There's people saying there's too many whites and males in tech too.

Males, sure, there way more men than women in dev roles.

At least for Silicon Valley though, white people are, oddly enough, underrepresented relative to the US as a whole. Though that's less because white people are discriminated against, and more because there are a LOT of Asian immigrant tech workers.

There's people in Quebec Canada saying there's too many who speaks English in Quebec.

Well, the difference being that white males hold institutional power in the United States, whereas that isn't true for Asian males (or females).

Are you saying that it is ok to be racist depending on the status of the person?

That’s what I was literally taught in school. Our required anti-racism lecture in jr high explicitly said that only white people can be racist and only males can be sexist because only they have power.

I understand the point of the argument; systemic oppression comes from power. The argument just seemed odd though.

No, I'm saying there's a difference between people saying "there's too many Asians in tech" and "there's too many white males in tech".

Americans fixate on skin colour and forget that class is far more important

People pushing that argument tend to pretend there's not a significant interlinking between race and class in America.

Isn't that a strong argument for class as a better means for analysis? I mean, if they're so interlinked, why not avoid the pitfalls of racialism?

There are people alive today who's parents or grandparents lived for a time without civil rights. I don't think disregarding their experience is the correct direction to take.

It looks like you've crossed into using HN primarily for political and ideological battle. That destroys the spirit of curiosity that HN exists for, and is against the site guidelines. Ditto for comments that cross into being nasty, like https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20942577 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21128710 and, unfortunately, others you've posted.

Would you please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and take the intended spirit of this place more to heart? We'd appreciate it.

That's not the point I was addressing.

Well, not really.

The California legislature (for example) is less than half white.[1]

You could argue white males are overrepresented in some circumstances, but claiming white males hold institutional power exclusively (which is what you inferred) is just plain wrong.

[1]https://www.library.ca.gov/Content/pdf/crb/reports/CRB_2017-...

Per your link, the CA Senate is 75% white.

True, but that means 25% of the power is in non-white hands.

Interesting claim but it's vague in a way that I really don't know what it means.

Why do you think that? Discriminating by race for hiring is explicitly illegal, so wherever it's happening, it's already happening despite the law.

Discriminating by race for college admissions is also explicitly illegal. (Edit: see https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/docs/hq43e4.html )

The law only matters inasmuch as it can be enforced. If judges decline to enforce the law when they believe it’s in the interest of diversity to discriminate against a specific race like Asians, it could equally apply to employment where similar diversity initiatives are taking root.

That's not true the way you claim it to be.

I just read the full decision, and there's a pretty decent number of citations of existing case law discussing what does and doesn't count as discriminating by race, specifically within the context of college admissions. It's in the last 1/3 of the document after the findings of fact and discussions of statistical analyses.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1mzqBPL57yCRWHZGE7A6U6re3cGX...

You might disagree with the reasoning of the decision, but there's already case law separating education from employment. Past that we get into slippery slope territory that this decision specifically avoids.

My point is that case law vs an explicit statement of law is not the same.

Judges in the future may rule that tech companies can pass strict scrutiny if they are discriminating against Asians in favor of other races, using similar arguments to those in education law.

This area of law is slippery because the text of Federal civil rights law doesn’t allow for discrimination, but case law (and arguably the original intent of the law’s authors) does.

There is currently a large movement in favor of “diversity” programs in hiring and I can see judges upholding them.

Absolutely reading the decision will be informative to everyone though.

While IANAL...

There is a difference between general admission and "programs or activities that receive Federal financial assistance". While I'm not saying this is right, it appears to be the current letter of the law. If, for example, race were a determining factor in who works on one of the R&D projects at Harvard that is funded by federal money it would be different than this situation.

Does each student at Harvard get federal financial assistance through Harvard? Not state financial assistance but federal. The different matters to the letter of the law.

It looks like the devil is in the details.

Almost every college is subject to this law because they accept federal grants and loans for students during the admissions process.

There are only a few conservative religious schools that are exceptions. They refuse all federal funds to prevent such laws applying. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grove_City_College_v._Bell

Thanks for the pointer. It also says...

> However, the Court also held that the regulation would apply only to the institution's financial aid department, not to the school as a whole.

Yes, but that part of the decision was overruled as noted on the page:

> The decision by the Supreme Court was effectively overturned when the United States Congress subsequently passed the Civil Rights Restoration Act of 1987, which specified that recipients of federal funds must comply with civil rights laws in all areas, not just in the particular program or activity that received federal funding.

A judge just said it is ok discriminating at admission, another one will say it is ok to discriminate on hiring. It is just a logical path of thinking.

It isn't really a logical path of thinking - admissions policy at Harvard doesn't have anything to do with normal hiring policies nationwide

There are laws against discrimination for both. Someone else just posted the link for the legislation for admission.

Unlike college admissions, the Supreme Court has since 1964 never upheld the idea that race could be an acceptable element of hiring practices.

Hiring =/= college admissions. Just because they both contain 'discrimination' in the complaint doesn't mean they are logically all that linked.

No it isn’t. Affirmative action programs in employment are legal.

No, they are not.

https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/practices/

Diversity efforts sit in a gray area that is nowhere close to race quotas.

Race quotas are illegal in both employment and admissions but affirmative action is not.

The trick is that affirmative action is sold as an effort to negate other discrimination.

https://definitions.uslegal.com/a/affirmative-action/

I-1000 is literally called "Affirmative Action and Diversity Commission Measure"

https://ballotpedia.org/Washington_Initiative_1000,_Affirmat...

It's a referendum. It's not law yet.

You'd be more right if it was passed, but it's not.

But even if companies are completely blind to race, if you reduce the % of asians in top universities, you mechanically reduce the hires of asians by companies, since the most sought after firms typically restrict their hiring to a small list of colleges.

This was a district trial court ruling so technically no binding legal precedent has been set. Presumably the plaintiffs will appeal to the First Circuit, and if they take the case they will eventually establish an actual precedent.

Considering that a degree opens doors to employment, not giving them the degree (all other things being equal) is guaranteed to result to hiring discrimination

I.e. Asians who went to Harvard will be seen as extra desirable because they had higher admission requirements?

wouldnt that be illegal hiring discrimination?

But are you not the one championing for discriminatory policies? The ones against this ruling are looking for merit based systems, not discrimination.

There is no such thing as a merit-based system. We have pitifully few examples of "merit"-based metrics functioning restoratively or in service of justice.

They already have been doing this. Asians are probably the most discriminated against group but no one ever talks about it. It's always about latino or blacks.

That doesn't pass the smell test.

Ask pretty much any Asian(-American) I know, myself included, and none of them would choose to switch places with a Latino or Black friend who went to the same college and has a similar job, because we all know the problems are overall worse on the other side.

Racism against Asians in the US gets less coverage because it's generally less bad.

When it comes to questions of "degrees" of racism in the US I believe the root of it goes to the news cycle. And in the news business there is a very old expression "If it bleeds, it leads."

Whatever the reason for one group having more violent crime over another - I guarantee you that the more violent groups' activities will be more closely covered due to the "bleed" factor.

Hiring and employment is different from college selection processes. Students attending a university are not employees. There are federal laws on equal opportunity employment and California has enacted additional laws.

If anyone is caught discriminating on employment based on race it's directly against federal law.

Discrimination based on race for college admission is illegal. There is Title VI (https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/docs/hq43e4.html) which may seem limited, but in general restricting economic activity based on race is illegal unless it is exclusive and unadvertised.

Even if it weren't, it should be obvious something wrong is happening...

Morally it is the same. Legally, I don't know, I am not a lawyer and I don't even live in US, someone else can tell what the law is.

Judges work based on the law. Morals and laws are different. Different people follow or believe different morals. Judges don't get the luxury to follow what they believe is morally right when there is a law covering it. In the US it's Congress who makes laws rather than judges.

Should job seekers be allowed to use prejudice to choose which company to work for?