelina. I think I'm up a bit too late).

Oh, yeah. I forgot to link to one of D'Souza's pieces. http://aad.english.ucsb.edu/docs/D-Souza.html

Most of my reasoning comes from reading Shelby Steele. He had an essay in a business ethics course I took that got me interested in the subject in the first place. I've read most of his stuff since then and find it very persuasive. Again, I'm not a lobbyist (and have fled from my family's lawyerly persuasion), so there are lots of other people out there who have better things to say than I.

He's the primary one from whom I've gotten the information about drop out rates, minority stigma and the victim mentality.

While Dinesh D'Sousa isn't the most qualified writer on these matters, he does a pretty good job of summing up what others have to say about the dropout rates. It's a pretty interesting issue.

If I could specify one recent piece that most closely sums up my views of affirmative action, it would have to be a column by Roger Clegg.
http://www.nationalreview.com/clegg/clegg021403.asp

That generally just lumps you in with "over represented" groups, and maintains the status quo. AND (for Javelina) if one is fine with the status quo, then that's TOTALLY FINE.

Or, mark it in crayons. :-|

I'm not doing much to convince people to change their views on affirmative action. That's not the intent of the site, nor of my original post here. It was just to let people know about the site.

There are many pundits, lobbyists, columnists and politicians out there who have a lot better things to say about it than I. On the site, I link to what other people have to say in the articles section. NoRace.org is there for people who are against affirmative action to do something about it. If you don't believe me, just look at how pitiful my brief introduction to affirmative action is on the web site.

And regarding the mentioned gullibility of the masses who may (or may not) see my site? I trust people to choose for themselves. I think we, the great unwashed masses, can make up our own minds.

I think what you say is unfortunately true, Old Sarge. So, I may have wasted my time. But I thought I'd give it a shot to see if there was enough interest from students who are against affirmative action.

Race certainly does have something to do with how people see the world, as you said. So does being married, being gay, being blonde, being religious and just about any thing else one can be. That doesn't mean we should force diversity in all those areas.

Anecdotal. The story is anecdotal. It is not the definitive source of all knowledge regarding affirmative action. No human experience is. The trouble is, there's no way to argue against any methods of college acceptance because it is secretive. So, nothing can ever be proved. Pretty convenient, isn't it?

Maybe my dad can explain it a bit better to me, hopefully with crayons.

I'm not set in my ways, actually. Keep trying.

Interesting: That's exactly what my dad said (he's a lawyer and for affirmative action). He joked that if we're all from Africa anyway, than we can mark whatever we want.

Hey, now. Calm down. :-D

The Supreme court decided that Michigan Law School could use race among other factors. I'm for the other factors, not for race.

Actually, there is zero chance you know that what I'm saying is unknown. I know the ACT and high-school GPA of both groups of students (two in each group). Regarding the fact that schools keep them private: I'm sure there's lots of other factors that they could use to dance around the issue of awarding student with inferiour academics a position over those with a better record.

I'll have to check with my friend regarding what school it was. She did tell me that those students were not required to perform the level of work required of everyone else. As I said, this is anecdotal. She could have descended from another planet and just masquerading as my friend, but that's what she said.

But I do stand corrected. I can now see that at least one person does not know of situations were things like this have happened.

I think that people should be helped in both secondary and higher ed. It's just that it's not happening. They're only trying to arbitrarily fix things by allowing people into higher ed. schools after they're already too far behind. As I said, I'm for vouchers and for holding public schools responsible for their failure (i.e. making them compete with other schools for students).

I'm not arguing this point for your benefit. You seem to be pretty set in your ways, or are just being argumentative for sport. Either way, I'm enjoying the discussion. My family's full of lawyers and lobbyists, so holidays gatherings are always pretty entertaining.

I'm hoping other folks are enjoying the subject as well.