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Hand-holding minorities label them even more as a group that needs to be helped. They should be encouraged to be successful in the "same" environment as others and treated the same. The moment you do something "for" them is the moment you label them as that group that needs hand-holding even more. I don't think they need special treatment this way. It is done by good intention, but it does not need saying, you're black, let me help you. I would just do it without naming it.

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The people doing that labeling are (a) not the minorities themselves, and (b) cheerfully oblivious to the fact that college recruiting programs at elite schools with 4-7% African American or Latino populations is itself a targeted outreach program that helps the overrepresented majority.

There's something especially galling about the repeated concern that targeted outreach to minorities will somehow label its beneficiaries as "inferior", since one expects that most of the time it's exactly the people raising that concern who are rushing to get the ink in their label printers refilled.

It's like saying "this makes African Americans inferior, but you don't get to hold that sentiment against me because I couched it as a concern". At least have the spine to make the meanness plain.

I get what you're saying; that the VC industry should "just do it" rather than make a splash by announcing a program. However, if someone is in one of these minority groups, and has tried to raise funding in a very white, male dominated VC industry, I'd guess that when pitching, sometimes either the rapport was off or they felt that the other side didn't wholly understand you.

I'm not saying that it's intentional on the VC end, because it's human nature to go with who or what you understand and feel comfortable with.

By announcing a program like this, it may encourage minorities to seek advice, when they otherwise might not have.

To be clear - these are office hours - YC is still the same program for all who participate in it. Regardless of their background.

Have you ever asked a black person what they think about that?

so, affirmative action should not be done, and structural racism should not be combated, just so that we do not offend the pride of the discriminated by labelling, or? this is ridiculous. by this logic we might have to ignore racism completely. e.g. if you say that cops in the US are more prone to killing unarmed black suspects, you're also pointing out that black people need help. i guess we should not do that either :D

Have you actually seen the history of Affirmative Action? I'd suggest you read 'Affirmative Action around the world' by Thomas Sowell. There's a plethora of sources and facts packed onto every page, very enlightening.

I take it the nutshell version is that Affirmative Action is a failure (according to this book at least)? (I mean, that is what your phrasing seems to imply.)

I'd suggest you read the book, it's only 200 pages and I can't summarise it in one sentence. It's sad that someone down voted me for suggesting a book which has voluminous facts and history. Human progress is building on what we have learnt before, if we can't learn from history I don't know how we will make progress.

I did not downvote you. I asked a question. There are only so many hours in the day. So, unfortunately, I cannot read every single thing I wish I could read. It would be nice if you actually answered my question instead of recommending "read this book" for the third time. I heard you the first two times.

Peace.

Edit: and have an upvote as a token of good faith.

I was under the impression you were the parent I initially replied to. I apologise.

So in regards to your question, AA has been disastrous around the world. In India and Bangladesh hundreds of thousands of deaths, people burning each other in the street, terrifying stuff. All because of class wars instigated by benefits to one class over the other. Same results, on a different magnitude, in Malaysia, Nigeria, Iran, Australia and to a smaller extent the U.S. AA has never worked in all of recorded history.

this is ridiculous. "in all of recorded history"? hundreds of thousands of deaths? in Australia?! :D but i guess if you read it in a book, it must be true!

there's also a book out there claiming the Nazi regime was all the work of gay people. look it up, you'll probably love it.

If you had bothered to read my post..."On a different magnitude".

In India and Bangladesh there is recorded history of hundreds of thousands of deaths. The book sources these facts, if you want to invalidate anything I suggest you go to the original sources, not make a straw man arguement.

I will reiterate, read the book, read the sources -- if you want to invalidate something, invalidate the primary pieces of evidence -- than come back here and we can have a productive conversation.

sorry, but you presented it very weakly. i checked wikipedia in the meanwhile, and it does it much better justice.

i certainly don't have the time or will to read a 200 page book for the sake of an HN discussion. this should not be a surprise. you could maybe outline something? i'm particularly interested in how exactly these killings came about. wikipedia quotes some criticism - that the examples were cherry-picked, and not even entirely comparable to affirmative action in the US, the contexts were too different (and, kinda funny, one critic states that he already published this same book in the 90s under a diff name :D). but then, wiki also quotes some very interesting arguments he laid out that i did not see here and that sound good.

all in all, i can agree it's a crude method, but hey, it's better than nothing. lots of people here pointing out problems and only some offering solutions, although strictly laughably unrealistic ones. certainly, no mass killings have happened in the US because of it, and such fear-mongering helps nothing. i personally would bet that, were the US a social democracy, all of this would probably be much less needed. when health and education are provided, opportunities are more available to everyone. but the way it is now, any disadvantaged group is more likely to stay that way.

Thank you. I am not a fan of affirmative action. But I also understand that a) it's a touchy topic and b) many people do not know what else to do and want to do something and c) it actually isn't possible to ever know for sure what the world would look like had these events not occured, so we do not know for a fact that it would have gone better had these initiatives not happened. Racism and hatred are rampant. Things might well have gone worse without these intiatives.

I still hope the world can improve on these models, but that is no small task.

Have a good day.

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