4 ms·

I don’t think that’s the whole story. The Ivy League are WASP institutions, and WASP culture always highly valued “well rounded” students and looked down on peo

I don’t think that’s the whole story. The Ivy League are WASP institutions, and WASP culture always highly valued “well rounded” students and looked down on people who single mindedly perused an end. Back in the day, they didn’t need to screen for this explicitly, since it was already universal in the applicant pool. They just needed a test to sort out the smart ones from the dumb ones. When the applicant pool changed, holistic admissions became a way to maintain that cultural trait. You see the same thing with asians today. The competitive-admissions high school I attended went from. 30% asian to almost 70% asian. There was a backlash, almost entirely from very liberal white people. I don’t think any of them disliked Asians per se. But they wanted to preserve a certain culture in the school and all the Asians led to a change in the culture.

oa335 1y ago
> WASP culture always highly valued “well rounded” students and looked down on people who single mindedly perused an end Citation please.
- rayiner 1y ago
  E.g. https://groveatlantic.com/book/flight-of-the-wasp/ https://groveatlantic.com/book/flight-of-the-wasp/
eli_gottlieb 1y ago
> The Ivy League are WASP institutions, and WASP culture always highly valued blah blah blah Ok, screw that and screw the Ivy League and the WASPs with it.
- rayiner 1y ago
  > Ok, screw that and screw the Ivy League and the WASPs with it. I understand the sentiment and sometimes share it. But I’m also sad to recognize that while elite asians like me can excel within the systems created by WASPs, we probably wouldn’t have created such systems ourselves. What other group in history has created a system so fair that they were replaced-without being conquered—within the very institutions they themselves created? My dad was born in a village in Bangladesh and my brother went to Yale and is an executive at J.P. Morgan (two of the WASP-iest institutions in America). WASPs are a minority in these institutions now. This sort of thing basically only happens in Anglo countries. Good reading: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/05/opinion/george-bush-wasps.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/05/opinion/george-bush-wasps...
  - abeppu 1y ago
    > created a system so fair I think that's really begging one of the important questions here. _Is_ the system fair now? The system clearly wasn't originally fair (when elite schools excluded women, people of color, etc). They became more open after decades of struggle driven in large part from the outside, and helped along by the GI bill, as well as a broader shift towards getting more public funds. The demographics have changed, but to the degree that it's more fair, is that because WASPs created them that way, or because women and other racial groups changed society more broadly?
    - rayiner 1y ago
      It’s critical to distinguish between being open to outsiders when you have the power to exclude them, versus advocating in your own interest to be included. Everyone advocates for their own inclusion when they have no power—that’s just human self interest. But such advocacy can’t create a fair system, by definition. Minorities and immigrants exist everywhere and advocate for themselves. But most societies don’t allow them to advance. Uyghurs in China can say whatever they want, but it won’t make a difference. WASPs were unusual in creating systems that saw openness to outsiders as a virtue, and then actually giving up their own power to allow others into the institutions they built. The first black Harvard student was admitted in 1847. Two Japanese students got a degree from Harvard law school in 1874. But if you look at societies where African and Asian people have the power to exclude, those places aren’t very open to outsiders.
      - abeppu 1y ago
        > WASPs were unusual in creating systems that saw openness to outsiders as a virtue In your view, did that view of openness to outsiders as a virtue manifest in other ways? It's been a while since I had to study the period but the colonial northeast was perennially at war with the native population and French Canadian colonists. E.g. it seems Harvard was founded during the Pequot war. In that same year of 1636, Roger Williams set up Rhode Island because he had been banished from Massachusetts after being convicted of heresy. So in general, it seems like WASPs were founding schools in an environment where being native, French, or indeed the wrong kind of Anglo-Puritan was worth attacking. I'm not seeing the openness to outsiders. > The first black Harvard student was admitted in 1847. Harvard was founded in 1636, so it seems like they went a full two centuries with total segregation before it finally admitted _one guy_. Again, not so much a culturally inculcated openness to outsiders so much as a slightly imperfect execution of exclusion. > But if you look at societies where African and Asian people have the power to exclude, those places aren’t very open to outsiders. I'm trying to think of what a fair comparison would be. I do think there's a meaningful difference between a dominant/imperial power that (begrudgingly, slowly) allows room for its own citizens of diverse racial backgrounds, vs a previously colonized or dominated country making space for foreign powers. So e.g. the oldest university in Asia is University of Santo Tomas, which was founded by the Spanish colonizers and is a Catholic university, and I think was under Spanish governance until the Philippine Revolution. Should the new fledgling country have made sure that it saved space for white students? I'm not sure whether they actually did, but I think that's a very different ethical question than, "should Harvard/Yale/Brown in New England built on native land with wealth substantially built off the triangle trade, admit BIPOC students?". The oldest "university" in the modern sense in China is Tainjin University, founded in 1895; i.e. they didn't have a university until a couple generations after the 2nd opium war. Should it have saved space for foreign students? The first "universities" in India were founded during British rule. Etc etc. But where there _isn't_ a strong power imbalance, I would be curious to see historical examples of any group having an especially better or worse record on inclusion.
- onetimeusename 1y ago
  I think it's interesting how it's universally acceptable to hate on WASPs. Even, perhaps especially, among people who say they are opposed to bigotry.
  - eli_gottlieb 1y ago
    That's fair. I shouldn't do that. Also, powerful institutions with massive endowments and government research grants should not be treated as the social institutions of one specific ethnic or racial subgroup, since they're clearly not drawing all of that wealth solely from the contributions of that subgroup.
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]

oa335 1y ago

> WASP culture always highly valued “well rounded” students and looked down on people who single mindedly perused an end Citation please.

rayiner 1y ago
E.g. https://groveatlantic.com/book/flight-of-the-wasp/ https://groveatlantic.com/book/flight-of-the-wasp/

eli_gottlieb 1y ago

> The Ivy League are WASP institutions, and WASP culture always highly valued blah blah blah Ok, screw that and screw the Ivy League and the WASPs with it.

rayiner 1y ago
> Ok, screw that and screw the Ivy League and the WASPs with it. I understand the sentiment and sometimes share it. But I’m also sad to recognize that while elite asians like me can excel within the systems created by WASPs, we probably wouldn’t have created such systems ourselves. What other group in history has created a system so fair that they were replaced-without being conquered—within the very institutions they themselves created? My dad was born in a village in Bangladesh and my brother went to Yale and is an executive at J.P. Morgan (two of the WASP-iest institutions in America). WASPs are a minority in these institutions now. This sort of thing basically only happens in Anglo countries. Good reading: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/05/opinion/george-bush-wasps.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/05/opinion/george-bush-wasps...
- abeppu 1y ago
  > created a system so fair I think that's really begging one of the important questions here. _Is_ the system fair now? The system clearly wasn't originally fair (when elite schools excluded women, people of color, etc). They became more open after decades of struggle driven in large part from the outside, and helped along by the GI bill, as well as a broader shift towards getting more public funds. The demographics have changed, but to the degree that it's more fair, is that because WASPs created them that way, or because women and other racial groups changed society more broadly?
  - rayiner 1y ago
    It’s critical to distinguish between being open to outsiders when you have the power to exclude them, versus advocating in your own interest to be included. Everyone advocates for their own inclusion when they have no power—that’s just human self interest. But such advocacy can’t create a fair system, by definition. Minorities and immigrants exist everywhere and advocate for themselves. But most societies don’t allow them to advance. Uyghurs in China can say whatever they want, but it won’t make a difference. WASPs were unusual in creating systems that saw openness to outsiders as a virtue, and then actually giving up their own power to allow others into the institutions they built. The first black Harvard student was admitted in 1847. Two Japanese students got a degree from Harvard law school in 1874. But if you look at societies where African and Asian people have the power to exclude, those places aren’t very open to outsiders.
    - abeppu 1y ago
      > WASPs were unusual in creating systems that saw openness to outsiders as a virtue In your view, did that view of openness to outsiders as a virtue manifest in other ways? It's been a while since I had to study the period but the colonial northeast was perennially at war with the native population and French Canadian colonists. E.g. it seems Harvard was founded during the Pequot war. In that same year of 1636, Roger Williams set up Rhode Island because he had been banished from Massachusetts after being convicted of heresy. So in general, it seems like WASPs were founding schools in an environment where being native, French, or indeed the wrong kind of Anglo-Puritan was worth attacking. I'm not seeing the openness to outsiders. > The first black Harvard student was admitted in 1847. Harvard was founded in 1636, so it seems like they went a full two centuries with total segregation before it finally admitted _one guy_. Again, not so much a culturally inculcated openness to outsiders so much as a slightly imperfect execution of exclusion. > But if you look at societies where African and Asian people have the power to exclude, those places aren’t very open to outsiders. I'm trying to think of what a fair comparison would be. I do think there's a meaningful difference between a dominant/imperial power that (begrudgingly, slowly) allows room for its own citizens of diverse racial backgrounds, vs a previously colonized or dominated country making space for foreign powers. So e.g. the oldest university in Asia is University of Santo Tomas, which was founded by the Spanish colonizers and is a Catholic university, and I think was under Spanish governance until the Philippine Revolution. Should the new fledgling country have made sure that it saved space for white students? I'm not sure whether they actually did, but I think that's a very different ethical question than, "should Harvard/Yale/Brown in New England built on native land with wealth substantially built off the triangle trade, admit BIPOC students?". The oldest "university" in the modern sense in China is Tainjin University, founded in 1895; i.e. they didn't have a university until a couple generations after the 2nd opium war. Should it have saved space for foreign students? The first "universities" in India were founded during British rule. Etc etc. But where there _isn't_ a strong power imbalance, I would be curious to see historical examples of any group having an especially better or worse record on inclusion.
onetimeusename 1y ago
I think it's interesting how it's universally acceptable to hate on WASPs. Even, perhaps especially, among people who say they are opposed to bigotry.
- eli_gottlieb 1y ago
  That's fair. I shouldn't do that. Also, powerful institutions with massive endowments and government research grants should not be treated as the social institutions of one specific ethnic or racial subgroup, since they're clearly not drawing all of that wealth solely from the contributions of that subgroup.

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]