Pay-By-Race Bake Sale by UC Berkeley Republicans

benbradley · Sep 26, 2011

Yes, that's right, a bake sale where your race and gender determine the price you pay for an item:

During the sale, scheduled for Tuesday, baked goods will be sold to white men for $2, Asian men for $1.50, Latino men for $1, black men for 75 cents and Native American men for 25 cents. All women will get 25 cents off those prices.

Now that's an interesting pricing structure. As a white man always looking for a discount, I'd look for friendly a nearby minority who would buy something for me, and I'd be willing to pay as much as half the difference between their price and my price, so I could get a discount and they could make some money. A black woman could buy a baked good for 50 cents, and I would buy it from her for $1.25.

By my calculations, a Native American woman could get baked good for free. This could make for a remarkable economic condition where she could resell these at ANY price, undercutting the prices to all other subgroups while still making money. As an armchair economist I'm wondering what would happen if several Native American women set up shop by the Berkeley Republicans student group bake sale. How fast would the Republicans run out of stock?

But the Berkeley Republicans claim they're not the only ones with race-and-gender-based policies on campus!

...
"We agree that the event is inherently racist, but that is the point," BCR President Shawn Lewis wrote in response to upheaval over the bake sale. "It is no more racist than giving an individual an advantage in college admissions based solely on their race (or) gender."

Michael Wolfe · Sep 26, 2011

I seem to remember John Stossel organizing a similar bake sale, awhile back. So this is nothing new, I think. Although IIRC at Stossel's bake sale, Asians had to pay the most, out of everyone.

In any case, it's kind of a silly stunt, imo, regardless of whether the politics involved make sense.

Mharvey · Sep 26, 2011

I'd love to see a picture of the Berkley Republican club. We could make a drinking game out of it. Every time you see a pretentious blond white kid, take a shot.

Anyone wanna get ****** up tonight?

NoGuessing · Sep 26, 2011

I don't get this.

Michael Wolfe · Sep 26, 2011

NoGuessing said:
I don't get this.

I think the idea is that it's a protest against affirmative action. Hence the different prices for different groups.

kuwisdelu · Sep 26, 2011

benbradley said:
By my calculations, a Native American woman could get baked good for free.

Excuse me, I have some friends and relatives to call up.

rugcat · Sep 26, 2011

Michael Wolfe said:
I think the idea is that it's a protest against affirmative action. Hence the different prices for different groups.

Exactly. It's meant to be satirical. Its also stupid and obnoxious, and the mostly left wing student body got into an uproar about it, terming it insensitive and hurtful.

UC Berkeley student senators voted Sunday to condemn discriminatory behavior on campus - even if done in satire - in response to a Republican student group's plans for an "Increase Diversity Bake Sale," with pastries labeled according to race and gender.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/09/25/BACG1L9CP3.DTL#ixzz1Z6qkmBfl

I think they should have just ignored them.

Mharvey said:
I'd love to see a picture of the Berkley Republican club. We could make a drinking game out of it. Every time you see a pretentious blond white kid, take a shot.

They were interviewed on the local news. In appearance, they looked like badly cast stereotypes.

However the treasurer of the group has a Hispanic (Peruvian, I believe) surname -- Loyaza

Francisco Loyaza IV, to be exact.

SPMiller · Sep 26, 2011

Corrective policies are critical in addressing long-term wealth inequalities. Get over it, GOP kids. You have enough advantages in life already.

Don · Sep 26, 2011

Some things that might seem mildy amusing as a written analogy should never be brought to physical fruition. Dumb, dumb, dumb. What rc said.

Bubastes · Sep 26, 2011

Michael Wolfe said:
Although IIRC at Stossel's bake sale, Asians had to pay the most, out of everyone.

I was surprised they didn't set it up this way, especially at UC Berkeley. The student body is always at least 40% Asian, IIRC. Some of my relatives in CA say it would be even higher, but the affirmative action policies act as a cap on Asians. I don't know if that's true, though.

Zoombie · Sep 26, 2011

SPMiller said:
Corrective policies are critical in addressing long-term wealth inequalities. Get over it, GOP kids. You have enough advantages in life already.

I agree!

Course, I was musing that it might shut the idiots up if we just made the criteria a socio-economic classification, rather than a racial one.

But then they'd bitch about class warfare or something...

Miss Plum · Sep 26, 2011

SPMiller said:
Corrective policies are critical in addressing long-term wealth inequalities. Get over it, GOP kids. You have enough advantages in life already.

Corrective policies? Sounds a bit Khmer Rouge.

Some of us believe the best "corrective policy" for injustice is justice -- not an equal and opposite injustice.

But I'm not sure why you're calling on "GOP kids" to pay up; the bake sale discriminated on the basis of race and gender, not political affiliation. Black Republicans got to pay less than White Democrats.

And I haven't even asked you yet where you get the idea that GOP kids have a long-term wealth advantage over Democrat kids.

Mharvey · Sep 26, 2011

rugcat said:
They were interviewed on the local news. In appearance, they looked like badly cast stereotypes.

However the treasurer of the group has a Hispanic (Peruvian, I believe) surname -- Loyaza

Francisco Loyaza IV, to be exact.

I'm impressed. That's one shot we all can't take.

SPMiller · Sep 26, 2011

Miss Plum said:
Corrective policies? Sounds a bit Khmer Rouge.

I guess invoking Pol Pot is better than invoking Hitler.

I guess.

But if you're going to aim that low, you might as well go all the way.

rwam · Sep 26, 2011

This whole event sings a sweet, sweet melody to the little passive-aggressive smart-alec devil on my shoulder.

kuwisdelu · Sep 26, 2011

Yeah, it's stupid, but I don't care. I'm stocking up on my 25¢ baked goods, bitches! :e2headban

nighttimer · Sep 26, 2011

Miss Plum said:
Corrective policies? Sounds a bit Khmer Rouge.

Some of us believe the best "corrective policy" for injustice is justice -- not an equal and opposite injustice.

Some of us agree the best "corrective policy" for injustice is justice and that the remedies to injustice are not remotely equal or opposite injustices.

Affirmative action is not close to the injustice that segregation was. Sorry if some smart-ass Republican brats think it is.

whistlelock · Sep 26, 2011

Excellent point made on their part.

now let's get everyone's education and income up to where we can all pay $1.25.

Torgo · Sep 27, 2011

Miss Plum said:
Some of us believe the best "corrective policy" for injustice is justice -- not an equal and opposite injustice.

I think it's possible for something which is just in societal terms to be unjust at the level of individuals. It may be possible to analyse a lot of current political controversies as a difference of opinion about which ought to have priority.

MarkEsq · Sep 27, 2011

Torgo said:
I think it's possible for something which is just in societal terms to be unjust at the level of individuals. It may be possible to analyse a lot of current political controversies as a difference of opinion about which ought to have priority.

That's true. But I think that's not the objection, rather what Miss Plum and others find offensive is the notion that some people (or groups) are allowed to discriminate on the basis of the color of someone's skin while it is unconstitutional for others to do so.

DavidZahir · Sep 27, 2011

Michael Wolfe said:
I think the idea is that it's a protest against affirmative action. Hence the different prices for different groups.

Yeah, because life is exactly like a bake sale in every meaningful way. That's why we let children run things from stands on street corners.

Miss Plum · Sep 27, 2011

Torgo said:
I think it's possible for something which is just in societal terms to be unjust at the level of individuals.

Which is why I support individual rights but not group rights. The U.S. Bill of Rights, incidentally, is dedicated to individual rights. This group rights crap is an ~~artifact~~ behemoth of liberal social engineers.

backslashbaby · Sep 27, 2011

When I glanced at the pricing poster on TV before hearing who ran it, I seriously thought someone was doing a bake sale based on wages (for the same job) to pricing.

I do have a question about the gender thing and college admissions. Aren't colleges having a hard time finding enough qualified men these days to go if they keep the same standards they used to use? I've read that many colleges accept more male applicants regardless* of merit nowadays because they are male, to keep the numbers from swinging too female, frankly.

I understand that colleges may want to give men every chance and my phrasing above is a bit harsh. I don't know how I feel about those policies, honestly. It gets into the whole boys-reading thing and other problems that do need to be addressed, imho.

eta* - let me say the merit thing better. In order to ensure adequate representation, colleges I've read about are including boys with lower test scores, etc. than they accept from female applicants.

Miss Plum · Sep 27, 2011

Aaaaand, the inimitable zombie weighs in.

http://pajamasmedia.com/zombie/2011...er-affirmative-action-satire/?singlepage=true

kuwisdelu · Sep 27, 2011

backslashbaby said:
I do have a question about the gender thing and college admissions. Aren't colleges having a hard time finding enough qualified men these days to go if they keep the same standards they used to use? I've read that many colleges accept more male applicants regardless* of merit nowadays because they are male, to keep the numbers from swinging too female, frankly.

This probably wouldn't sound so weird to me if I weren't in a mathematical/computational science.

Pay-By-Race Bake Sale by UC Berkeley Republicans

It's a doggy dog world

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