3 ms·

I'm not sure how I feel about this article because I was a student that attend NYC's specialized high schools such as Stuy and Tech. I can understand a lot of

by camz 15y ago

I'm not sure how I feel about this article because I was a student that attend NYC's specialized high schools such as Stuy and Tech. I can understand a lot of what was said in this article on a personal level because I've been through it. Especially, the line where she states that shes heard enough about blacks having an easier time getting into schools. I'm Asian and as someone who's seen affirmative action effect my life in the past 10 years. I can say that its fair for them to say that because that's the reality. America has been obsessed about being diverse. Diversity for the sake of diversity is a failure in the country. Diversity born of necessity and natural selection is what we should be seeking out. I say worry less about making sure we have blacks, yellows, white and bullshht. Worry more about helping anyone who's willing to learn at an early age. The single greatest determinant in whether we're successful is how curious and willing we are to learn. Our focus has been skewed toward things that just aren't as important to success. *obviously, Im biased as these are my opinions but I've always been results orientated and less focused on ethnicity. I've traveled around a lot as rdl has as well and I've noticed that most countries don't put an emphasis on race as much as Americans do.

rdl 15y ago
Right, the big point is "work with younger kids", not "work with disadvantaged racial minorities". It just happens that rich white or asian younger kids are a lot more likely to have parents, schools, etc. already helping them. (within math/science, this might apply to women as well) I'm with you on being against "lowering the bar" style affirmative action -- it's unfair to everyone, including the high achieving members of the protected group. The problem is the cultural and family structures don't exist to help intelligent and otherwise-likely-to-succeed people from certain groups progress through the very long pipeline to being successful startup founders. I'm just saying trying to apply late-stage correction (pushing for proportional representation in startup incubators, colleges, etc.) is the wrong place to work -- you can get by with much less expensive, much more fair interactions by starting a lot earlier. KIPP will probably do more for minority representation in the startup world than anything at the incubator level, but it will take 15 years. One of the things the military has done pretty well is racial (and geographic) integration, through treating everyone basically the same (after integration), and aggressively getting rid of organizational or structural racism. That's different from startups, but does seem to support the idea that it's possible, given enough time. Actually, most of the countries I've visited care more about ethnicity/race than the US, especially more so than silicon valley. Possibly selection bias. Malaysia is, in my experience, one of the most racist and weirdly political-about-race countries I've ever visited. Thailand and other areas with an ethnic Chinese population often have really weird race based politics. I'm also not really sure how you count tribalism in places like Iraq/Afghanistan/Central Asia. Then there are places in the middle east where an Indian family who has lived there for 150 years is still not "local". Race and socioeconomic class are maybe more tied in the US than in the other places (where it's more political), but it would be just as valid to say rural poor white kids from West Virginia have little exposure to quality math/science education early on, too.

by camz 15y ago

rdl 15y ago

Right, the big point is "work with younger kids", not "work with disadvantaged racial minorities". It just happens that rich white or asian younger kids are a lot more likely to have parents, schools, etc. already helping them. (within math/science, this might apply to women as well) I'm with you on being against "lowering the bar" style affirmative action -- it's unfair to everyone, including the high achieving members of the protected group. The problem is the cultural and family structures don't exist to help intelligent and otherwise-likely-to-succeed people from certain groups progress through the very long pipeline to being successful startup founders. I'm just saying trying to apply late-stage correction (pushing for proportional representation in startup incubators, colleges, etc.) is the wrong place to work -- you can get by with much less expensive, much more fair interactions by starting a lot earlier. KIPP will probably do more for minority representation in the startup world than anything at the incubator level, but it will take 15 years. One of the things the military has done pretty well is racial (and geographic) integration, through treating everyone basically the same (after integration), and aggressively getting rid of organizational or structural racism. That's different from startups, but does seem to support the idea that it's possible, given enough time. Actually, most of the countries I've visited care more about ethnicity/race than the US, especially more so than silicon valley. Possibly selection bias. Malaysia is, in my experience, one of the most racist and weirdly political-about-race countries I've ever visited. Thailand and other areas with an ethnic Chinese population often have really weird race based politics. I'm also not really sure how you count tribalism in places like Iraq/Afghanistan/Central Asia. Then there are places in the middle east where an Indian family who has lived there for 150 years is still not "local". Race and socioeconomic class are maybe more tied in the US than in the other places (where it's more political), but it would be just as valid to say rural poor white kids from West Virginia have little exposure to quality math/science education early on, too.