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Comment by nvarsj | Hacker News Reader

> Instead we have a system that systematically disadvantages non black people.

This is patently false. If you're white, you're at a huge advantage from birth. It's trivial to find data supporting this.

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I'm not saying in general, I'm talking specifically about AA. With affirmative action and applying to something like grad school, a minority that is "qualified" can and will get a spot over a non-minority, that is "slightly more qualified."

In general, averaging across all of America, I'm certain it's an advantage to be white. I'm also certain it's an advantage to grow up to rich parents. I'm also certain it's an advantage to grow up in a good school district. It's also and advantage to grow up in a 2 parent household. It's an advantage to not grow up in the ghetto, white or black.

Life isn't fair, but at the end of the day at some point you have to be accountable for your decisions and all you can do is your best. Picking a winner based on skin color is not the right answer. We should always be picking the absolutely most qualified person for everything. That is something that clearly doesn't happen enough.

Yes, but the absolutely most qualified person for a whole bunch of things is disproportionately often white and male. And even if we as a society wake up tomorrow magically not racist or sexist at all, that will be the case for the foreseeable future simply because white men have disproportionate amounts of money and connections.

Hiring through AA is _intentionally_ suboptimal. The whole point is to give members of disadvantaged communities access to opportunities they are less qualified for in the hope that they, and by extensions their communities, will over time become _less_ _disadvantaged_.

There are more important things in this universe than efficiency.

Instead we discriminate against the poor white guy from the ghetto growing up with a single mom? Brilliant. That guy had none of the supposed white male advantages. Hire/accept people based on their merits. If you want to take into account overcoming adversity that's fine with me. But picking someone based on the color of their skin, be it white, black, or other, is wrong, and it's racist.

Let's argue based on aggregate statistics instead of individual situations. I don't see why otherwise rational/scientific people feel the need to debase themselves by talking about edge-case individual examples when it comes to things like this.

Individual situations are important in this case. It is as much about fairness for the white guy/girl with poor parents who is being discriminated against by his or her government as it is about the African American who is being discriminated against by employers, schools etc.

This is obviously a tough issue, but edge cases are important. There is too much noise in the statistics.

I don't think poor, white people are an edge case. As of 2007, 9.9% of the white, non-hispanic population lived in poverty (compared to 27.6% of black people and 26.6% of hispanics). The numbers are lower, but they are far from edge cases. The source of adversity in the human experience is not solely rooted in race.

Just curious, but what do you get if you multiply those percentages by the size of those groups?

~24 mil white ~11 mil black ~14 mil hispanic

Imagine that. All kinds of people leaving in poverty and having disadvantaged lives.

African Americans constitute 15% of America.

White Americans constitute 74% of America.

Thus African Americans are more than twice as likely to live under the poverty line. Those are not I odds I would like to gamble with had I been born black.

You won a lottery when you were born.

Merely being born American made us winners in that lottery, if you get down to it.

Is anyone really against the idea that all 49 million need help?

You mean being born a first world country. But there are other first world countries that have better average quality of life than the US.

There will always be some people who have it better than others. I would prefer that we make sure that those who have it the worst comparatively don't have it that bad on an absolute scale.

> But picking someone based on the color of their skin, be it white, black, or other, is wrong

In these circumstances, some of us disagree with you.

> That guy had none of the supposed white male advantages.

Merely looking like those who hold power is, in fact, a huge advantage.

I'm that white guy from the ghetto with a single mom. I'm an executive now, and I'm sure it was easier for me than a black kid from my old neighborhood.

Let me change the subject slightly, people who are tall and good looking have more opportunity and success than those that aren't. No one, even you, are making purely rational decisions based on merit. All of us make decisions that are influenced by things we aren't aware of.

90% of American CEOs are taller than the average American; 30% of CEOs are 6'2" or taller, compared to 4% of the American population. CEOs are taller on average than actors, a job where appearance should matter.

Humans are shallow creatures.

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