From CNN:
In largely white male tech world, why capitalism needs an upgrade
By Mitchell Kapor and Benjamin Todd Jealous
Mitch Kapor and Ben Jealous worry that a lack of diversity in tech firms is stalling innovation
Startups succeed, they say, when they meet unmet needs. Innovators from diverse backgrounds can uncover fresh, unsolved problems
Editor's note: Tech pioneer Mitchell Kapor is the co-founder of the Kapor Center for Social Impact and Kapor Capital. Benjamin Todd Jealous, the former president and CEO of the NAACP, is a venture partner at Kapor Capital. Both Kapor and Jealous serve on the board of the Level Playing Field Institute. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the authors.
(CNN) -- When Frederick Hutson left prison in 2012 after serving four years on marijuana-related charges, he realized he had gained something more than his freedom: insight into an overlooked consumer market.
Many inmates are stuck in an age before Instagram or Facebook, relying on envelopes and pay phones to connect with family on the outside.
So Hutson founded Pigeonly, a photo-sharing and low-cost phone call service that has already helped 50,000 incarcerated individuals connect with their loved ones, maintain their ties to society, and remain a presence in their children's lives.
And, via Pigeonly, order hits on the stool pigeons who put them behind bars.
Last year there were eight states where zero Latino students took the Advanced Placement exam in computer science, and 11 states in which no black students took the test. In three states, not a single female student sat for the exam.
A bigger problem is that the Latinos, blacks, and, to a lesser extent, women, didn't do so hot on average when they took the test. If black Puerto Rican females were acing the AP exam at a high rate when they were allowed to take it, it would be obvious that getting more to take it is a high priority, since even diminishing marginal returns would just bring the pass rate down to the white male average. But when those legally privileged individuals who take the AP Computer Science exam currently are failing it at a high rate, well, expansion will increase the failure rate.
It is no surprise, then, that 99% of venture capital-funded startups in 2010 were founded by whites or people of Asian descent, the vast majority of whom were men. The result of this pipeline problem is an enormous amount of untapped talent and a tech sector that fails to reflect the demographics of its users.
We really, really need a term for whites and Asians when talking about subjects like computers.
Underrepresented populations are uniquely prepared to do what the tech sector claims to do best: innovate.
Sure they are.
Ben Jealous... is he that actor on the Sopranos?
ReplyDeleteTell me this is an April fools post
ReplyDelete1st question for Mr. Kapor is why not make Mr. Jealous a full partner rather than a venture partner?
ReplyDeleteI spent the last ten years of my career in tech as a contractor. My guess as to why employers preferred to hire me as a contractor is this... a white, hetero guy doesn't get counted on the books when the EEOC comes knocking. This improves that all important Diversity profile.
ReplyDeleteOne job I frequently did was setting up the dBase and front ends for online course systems. And the course all my employers wanted first was the glorious Diversity course.
The problem was always a lack of content. That sentence... Innovators from diverse backgrounds can uncover fresh, unsolved problems... was usually just about all they had.
Everybody wanted a 45 minute to 60 minute presentation for the Diversity course, but nobody could think of any hard content to put in the damned thing.
In exasperation, the content people would detail me to "look up" what their competitors did and see if I couldn't find some stuff to puff up their courses.
Many days spent wringing my hands trying to find some content of actual value to include in those courses. My solution. Repeat that one idea in as many ways as possible and try to disguise what I was doing. Lots of stock photos and video to keep things moving was another strategy.
Kapor was one of the Lotus software founders. Lotus was dominant for a while in the 80s.
ReplyDelete""""We really, really need a term for whites and Asians when talking about subjects like computers."""""
ReplyDeleteI thought we already have a few. Try 'smart'; 'bright' 'inherently higher IQ'; along those lines. No?
Seriously?
"""Underrepresented populations are uniquely prepared to do what the tech sector claims to do best: innovate.""""
Ok, let's get to it: Malcolm Gladwell called and he wants full credit for Jealous's plagiarism (this concept was quite apparent in Blink, no?)
This sentence sounds quite Gladwellian. Somebody somewhere cribbed Malcolm Gladwell, at the very least he will subtly insist on his share of due credit.
By the way, who actually pioneered and invented the vast majority of what would be labeled the modern tech sector? In other words, what color or race or racial ethnicities would these pioneers and overall top 1% of the bell curve's right side had the vast input in creating the
"""Sure they are."""
Anyone find it somewhat ironic that of the two who wrote the opinion piece it's the white Jewish person who actually has experience in the tech industry? Whereas Jealous was a race hustling ER...CEO of the NAACP. Now wait a second.
A CEO of advancing the interests of a specific race?How does one determine his success as a CEO? He sure parleyed his good fortune into guilt tripping the techie to help him out and allow him to serve on his board.
But definitely the Gladwellian influence is lurking there in that concept of diversity = success and innovation.
I thought CNN was only talking about the plane.
ReplyDeleteYou know, you are born, you live and you die.
ReplyDeleteSome people make it rain; most don't.
Just saying that the environment around you plays a big part.
These numbers seem freaky no?
"Last year there were eight states where zero Latino students took the Advanced Placement exam in computer science, and 11 states in which no black students took the test. In three states, not a single female student sat for the exam."
I can tell you from personal experience that if you solely grok things from your environment, there are some things you are never exposed to. I had no idea there was such a thing as AP till I was a senior in high school and applying to college. My school didn't offer it. None of my rural classmates had ever heard of it, nor would have been interested if they did.
The old nature and nurture thing. Jayman doesn't seem to post here much, but I still have to wonder...
Take the most Jewish guy in the world, one with every intelligence enhancing inbred mutation possible. Take him from his parents as a babe.
Then stick him in Slapout, Alabama and raise him in a trailer park.
I wonder what his life trajectory would look like.
Because as Janis Joplin once said:
"Port Arthur is the asshole of the world and Beaumont is 20 miles up it."
You can't get to some places from some places.
This site and La Griffe du Lion have changed my thinking about a lot of things. But still... I can tell you from personal experience, or at least what I imagine...
If I had been raised in San Francisco among "normal" white people instead of being in an environment in which the Clampetts didn't seem outlandish...
Well things might have been much different.
My major regret is that I had no idea how much college choice plays in the course of the rest of your life. Go figure, I thought that you just got a degree and what you did was what mattered. Now, well suicide almost seems warranted if you don't make it into Stanford and become one of the elect.
I have learned to respect the cachet.
Of course cachet varies. Go to MIT and you are a Green Beret. Go to Caltech and you are a Navy Seal.
Go to Harvard, and you are a REMF.
I'd like more diversity among media pundits.
ReplyDeleteThe article cites a black ex-con who invented a prison social networking service and some Hispanic who invented some internet method to do cross-border remittances as examples of all these NAM innovative brains.
ReplyDeleteBecause...that's just what we needed, more black prisoners doing social networking and more immigrant Hispanics remitting money back to Guadeltombiexico.
GATES MILLENNIUM SCHOLARS PROGRAM
ReplyDelete""""
The Gates Millennium Scholars (GMS) Program, funded by a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, was established in 1999 to provide outstanding African American, American Indian/Alaska Native*, Asian Pacific Islander American**, and Hispanic American students with an opportunity to complete an undergraduate college education in any discipline area of interest.
""""
https://scholarships.gmsp.org/Program/Details/0fb486dd-d32c-4a4f-a0c5-d911d7d89cb7
That's right, Bill Gates actively discriminates against white people for his scholarship program. I wish someone would setup a William Shockley Millenium Scholars program.
"Level Playing Field Institute"
ReplyDeletewow. wow. not even hiding it now, are they.
Because as Janis Joplin once said:
ReplyDelete"Port Arthur is the asshole of the world and Beaumont is 20 miles up it."
Unless you'd like to grow up to be a great blues singer.
My bet is Janis Joplin grew up listening to and learning every aspect of the roots of the blues in Port Arthur.
Where do you think her chops came from?
Okay, we have one example of a black guy discerning a market that whites and Asians overlooked: things guys in jail need. Definitely that is an area where diversity provides useful insights. I could rack my brain for hours and have no idea what guys in jail could use. Harnessing the untapped wealth of the underclass will be key to America's economic recovery.
ReplyDeleteIn Largely Black Male NBA, Why Professional Basketball Needs an Upgrade.
ReplyDeleteUnderrepresented populations, like Jews, Eskimos, and Pygmies, are uniquely prepared to do what the NBA sector claims to do best: rebound, block shots, and dunk.
>>Sunbeam attempted and insisted upon saying:
ReplyDeleteThe old nature and nurture thing. Jayman doesn't seem to post here much, but I still have to wonder...
"""Take the most Jewish guy in the world, one with every intelligence enhancing inbred mutation possible. Take him from his parents as a babe.""""
Sunbeam, Sunbeam. As Michael said to Fredo "You broke my heart!' Come on now.
First off, Jews have some of the US's lowest divorce rates and separated from biological parents so this analogy isn't even real world based to attempt to make the faith-leap. Analogy has to be reality based for it to work and Jews raised without either of their natural parents? Nope, won't fly, cause it ain't real. If you want to say for us to imagine LaShantwa or Rachael Jeantel, or DeMarcishawnus, than fine, we all can follow that analogy.
"""Then stick him in Slapout, Alabama and raise him in a trailer park."""""
Uh, who do you THINK is taking those AP tests in those states? Think about it.
In nature, cream always rises to the top. Always.
"""I wonder what his life trajectory would look like."""""
Well, frankly and honestly, the words white trash and Jews are not in the same sentence by any stretch of imagination. So his life would STILL be heads and shoulders above the average white in those areas cause the few infinitesimal percentages of Jews in that area would see to it that he 'got the hell out' and made it to the big time, keeping in mind that its all relative. Compared to Jews nationwide he's in the poorhouse. Compared to whites living in these backwater areas he's sitting pretty, high off the hog. His smarts would see to that.
Almost a guarantee: The few whites taking those AP tests in those states: near 70% are Jewish.
EXAMPLE: The head of the Miss. based Southern Poverty Law Center, Morris Dees, is Jewish. Do you think he's living in a trailer park? Do you really?
"""Because as Janis Joplin once said:
"Port Arthur is the asshole of the world and Beaumont is 20 miles up it." """
Janis was a drugged out hippie freak. Vast majority of Jews aren't anywhere near that sort of person.
"""You can't get to some places from some places."""
But you CAN if you're already there, DUH.
Why do you think that most Jews live in NY, LA, Chi; etc. What do they know that others dont?
QED
Fun with anagrams: Bitch Men do Jealous Capers.
ReplyDelete"""That's right, Bill Gates actively discriminates against white people for his scholarship program. ""
ReplyDeleteOf course, how many scholarships per yr does Ms. Gates actually hand out? Five total? Twenty? Fifteen? How many?
AP tests are underutilized by Red State whites who don't realize they can cut a semester or even a year out of college using them. That's a sizable amount of money that can be saved. The rate of usage of AP tests has been growing steadily since I started pounding the drum about it a half decade ago.
ReplyDeleteAny chance those Gates Scholars will look like the current latino mayor of Los Angeles?
ReplyDeletegoatweed
Why doesn't Kapor simply fund some of the many high-tech start-ups founded by Blacks and Mexicans, what with the unique insight and tech prowess they bring to identifying problems and solving them, that are languishing only for want of money?
ReplyDeleteWhen he makes a pile off them, the venture capital for others will flow fast and furious.
Problem solved.
Hah, indeed. He probably does fund some, for window dressing. Same way he'd like kids to go to a school that has just a touch of "diversity".
DeleteToo bad we have no way of knowing the details of his portfolio since his company is privately held.
>>Steve Sailer said...
ReplyDelete"""AP tests are underutilized by Red State whites who don't realize they can cut a semester or even a year out of college using them. That's a sizable amount of money that can be saved. The rate of usage of AP tests has been growing steadily since I started pounding the drum about it a half decade ago.""""
My question, though is this. AP tests have basically been around for about, what, about a half a century or more? Since the early 60's?
Careful how this is phrased. Doesn't it stand to reason that most, the vast majority of public school administrators have heard of these tests? They're to prepare students for college, right? To see how well a student could do in college classroom in that particular field of which the test is based on, right? More or less?
Isn't it in the public school administrators best interests to see to it that most of the public high schools in the district are familiarized with these tests?
It doesn't fully add up that in 2014 there would be administrators of public schools in all of America's public school districts who had never heard of, let alone were familiar with AP testing. They'd have to be.
So, assuming that administrators are familiar with AP tests, isn't it their responsibility to see to it that their school districts are offering the tests to their high school Jr and Sr's?
The fact that some states have very few AP test takers reflects quite poorly upon their school district. I'd have to wonder if these are gang bang districts or worse (e.g. prison prep districts for the urban hoods' late teens).
I would place the responsibility as well as the onus on the public school districts administrators for not familiarizing their high school's teachers with the tests as well as getting the word out in various educational trade journals that are local/district based to encourage or persuade the district to actively "push" their schools to offer the AP tests in the first place.
I read up on the history of Lotus Software, the company that made Kapor's fortune, not long ago. It included an awful lot of Jews and not many blacks or Hispanics. Kapor should take every dime he has left and invest it in a startup run entirely by blacks and Hispanics. Cause everyone else in Silicon Valley discriminates agin' em, don't ya know?
ReplyDeleteIt's the old Sarnoff v Farnsworth thing.
DeleteZuckerberg v the Vom Trumfps
The way to get rid of the clever white goy is to import a pliant black who will do as he is told. And love it.
Underrepresented populations are uniquely prepared to do what the tech sector claims to do best: innovate.
ReplyDeleteThey just keep talking nonsense. When I hear them indulging such false pride I think of that clip of Ali being interviewed by Cosell, where he says, in that stubborn country drawl: "whatever 'truculent' means, if it's good, I'm it."
"We really, really need a term for whites and Asians when talking about subjects like computers."
ReplyDeleteIt's been some time now since Mr. Derbyshire coined that term: Ice People. The other, unmotivated, uninventive humans being Sun People.
Mitch Kapor is a prime example of hitting one Big Swing when young and then spend the rest of your life coasting.
ReplyDeleteWhat was the shelf life of Lotus? 5 years max?
As I saw somebody comment somewhere, the fact of white men inventing practically all the stuff is not exactly news.
ReplyDelete>Everybody wanted a 45 minute to 60 minute presentation for the Diversity course, but nobody could think of any hard content to put in the damned thing.<
ReplyDeleteWhen I worked for a large railroad company, I had to take the diversity briefing. In it, they talked about how the rhino refitted his house in order to have the giraffe over for tea.
Ben Jealous must have followed Fenty out to Silicon Valley. Fenty is doing quite well for himself in Silicon Valley. I bet Ben is hoping for similar success.
ReplyDeleteSteve; I just can't get over how you can manage to spend a substantial part of your time reading stuff like this CNN article without suffering brain damage from the searing levels of stupidity beams they radiate. I would swear I felt my IQ dropping just from those brief excerpts. What is your secret, some sort of impenetrable cranial shield? And how in the name of Heaven can someone smart enough to be a software entrepreneur emit that kind of drivel?
ReplyDeleteIs Been Jealous related to Michelle Obama? Other than ideologically.
ReplyDeleteGod made them as they are but apparently they're gonna rebel fulltime against that, definitely Somebody's fault... shred everybody else with them, live off racialism. Oh well Here's to you Mr. Jealous and Ms. Robinson.
"We really, really need a term for whites and Asians when" Eurasian
ReplyDeleteAP math tests results would be a better data set to choose.
"Why do you think that most Jews live in NY, LA, Chi; etc. What do they know that others dont?"
ReplyDeleteI assume you mean that they can pursue materialistic lifestyles in those places and take advantage of ethnic affinity networks.
"Fun with anagrams: Bitch Men do Jealous Capers"
ReplyDeleteperfect, i was beginning to wonder why we had Professors at all
Because as Janis Joplin once said:
ReplyDelete"Port Arthur is the asshole of the world and Beaumont is 20 miles up it."
You can't get to some places from some places.
Whatever. The first girl I met in Texas was from Beaumont, and she was graduated from the Wharton School.
Of course, how many scholarships per yr does Ms. Gates actually hand out? Five total? Twenty? Fifteen? How many?
ReplyDeleteOne thousand.
Pilpul: A rhetorical process that the Rabbis used to formulate their legal decisions. The word is used as a verb: one engages in the process of Pilpul in order to formulate a legal point..Pilpul occurs at any time the speaker is committed to “prove” his point regardless of the evidence in front of him. The casuistic aspect of this hair splitting leads to a labyrinthine form of argument where the speaker blows enough rhetorical smoke to make his interlocutor submit. Reason is not an issue when Pilpul takes over: what counts is the establishment of a fixed, immutable point that can never truly be disputed..What is thought to be the Jewish “genius” is often a mark of how Pilpul is deployed. The rhetorical tricks of Pilpul make true rational discussion impossible..There is little use trying to argue in this context, because any points being made will be twisted and turned to validate the already-fixed position.
ReplyDelete"Port Arthur is the asshole of the world and Beaumont is 20 miles up it."
ReplyDeleteUnless you'd like to grow up to be a great blues singer.
Or (like one of her high school classmates) a football coach who won a national championship as the head coach of the Miami Hurricanes and two Super Bowls as the head coach of the Dallas Cowboys.
Ben Jealous is a local boy (Monterey) and his mom still pops up now and then in the local news with diversity or civil rights stuff.
ReplyDeleteI don't know about when he was a kid, but I almost never see a black person here, esp. not in his hometown of Pacific Grove. Of course, "black" in his case is pushing it.
For Christ's Sake Dumbasses.
ReplyDeleteWhether you are responding explicitly to me or not, the point I want to make is simply this:
Take a kid of a certain genetic potential. Call it IQ if you want to fetishize things.
Now say we clone the kid (same genes get it?), we are taking the same genetic potential and putting in places of our choosing.
I might add that our procedure is totally anonymous; ie the members of some dumbass synagogue in Poughkeepsie have no idea we are taking one of the sons of Abraham, cloning him and putting the resultant infants up for adoption in disparate pars of the country.
Little Seymour McHale in Wyoming has no F*#%ING IDEA there is such a thing as an AP calculus test. Let alone people teach courses to prepare you for it.
Tell me how many SAT prep courses are available in Laramie?
We really, really need a term for whites and Asians when talking about subjects like computers.
ReplyDeleteEurasians?
It is no surprise, then, that 99% of venture capital-funded startups in 2010 were founded by whites or people of Asian descent.
ReplyDeleteBecause, with very few exceptions, only men have the aggression and drive for dominance necessary to ensure they come out on top and own their market. Yes, sometimes someone comes along who is so brilliant and ahead of the curve that he ends up owning a market he essentially creates. Google strives for this sort of benign, brainy, effortlessness. Facebook, on the other hand, was not even third company to try and make it big in its particular niche. Zuckerburg may be a weasel and skunk (backstabbing even associates within his own company), but someone has to throw a few elbows until the chaos of an essentially open market shakes out to a few big firms. After all (to use a different context) someone has to be seltzer and seltzer accessory king of upper New Jersey.
99% of venture capital-funded startups in 2010 were founded by whites or people of Asian descent.
So, yes, Carly Fiorina, Meg Whitman, and even the magnificent Sheryl Sandburg are not confirmations of the stereotype that women can be adequate, stay-the-course type executives for already-successful firms but rarely have the chops to be swashbuckling founders. They are- wait for it- victims too!
@sunbeam
ReplyDelete"These numbers are freaky, no?"
Did you click through to the article CNN was quoting? One of those states with no black test takers was Montana. How many black high school students do you imagine Montana has? How many total students do you think are taking the computer science test in Montana?
When it turns out that - among a small pool of black students - none of them end up taking an unpopular test, the word you are looking for is "expected" not "freaky."
Mitchell Kapor and Benjamin Todd Jealous
ReplyDeleteWould they happen to have a couple of dogs in this fight? Or are they merely concerned citizens, only thinking of the common, generic good?
Underrepresented populations are uniquely prepared to do what the tech sector claims to do best: innovate
ReplyDeleteWhy are they supposed to do that in tech or perhaps 'tech'? When they didnt manage do it in aerospace. Or cars. Or Steam trains etc etc
Steve, I thank you for mentioning the AP classes. I made sure my kid has taken some. Also since her Sophomore year she has taken on class a semester at the local university. The result is she gets to start out a Sophomore and got accepted into the program she wanted out of the gate. I even got her school to let her take an extra study hall so she could prep for the AP Biology test which they don't offer.
ReplyDeleteAt a university orientation this year, several kids already had 50+ credit hours in AP classes.
One thing I would like to point out though is that schools, where possible, are starting to require real life experience before being admitted to certain programs. So, for example, vet school will require you have a minimum of 200 hours work/shadowing at a vet's office before they will even look at you. And the actual hours you need to be competitive are far more than that. It looks like guilds might be making a comeback.
Whites & Asians. Whisians?
ReplyDeleteAuntie Analogue said...
ReplyDelete"We really, really need a term for whites and Asians when talking about subjects like computers."
It's been some time now since Mr. Derbyshire coined that term: Ice People. The other, unmotivated, uninventive humans being Sun People."
Derb didn't invent the term, he's playing poker with some academic dimwit. Essentially call and a raise. I'm sure Steve Sailer is aware of the term an is being ironic when he says we need one. He's more polite than Derb and might be reluctant to wade into that territory.
"When Frederick Hutson left prison in 2012 after serving four years on marijuana-related charges, he realized he had gained something more than his freedom: insight into an overlooked consumer market. "
ReplyDeleteFinally, something black people can offer: familiarity with the prison system!
Auntie Analogue: It's been some time now since Mr. Derbyshire coined that term: Ice People. The other, unmotivated, uninventive humans being Sun People.
ReplyDeleteHunsdon said: I think it goes back further, and I believe Derbyshire adopted the phrase from Leonard Jeffries.
http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,157721,00.html
(Another example of The Man expropriating the hard work of the Black Man! Fist of Power, raised to the sky!)
"When Frederick Hutson left prison in 2012 after serving four years on marijuana-related charges, he realized he had gained something more than his freedom: insight into an overlooked consumer market."
ReplyDeleteYes, that is what our economy needs. We need to make use of all that untapped talent residing in the population of convicted felons.
sunbeam said: Now, well suicide almost seems warranted if you don't make it into Stanford and become one of the elect.
ReplyDeleteHunsdon said: Damn, dude: take a walk, look at the sky, read some poetry.
Anonydroid at 7:52 PM said: Well, frankly and honestly, the words white trash and Jews are not in the same sentence by any stretch of imagination. So his life would STILL be heads and shoulders above the average white in those areas cause the few infinitesimal percentages of Jews in that area would see to it that he 'got the hell out' and made it to the big time, keeping in mind that its all relative. Compared to Jews nationwide he's in the poorhouse. Compared to whites living in these backwater areas he's sitting pretty, high off the hog. His smarts would see to that.
ReplyDeleteHunsdon said: Keeping in mind that it's all relative: is that like saying it's all tribal? Like saying, oh, I don't now, "ethnic nepotism"?
Anonydroid: In nature, cream always rises to the top. Always.
Hunsdon: What else floats?
Anonydroid: Why do you think that most Jews live in NY, LA, Chi; etc. What do they know that others dont?
Hunsdon: How hard it is to get a good bagel lox and cream cheese in flyover country? That the peasants are revolting? (Cue Mel Brooks: "They stink on ice.")
Ben Jealous has such a ruddy complexion.
ReplyDeleteLittle Seymour McHale in Wyoming has no F*#%ING IDEA there is such a thing as an AP calculus test. Let alone people teach courses to prepare you for it.
ReplyDeleteTell me how many SAT prep courses are available in Laramie?
Laramie is a college town, and Laranie High School offers 13 AP courses, including AB and BC calculus. But, yes, there are smart kids in the sticks whose intelligence gets overlooked.
Seattle Seahawks need more diversity--including women--to be a better team.
ReplyDelete>Now say we clone the kid (same genes get it?), we are taking the same genetic potential and putting in places of our choosing<
ReplyDeleteThe reason this is a hypothetical is that it's at variance with how the world works. It's like saying "assume a can opener" or "assume we grew a moon made of green cheese."
But let's grant it without reservation, and project what would actually happen, based on reports of smart orphans raised by adoptive parents very dissimilar to the birth parents and their environment. 1. The kid would feel himself to be special in some undefined way. 2. His natural talent would emerge in odd ways. He would be caught behind the barn, not smoking, but reciting Shakespeare. 3. In all likelihood, given modern communications at least, he would indeed know of anything important related to the things he takes an interest in (maybe not AP tests). 4, Unusual talent attracts attention - mostly negative, but sometimes there is a sympathetic teacher or other mentor who clues the unusual student in. Etc. In short, heredity always influences/shapes environment.
One might argue that this influence is merely reciprocal. But it seems clear that heredity has the upper hand. If it didn't, it wouldn't be evolutionarily effective. Intelligence, better muscles, and other inherited traits would be worthless if they didn't confer an advantage. Advantage over what? Over the environment of the nonce. In fact, inherited traits represent x years of adaptations, so that even if we decided to be strict behaviorists we would - when pitting nature against nurture - be pitting against nonce environments x years of environmental influence.
More generally, as the folk saying goes, "blood will tell." I'm reminded of an extreme example of this here.
"People of Asian descent", if taken literally would include American Indians, and all Hispanics with Native ancestry. What an awkward phrase
ReplyDeleteSorry, forgot this somehow, which is what was relevant to my point:
ReplyDeleteIt is no surprise, then, that 99% of venture capital-funded startups in 2010 were founded by whites or people of Asian descent, the vast majority of whom were men.
What is wrong with you guys? White males get scholarships all the time, either through academics or through sports. Stop being such big cry babies! Gee Whiz!!
ReplyDeleteAs a white male, you benefit from living in a society mostly because of your gender and race. Women and minorities often have to work twice as hard, just to be considered equal to you. I'm not denying that there are white people who are unfairly denied scholarships, but white guys have had it their way for so long in this country that it's time to level the playing field a bit by making colleges and workplaces more diverse. It isn't just white men that have brain power and can contribute something positive to a company and society.
ReplyDeletedo you think the fact that across the entire planet whites control most of the global wealth has nothing to do with europes military campaigns, enslavement, etc of the past. these benefits have trickled down to you the present generation. it is not your fault but thats just how things are. change is taking place: china is rising, india is rising, africa is now fasting growing continent, a black family heads the U.S. we are headed towards balance but many structures of the past remain. these structures is not the fault of any individual white person alive today. blacks still get imprisioned more than whites for the SAME crime...not usually because the white cop is a hater but because he (like blacks) have been conditioned to think a certain way.
ReplyDeletethe world is getting better...it is all going to get better....lets all just keep talking, be honest and have good hearts...it will be better i promise...
the real challenge of responsible leadership is going to be how to incorporate you disgruntled? how to pre-empt your resentment being converted into crimes. we must also be careful not to listen to you disproportionately because of your vocal voices....youtypes are the ones who hated fact that ms america is of indian descent. hate that the first family is non-white. hate that non-white foreigners is driving up real estate prices you cannot afford. hate med schools and engineering classes are seeing indians and chinese. these are the same type of guys who hate jews: first for their ethnicity, then for their success (hate pattern is same towards other minorities).
ReplyDeleteyou guys have alot of resentment and this makes you very dangerous. you are the type that became genociders...dont take you lightly.
I'm reminded of this.
ReplyDelete"We really, really need a term for whites and Asians when talking about subjects like computers." - NERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDSSSSSSSSS!
ReplyDeleteSo, assuming that administrators are familiar with AP tests, isn't it their responsibility to see to it that their school districts are offering the tests to their high school Jr and Sr's?
ReplyDeleteI think what you're missing is the strong egalitarian streak in the kind of people who run the public schools. Generally, they're not that excited about praising some kids above others (not in academics, anyway; in sports it's different, although even there you get the "everybody is a winner" attitude sometimes). In my grade school 35 years ago, it was impossible to get permission to jump a kid ahead a grade, even when he'd demonstrated the ability to do the work several years ahead. Many teachers and administrators don't like smart kids one bit.
Then multiply that reluctance by a thousand if their student body is such that they know that having such classes will segregate the students in a way that might cause them to be asked uncomfortable questions along the lines of this stupid article.
"We really, really need a term for whites and Asians when talking about subjects like computers."
ReplyDeleteWhite rice.
Mr. Sailer,
ReplyDeleteHave you been watching Neil De Grasse Tyson's COSMOS? It sucks.
In other diversity news, there is now something called "Project Plie" to address the criminal lack of blacks in elite ballet companies.
"Take a kid of a certain genetic potential... we are taking the same genetic potential and putting in places of our choosing."
ReplyDeleteOh no, I followed you precisely, Sunbeam; yet I would like you to follow your own point to the most logical conclusion. If nurture truly is a solution for the general educational underperformance of the NAM community, why not institute forced governmental segregation of the potential wunderkins by removing them from their parents, isolating them in conclaves and guiding them towards the progressive light?
It worked for the Maoris and American Indians, after all.
"blacks still get imprisioned more than whites for the SAME crime" - control for priors. and while you are at it stop projecting.
ReplyDeleteahahaha we got a concern troll on this post
ReplyDeleteyou guys have alot of resentment
ReplyDeleteYou're projecting your malevolent resentment onto us. Whites don't hate anyone's ethnicity or success. We hate their aggression against us.
do you think the fact that across the entire planet whites control most of the global wealth has nothing to do with europes military campaigns, enslavement, etc of the past.
What enslavement? The enslavement I think you're talking about was an enslavement of Blacks by Blacks. And how did "Europe" ever conduct a military campaign? Your worldview is garbled nonsense.
"Mitch Kapor is a prime example of hitting one Big Swing when young and then spend the rest of your life coasting. What was the shelf life of Lotus? 5 years max?"
ReplyDeleteKapor is a very smart guy. At one point Lotus had higher revenues than Microsoft - and that was with virtually every desktop automatically coming with a copy of DOS. Lotus only died because of MS's manipulation of its monopoly of the OS.
Kapor's intelligence isn't in doubt. I'm just asking him to put his money where his mouth is by backing all these supposed NM geniuses. Stop telling *us* what to do with our money and start doing it yourself. Because none of Kapor's guys at Lotus were black or Hispanic. They were far more likely to be Jewish or even gay.
The reason lefties like gays so much is simple: they provide "diversity" without sacrifice. They are not any different from straights in terms of talent or ability, and since they don't worry about having kids they like to party and have a good time. I have lots of gay friends. I hardly think of them as "diverse."
The "tech" sector sure claims to innovate a lot. Does it actually innovate? What was the last innovation to come from the soi-disant tech sector?
ReplyDeletethere is now something called "Project Plie" to address the criminal lack of blacks in elite ballet companies
ReplyDeleteIn a small but somewhat representative sample that I can observe, gay black men are doing quite competitively in ballet.
"Of course, how many scholarships per yr does Ms. Gates actually hand out?
ReplyDeleteOne thousand.
The only BGS on know of is from Northwestern. She got a BA in PolySci with a Minor in "African-American Studies."
This got her a job at an insurance company.
EDUCATION has got to be the biggest scam EVER in America. The use of SCHOLARSHIPS to allow the college education-industrial complex to feather their nests with $$$ at several times the inflation rate shows that we NEED TO REDUCE HIGHER EDUCATION to the HS graduation crowd.
Lemon meringue.
ReplyDelete>>>Hunsdon said...
ReplyDelete"""Keeping in mind that it's all relative: is that like saying it's all tribal? Like saying, oh, I don't now, "ethnic nepotism"? """
Right. Sure. That's all it is.
"""Hunsdon: What else floats?"""
Look in the mirror down at the backside area.
""""Hunsdon: How hard it is to get a good bagel lox and cream cheese in flyover country? That the peasants are revolting? (Cue Mel Brooks: "They stink on ice.")"""""
Not anymore, Whole Foods, old boy. Whole Foods.
"4/2/14 10:37 AM", "10:38 AM", "10:40 AM", and "10:42 AM" are quite obviously the same exact person. A sad. sad little man. However, I will say that he can type quickly. He should at least have made up four different aliases though.
ReplyDeleteKapor had the One Big Swing, then surfed in Ray Ozzie's wake.
ReplyDeleteKapor was on the cutting edge of creating the heinous individual know as the HR Lady. I was a vendor and a regular visitor to one of their MA facilities, and they had way more "out" gays and lesbians than my other tech customers. More women, too. Still all white, though.
Read about Kapor's wife, the original Assistant HR Lady at Lotus. A bigger Red Diaper baby you'll never find!
"Anonymous said...
ReplyDeleteAs a white male, you benefit from living in a society mostly because of your gender and race. Women and minorities often have to work twice as hard, just to be considered equal to you."
You have never worked around them, obviously. Often times, they can easily get a way with working far less than half as much in order to be considered "equal to you". Not all of them do - but they can do so if they wish.
So George Zimmerman is a "White" man but Benjamin Jealous is a "Black" man. That is how you know race in this new Multicultural leftist America is extremely confusing.
ReplyDeleteRace in America however was not this confusing before 1965.
The new post-hatecrime "chairwoman" of Mozilla is named Mitch too
ReplyDelete