Is tolerance intolerant?

[bennyboy]

I've suggested methods specifically meant to reduce bias in screening-- like a blind screening process, which would 100% remove cultural bias-- which you shot down anyway, for some reason.

Because it's not true that this would 100% remove cultural bias, and I pointed out why that is. It doesn't matter if you make it a blind screening process. The way the tests are written, and the circumstances that lead to proficiency in these tests, mean black students will continue to be at a disadvantage compared to white students because the environmental factors clearly favor white over black students. Hence, the need for race-based affirmative action.

But eventually, you need some metric to determine which students will perform better.  The best available education is important to all human beings-- I'd categorize it as a right-- and you'd damn well better have a metric better than skin color when you tell some kids that they won't be going to Harvard because they sunburn too easily.

Again, privilege plays an important contributing role when it comes to better performance with respect to privileged vs. not-so-privileged groups. How about you stop pretending you have such awesome solutions for these problems and instead listen to what black people themselves have to say on this matter. The more you continue to speak with such white privilege, dismissing the actual struggles (and the extent of those struggles) that black people face, the less time you have to empathize with them and the less time you have to realize you really don't know shit.

Oh stfu about my privilege.  I grew up on the streets (well, basically in my middle school and high school years) trying to prevent dirty old men from raping me behind dumpsters.  I was in fact NOT accepted into a top college-- I went to a shitty one, busted my ass, and transferred to a top school based on my grades. Nor did I have any of the additional scholarships which were presented to aboriginal Canadians or other minorities-- I did it all on a student loan, which took me many years to pay off.

Okay so here's what we have so far from you:
1)  Grades and entrance exams, being somehow unfair, shouldn't be used in admitting students to school.
2)  The decision is therefore left to arbitration-- but you accuse the system of bias, which means the arbitrators are biased.

What's left?  I guess you are going to say that the process should be arbitrated, but by a special committee with "sensitivity training backgrounds," which means that all the favored minorities of the day will gain easy acceptance, and white and Asian students, no matter how hard they've worked or how smart they are, will be expected to give way in the name of "fairness."

Have you considered that not only entrance, but also all subjects are "culturally biased?" and that the kids you shuffle through the door, if they had bad SAT scores, are not going to be literate enough to read complex medical textbooks, or research law texts written in very formal and archaic language?  Have considered that the purpose of SAT scores isn't to punish people who get bad scores, but to make sure they don't waste 4 years of their lives chasing a dream that their own limitations will make nearly impossible?

If you want to take equal candidates, and make sure that black ones are given preference, I'm okay with that.  But if you want to throw out testing as a basis of acceptance, then you're a real fool. You're not helping anyone by letting them get in over their heads-- in fact, you are seriously damaging the classroom experience of those students academically astute and intellectually gifted enough to gain acceptance through testing.