14 ms·

Jewish Problems (2011)

110 points by spython 5y ago

pvg 5y ago
Previously, at great length: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=Jewish%20Problems%20comments%3E10&sort=byPopularity&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
- dang 5y ago
  Macroexpanded: Jewish Problems (2011) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28136729 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28136729 - Aug 2021 (77 comments) Jewish Problems (2011) [pdf] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22896047 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22896047 - April 2020 (33 comments) These problems were designed to prevent Jewish people from passing (2011) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15424117 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15424117 - Oct 2017 (170 comments) Jewish problems (2011) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10923934 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10923934 - Jan 2016 (95 comments) Jewish Problems - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4759642 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4759642 - Nov 2012 (69 comments) Jewish problems - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3096793 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3096793 - Oct 2011 (187 comments)
TchoBeer 5y ago
What reason did the Russian admissions have to prevent Jews from getting in? What about Jews were undesirable?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- umanwizard 5y ago
  Europe in general has had a strong tradition of virulent antisemitism at least from the Middle Ages until the present day (but especially until the 1950s).
  - VaxportsForever 5y ago
    You didn't answer the question of what made them undesirable. Edit: The HNers quoting Wikipedia can sit this one out. You already demonstrated you don't have an answer to this question.
    - mslate 5y ago
      Beginning with Lutheranism, it was their unwillingness to convert: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_and_antisemitism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_and_antisemitism Prior to Lutheranism it was their unwillingness to convert, see Spanish Inquisition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Inquisition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Inquisition If you're seeking some negative stereotype that's true about them, you'll be disappointed to find out that the main one was their unwillingness to convert.
      - MontrealRaised 5y ago
        Religion was -at that time- just defining social norms, like the government defines them today (the church got kicked out at some point then, because science proofed them wrong with many things). If everyone lives by "rules A" (and are convinced those are the right rules, e.g. "don't lend money"), then just living by a different/opposing set of rules is asking for trouble.
    - X6S1x6Okd1st 5y ago
      > Antisemitism has been explained in terms of racism, xenophobia, projected guilt, displaced aggression, and the search for a scapegoat.[243] Some explanations assign partial blame to the perception of Jewish people as unsociable. Such a perception may have arisen by many Jews having strictly kept to their own communities, with their own practices and laws.[244] > It has also been suggested that parts of antisemitism arose from a perception of Jewish people as greedy (as often used in stereotypes of Jews), and this perception has probably evolved in Europe during Medieval times where a large portion of money lending was operated by Jews.[245] Factors contributing to this situation included that Jews were restricted from other professions,[245] while the Christian Church declared for their followers that money lending constituted immoral "usury".[246] From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism#Causes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism#Causes
- Gunax 5y ago
  There was a feeling that without deliberate effort, the university would be dominated by a minority who were simply good at tests/human calculators but lacking in the customs, morals, and values that contribute to society. This really was not limited to Soviet Union, but also lots of Europe and American/Canada too. See also the way Asians are treated in America now.
  - livinginfear 5y ago
    This is not the reason why Asian-Americans are discriminated against in college admissions, and this is not why Jews were discriminated against in the Soviet Union.
    - anchpop 5y ago
      Could you elaborate on the reason?
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - majjgepolja 5y ago
    > the university would be dominated by a minority who were simply good at tests/human calculators but lacking in the customs, morals, and values that contribute to society. Relevant excerpt from "Why nerds are unpopular" [0] > I mistrusted words like "character" and "integrity" because they had been so debased by adults. As they were used then, these words all seemed to mean the same thing: obedience. The kids who got praised for these qualities tended to be at best dull-witted prize bulls, and at worst facile schmoozers. If that was what character and integrity were, I wanted no part of them. [0] http://www.paulgraham.com/nerds.html http://www.paulgraham.com/nerds.html
- forgotmypw17 5y ago
  I think at the root of it is genetic distance and competition for resources, amplified by culture.
- FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
  Sounds like an anti-Semitic troll, but I'll respond with a related point: It is very slightly surprising that these come from Soviet times. Weren't the Soviets supposed to have rid Russia of evils like this? Turns out that the relationship between the Soviets and Judaism was complicated. There were "good Soviet" Jewish organizations, but these are not remembered fondly by the sources I read today. I guess it was a problem of loyalty related to totalitarianism: Your only really important identity was supposed to be "Party member". I also note that "Jewish problems" is a (sick) pun.
  - FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
    This is the article I'd had in mind. It's sort of about Judaism during Soviet times, though it's also about other things (and one core metaphor is backwards, IMO). But still, it's interesting: https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts-letters/articles/the-cool-kids https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts-letters/articles/the...
  - livinginfear 5y ago
    > It is very slightly surprising that these come from Soviet times. Weren't the Soviets supposed to have rid Russia of evils like this? You surely can't be serious. You are either being very disingenuous, or have not spent much time looking at the history of the Soviet Union.
    - FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
      > or have not spent much time looking at the history of the Soviet Union. Probably that. I say "surprising" because there's a simplistic view in some places (particularly the US) that "antisemitism is Right" and "Communism is Left" and moreover "antisemitism is all due to Christianity" while at the same time "those godless Soviets were against Christianity" so automatically "the Soviets must have been pro-Jewish". I think this is believed in large swathes of the "Right" and "Left", but particularly on the "Right", where super-dumb Nazi types think "all those damn Jewish libtards" and so-on. I am making a pot shot at all that kind of stupidity, so people know life is never as simple as whatever dichotomous cartoon lives in their heads.
- Detrus 5y ago
  One reason was Jews could not be trusted with state secrets because they could emigrate with them.
  - XEKEP 5y ago
    Well, not really. In order to immigrate, or even simply travel outside, one had to get a permission first. And one was not usually granted to those who had access to any state secret.
- Sideyon 5y ago
  Over-representation + Israel
  - reissbaker 5y ago
    ...More like centuries of anti-Semitic discrimination. https://scholarworks.umt.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1320&context=tme https://scholarworks.umt.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=132...
MikeUt 5y ago
US universities also had a history of trying to exclude Jewish people [1]. I say history, because the practice has by all accounts stopped, and the current situation in the Ivy League [2] is as follows (looking only at non-international students): Ivy League US Ratio Jewish 17.2% 2.4% 7.16 Asian 19.6% 5.3% 3.71 White (incl. Jewish) 50.3% 61.5% 0.82 Hispanic 11.4% 17.6% 0.65 Black 7.8% 12.7% 0.61 White (non-Jewish) 33.1% 59.1% 0.56 The numbers don't sum to 100% because I did not include multi-ethnic students, a few minor ethnicities (American-Indian, Pacific Islander..), and students categorized as "unknown" or "other" by the universities. Data on university undergraduate demographics was taken from the universities own diversity reports. Jewish representation was was gathered from http://hillel.org/college-guide/list/ http://hillel.org/college-guide/list/, https://forward.com/jewish-college-guide/ https://forward.com/jewish-college-guide/, and https://ejewishphilanthropy.com/how-many-jewish-undergraduates/ https://ejewishphilanthropy.com/how-many-jewish-undergraduat..., taking the lowest estimate when sources conflicted. ejewishphilanthropy.com (eJP) points out flaws in Hillel's data gathering (e.g. showing Harvard as 30% Jewish, when eJP found it only 16%) Hillel seems to have since fixed these flaws, as the estimates they now give are in-line with those of eJP. No correction has been made to look at only the college-age population of the US, or only at the Northeastern US where all the Ivy League universities are located, so that may be a source of some bias. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_quota#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_quota#United_States [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivy_League https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivy_League
- andrewclunn 5y ago
  Thank you for the informative post, with cited sources. It however doesn't fit the narrative pushed by halls of power and institutions, and must therefor be downvoted. This has nothing to do with who runs or owns those institutions. Absolutely nothing.
- alecst 5y ago
  Can someone explain why this is being downvoted? I feel out of the loop. Is it factually wrong in some way, or just off-topic?
phendrenad2 5y ago
1975 doesn't seem that long ago. Goes to show that we're not out of the dark ages when it comes to state-sanctioned racism, even among supposed "progressive" nations. The US, if anything, is much less progressive than the USSR was at that time.
- chmod775 5y ago
  The USA embody both conservative and progressive extremes, and whether that is a cause or an effect of polarized politics I can't speculate. In either case the leadership of the USSR was just reversing course with force on the issue around that time. I wouldn't put that bygone state on either side outside the spectrum that are the USA.
- marcellus23 5y ago
  > The US, if anything, is much less progressive than the USSR was at that time. This seems like a pretty baffling conclusion. Why do you think that’s the case?
  - actually_a_dog 5y ago
    Regarding racism in the USSR, the answer is "it's complicated." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_the_Soviet_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_the_Soviet_Union https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/black-skin-red-land-african-americans-and-soviet-experiment https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/black-skin-red-land-a... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afro-Russians#Early_Soviet_period https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afro-Russians#Early_Soviet_per... https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/000271627743300108?journalCode=anna https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/000271627743300... https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2002/06/10/the-affirmative-action-empire https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2002/06/10/the-affirmativ... https://interzine.org/2021/03/18/was-the-soviet-union-racist-a-discussion-with-alexander-verkhovsky/ https://interzine.org/2021/03/18/was-the-soviet-union-racist...
    - marcellus23 5y ago
      Racism is also just a single axis of progressivism though.
worik 5y ago
The medical school in the city I grew up in had a policy of taking the students with the highest marks in last year school exams. That was it, no other judgement. One year this would mean that the intake would be solely one ethnicity, and it was not white. So the policy was abandoned for a more rounded approach. These days the medical schools try very hard to make the population of graduating doctors look like the population they are going to treat. This drives the (rich) parents of white students who just miss out getting into medical school extremely irate and litigious. But so far it has withstood attack. The results are not achieved by different standards for graduation, but by different standards for admission.
- Clewza313 5y ago
  "What do you call the person that finishes last in medical school? Doctor." Somewhat less snarkily, I was under the impression that medical schools hate not graduating their students, so once you're in, basically anybody who can physically survive the grind will become a doctor. Is this incorrect?
  - nradov 5y ago
    In reality the person who finishes last in medical school is at serious risk of not being matched to a residency slot. So technically they're a doctor, but not able to practice medicine. Those people tend to go to work in related fields like pharmaceutical sales or hospital administration.
    - ThePadawan 5y ago
      I'm not from the US, so this comes from curiosity and lack of knowledge of the system: Doesn't that suck for everyone? In Germany, there is a (apparently) large generation gap of countryside doctors. The old ones retire, but no one young shows up to replace them, even though they are very well paid. But what 30 year old would want to live and work in a village of 5000? Is that scenario not applicable in the US, or are the jobs you mentioned simply still considered a better deal.
fny 5y ago
Tanya Khovanova (first author) maintains an archive of these problems on her personal site: http://www.tanyakhovanova.com/Coffins/coffinsmain.html http://www.tanyakhovanova.com/Coffins/coffinsmain.html
- selcuka 5y ago
  Some problems from the PDF are not on that web page. I guess that's expected given that the web page is last updated in 2005.
  - fny 5y ago
    There are actually more qs on the website, and the website references the paper for solutions.
reissbaker 5y ago
Truly incredible how a scholarly article on anti-Semitic actions in the '70s by Moscow University has brought out legions of anti-Semitic trolls suggesting that the Jews must have deserved it, and covering anti-Semitism by claiming it was simply anti-Zionist (as if Soviet university staff discriminating against Soviet Jews somehow punished Israel). Saddening to see this on HN, although at least some of these comments have been flagged out of existence.
- Centigonal 5y ago
  I think part of it is that the paper (and the HN story) is titled "Jewish Problems." That sort of language is catnip to anti-semites.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- Clewza313 5y ago
  Are we reading the same HN here? You're telling me there are "legions of anti-Semitic trolls", but all I see is one post that's already been flagged & downvoted to oblivion.
  - reissbaker 5y ago
    There are currently four separate posters who have been flagged out of existence, as well as a couple others in that thread who have been downvoted to oblivion. One of the posters kept re-posting the same comment after it got flagged, although it seems that has been removed. At the time of my post that thread was the largest discussion thread on this article (it still is, although it's at least been downvoted enough to stop appearing near the top).
  - neolog 5y ago
    Turn on "show dead" in your HN settings
  - commandlinefan 5y ago
    Even with "show dead" on, the posts I see that are flagged and downvoted seem... pretty even-handed.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Clewza313 5y ago
There is a great personal account of facing these problems in the New Criterion: https://newcriterion.com/issues/2012/10/the-fifth-problem-math-anti-semitism-in-the-soviet-union https://newcriterion.com/issues/2012/10/the-fifth-problem-ma... Unfortunately the current paywall looks pretty insurmountable, any mirrors would be appreciated.
nradov 5y ago
Harvard also used to have admission policies specifically designed to exclude Jews. It's a dark chapter in higher education. https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/at-trial-harvards-asian-problem-and-a-preference-for-white-students-from-sparse-country https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/at-trial-harva...
- cobookman 5y ago
  As did Emory: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/emory-apologizes-for-past-discrimination-of-jewish-students/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/emory-apologizes-for-past-discr...
  - vanderZwan 5y ago
    I would be highly surprised if this wasn't a case of "they either did it or they just haven't been found out yet" for most regular institutions.
pandaman 5y ago
In the Lomonosov Moscow State Uni, in the math departments (Mechmat and VMK) there were 4 entrance exams, at the time of the article three of those graded at 3-5 points and one pass/fail. One could get 9-15 points total and the admission was in the order of the highest points, with the cut off being between 13 and 12 usually (the 12 pointers would compete in the high school's GPA and other extra credits). A failure in any of the exams (2 points) would eliminate one from the admission. There was a shortcut: anybody with 9+ points for the first two (written and oral math) would be unconditionally admitted without even needing to take the two remaining exams (and risking a failure). There were other shortcuts not relevant here. The written exam is 6 problems. You get a point for every one solved. Naturally the difficulty is increasing exponentially with the 5th and 6th being very hard (you only need to solve one of these to get the maximum 5 points, they are the same difficulty but one is usually an equation and another is a geometry problem). The first 4 problems are still easy for a good high school student, the 5th/6th requires extra preparation or going to a special math school. (some examples http://kvant.mccme.ru/1991/02/p65.htm http://kvant.mccme.ru/1991/02/p65.htm ) The oral exam is two questions on a "ticket" and a problem. The list of questions is known beforehand and they are generic topics like "What are the properties of triangles?", the ticket is literally a piece of paper one pulls from a pile, face down. And each question and the problem give a point to add to 2. So you can only fail if you don't answer any question and don't solve the problem. Again, it's an easy 4 points with the two questions (out of total 50 or so) answered. So what happens when somebody answered correctly the both ticket questions? He or she already has 4 points and the problem will decide between 4 and 5. If he or she has 5 for the written math (the written test is in front of the examiner) it does not matter, this person is already admitted with 9 points so the problem will be a simple one to save time. If the written score is 3, it will be a hard problem that this person is likely not going to solve (harder than the 4th problem in the written exam but not as hard as 5th or 6th) that will make the total math 7 points and limit that person's entrance exam score to 12 points, likely not letting them in because you really should not be in the math department if you could only solve 3 easy problems in the written exam. The 4 points for the written math is the most peculiar, especially if one had good work done on the 5th problem even without solving it ultimately. If this person solves the problem in the oral math, it's the automatic admission. So a tricky problem comes out. You cannot give the same problem you give to the one with 3 points because it will be too easy. You cannot really give another 5th or 6th problem from the written math because it takes an hour to solve so they give a problem that is as hard as the 5th/6th but can be solved in minutes, giving a fair chance for an automatic admission. If the candidate fails it it's not the end, they continue with 8 points and still a fair chance for admission. This is not related to Jews, as far as I know, I know people who were not Jewish and got these problems after getting 4 points for the written math. This is to set the uniform standard for the accelerated admission: five written exam problems and two theoretical questions.
nahnahno 5y ago
This is why I’m angered when people point to “white privilege”. My family survived genocide, then was excluded from society. We survive, emigrate to the west, are labeled white and therefore oppressors. Unreasonably shite.
- fortran77 5y ago
  Actually, we weren't labeled "white" in the U.S. until relatively recently. Early US Census forms had a "Hebrew" race option https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/padr.12243 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/padr.12243
  - nahnahno 5y ago
    This is exactly the point
TimTheTinker 5y ago
From TA: > Among problems that were used by the department to blackball unwanted candidate students, these problems are distinguished by having a simple solution that is difficult to find. Could someone explain the mechanism here? I can understand how this would hurt any relatively unprivileged group, by requiring certain "gotchas" that have nothing to do with people's innate ability or level of education. But is there anything further? I.e. were these problems well-known among students who had already passed through an unfairly discriminatory gauntlet?
- pvg 5y ago
  The mechanism is you simply don't put these problems to the candidates you don't want to flunk out.
  - TimTheTinker 5y ago
    I didn't see anything like that mentioned in TA. It sounded like the same problems were being given to everyone -- and that the malicious behavior was in problem selection itself. Am I wrong?
    - ekiru 5y ago
      The "A personal story of Tanya Khovanova" section at the start of the article itself describes the method more explicity: "One of the methods they used for doing this was to give the unwanted students a different set of problems on their oral exam." The introduction adds that the Jewish (or otherwise "undesirable") students "were given these problems one after another until they failed one of them, at which point they were given a failing mark."
    - pvg 5y ago
      You are. It's described several times including on the first page, second paragraph: One of the methods they used for doing this was to give the unwanted students a different set of problems on their oral exam.
- PoignardAzur 5y ago
Ice_cream_suit 5y ago
Australia had a notorious "dictation test" that was used to weed out non-white immigrants. "Under the Immgration Act, migrants who entered Australia between 1901 and 1958 could be asked to take a dictation test. To pass the test, they needed to write 50 words in any European language, as dictated by an immigration officer. After 1905, the officer could choose any language at all. A Chinese immigrant, for example, could be asked to write out 50 words in French, Italian or another language. Few migrants could pass the test in these circumstances. This meant that it was easy to fail an applicant if they were from an ‘undesirable’ country, had a criminal record, had medical issues or were thought to be ‘morally unfit’. If an applicant failed the test, they could be deported by the Australian Government." https://www.naa.gov.au/explore-collection/immigration-and-citizenship/immigration-restriction-act-1901 https://www.naa.gov.au/explore-collection/immigration-and-ci...
- idnefju 5y ago
  This still exists officially btw, migrants need to be at a certain level in IELTS and have no criminal records to get a migrant visa. And if you get any criminal conviction during the visa, you can get deported or be blacklisted from getting citizenship down the line.
  - syockit 5y ago
    IELTS is justifiable, as (British) English is Australia's official language. Any other European language is just them screwing with the immigrants.
  - JimTheMan 5y ago
    An English language test and what the white Australia policy did are not the same thing. Basically everything you've stated is just called immigration policy. I personally think we're too hard on skilled migrants and too lenient on relationship visas. But I'm sure I don't have a properly informed opinion, just a hunch based on my experiences.
    - vanderZwan 5y ago
Ice_cream_suit 5y ago
"The Triguboffs were refused visas for Canada and the United States, which had strict quotas on Jewish immigrants. But they had obtained landing permits for Australia back in 1946 when the country had an open-door policy to Jewish refugees. By early 1948, however, Australian policy had changed and a family of rich Jews ... were not the migrants Australia was looking for. In postwar Australia, Jews were tarred with a mix of old-fashioned anti-Semitism and suspicion they were either communists or Zionists attacking British forces in Palestine. Things came to a crisis in January 1947 when an old ferry called the Hwa Lien docked in Sydney carrying 300 stateless Jews from Shanghai. Sydney's The Sun newspaper claimed that criminal syndicates run by communists had backed the Jewish immigrants and hinted that Jewish refugees had collaborated with the Japanese. The Sun editorialised: "The danger of infiltration by professional trouble makers, whether Jewish terrorists or Communist agents, will arouse the natural suspicion of all who wish to see Australia kept Australian." Arthur Calwell, Australia's immigration minister following World War II, was a champion of mass migration (although famously within the confines of the White Australia Policy) and had initially been sympathetic to the plight of Jewish refugees. He let the Hwa Lien unload its passengers. But in the heated aftermath he quietly imposed a secret quota on the number of Jews who would be given entry on any future migrant ships." https://www.afr.com/life-and-luxury/harry-triguboffs-dark-secret-the-19year-struggle-that-split-his-family-20171102-gzdgy8 https://www.afr.com/life-and-luxury/harry-triguboffs-dark-se...
specialist 5y ago
Bias & fairness in enrollment is easy to solve, right? Just expand capacity to meet demand. I get that higher ed has a branding problem. I don't care. If you want society support, you play by society rules. Further, they're doing a fine job of destroying their own brands without any outside help. Berkeley created and maintained an elite institution without being a finishing school for trust fund babies. Until they had their funding ganked, of course.
sam_lowry_ 5y ago
USSR was much more secular than US is today. Downgrading jews in prestigious universities back in USSR had nothing to do with antisemitism as it is understood by most readers on HN. The reason was pragmatic. Jews were likely to emigrate, taking precious knowledge to US or Israel. This also made it difficult to place them in the military industrial complex upon graduation. The authors of the above paper are emigrants to US, this kind of proves the point.
- AzzieElbab 5y ago
  This is not entirely true. You had to apply to leave USSR and 90% were refused for one reason or another. Borders did not truly open until the 90s. Another unofficial motivation was in lines with "equity". Universities were trying to meet USSR's unofficial quotes per nationality. I heard China was/is trying to do something similar
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- pvg 5y ago
  The reason was bigotry, which is why problems like these were a kind of 'secret' method with plausible deniability. Otherwise why not just declare it as an open policy? People were not 'likely' to emigrate, emigration out of the USSR was exceptionally difficult and impossible for most.
- PoignardAzur 5y ago
  Fucking over every single individual of a given group because of vague fears of what they might do if treated fairly, where these fears are entirely based on them belonging to said group, seems like the very definition of bigotry.

110 points by spython 5y ago

pvg 5y ago

Previously, at great length: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=Jewish%20Problems%20comments%3E10&sort=byPopularity&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

dang 5y ago
Macroexpanded: Jewish Problems (2011) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28136729 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28136729 - Aug 2021 (77 comments) Jewish Problems (2011) [pdf] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22896047 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22896047 - April 2020 (33 comments) These problems were designed to prevent Jewish people from passing (2011) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15424117 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15424117 - Oct 2017 (170 comments) Jewish problems (2011) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10923934 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10923934 - Jan 2016 (95 comments) Jewish Problems - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4759642 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4759642 - Nov 2012 (69 comments) Jewish problems - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3096793 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3096793 - Oct 2011 (187 comments)

TchoBeer 5y ago

What reason did the Russian admissions have to prevent Jews from getting in? What about Jews were undesirable?

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
umanwizard 5y ago
Europe in general has had a strong tradition of virulent antisemitism at least from the Middle Ages until the present day (but especially until the 1950s).
- VaxportsForever 5y ago
  You didn't answer the question of what made them undesirable. Edit: The HNers quoting Wikipedia can sit this one out. You already demonstrated you don't have an answer to this question.
  - mslate 5y ago
    Beginning with Lutheranism, it was their unwillingness to convert: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_and_antisemitism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_and_antisemitism Prior to Lutheranism it was their unwillingness to convert, see Spanish Inquisition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Inquisition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Inquisition If you're seeking some negative stereotype that's true about them, you'll be disappointed to find out that the main one was their unwillingness to convert.
    - MontrealRaised 5y ago
      Religion was -at that time- just defining social norms, like the government defines them today (the church got kicked out at some point then, because science proofed them wrong with many things). If everyone lives by "rules A" (and are convinced those are the right rules, e.g. "don't lend money"), then just living by a different/opposing set of rules is asking for trouble.
  - X6S1x6Okd1st 5y ago
    > Antisemitism has been explained in terms of racism, xenophobia, projected guilt, displaced aggression, and the search for a scapegoat.[243] Some explanations assign partial blame to the perception of Jewish people as unsociable. Such a perception may have arisen by many Jews having strictly kept to their own communities, with their own practices and laws.[244] > It has also been suggested that parts of antisemitism arose from a perception of Jewish people as greedy (as often used in stereotypes of Jews), and this perception has probably evolved in Europe during Medieval times where a large portion of money lending was operated by Jews.[245] Factors contributing to this situation included that Jews were restricted from other professions,[245] while the Christian Church declared for their followers that money lending constituted immoral "usury".[246] From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism#Causes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism#Causes
Gunax 5y ago
There was a feeling that without deliberate effort, the university would be dominated by a minority who were simply good at tests/human calculators but lacking in the customs, morals, and values that contribute to society. This really was not limited to Soviet Union, but also lots of Europe and American/Canada too. See also the way Asians are treated in America now.
- livinginfear 5y ago
  This is not the reason why Asian-Americans are discriminated against in college admissions, and this is not why Jews were discriminated against in the Soviet Union.
  - anchpop 5y ago
    Could you elaborate on the reason?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- majjgepolja 5y ago
  > the university would be dominated by a minority who were simply good at tests/human calculators but lacking in the customs, morals, and values that contribute to society. Relevant excerpt from "Why nerds are unpopular" [0] > I mistrusted words like "character" and "integrity" because they had been so debased by adults. As they were used then, these words all seemed to mean the same thing: obedience. The kids who got praised for these qualities tended to be at best dull-witted prize bulls, and at worst facile schmoozers. If that was what character and integrity were, I wanted no part of them. [0] http://www.paulgraham.com/nerds.html http://www.paulgraham.com/nerds.html
forgotmypw17 5y ago
I think at the root of it is genetic distance and competition for resources, amplified by culture.
FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
Sounds like an anti-Semitic troll, but I'll respond with a related point: It is very slightly surprising that these come from Soviet times. Weren't the Soviets supposed to have rid Russia of evils like this? Turns out that the relationship between the Soviets and Judaism was complicated. There were "good Soviet" Jewish organizations, but these are not remembered fondly by the sources I read today. I guess it was a problem of loyalty related to totalitarianism: Your only really important identity was supposed to be "Party member". I also note that "Jewish problems" is a (sick) pun.
- FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
  This is the article I'd had in mind. It's sort of about Judaism during Soviet times, though it's also about other things (and one core metaphor is backwards, IMO). But still, it's interesting: https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts-letters/articles/the-cool-kids https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts-letters/articles/the...
- livinginfear 5y ago
  > It is very slightly surprising that these come from Soviet times. Weren't the Soviets supposed to have rid Russia of evils like this? You surely can't be serious. You are either being very disingenuous, or have not spent much time looking at the history of the Soviet Union.
  - FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
    > or have not spent much time looking at the history of the Soviet Union. Probably that. I say "surprising" because there's a simplistic view in some places (particularly the US) that "antisemitism is Right" and "Communism is Left" and moreover "antisemitism is all due to Christianity" while at the same time "those godless Soviets were against Christianity" so automatically "the Soviets must have been pro-Jewish". I think this is believed in large swathes of the "Right" and "Left", but particularly on the "Right", where super-dumb Nazi types think "all those damn Jewish libtards" and so-on. I am making a pot shot at all that kind of stupidity, so people know life is never as simple as whatever dichotomous cartoon lives in their heads.
Detrus 5y ago
One reason was Jews could not be trusted with state secrets because they could emigrate with them.
- XEKEP 5y ago
  Well, not really. In order to immigrate, or even simply travel outside, one had to get a permission first. And one was not usually granted to those who had access to any state secret.
Sideyon 5y ago
Over-representation + Israel
- reissbaker 5y ago
  ...More like centuries of anti-Semitic discrimination. https://scholarworks.umt.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1320&context=tme https://scholarworks.umt.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=132...

MikeUt 5y ago

US universities also had a history of trying to exclude Jewish people [1]. I say history, because the practice has by all accounts stopped, and the current situation in the Ivy League [2] is as follows (looking only at non-international students): Ivy League US Ratio Jewish 17.2% 2.4% 7.16 Asian 19.6% 5.3% 3.71 White (incl. Jewish) 50.3% 61.5% 0.82 Hispanic 11.4% 17.6% 0.65 Black 7.8% 12.7% 0.61 White (non-Jewish) 33.1% 59.1% 0.56 The numbers don't sum to 100% because I did not include multi-ethnic students, a few minor ethnicities (American-Indian, Pacific Islander..), and students categorized as "unknown" or "other" by the universities. Data on university undergraduate demographics was taken from the universities own diversity reports. Jewish representation was was gathered from http://hillel.org/college-guide/list/ http://hillel.org/college-guide/list/, https://forward.com/jewish-college-guide/ https://forward.com/jewish-college-guide/, and https://ejewishphilanthropy.com/how-many-jewish-undergraduates/ https://ejewishphilanthropy.com/how-many-jewish-undergraduat..., taking the lowest estimate when sources conflicted. ejewishphilanthropy.com (eJP) points out flaws in Hillel's data gathering (e.g. showing Harvard as 30% Jewish, when eJP found it only 16%) Hillel seems to have since fixed these flaws, as the estimates they now give are in-line with those of eJP. No correction has been made to look at only the college-age population of the US, or only at the Northeastern US where all the Ivy League universities are located, so that may be a source of some bias. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_quota#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_quota#United_States [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivy_League https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivy_League

andrewclunn 5y ago
Thank you for the informative post, with cited sources. It however doesn't fit the narrative pushed by halls of power and institutions, and must therefor be downvoted. This has nothing to do with who runs or owns those institutions. Absolutely nothing.
alecst 5y ago
Can someone explain why this is being downvoted? I feel out of the loop. Is it factually wrong in some way, or just off-topic?

phendrenad2 5y ago

1975 doesn't seem that long ago. Goes to show that we're not out of the dark ages when it comes to state-sanctioned racism, even among supposed "progressive" nations. The US, if anything, is much less progressive than the USSR was at that time.

chmod775 5y ago
The USA embody both conservative and progressive extremes, and whether that is a cause or an effect of polarized politics I can't speculate. In either case the leadership of the USSR was just reversing course with force on the issue around that time. I wouldn't put that bygone state on either side outside the spectrum that are the USA.
marcellus23 5y ago
> The US, if anything, is much less progressive than the USSR was at that time. This seems like a pretty baffling conclusion. Why do you think that’s the case?
- actually_a_dog 5y ago
  Regarding racism in the USSR, the answer is "it's complicated." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_the_Soviet_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_the_Soviet_Union https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/black-skin-red-land-african-americans-and-soviet-experiment https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/black-skin-red-land-a... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afro-Russians#Early_Soviet_period https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afro-Russians#Early_Soviet_per... https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/000271627743300108?journalCode=anna https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/000271627743300... https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2002/06/10/the-affirmative-action-empire https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2002/06/10/the-affirmativ... https://interzine.org/2021/03/18/was-the-soviet-union-racist-a-discussion-with-alexander-verkhovsky/ https://interzine.org/2021/03/18/was-the-soviet-union-racist...
  - marcellus23 5y ago
    Racism is also just a single axis of progressivism though.

worik 5y ago

The medical school in the city I grew up in had a policy of taking the students with the highest marks in last year school exams. That was it, no other judgement. One year this would mean that the intake would be solely one ethnicity, and it was not white. So the policy was abandoned for a more rounded approach. These days the medical schools try very hard to make the population of graduating doctors look like the population they are going to treat. This drives the (rich) parents of white students who just miss out getting into medical school extremely irate and litigious. But so far it has withstood attack. The results are not achieved by different standards for graduation, but by different standards for admission.

Clewza313 5y ago
"What do you call the person that finishes last in medical school? Doctor." Somewhat less snarkily, I was under the impression that medical schools hate not graduating their students, so once you're in, basically anybody who can physically survive the grind will become a doctor. Is this incorrect?
- nradov 5y ago
  In reality the person who finishes last in medical school is at serious risk of not being matched to a residency slot. So technically they're a doctor, but not able to practice medicine. Those people tend to go to work in related fields like pharmaceutical sales or hospital administration.
  - ThePadawan 5y ago
    I'm not from the US, so this comes from curiosity and lack of knowledge of the system: Doesn't that suck for everyone? In Germany, there is a (apparently) large generation gap of countryside doctors. The old ones retire, but no one young shows up to replace them, even though they are very well paid. But what 30 year old would want to live and work in a village of 5000? Is that scenario not applicable in the US, or are the jobs you mentioned simply still considered a better deal.

fny 5y ago

Tanya Khovanova (first author) maintains an archive of these problems on her personal site: http://www.tanyakhovanova.com/Coffins/coffinsmain.html http://www.tanyakhovanova.com/Coffins/coffinsmain.html

selcuka 5y ago
Some problems from the PDF are not on that web page. I guess that's expected given that the web page is last updated in 2005.
- fny 5y ago
  There are actually more qs on the website, and the website references the paper for solutions.

reissbaker 5y ago

Truly incredible how a scholarly article on anti-Semitic actions in the '70s by Moscow University has brought out legions of anti-Semitic trolls suggesting that the Jews must have deserved it, and covering anti-Semitism by claiming it was simply anti-Zionist (as if Soviet university staff discriminating against Soviet Jews somehow punished Israel). Saddening to see this on HN, although at least some of these comments have been flagged out of existence.

Centigonal 5y ago
I think part of it is that the paper (and the HN story) is titled "Jewish Problems." That sort of language is catnip to anti-semites.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Clewza313 5y ago
Are we reading the same HN here? You're telling me there are "legions of anti-Semitic trolls", but all I see is one post that's already been flagged & downvoted to oblivion.
- reissbaker 5y ago
  There are currently four separate posters who have been flagged out of existence, as well as a couple others in that thread who have been downvoted to oblivion. One of the posters kept re-posting the same comment after it got flagged, although it seems that has been removed. At the time of my post that thread was the largest discussion thread on this article (it still is, although it's at least been downvoted enough to stop appearing near the top).
- neolog 5y ago
  Turn on "show dead" in your HN settings
- commandlinefan 5y ago
  Even with "show dead" on, the posts I see that are flagged and downvoted seem... pretty even-handed.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

Clewza313 5y ago

There is a great personal account of facing these problems in the New Criterion: https://newcriterion.com/issues/2012/10/the-fifth-problem-math-anti-semitism-in-the-soviet-union https://newcriterion.com/issues/2012/10/the-fifth-problem-ma... Unfortunately the current paywall looks pretty insurmountable, any mirrors would be appreciated.

nradov 5y ago

Harvard also used to have admission policies specifically designed to exclude Jews. It's a dark chapter in higher education. https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/at-trial-harvards-asian-problem-and-a-preference-for-white-students-from-sparse-country https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/at-trial-harva...

cobookman 5y ago
As did Emory: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/emory-apologizes-for-past-discrimination-of-jewish-students/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/emory-apologizes-for-past-discr...
- vanderZwan 5y ago
  I would be highly surprised if this wasn't a case of "they either did it or they just haven't been found out yet" for most regular institutions.

pandaman 5y ago

In the Lomonosov Moscow State Uni, in the math departments (Mechmat and VMK) there were 4 entrance exams, at the time of the article three of those graded at 3-5 points and one pass/fail. One could get 9-15 points total and the admission was in the order of the highest points, with the cut off being between 13 and 12 usually (the 12 pointers would compete in the high school's GPA and other extra credits). A failure in any of the exams (2 points) would eliminate one from the admission. There was a shortcut: anybody with 9+ points for the first two (written and oral math) would be unconditionally admitted without even needing to take the two remaining exams (and risking a failure). There were other shortcuts not relevant here. The written exam is 6 problems. You get a point for every one solved. Naturally the difficulty is increasing exponentially with the 5th and 6th being very hard (you only need to solve one of these to get the maximum 5 points, they are the same difficulty but one is usually an equation and another is a geometry problem). The first 4 problems are still easy for a good high school student, the 5th/6th requires extra preparation or going to a special math school. (some examples http://kvant.mccme.ru/1991/02/p65.htm http://kvant.mccme.ru/1991/02/p65.htm ) The oral exam is two questions on a "ticket" and a problem. The list of questions is known beforehand and they are generic topics like "What are the properties of triangles?", the ticket is literally a piece of paper one pulls from a pile, face down. And each question and the problem give a point to add to 2. So you can only fail if you don't answer any question and don't solve the problem. Again, it's an easy 4 points with the two questions (out of total 50 or so) answered. So what happens when somebody answered correctly the both ticket questions? He or she already has 4 points and the problem will decide between 4 and 5. If he or she has 5 for the written math (the written test is in front of the examiner) it does not matter, this person is already admitted with 9 points so the problem will be a simple one to save time. If the written score is 3, it will be a hard problem that this person is likely not going to solve (harder than the 4th problem in the written exam but not as hard as 5th or 6th) that will make the total math 7 points and limit that person's entrance exam score to 12 points, likely not letting them in because you really should not be in the math department if you could only solve 3 easy problems in the written exam. The 4 points for the written math is the most peculiar, especially if one had good work done on the 5th problem even without solving it ultimately. If this person solves the problem in the oral math, it's the automatic admission. So a tricky problem comes out. You cannot give the same problem you give to the one with 3 points because it will be too easy. You cannot really give another 5th or 6th problem from the written math because it takes an hour to solve so they give a problem that is as hard as the 5th/6th but can be solved in minutes, giving a fair chance for an automatic admission. If the candidate fails it it's not the end, they continue with 8 points and still a fair chance for admission. This is not related to Jews, as far as I know, I know people who were not Jewish and got these problems after getting 4 points for the written math. This is to set the uniform standard for the accelerated admission: five written exam problems and two theoretical questions.

nahnahno 5y ago

This is why I’m angered when people point to “white privilege”. My family survived genocide, then was excluded from society. We survive, emigrate to the west, are labeled white and therefore oppressors. Unreasonably shite.

fortran77 5y ago
Actually, we weren't labeled "white" in the U.S. until relatively recently. Early US Census forms had a "Hebrew" race option https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/padr.12243 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/padr.12243
- nahnahno 5y ago
  This is exactly the point

TimTheTinker 5y ago

From TA: > Among problems that were used by the department to blackball unwanted candidate students, these problems are distinguished by having a simple solution that is difficult to find. Could someone explain the mechanism here? I can understand how this would hurt any relatively unprivileged group, by requiring certain "gotchas" that have nothing to do with people's innate ability or level of education. But is there anything further? I.e. were these problems well-known among students who had already passed through an unfairly discriminatory gauntlet?

pvg 5y ago
The mechanism is you simply don't put these problems to the candidates you don't want to flunk out.
- TimTheTinker 5y ago
  I didn't see anything like that mentioned in TA. It sounded like the same problems were being given to everyone -- and that the malicious behavior was in problem selection itself. Am I wrong?
  - ekiru 5y ago
    The "A personal story of Tanya Khovanova" section at the start of the article itself describes the method more explicity: "One of the methods they used for doing this was to give the unwanted students a different set of problems on their oral exam." The introduction adds that the Jewish (or otherwise "undesirable") students "were given these problems one after another until they failed one of them, at which point they were given a failing mark."
  - pvg 5y ago
    You are. It's described several times including on the first page, second paragraph: One of the methods they used for doing this was to give the unwanted students a different set of problems on their oral exam.
PoignardAzur 5y ago

Ice_cream_suit 5y ago

Australia had a notorious "dictation test" that was used to weed out non-white immigrants. "Under the Immgration Act, migrants who entered Australia between 1901 and 1958 could be asked to take a dictation test. To pass the test, they needed to write 50 words in any European language, as dictated by an immigration officer. After 1905, the officer could choose any language at all. A Chinese immigrant, for example, could be asked to write out 50 words in French, Italian or another language. Few migrants could pass the test in these circumstances. This meant that it was easy to fail an applicant if they were from an ‘undesirable’ country, had a criminal record, had medical issues or were thought to be ‘morally unfit’. If an applicant failed the test, they could be deported by the Australian Government." https://www.naa.gov.au/explore-collection/immigration-and-citizenship/immigration-restriction-act-1901 https://www.naa.gov.au/explore-collection/immigration-and-ci...

idnefju 5y ago
This still exists officially btw, migrants need to be at a certain level in IELTS and have no criminal records to get a migrant visa. And if you get any criminal conviction during the visa, you can get deported or be blacklisted from getting citizenship down the line.
- syockit 5y ago
  IELTS is justifiable, as (British) English is Australia's official language. Any other European language is just them screwing with the immigrants.
- JimTheMan 5y ago
  An English language test and what the white Australia policy did are not the same thing. Basically everything you've stated is just called immigration policy. I personally think we're too hard on skilled migrants and too lenient on relationship visas. But I'm sure I don't have a properly informed opinion, just a hunch based on my experiences.
  - vanderZwan 5y ago

Ice_cream_suit 5y ago

"The Triguboffs were refused visas for Canada and the United States, which had strict quotas on Jewish immigrants. But they had obtained landing permits for Australia back in 1946 when the country had an open-door policy to Jewish refugees. By early 1948, however, Australian policy had changed and a family of rich Jews ... were not the migrants Australia was looking for. In postwar Australia, Jews were tarred with a mix of old-fashioned anti-Semitism and suspicion they were either communists or Zionists attacking British forces in Palestine. Things came to a crisis in January 1947 when an old ferry called the Hwa Lien docked in Sydney carrying 300 stateless Jews from Shanghai. Sydney's The Sun newspaper claimed that criminal syndicates run by communists had backed the Jewish immigrants and hinted that Jewish refugees had collaborated with the Japanese. The Sun editorialised: "The danger of infiltration by professional trouble makers, whether Jewish terrorists or Communist agents, will arouse the natural suspicion of all who wish to see Australia kept Australian." Arthur Calwell, Australia's immigration minister following World War II, was a champion of mass migration (although famously within the confines of the White Australia Policy) and had initially been sympathetic to the plight of Jewish refugees. He let the Hwa Lien unload its passengers. But in the heated aftermath he quietly imposed a secret quota on the number of Jews who would be given entry on any future migrant ships." https://www.afr.com/life-and-luxury/harry-triguboffs-dark-secret-the-19year-struggle-that-split-his-family-20171102-gzdgy8 https://www.afr.com/life-and-luxury/harry-triguboffs-dark-se...

specialist 5y ago

Bias & fairness in enrollment is easy to solve, right? Just expand capacity to meet demand. I get that higher ed has a branding problem. I don't care. If you want society support, you play by society rules. Further, they're doing a fine job of destroying their own brands without any outside help. Berkeley created and maintained an elite institution without being a finishing school for trust fund babies. Until they had their funding ganked, of course.

sam_lowry_ 5y ago

USSR was much more secular than US is today. Downgrading jews in prestigious universities back in USSR had nothing to do with antisemitism as it is understood by most readers on HN. The reason was pragmatic. Jews were likely to emigrate, taking precious knowledge to US or Israel. This also made it difficult to place them in the military industrial complex upon graduation. The authors of the above paper are emigrants to US, this kind of proves the point.

AzzieElbab 5y ago
This is not entirely true. You had to apply to leave USSR and 90% were refused for one reason or another. Borders did not truly open until the 90s. Another unofficial motivation was in lines with "equity". Universities were trying to meet USSR's unofficial quotes per nationality. I heard China was/is trying to do something similar
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
pvg 5y ago
The reason was bigotry, which is why problems like these were a kind of 'secret' method with plausible deniability. Otherwise why not just declare it as an open policy? People were not 'likely' to emigrate, emigration out of the USSR was exceptionally difficult and impossible for most.
PoignardAzur 5y ago
Fucking over every single individual of a given group because of vague fears of what they might do if treated fairly, where these fears are entirely based on them belonging to said group, seems like the very definition of bigotry.