Race classification to med schools: possibly controversial thread

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It has recently come to my awareness that the government tells people from Pakistan and India to identify themselves as "White" rather than "Asian" for governmental recognition (look it up, see EEOC examples). I was told that to the government, "Asian" largely refers to people from China, Japan, rest of mainland Asia, and EXCLUDES India and Pakistan.

What is medical school identification for Pakistan/India applicants? Should we select "Asian" or follow the governmental identification as "White"?
What happens if we choose the wrong one? Would it be safer to select "Other"?
 
Pakistanis and Indians are not white, they are Asian and are minorities in America. I'm 99.9% sure that med schools don't consider Pakistanis/Indians as white--that would be racially insensitive.
 
I don't think race really counts against you in a you "lose points" sense. However, other people's race may give them a relative advantage (ie. added points") for them. I may not understand your question completely, but is there a way to opt out of declaring race? I usually do and let myself be judged by my own non-phenotypic merits.
 
Shams al Deen said:
Pakistanis and Indians are not white, they are Asian and are minorities in America. I'm 99.9% sure that med schools don't consider Pakistanis/Indians as white--that would be racially insensitive.
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They're not white, but they are Caucasian.
 
What about Persians? I'm not Persian, but Arabs are classified as white by the AAMC, right? The two groups are different, but are both white?
 
You guys realize that these classification are really for tabulating demographics, and nothing else.

Yes, I know that South Asians aren't the same as East Asians.

You don't have to check the boxes. Checking one of them, or checking multiples, or not checking doesn't help or hurt.

ratman7 said:
It has recently come to my awareness that the government tells people from Pakistan and India to identify themselves as "White" rather than "Asian" for governmental recognition (look it up, see EEOC examples). I was told that to the government, "Asian" largely refers to people from China, Japan, rest of mainland Asia, and EXCLUDES India and Pakistan.


What is medical school identification for Pakistan/India applicants? Should we select "Asian" or follow the governmental identification as "White"?
What happens if we choose the wrong one? Would it be safer to select "Other"?
Click to expand...



Iranians are considered Caucasians, thus go into the "white" category. The Iranian people are Indo-European, BTW, as opposed to the Arabs, who have a semitic origin.

What about Persians? I'm not Persian, but Arabs are classified as white by the AAMC, right? The two groups are different, but are both white?
 
If we follow basic geography, then you would be classified as Asian. Is classifying 3 billion people to be the same stupid? Yes, but it is what it is. No idea who told you that medical schools consider south asians to be white.
 
Shams al Deen said:
Arabs are Caucasian, not Pakistanis/Indians.
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Anthropologically, Indians and Pakistanis are Caucasian, although they are not white. Caucasians include people groups from the Middle East, South Asia (which includes both India and Pakistan), and Central Asia.
 
MrLogan13 said:
Anthropologically, Indians and Pakistanis are Caucasian, although they are not white. Caucasians include people groups from the Middle East, South Asia (which includes both India and Pakistan), and Central Asia.
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Anthropologically, and with the caveat we're speaking of 19th and early 20th century anthropology here, it depends on if you're talking about Pakistan/North India or if you're talking about South India. North Indians are "Aryan" and some historical anthropologists might say "Caucasian" but they got into a lot of arguments about the Dravidian speaking peoples of southern India.

Regardless, in modern understanding, if you're descended of ethnic groups originally from Europe, North Africa, or the Middle East, you're in the general grouping of "Caucasian". And if you're descended of ethnic groups originally from East Asia, Southeast Asia, or South Asia (which includes India/Pakistan), you're in the general grouping of Asian.

For people that play devil's advocate and bring up things like white South African's, try to classify yourself based on where (to your best guess) your ancestors lived in 1492. (Obviously, the Hispanic question is one you don't go to 1492 for, but there shouldn't be too much confusion there either). If you are worried about it, put other or decline to state. Chances are that between your name, your photograph, your activities, or your interview, someone is going to be able to figure out your ethnicity even if you somehow wanted to hide it.
 
caffeinemia said:
I don't think race really counts against you in a you "lose points" sense. However, other people's race may give them a relative advantage (ie. added points") for them.
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Huh? I don't mean to be rude or abrasive, but that makes no sense. Medical school application is a zero-sum game. If being of a certain race gives your competition "added points" then by definition your own race counts against you.

Let's play a game: there are 100 people competing for 40 spots. The 40 people with the most points at the end of the game get those spots, and the maximum number of points one can hypothetically earn during the course of the game is 500. However, competitors of race X,Y, and Z get an automatic 100 points due to their race, while competitors of race A start with zero.

You tell me whether that's fair or not. lol.
 
rekrul said:
Huh? I don't mean to be rude or abrasive, but that makes no sense. Medical school application is a zero-sum game. If being of a certain race gives your competition "added points" then by definition your own race counts against you.

Let's play a game: there are 100 people competing for 40 spots. The 40 people with the most points at the end of the game get those spots, and the maximum number of points one can hypothetically earn during the course of the game is 500. However, competitors of race X,Y, and Z get an automatic 100 points due to their race, while competitors of race A start with zero.

You tell me whether that's fair or not. lol.
Click to expand...
What you haven't factored into the starting points are the effects of long-term systematic racism that puts certain races at a disadvantage from the very start of life. So rather than the 100 points putting some people ahead, it is meant to bring everyone to zero at the start, rather than some applicants starting in the negative.
 
cactus8910 said:
What you haven't factored into the starting points are the effects of long-term systematic racism that puts certain races at a disadvantage from the very start of life. So rather than the 100 points putting some people ahead, it is meant to bring everyone to zero at the start, rather than some applicants starting in the negative.
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THIS.
 
cactus8910 said:
What you haven't factored into the starting points are the effects of long-term systematic racism that puts certain races at a disadvantage from the very start of life. So rather than the 100 points putting some people ahead, it is meant to bring everyone to zero at the start, rather than some applicants starting in the negative.
Click to expand...

Sure, that is a fair point. That is how it's supposed to work in theory, and in many cases it actually does work that way in practice. From my own personal experience though, a very common situation is that my URM classmates who ended up applying to medical schools actually came from socioeconomic backgrounds that were well above average not just for their ethnic group but for the population as a whole. I just don't see why giving 100 bonus points to the son of two wealthy, African immigrant doctors is fair to the Asian or white kids from working class families.

These things should be looked at on a case by case basis rather than making blanket statements by race, else you will end up with outrageously unjust situations. The US is a huge, huge country of 300 million+ people. There are thousands upon thousands of white and Asian kids who grew up in poor and unstable homes, and thousands upon thousands of black and hispanic kids who were raised in the lap of luxury. It's completely unfair to effectively kick those kids in the teeth while they're already down by discriminating against them due to their race, all the while telling them how privileged they are compared to their BWM driving URM competition.

(I think this should be clear enough but this topic makes people so illogical that I'm going to go out of my way and state it loud and clear: I am NOT saying URMs are richer or advantaged compared to Asians and whites. I'm saying that in a large sample size, like a freakin' country, there is going to be a large number of overlaps between the distributions, and it is unfair to pretend that 5th percentile whites/Asians are somehow advantaged compared to 95th percentile URMs)
 
Doug Underhill said:
I think it's safe to say that the children of wealthy African immigrants were not whom the system was intended to promote. However, they're the exception rather than the rule.
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Ah that makes it totally alright then.

Let me ask you this, at what point will races be considered equal? What criteria are you looking for? Do you really think this will ever happen?
 
rekrul said:
Huh? I don't mean to be rude or abrasive, but that makes no sense. Medical school application is a zero-sum game. If being of a certain race gives your competition "added points" then by definition your own race counts against you.

Let's play a game: there are 100 people competing for 40 spots. The 40 people with the most points at the end of the game get those spots, and the maximum number of points one can hypothetically earn during the course of the game is 500. However, competitors of race X,Y, and Z get an automatic 100 points due to their race, while competitors of race A start with zero.

You tell me whether that's fair or not. lol.
Click to expand...
cactus8910 said:
What you haven't factored into the starting points are the effects of long-term systematic racism that puts certain races at a disadvantage from the very start of life. So rather than the 100 points putting some people ahead, it is meant to bring everyone to zero at the start, rather than some applicants starting in the negative.
Click to expand...

My school doesn't "give points" for URM status but if we did give 100 points for URM and 100 points for E1 status (AAMC measure of low SES) to bring everyone to zero at the start, could we all be cool with that? Blacks, Mexicans and Puerto Ricans do face discrimination regardless of what their bank accounts hold. Assumptions are made all the time about their qualifications and suitability for certain tasks just based on their race/ethnicity. And on a 500 point scheme I'd give 50 points for URM and 50 points for E01 and 100 points if both URM and Eo1.
 
LizzyM said:
My school doesn't "give points" for URM status but if we did give 100 points for URM and 100 points for E1 status (AAMC measure of low SES) to bring everyone to zero at the start, could we all be cool with that? Blacks, Mexicans and Puerto Ricans do face discrimination regardless of what their bank accounts hold. Assumptions are made all the time about their qualifications and suitability for certain tasks just based on their race/ethnicity. And on a 500 point scheme I'd give 50 points for URM and 50 points for E01 and 100 points if both URM and Eo1.
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But then don't all minorities (not just Blacks and Hispanics) deserve points for discrimination. I thought the real reason for affirmative action was to make the physicians more representative of the patients they serve-not for fairness.
 
Shams al Deen said:
But then don't all minorities (not just Blacks and Hispanics) deserve points for discrimination. I thought the real reason for affirmative action was to make the physicians more representative of the patients they serve-not for fairness.
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Well, if you want to say that doctors who grew up poor are underrepresented in medicine and doctors who grew up black, Mexican or Puerto Rican Mainland (not island) are under-represented and if you want to say that both are less likely to get in because of less steller applications due to poverty/discrimination, then okay, we'll say that. Points remain. Minorities that aren't URM don't need a boost to make the population of physicians more representative of the patients they serve and therefore won't get points.
 
After reading all these posts, I think both sides are making valid points. So it seems that there should be a system in place to account for socioeconomic backgrounds. The current system works in most situations but is flawed in some. So maybe there should be a better system in place?
 
TigerLax said:
After reading all these posts, I think both sides are making valid points. So it seems that there should be a system in place to account for socioeconomic backgrounds. The current system works in most situations but is flawed in some. So maybe there should be a better system in place?
Click to expand...
What do you propose?
 
Womb Raider said:
Ah that makes it totally alright then.

Let me ask you this, at what point will races be considered equal? What criteria are you looking for? Do you really think this will ever happen?
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We are all equal, but what the majority won't ever have to experience is that of which minorities have in the past.
 
onyisraw said:
We are all equal, but what the majority won't ever have to experience is that of which minorities have in the past.
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Well we aren't all equal in this regard if some are getting benefits and others aren't. Every single human being can point to something in the past an say "I was treated unfairly!" - my question was at what point will the races in America be able to compete as equals? How long must we use the past as a tool to legitimize current discriminatory practices? I'm asking you.
 
Womb Raider said:
Well we aren't all equal in this regard if some are getting benefits and others aren't. Every single human being can point to something in the past an say "I was treated unfairly!" - my question was at what point will the races in America be able to compete as equals? How long must we use the past as a tool to legitimize current discriminatory practices? I'm asking you.
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At what point will the races in America be able to compete as equals? When no one looks at another's facial features and considers them "inferior" due to their perceived race/ethnicity.
 
LizzyM said:
At what point will the races in America be able to compete as equals? When no one looks at another's facial features and considers them "inferior" due to their perceived race/ethnicity.
Click to expand...
I personally didn't wanna bring this up, but this is the huge idea I was leaning towards. It's the root of our problem as a whole. Whenever we realize that no one is better or worse than the next man or woman, we'll be much better off altogether.

Personally, I'd like to say let's not pretend that race/ethnicity and class isn't an issue both in and out of the academic scheme of things.
 
This might sound crazy, but I'll throw it out there (and then run for cover since race is a huge hot topic button here): don't ask about it. Throw away all forms requiring you to identify your race and let the relic from the past stay in the past.
 
LA1004 said:
This might sound crazy, but I'll throw it out there (and then run for cover since race is a huge hot topic button here): don't ask about it. Throw away all forms requiring you to identify your race and let the relic from the past stay in the past.
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Why do you say this?
 
Goro said:
Iranians are considered Caucasians, thus go into the "white" category. The Iranian people are Indo-European, BTW, as opposed to the Arabs, who have a semitic origin.
Click to expand...

So is an anti-semitic arab anti themselves too?

My head hurts.
 
LA1004 said:
This might sound crazy, but I'll throw it out there (and then run for cover since race is a huge hot topic button here): don't ask about it. Throw away all forms requiring you to identify your race and let the relic from the past stay in the past.
Click to expand...

As long as you are fine with discrimination that can not be proven. Based on people's names and photos I could (illegally) discriminate against certain groups of people (Asians, Blacks, Mexicans, etc) and no one could prove anything because there would be no way of classifying applicants and determining if something sinister is going on.

This was something interesting from Salon that came across my desk today:
1. College professors, across race/ethnicity and gender, are more likely to respond to queries from students they believe are white males. Despite universities frequently being described as bastions of progressivism and liberal indoctrination centers, a recent study found that faculty of colleges and universities are more likely to ignore requests for mentorship from minority and/or female students. Researchers sent more than 6,500 professors at 259 schools in 89 disciplines identical letters that differed only in the name and implied race/gender of the fictitious student sender (e.g., “Mei Chen” as an Asian female; “Keisha Thomas” as a black female; “Brad Anderson” as a white male). The study found that regardless of discipline (with the sole exception of fine arts), faculty more consistently responded to perceived white males. Two notable additional findings: 1) professors at public institutions were significantly more likely than their private institution counterparts to respond to students of color, and 2) the students most discriminated against were perceived East Asian women, followed by South Asian men. You can look at the numbers up close here.
Click to expand...
 
LizzyM said:
At what point will the races in America be able to compete as equals? When no one looks at another's facial features and considers them "inferior" due to their perceived race/ethnicity.
Click to expand...


As long as being discriminated against gets you free things, people will continue to claim that they are being discriminated against. Nothing wrong with that, it's human nature and I would do the same if I were in their shoes. But we have to admit there will never come a day when URMs (or rather, the professional agitators that claim to speak for URMs as a career) will say "yep, discrimination is finished. It's time for the free things we've been getting for the past 100 years to end, and by the way you should fire us since our positions are now void." Not gonna happen.

Am I saying that discrimination doesn't exist today? No, I'm not saying that, since I don't know. It's a hard question. Whites are slightly under-represented at medical schools compared to their percentage of the US populations, whereas Asians are overrepresented by something like a factor of 4-5X. In other words, Asians are more than 4 times as likely to be medical students as whites are. Yet nobody is saying whites are being discriminated against and that's why they under perform compared to Asians. On the other hand, blacks (including AAs and African immigrants) make up roughly half of what you would expect based on their share of the overall population, and this is taken at face value as evidence of discrimination.

-Whites are represented 2x compared to blacks? Wow, that's a huge gap in outcomes. Must be discrimination, and it's a problem.

-Asians are represented 4-5x compared to whites? Yeah, so what, who cares. You can't always expect everyone to do equally well, can you? That would be unreasonable.

Again, I'm sure discrimination exists, but I feel like we're getting set in our ways and just keep trying to use to past to explain the present, even as the past keeps receding further and further into..the past. Instead of assigning people benefits of the doubt based on race, we should assign them benefits of the doubt based on their individual, unique life experiences. Isn't that why schools have us write all these darn essays?
 
rekrul said:
As long as being discriminated against gets you free things, people will continue to claim that they are being discriminated against.
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Blacks are URM in medicine. When they are no longer URM then we will stop considering them URM. We aren't getting there soon. There may come a day when whites are URM. We aren't there yet.
 
Tell that to the people who live in Ferguson, MO, and read the Justice Dep'ts report on the police practices. It's not a city, it's a plantation!

As long as being discriminated against gets you free things, people will continue to claim that they are being discriminated against. Nothing wrong with that, it's human nature and I would do the same if I were in their shoes.
 
LizzyM said:
At what point will the races in America be able to compete as equals? When no one looks at another's facial features and considers them "inferior" due to their perceived race/ethnicity.
Click to expand...

And when that perceived inferiority no longer leads to inferiority of resources. This is really the heart of it. If, despite historical racism and discrimination, all minorities had equal access to proper funding for education, employment, housing and health as their majority counterparts, then the need for any policy addressing some of these shortcomings would be unnecessary.
 
Last edited:
I'm Asian. I eat rainbows and poop butterflies. I'm fabulous.
 
LizzyM said:
As long as you are fine with discrimination that can not be proven. Based on people's names and photos I could (illegally) discriminate against certain groups of people (Asians, Blacks, Mexicans, etc) and no one could prove anything because there would be no way of classifying applicants and determining if something sinister is going on.

This was something interesting from Salon that came across my desk today:
Click to expand...

Ok, this is interesting and something I haven't thought about: if I understand your point correctly, one reason to use racial classifications is to ensure colleges are being fair in accepting/rejecting people purely based on academics/LOR/experiences rather than arbitrary traits like skin color? If so, that sounds legit (I'm being serious).
 
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