There's another element of the exam school picture that people have to grapple with: when research is done that addresses the selection bias inherent to the admissions system, looking at students just below and above the cut scores, those students go on to identical futures in terms of college and employment. That is, when you look at students who are very similar in educational profiles and chart their paths after some get sorted into the exam schools and some get sorted into regular high schools, they end up just the same. There's no special advantage to attending the exam schools. Of course the outcomes look good, unadjusted, when you're selecting for the highest-performing students. But when you look for advantage that stems from attending the elite schools themselves, it simply makes no difference.
You could use this to say, look, who cares if Asian kids etc. are getting shut out of these schools at higher rates now, they don't matter. But the problem is this: if the advantage is accruing to ability rather than to the school that you go to, then sending less prepared Black and Hispanic kids there won't do them any favors. They'll still have the same level of underlying ability, and that's what's going to determine their success moving forward. It's a shell game.
...which is the outcome we'd expect if progressives are right. The anti-test rhetoric is so strange from the left. If I believe that our economy has systematically left black and Hispanic/Latino people worse off (which I believe), then I would expect them to lack the underlying ability for high school and college.
It's so bizarre that some people think systematic racism only takes place at the point of testing or resume evaluation.
Logical coherent thought is a white-centric heteronormative oppressive tool to enforce hegemonic systemic bigotry. Even worse, it doesn’t express lived experience.
It's sort of interesting to think about Andrew Yang's mayoral run, and how there were so, so, *so* many thinkpieces about him, and every single one of them had the same comically wrong thesis, which is that Yang may claim to represent Asian Americans, but his pro-cop policies were not aligned with what Asian Americans want. (See Li Zhou in Vox last June, "Andrew Yang and the complexities of representation." Or, like, any lefty mag, which had a piece with this theme.) Which is hilarious, the idea that being pro-cop somehow made Yang *not* representative of the majority of Asian American voters. But the narrative took off!
And it's not hard to see why, because while the majority of Asians in NYC may be pro-cop, the majority of Asians *in media* aren't. Remember that utterly inane "Asians Against Yang" website, in which 900 very online AAPI voters said they didn't like the guy because he was too pro-Israel (LMAO), and how that got plenty of press coverage? There were probably at least 900 Asians who came out in support of Peter Liang back during the Akai Gurley shooting in 2015. Which percent of each of those 900 people do you think are on Twitter?
Good essay but a few points. You make it sound like the worst problem with the progressives throwing Asians under a bus is that they're being lost to the republicans. No the worst thing about it is that innocent people are suffering because there seems to be an unwritten rule that any issue where one has to choose between pandering to Blacks or non Blacks it is always the former that will win even when it is clear it is the latter who is in the right. I honestly have come to think of the Black lobby as a left-wing domestic version of AIPAC.
"Another uncomfortable fact for the identity-based left—the NGO and nonprofit leaders, the anti-racist activists, certain progressive power brokers—is that their language has systematically alienated working-class Asian voters."
Their language isn't what a systemically alienating Asian voters. It's their blatant willingness to throw them under the bus. Look how they're dealing with all the anti-asian violence? They're using it as a excuse to vilify Trump. Now Trump is horrible, but the very little this violence has anything to do with him. It's not the language that's the problem it's the blindly favoring Blacks over non Blacks that is the problem. And it's Asians and often Jews who bear the brunt of this.
Excellent comment. Seen this way too many times over the years. Democrats in NYC refuse to say who is attacking Asians for fear of alienating a bigger base.
I’m not Asian, but my spouse is an Asian immigrant and our child is half-Asian. This is exactly right. We will never vote Republican but Democrats annoy TF out of us on a regular basis to the point where it’s almost tempting.
This “white adjacent” and BI(important)POC(less important) stuff is insulting, and the efforts to punish Asian kids for achievement are transparent. It’s a toxic, zero-sum power struggle between elites that divides marginalized people instead of bringing them together. Anyone who gets ahead needs to be knocked down in the name of equity.
Democrats need to stop taking for granted that POC will always vote for them and start listening to their actual concerns. The opinions of overeducated white elites don’t represent them just because those elites claim their agenda is antiracist.
Just do it. Vote for a Republican, as long as they are not too crazy (no Marjorie Taylor Greens, obviously.) I'm in the same position as you - almost tempted. To do the unthinkable. When the unthinkable becomes thinkable, it's probably time to stop thinking about it and take action.
They will never ever stop taking us for granted if we don't stop allowing them. Why would they ever care if they know they can win our votes anyway? Guaranteeing your vote is giving up all your bargaining power. "Raise my wages or I'll...keep coming into work, but be pretty frustrated about it, believe you me" will not move your boss one inch, so why would a similar tactic work on the Democratic party?
Because the Republican Party is relentlessly purging its moderates. Up here in Mass, Charlie Baker would be the natural candidate of the education-oriented, antiwoke voter. He's retiring, seemingly because he doesn't think he can convince the Republican primary electorate his COVID policies (eg: actually giving half a damn) were lax enough.
The more Asians and Hispanics vote Republican, the more incentive they have to swing to the center. I would love a reasonable centrist third party, but you only have two choices: Crazy ass Coke, or Crazy ass Pepsi. : )
sounds like he isn't up to the task, not that the task is impossible. in Virginia, Youngkin won both the primary and the election for governor as a moderate Republican.
Another thing I've realized is that certain portions of the electorate on both the left and the right can be led to believe literally anything. If they can, in the span of 5 years, completely lose their grip on reality because their politicians preferred it to happen, then they can be led back to reality by a different set of politicians. What we need are the moderates to have less fear.
William Butler Yeats said it back in 1919: "The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity."
You forgot to mention the most important point,I live in nyc,I ride the subways etc. one race if physically attacking Asians even elderly ones,but it is taboo to tell the truth
Black leadership and White progressives certainly appear to be anti-Asian, for a thousand years the path to success was through the Chinese exam system, the attacks on the SHSAT appear to be directed at Asians, appearance is reality. The Specialized HS alumni associations are 501s and have millions of dollars (check IRS 990s), and employ major lobbyists… the law is not changing.. a Black mayor, Black chancellor, Black Speaker - know any Sino-Latinx candidates?
The Asian-American civil rights struggle was fought in the San Francisco courts against the labor movement and progressives fighting for the equality of women and black people.
This is why we considered Bill DeBlasio's policy racist:
1. It's a facially neutral policy with disparate impact.
2. The plan uses geography as a proxy for race to circumvent the equal protection clause.
3. When you accuse Asian's of gaming the system, you're accusing them of being unscrupulous Orientals, and sound exactly like Samuel Gompers advocating for the Chinese Exclusion Act and the Geary Act.
4. When you claim Asian's area wedge, you're invoking Terence V. Powderly justify the Rock Springs Massacre and the entire history of systemic anti-Asian racism in this country.
5. When you complain the demographics not matching "the community", you sound exactly like like Dennis Kearney saying the "Chinese Must Go".
7. The Portuguese/Spanish racial caste system is based on genetic purity with three pure races. Have you noticed that all of the equity advocates are white or part white?
Wow. This started out as a great piece, then, BLAM! You went completely off the rails. It started with this bald-faced lie: "only 9 percent of seats are being offered to Black and Latino students." Then proceeded to imagine, completely without justification, that neighborhood schools would not lead to hardened segregation due to parents voting with their feet, just like they have in most every other city in the nation. Nobody wants you as school Chancellor.
There's another element of the exam school picture that people have to grapple with: when research is done that addresses the selection bias inherent to the admissions system, looking at students just below and above the cut scores, those students go on to identical futures in terms of college and employment. That is, when you look at students who are very similar in educational profiles and chart their paths after some get sorted into the exam schools and some get sorted into regular high schools, they end up just the same. There's no special advantage to attending the exam schools. Of course the outcomes look good, unadjusted, when you're selecting for the highest-performing students. But when you look for advantage that stems from attending the elite schools themselves, it simply makes no difference.
You could use this to say, look, who cares if Asian kids etc. are getting shut out of these schools at higher rates now, they don't matter. But the problem is this: if the advantage is accruing to ability rather than to the school that you go to, then sending less prepared Black and Hispanic kids there won't do them any favors. They'll still have the same level of underlying ability, and that's what's going to determine their success moving forward. It's a shell game.
...which is the outcome we'd expect if progressives are right. The anti-test rhetoric is so strange from the left. If I believe that our economy has systematically left black and Hispanic/Latino people worse off (which I believe), then I would expect them to lack the underlying ability for high school and college.
It's so bizarre that some people think systematic racism only takes place at the point of testing or resume evaluation.
Logical coherent thought is a white-centric heteronormative oppressive tool to enforce hegemonic systemic bigotry. Even worse, it doesn’t express lived experience.
It's sort of interesting to think about Andrew Yang's mayoral run, and how there were so, so, *so* many thinkpieces about him, and every single one of them had the same comically wrong thesis, which is that Yang may claim to represent Asian Americans, but his pro-cop policies were not aligned with what Asian Americans want. (See Li Zhou in Vox last June, "Andrew Yang and the complexities of representation." Or, like, any lefty mag, which had a piece with this theme.) Which is hilarious, the idea that being pro-cop somehow made Yang *not* representative of the majority of Asian American voters. But the narrative took off!
And it's not hard to see why, because while the majority of Asians in NYC may be pro-cop, the majority of Asians *in media* aren't. Remember that utterly inane "Asians Against Yang" website, in which 900 very online AAPI voters said they didn't like the guy because he was too pro-Israel (LMAO), and how that got plenty of press coverage? There were probably at least 900 Asians who came out in support of Peter Liang back during the Akai Gurley shooting in 2015. Which percent of each of those 900 people do you think are on Twitter?
"Pretending Problems Don't Exist Won't Make Them Disappear"
It is amazing how such a simple statement can see so radical today.
Yep. I talk about this dynamic a lot in my own writing. The Asian media class is a horrible representation of Asians in general.
https://societystandpoint.substack.com/p/the-real-white-adjacent-asians
Good essay but a few points. You make it sound like the worst problem with the progressives throwing Asians under a bus is that they're being lost to the republicans. No the worst thing about it is that innocent people are suffering because there seems to be an unwritten rule that any issue where one has to choose between pandering to Blacks or non Blacks it is always the former that will win even when it is clear it is the latter who is in the right. I honestly have come to think of the Black lobby as a left-wing domestic version of AIPAC.
"Another uncomfortable fact for the identity-based left—the NGO and nonprofit leaders, the anti-racist activists, certain progressive power brokers—is that their language has systematically alienated working-class Asian voters."
Their language isn't what a systemically alienating Asian voters. It's their blatant willingness to throw them under the bus. Look how they're dealing with all the anti-asian violence? They're using it as a excuse to vilify Trump. Now Trump is horrible, but the very little this violence has anything to do with him. It's not the language that's the problem it's the blindly favoring Blacks over non Blacks that is the problem. And it's Asians and often Jews who bear the brunt of this.
Excellent comment. Seen this way too many times over the years. Democrats in NYC refuse to say who is attacking Asians for fear of alienating a bigger base.
I’m not Asian, but my spouse is an Asian immigrant and our child is half-Asian. This is exactly right. We will never vote Republican but Democrats annoy TF out of us on a regular basis to the point where it’s almost tempting.
This “white adjacent” and BI(important)POC(less important) stuff is insulting, and the efforts to punish Asian kids for achievement are transparent. It’s a toxic, zero-sum power struggle between elites that divides marginalized people instead of bringing them together. Anyone who gets ahead needs to be knocked down in the name of equity.
Democrats need to stop taking for granted that POC will always vote for them and start listening to their actual concerns. The opinions of overeducated white elites don’t represent them just because those elites claim their agenda is antiracist.
It goes to show the weakness of race/whiteness as the primary lens of analysis. Things make a lot more sense when you look at class/wealth/income etc
It REALLY makes sense if you are brave enough to look at average IQ. But that will get you a modern-day lynching.
Just do it. Vote for a Republican, as long as they are not too crazy (no Marjorie Taylor Greens, obviously.) I'm in the same position as you - almost tempted. To do the unthinkable. When the unthinkable becomes thinkable, it's probably time to stop thinking about it and take action.
They will never ever stop taking us for granted if we don't stop allowing them. Why would they ever care if they know they can win our votes anyway? Guaranteeing your vote is giving up all your bargaining power. "Raise my wages or I'll...keep coming into work, but be pretty frustrated about it, believe you me" will not move your boss one inch, so why would a similar tactic work on the Democratic party?
Because the Republican Party is relentlessly purging its moderates. Up here in Mass, Charlie Baker would be the natural candidate of the education-oriented, antiwoke voter. He's retiring, seemingly because he doesn't think he can convince the Republican primary electorate his COVID policies (eg: actually giving half a damn) were lax enough.
The more Asians and Hispanics vote Republican, the more incentive they have to swing to the center. I would love a reasonable centrist third party, but you only have two choices: Crazy ass Coke, or Crazy ass Pepsi. : )
sounds like he isn't up to the task, not that the task is impossible. in Virginia, Youngkin won both the primary and the election for governor as a moderate Republican.
Another thing I've realized is that certain portions of the electorate on both the left and the right can be led to believe literally anything. If they can, in the span of 5 years, completely lose their grip on reality because their politicians preferred it to happen, then they can be led back to reality by a different set of politicians. What we need are the moderates to have less fear.
William Butler Yeats said it back in 1919: "The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity."
You forgot to mention the most important point,I live in nyc,I ride the subways etc. one race if physically attacking Asians even elderly ones,but it is taboo to tell the truth
Black leadership and White progressives certainly appear to be anti-Asian, for a thousand years the path to success was through the Chinese exam system, the attacks on the SHSAT appear to be directed at Asians, appearance is reality. The Specialized HS alumni associations are 501s and have millions of dollars (check IRS 990s), and employ major lobbyists… the law is not changing.. a Black mayor, Black chancellor, Black Speaker - know any Sino-Latinx candidates?
The Democrats are the party of Randi Weingarten and "race to the bottom", or it makes you feel better, equity.
The Asian-American civil rights struggle was fought in the San Francisco courts against the labor movement and progressives fighting for the equality of women and black people.
This is why we considered Bill DeBlasio's policy racist:
1. It's a facially neutral policy with disparate impact.
2. The plan uses geography as a proxy for race to circumvent the equal protection clause.
3. When you accuse Asian's of gaming the system, you're accusing them of being unscrupulous Orientals, and sound exactly like Samuel Gompers advocating for the Chinese Exclusion Act and the Geary Act.
4. When you claim Asian's area wedge, you're invoking Terence V. Powderly justify the Rock Springs Massacre and the entire history of systemic anti-Asian racism in this country.
5. When you complain the demographics not matching "the community", you sound exactly like like Dennis Kearney saying the "Chinese Must Go".
6. Have you ever looked into the role institutionalized anti-Asian racism played in the Mexican Revolution? https://globalvoices.org/2015/05/29/the-forgotten-massacre-of-chinese-people-in-torreon-mexico/
7. The Portuguese/Spanish racial caste system is based on genetic purity with three pure races. Have you noticed that all of the equity advocates are white or part white?
Wow. This started out as a great piece, then, BLAM! You went completely off the rails. It started with this bald-faced lie: "only 9 percent of seats are being offered to Black and Latino students." Then proceeded to imagine, completely without justification, that neighborhood schools would not lead to hardened segregation due to parents voting with their feet, just like they have in most every other city in the nation. Nobody wants you as school Chancellor.
Fantastic post. This is why I’m a paying subscriber. Bravo, and looking forward to more like this!
The first half was very good, then it took a terrible nosedive.
I could be wrong, but I thought the Asian community tended to vote Republican until or through the early 1990s.