Re: Are Extropians Libertarian? (was RE: Learn to shoot)

From: Mike Lorrey (retroman@turbont.net)
Date: Sun Oct 29 2000 - 15:54:05 MST


"J. R. Molloy" wrote:

> BTW, have you heard of these guys?
> http://www-tech.mit.edu/V117/N30/anders.30c.html
> "So say the MIT Extropians on their World Wide Web site
> http://mit.edu/extropians/ and in the pamphlet that they sent out to freshmen a
> few weeks ago. Under the self-applied label "reasoned discourse," the
> Extropians' founders, Hanyoung Huang G, Jason P. Davis '98, and John R. Bender
> '00, are out to stir up and promote good old-fashioned white suburban
> prejudices."

Actually, what the Bostropians have said in their pamphlet is the truth as follows:

> "MIT certainly lowers standards for women and Œunderrepresented' minoritiesŠ The average woman at MIT is less intelligent
> and ambitious than the average man at MIT. The average Œunderrepresented' minority at MIT is less intelligent and ambitious
> than the average non-Œunderrepresented' minority."
>
MIT does, in fact, have lower standards of admission for women and underrepresented
minorities. Anders Hove has been a consistent liberal critic of bostropes on the
MIT campus, and, this is, after all, Massachusetts, birthplace of racial quotas and
affirmative action (and where it is still going strong across the state).

Anders and his allies try to show this is not correct in the following:

> Indeed, Jones added, the board scores of underrepresented minorities at MIT are higher than the mean scores for all students
> attending the top 40 schools. Because of this, Jones doubts anyone could reasonably draw any conclusions about differences in
> qualifications.
>
THough they never state whether or not womens' or under-represented minorities'
board scores are lower than white males AT MIT, which is the point in question.

This is not a statement of racist hate (though it does seem that Anders and company
do have some hatred toward white males), but of facts about MIT policies. BTW this
is old news among the Bostropes, as it happened three years ago or so. This is the
standard reaction you see in Boston among protected groups, if you try to point out
that the playing field is slanted, its you who gets labeled a racist....

As for the MIT extropians having Ayn Rand quotes on their website, so what? If I
quote Stalin, does that make me a commie?

Mike Lorrey

Mike Lorrey



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