an alternative argument that is neither based in "erasing privilege" or "increasing diversity" nor any other possible reason for affirmative action (or some oth

an alternative argument that is neither based in "erasing privilege" or "increasing diversity" nor any other possible reason for affirmative action (or some other kind of quota system). disclaimer: this is conjecture, so please humor me. I don't have citations. this is a thought experiment for the sake of discussion. suppose that the aspects by which Asian-American students claim they excel in, and claim as the basis for why they ought to have higher acceptance rates at certain universities, are actually not considered very valuable by those universities? example: standardized test scores. SAT or ACT or some similar thing. maybe its true that the average standardized test score amongst Asian-American university applicants is higher than that of the general population. what advantage is that if the standardized test score itself is not something being highly valued by the admissions officer? what would falsify that claim? examples of applicants from other cohorts being over-represented at the same average standardized test score levels. under-representation of another group with similar test scores would not falsify the claim that standardized test scores are not considered valuable. if they're not important than there is some other criteria being selected for. over-representation of another cohort would, however, evidence some kind of discrimination. the claim is that over-performance in standardized test scores ought to lead to over-representation in admissions. if it does for one group that over-performs but not another that also over-performs that does look like discrimination.