[0xy]

I would be willing to entertain the point that systematic racism exists if universities had roughly equivalent admission rates for all races for identical test scores, however black people tend to have significantly higher rates of admission than white people, and very significantly higher rates than Asian people.

If systemic racism exists in a specific direction as you imply, why do institutions have their fingers on the scale in favor of the oppressed race?

In fact, if students were treated identically without the consideration of race then black admission rates to universities would dramatically fall.

[dragonwriter]

> If systemic racism exists in a specific direction as you imply, why do institutions have their fingers on the scale in favor of the oppressed race?

You are literally asking “if systemic racism exists, why are specific institutions taking specific steps to correct systemic racism”. Suggesting that you think that if anyone notices and attempts to address systemic racism, then it must not exist.

[ThrowawayR2]

So why aren't whites being disadvantaged more than Asians? Asians aren't at fault for America's putative racism problems.

[Chris2048]

This would be v tribal thinking. (to generalise) white people are to blame for racism, but whites university applicants are not to blame for racism.

This paradox arises from the nebulous grouping of "white people" to include all whites, past and present, and ignoring any relevant differences or disproportion of blame.

Hence, a white 18 year old somehow inherits crimes of the past committed by white people in the past. That that white person may have entered the country just a few years ago is not taken into account - It is assumed they receive "white privilege" to amount that justifies any magnitude of countermeasure.

[crmrc114]

At some point people are going to wake up and figure out that we are all human, and we all have a collection of unique threads in our fabric. There is an recent and pervasive behavior in American media and MegaCorp that is now engaged in straight out Rules for Radicals:

"Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it"

The emergent behavior in media is a closed loop cycle fueled by viewership. If we can increase outrage on each end of the "political spectrum" we can keep people watching. The same feedback loop is taking place on social networks with "The Stream(tm)".

I don't know what the solution is- But Hacker News commentators. I love you all.