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>What you want can only happen when parents are no longer associated with their children in any way and all children are raised by the State so that everyone ca

>What you want can only happen when parents are no longer associated with their children in any way and all children are raised by the State so that everyone can be provided "equal opportunities" and even then the type of genes you inherit will impact your opportunities because although social inequality has been removed, biological inequalities can never be removed. This is one of the weariest types of hyperbolic strawmanning typically employed in discussions of unequal backgrounds, opportunities, etc. Literally nobody wishes for this imaginary future you're presenting. Not the comment you're responding to, likely not even the staunchest of activists against social injustice. The question is, do we see children with potential not being able to utilize it because of happenstance, as a problem? Is it fair that a child from a better-off family is more likely to enter better academic institutions regardless of their merit? Should we not help disadvantaged kids? Of course you can throw your arms up into the air and say "life isn't fair", and hold people responsible for the situation they were born into - but right now we're having this discussion, and we can make decisions and change these things. What if there's a better way? (PS: Standardized Adveristy Scores don't exactly sound like the better way though.)

air7 7y ago
> Is it fair that a child from a better-off family is more likely to enter better academic institutions regardless of their merit? At the point of admission, the merits of our two imaginary college kids are not same, even if they started out "the same". The current system, that only looks at objective test scores, is actually blind to anything but merit. You seem to be making the same strawman mistake you described: No one claims that rich kids can buy their way into elite schools, but rather that they can buy better education along the way.

air7 7y ago

> Is it fair that a child from a better-off family is more likely to enter better academic institutions regardless of their merit? At the point of admission, the merits of our two imaginary college kids are not same, even if they started out "the same". The current system, that only looks at objective test scores, is actually blind to anything but merit. You seem to be making the same strawman mistake you described: No one claims that rich kids can buy their way into elite schools, but rather that they can buy better education along the way.