Serious question: Why are people afraid to admit privilege?
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Anonymous
You probably have no patience for lots of things... it’s called having a low EQ. |
Anonymous
Oh, honey. You’re doing yourself no favors. |
Anonymous
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The "nobody works harder than the janitorial staff" comment is interesting.
Here's what people fail to realize: the janitors will move up in American society precisely because of their hard work. Their kids will be fully bilingual, speak and write English perfectly, attend our suburban public schools, and thrive. I know a woman who received asylum (not easy), started her own house cleaning business in moco, etc. Fast forward: she's a home owner and her 3 kids all have advanced degrees. I could rattle off tons of stories like this (I work in homelessness/poverty advocacy). But here's what nobody says out loud: the immigrants will be fine. Statistics show the American Dream is still alive for them. They move up the ladder quickly, and their kids thrive. By contrast, poor Americans (primarily black and white) are stuck. It can't be the schools because the immigrants' kids are in the same schools. MoCo is a great microcosm for this social experiment: immigrants thrive, while inter generational poverty among AAs persists. Don't you think we should ask ourselves why? (Happy to provide hints: teen pregnancy, dropping out, raised by stressed out single mom/aunt/grandma, burdened by bad credit and criminal records so jobs and housing options are limited, etc. Dozens of studies indicate that delaying child birth and 2 income families lift people out of poverty. We can't legislate that. Bummer. Because it's the silver bullet to family economic stability and the ticket to a solid adulthood. Again: the immigrants and the low-performing American kids are in the exact same neighborhoods and schools; the difference is the immigrant families eventually move on.) Lastly: the guy who drives me to the airport is an immigrant. He now owns a fleet of cabs. He lives in a $1.5 mil home in the burbs, and 2 of his handful of kids are on scholarships in DC grad schools. He started out in a very crappy neighborhood. He and his wife hustled before having kids. |
Anonymous
+1. Typical privileged American BS. |
Anonymous
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Is throwing kids into a college way over their heads a good idea? Heck, is out of state college a good idea for *anyone* anymore? Student loan debt should be avoided at all costs---especially for kids whose families lack assets to bail them out.
Perhaps an apt comparison is the failed home ownership push? While homeownership can produce "wealth", it isn't for everyone. For nearly two decades, the antipoverty movement focused on pushing everyone towards it---ready or not. It didn't go well. Home ownership is a big responsibility, and it's quite costly. Maintaining a home over the course of a mortgage and keeping up with taxes can be impossible for some. It turns out subsidizing rentals is the better investment. Lastly, the unintended political consequences of such a policy will be big. This is why we have trump. People don't like whatever is perceived as a handout---even otherwise good people. Rather: invest in quality public education, communities, etc. AND make clear that personal responsibility is a "thing" that benefits all of us. The conservatives are outpacing liberals simply behave their policies are built on personal responsibility rhetoric. It matters, for a variety of reasons. I would love to see us stop taking the easy way out with sweeping policies that don't produce results (like this sat policy). Instead, let's take the more complex approach of actually improving schools, communities and economic and family stability. |
Anonymous
if you are implying that i am low on conscientiousness (only one facet of EQ) then, as it happens, this is not the case. i have a phd and i am doing well, thanks. but no way my kids will be paying for the fact that there were slaves like 200 years ago in the US. we don't care. |
Anonymous
I think what people are worried about is how this is going to be used. If it's used as a context around scores it's probably a good idea. I.e. the (probably truthful) idea that a kid with a 1350 on the SAT from a horrible neighborhood and family situation is more innately takented than a kid with a 1400 from a more advantageous situation. There could be arguments about what constitutes "adversity" as well, and I'm sure that reasonable people could disagree with some of the criteria selected, but there's some truth in what they're measuring. What I'm afraid is going to happen is that they're going to build the scores to be a proxy for race so that they can continue with (IMO) failed AA policies if they're shut down by the courts. This will continue to have the corrosive effect of putting clearly less qualified candidates into institutions where they're unsuited. I also think the "privilege" argument is a tough one. A lot of the successful people I see are successful because they're very smart, very hard working and have sacrificed short term gain to achieve long term goals. While an advantageous family situation can certainly help, it still takes a lot of hard work and effort to be successful. Most of the people arguing about "privilege" speak in very absolute terms as though everything these people have accomplished was simply an accident of birth. That's going to rub a lot of people the wrong way. |
Anonymous
I agree with all of this. Obviously there are the exceptional kids who make it out of generational poverty, but they are the exception. |
Anonymous
Yep. Parental death, sexual assaults, alcoholic parents, etc. Where do you draw the line? My white husband grew up dirt poor. His father was an alcoholic. His mother worked two jobs and wasn’t around because of it. His HS had only a small number that went on to 4-year colleges. He scored a near perfect SAT score, much higher than me as white UMC student. The students that benefited from racial admissions boost in my HS had wealthy doctor parents. I couldn’t understand how they needed admissions help and with a full grade point lower they got in to every college they applied. These things don’t always serve the group they are trying to help. It’s similar to the wealthy Latinos at my children’s school getting into every Ivy. It helps diversity numbers, but zero to do with SES. This new adversity score tries to address that, but things like this are always a disaster and a slippery slope. Then, the students often aren’t prepared for the rigor of the environment they are thrust into. And what about the Asians that are handicapped getting into Universities solely by being Asian? Just do away with the test. People looking at my husband now in his late 40s would assume he was a white, blue eyed man of privilege. He pulled himself up by the bootstraps. Read “Hillbilly Elegy”. Eye opening. My husband thinks much like the author does about this type of thing. Not a fan. |
Anonymous
| If the numbers added are linked to neighbirhood demographics, then here's an issue: kids from disadvantaged families using subsidized housing vouchers in good neighborhoods likely won't get a bump, right? Plenty of families using vouchers in Bethesda, Rockville, Olney, etc. Demographics for the zip codes will have high incomes, dual income families, low crime, etc. They must realize that, right? So is this just smoke and mirrors cover for a more traditional approach to affirmative action? (Black kid with a single mom gets a bump.) How else are they drilling down beyond zip code? |
Anonymous
Agreed. Socioeconomics is far more accurate data point than race. But we're just talking about white privilege. |
Anonymous
| The only constant on DCUM is an obsession with status and how it is defined. Those on the left generally appear even more obsessed with this than those on the right. The discussion around privilege is a prime example. |
Anonymous
PhD is just a bunch of people that can't hack it at real jobs and don't get accepted to Med School... stay in school as long as possible. Nobody respects Phd's ... fake doctors. Stay in your cubby and do "research" and write "papers" nobody will read. It's a fake job. Nobody is impressed. |
Anonymous
+1. The privileged want to retain the privilege of imposing their stupidity onto everyone else. |
Anonymous
I'm an upper middle class black person with a kid at an Ivy. I understand my level of privilege and add on to it I am fairer skinned and that confers some advantages in society as well. I wish people would understand that privilege is a nuanced thing I certainly have it but of course not as much as a white, male 1%er. I don't know how this discussion turned to be about black people - how do we get blamed for this adversity scale??? I'm fine with releasing some of my privilege to give others an opportunity - this is important to me as a black person and I try to live my life this way. My kid would have done well at non-Ivy school too, and we certainly would release her spot to give another kid from less circumstances a chance. What I also find amusing though is if you go on the threads about the Harvard lawsuit and abolishing affirmative action you'll find dozens of posts with people saying "it should all be based on SES and not race!!!!". Well here is an attempt at a solution and everyone goes crazy!! This thread and others basically verifies that people DO have privilege and will do anything to hang on to it. Also people should understand, the College Board can do whatever it wants and create these tools. It has reams of data on our kids over decades, never mind all the public data this is available. Thanks to technology and data-gathering it is possible to create a scale like this. However, it doesn't mean colleges have to use it. |