The Table of Contemplation and Consultation

12/5/2011

What a difference five words can make. In a tweet promoting my latest story, I said that some Asian-Americans are not checking the Asian box on college applications "to avoid what they call discrimination." That prompted an interesting question from a cat I had not met named Jabari Bell, who tweeted, "what's the difference between 'discrimination' and 'what Asians call discrimination'?" He included another brother I had not met, Professor Dumi Lewis (his real name is even fresher than that), in the tweet.

This is an important question. It's hard to tell on Twitter, but I think what these dudes were saying was, "Why you half-stepping?" Why not call the proverbial spade a spade?

I tweeted back that since some disagree that Asians are discriminated against in college admissions, I qualified the statement. The colleges themselves, for example, strenuously deny any discrimination (although they would not comment for my story, cough cough). More importantly: If you believe that admission to elite schools should be based solely or primarily on test scores and GPA, then yes, it's easy to call this discrimination. But if you believe that admissions decisions should include other factors in order to assemble a university environment full of different types of people with different skills, experiences, interests and abilities--and that all of the people admitted under this scenario have the ability to be academically successful at that school--then it's harder to call it "discrimination."

Dumi and Jabari had some interesting challenges to my statement. I'd rather let them voice these in their own words rather than describe them myself. I'm eager to hear and learn from what they have to say in a more nuanced space than Twitter. The comment section is below, brothers.

One more thing, though: This question get to the heart of how I do my job at The Associated Press. My goal is to introduce and explore topics that shed light on race and ethnicity in America. Hopefully I can talk about new things, or new aspects to old things (the Asian admissions story was one of those), or introduce readers to people and places they probably would not have otherwise encountered. I specifically avoid taking sides. That's for columnists. I'm a reporter. So to simply call this Asian admissions situation "discrimination" goes against my AP DNA. I'm not saying I don't have a personal opinion on whether or not it's discrimination--I'm saying that expressing this opinion (even subtly, in a Twitter post) would hinder my goal of bringing various people of various beliefs to the table of contemplation and consultation.

So Dumi and Jabarai: What say y'all?

6 Comments

Dumi L'Heureux Lewis link

12/5/2011 02:12:49 pm

Glad to comment brotha. I think your attempt to not take sides, is in fact taking sides. As a sociologist, I was trained to treat all discrimination as perceived discrimination. We want to value people's subjective understanding of what discrimination is. If we don't let those who feel oppression speak for themselves, then who will? It is very common for people to talk about discrimination when there is an easily observable pattern such as Black-White relations but that doesn't make this discrimination any more real or the discrimination identified by the multiracial Asian brothers and sisters any less real. Instead, we have to look at what is the harm? who feels it? how do they cope? I think you piece answered all those questions but instead of giving the folks in your story equal discriminatory credentials the "what some called" qualifies it in a way that I don't think we would with Black folks. Let's pretend for sake of argument biracial Black-White applicants didn't check a race for fear of discrimination - would you use the qualifier there? You suggested that you used the qualifier because not all think it's discrimination, which I responded well the majority of whites don't think discrimination is meaningful to black life chances (i cited gallup and krysan's racial attitudes data) either but I guess you would not hesitate to call that discrimination. At the end of the day, I think everyone is entitled to define their own reality and as a reporter, not an op-ed columnist, you must give the most even treatment possible. In this case it seems evenness may be to drop the qualifier unless you'd qualify it for everyone. For the record I think Espenshade and Frank Samson's research on this topic are pretty convincing about discriminatory practices. Please excuse typos. It's late.

Jesse link

12/6/2011 12:26:32 am

I hear you, Dr. Dumi. I think you are looking at this from a higher altitude than I am. I'm choosing my words based on the specific issues at play in this story. I do I believe I have to make a decision whether to qualify discrimination as perceived or not on a case-by-case basis.

For one thing, EVERYONE thinks they are being discriminated against these days. Here's a quote from another email I got on the Asian admissions story:

"Why do you not share the views on how unfair the system is to the average middle class white student? ... Simply put the system is NOT fair to the average white student. If they are not the Standout Athelete they don’t get that scholarship (Guess who does) not them or the Asians. The government Hands out WAY more money to students with ethnic backgrounds over those who do not. It sounds like this particular Ivy League school may have an issue, but it is far worse across the board nationwide for everyone else to get funding if they are NOT Asian."

This is not the only email I received from a white person claiming discrimination. I actually get those all the time, regardless of what story I'm writing. So we have Asians claiming the big D because of SAT disparities; blacks/Latinos claiming D because of less educational opportunity before college, less networks, etc; whites claiming D because of ... if everyone is being discriminated against, is anyone?

Also: If we are going to decide that Asians are in fact discriminated against in the admissions process, that means we are in favor of admissions policies that would assign a rank to each applicant primarily based on SATs and GPAs. This would keep the vast majority of poor children, blacks, Latinos, and certain other minorities out of the most selective colleges.

Also: I'm not sure it's discriminatory for a college to choose one qualified applicant over another. That's what gets lost in the affirmative action debate. Asian students with perfect SATs are not being rejected from Yale in favor of dummies who can't do the work. They are being rejected in favor of talented, accomplished students with lower SATs, who can offer Yale something that particular Asian cannot. "You might be a tuba player in a piccolo year," is one quote that did not make it into the story. I'm not ready to call that flat-out "discrimination." I don't know what to call it.

Thanks again for your thoughtful comments, Dr. Dumi. Hope you don't mind if I call you that--it just rolls off the keyboard so nicely :)

Judith

12/6/2011 01:14:42 am

If I follow your thesis correctly, Dr. Lewis, you consider that perceived discrimination is discrimination in some form, and that drawing distinctions between the two is a bias in itself.

I agree that airing feelings of discrimination by any group, making the unheard voice heard, can be beneficial to all. It can lead to greater understanding among all people and a more just society. Also that if we have a “litmus-test”, it should be applied across the board. However, in order for a dialog to produce beneficial results, in order to find solutions to discrimination in its various and seemingly endless manifestations, it seems there has to be some reality testing. If not, we are all merely venting.

In the example you cited about Jewish people and the Holocaust, it is not feeling and perception, but extensive and long standing documentation from many sources, providing irrefutable proof of the existence of the Holocaust, that negates deniers’ statements. At this point, exploring reasons why various people or groups continue to deny the Holocaust in the face of such evidence might be fruitful. For example: are there psychological characteristics/traits/belief systems deniers have in common? If so, how might this be best addressed?

In this, and all too many analogous examples, it seems obvious that many political and religious leaders of all stripes prey on people’s feelings of fear, jealously, frustration, etc. with the objective of gaining or maintaining power, not in order to open anyone's eyes to truth. Why are such methods, despite the overwhelming hardships and deaths they continue to produce, still effective to this day?

Besides defining discrimination as a phenomenon, I think we would do well to investigate root causes. And perhaps if we are serious about this, each examine and unravel our own beliefs, asking ourselves: what is the foundation upon which they rest? That is, if we wish to come up with lasting remedies instead of only treating symptoms.

Char

12/6/2011 02:41:48 am

soooo I'm jumping in late and possibly a bit out of context, since I didn't read the actual story.

Please excuse the numeration, it's not intended for emphasis but just for me to keep track of my thoughts.

1. using the qualifier does indicate taking sides and therefore that you don't validate it as discrimination. However, besides the career conflict, I'm not sure this has to be a bad thing... On the flip side, if generations before us never judged / validated I'm not sure how we'd view, the civil rights movement, end of apartheid, occupy wall street etc.

2. In order to be on the same page, how are you defining discrimation? If you see it as "the recognition and understanding of the difference between one thing and another" then logically I'd have to say you're wrong (assuming you're not validating this as real discrimination). But if you're defining it as "the unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people or things, esp. on the grounds of race, age, or sex."

Then "unjust" opens up the can of words that you're all alluding to.

Who validates what "unjust" treatment is?

Focusing solely on college acceptance, at the surface affirmative action maybe seen as unjust treatment.. but in the larger context of life (where status intersects with education and race and gender ) its attempting at counter balancing those systematic inequalities. (So affirmation is quite frankly the most JUST thing to do)

So I guess I agree .. you have to choose what you feel is valid discrimation and hope the systems at play agree with you. Because at the end of the day leaving it up to self interpretation will result in everyone assuming the need for empowerment or vindication

12/8/2011 09:35:56 am

@Judith You're on the money with my thesis. Just to be clear, I didn't mention the Jewish Holocaust that was someone else. I think it is the documentation of the Holocaust that makes the claim of discrimination unqualified in part. I think importantly that Washington cites the work of Espenshade in his article which also documents the practice of discrimination. Espenshade and a number of other scholars work make me convinced discrimination is at play -- particularly that rules are being gerrymandered to keep out certain groups of folks.

@Jesse- A higher angle, nah. A different angle, certainly! Individual antecdoctal claims are one thing, documented, researched, and reliable scholarly results are another. I'd point your white detractors to Bowen and Bok's research on the impacts on chances of admission to 1st choice selective colleges for Whites where they find less than a 2 percent decrease in chances of admission. You invoked scholarship in your piece for a reason, there are folks who are trained to interrogate these claims and look at patterns. But let's be real no one wants to just read large studies, the stories of informants you have are much more compelling! Also, I don't think we have to say what we want admissions to be based on gpa to call a thing discrimination, we simply have to observe the shifting of policies and their subsequent impacts on applicants. I don't want things to be simply GPA based any more than i want them to be standardized test based or extracurriculars based. My desire is not attached but my observations are clear. What I observe is that school are "changing the rules" in ways that are race conscious and impactful. You'd probably get a great kick out of reading Frank Samson's experimental studies around this stuff. Thanks for the dialogue. Always good to be in conversation with concerned, reflexive folks.

sentence rephraser link

10/26/2015 12:11:13 pm

Asian students with perfect basis are not being rejected from Yale in favor of dummies who can't do the work.

The Table of Contemplation and Consultation

Leave a Reply.

Author

Archives

Categories

Serving Fresh Words Daily from '86 to Infinity. All Rights Reserved, Son!