So, racist policy (including or excluding based on race) is okay if you can rationalize it? Racism isn't absolutely bad... it's only that depending on who is doing it?

> Proportional representation is inherently fixed sum. If X% of one group is too low and you want to increase it, then increasing that representation must also reduce the representation of other groups. There's no way around this.

The overall quality of America's educational system is not fixed-sum. We should be creating a dozen more TJs for every one that currently exists.

But that's not what is happening. What's happening is that Thomas Jefferson is now using race as a factor in admissions, resulting in reduced representation of Asians.

To narrow down more surgically on the issue here:

> Many progressives believe in affirmative action, which doesn't say anything about the particulars of the groups that aren't being explicitly included. Nobody at all is interested in exclusion; they are interested in more inclusion.

This is incorrect. Affirmative action is absolutely just as much about exclusion as inclusion. Advantaging one group is the same thing as disadvantaging all other groups. And yes, the mainstream progressive platform is to advantage minorities other than Asians - which is the same thing as disadvantaging Asians.

My company tried to pull this argument when proposing a larger bonus to recruiters for hiring diverse candidates. "Oh it's not disadvantaging any group, it's just being more inclusive towards diverse groups". But it's not. The company phrased is as an extra $250 to ($500 vs $250) to inspire recruiters to be more inclusive towards women and URM. But you could say the normal bonus is $500, but there's a $250 penalty for non-diverse candidates. Advantaging vs disadvantaging, and inclusion vs exclusion. They're all two ends of the same lever.

What you say is as inarguable as 1+1=2. That's why it's fascinating to watch people twist themselves into rhetorical knots to avoid the obvious truth.

The reason for disadvantaging Asians (and Jews) is that it has always been fashionable to do so. This was true long before the Chinese Exclusion Act and, in the US, it seems it may always be true.

There are a couple takes on this. One is that it was genuine discrimination targeted at Jewish people and Asian people then where as now that is not so much the case. The other take is the reason for affirmative action is to address a very real and stubborn problem where we have what seems to be a permanent underclass. Asian and Jewish people do not seem to be having that problem now, at least regarding college admissions.