 So apparently, to get accepted into Harvard nowadays, you need to be less Asian and less nerdy. How does this even make any sense, David? Today, we are talking about a article that went super viral in the Asian-American community called Applying to College and Trying to Appear Less Asian. Andrew, this one comes from the New York Times, so you know it's a banger. It basically chronicles two students, two, I guess, I don't know how to say it, Chinese nerds who got into Harvard by hiding that they were Chinese nerds. They didn't check the ethnicity box, so they basically did not say they were Asian. They basically took other languages, even though they could take Chinese AP class, the AP test, they took the French one. They hid that they love chess. Basically, they were doing everything they could to not fit into that stereotypical overachiever box that has been an American trope for like 20, 30 years at this point because they were like, dude, all the advice we got from these pro counselors was that Harvard does not like Asian nerds anymore. They're capping the level because they say there's too many, so we were doing whatever we could to look like we were not. So I know when Max Lee showed up, Andrew, the first day of freshman orientation, based off this, they were mad. They were probably like, oh my gosh, this guy clearly snuck through the filter. How did he do it? Did he pull the don't say he's Asian trick again on the present, resume? Max is just one haircut away from looking decent, man. All right? No, there's nothing wrong with him. He probably would kill me on any IQ test, by the way. So you guys don't get mad. Guys, we're going to go through the four main different view points on this, and then actually at the end of the video, we're going to provide some solutions. Yes, solutions. We got them, or at least we think we might have some ideas, all right? So David, let's get into the perspective number one. Number one, of course, is probably from the Asian community, which is more like, this is racist. We try so hard from the day we're born. You know, like so many Tiger parents are almost like LeVar ball, but for like school. Like so many kids are molded to be the perfect tennis player, cello player, violin player, perfect GPA, perfect SAT. And then you're just telling me, because so many Asians are so good at school and having academic achievements, it's whack now. And you're going to cap the amount at like 20%. Yeah, because there's just too many of them. Actually, we still understand that they're very valuable to society and to the world in general. But we're just getting really sick of seeing piano and Chinese on our applications. It might sort of ruin the social vibe. You know, this Max Lee guy, I'm sure he's got a great brain, but he's not necessarily the nicest on the eyes. But also, you know, East Asians aren't the only ones on the chopping block. It's also Hindu Brahmins. If you guys play too much venue flute, we're going to see that as a red flag too. No, the venue flute being a red flag is literally in the New York Times article. That is a Hindu instrument. Andrew, there's also people though that are like, want to get into Harvard so bad because you know how we just can't shake the love of the brand name? Asians can't. They're like, what do I need to do? Do I need to drop swimming in tennis and try to play lacrosse? Do I need to be on the football team, the baseball team? Tell me what I need to do. I won't learn any Chinese. I'll learn French. I'll learn Latin. Just tell me what will make me not this stereotypical overachiever robot Asian that they view me as how do whatever it takes? Which is actually, I'm not going to like kind of like a robotic response to not being told to be robotic. That is exactly a super academic like try hard study. Guys, by the way, I just want to note that I had no chance of going to an Ivy League school. Like I only just applied to John Hopkins for my dad. I know that's not even an Ivy League school and I knew I wasn't going to get in. Yeah, I got denied from all of them too. I will say this as somebody who is from a family that had those dreams, but probably didn't like fully have the execution in the back end to like make it happen. It's just our culture. Chinese invented the national exam 1500 years ago during the soy dynasty. I mean, it's a real thing. It runs deep, man. Like academic achievement to a lot of Asian families, not all of them I get. Everybody comes over in different situations, but it's like the religion. Now, David, there's another perspective that I want to talk about and it's getting at Harvard's legacy admissions, which is a big point of argument because legacy admissions, right? Whether this is kids of people who went to Harvard before or big donors that donate to Harvard or the Illuminati, I don't know. But you know, like these kids are saved a lot of spots for them each year. Yeah, people estimate the legacy admissions, people from really old money, super influential, powerful families, make up anywhere from like 30 to 50% of the Harvard enrollment. And I don't think all these families are like white, by the way. I think some of these are diplomatic kids. Probably a lot of them are white, but yeah, not all of them. Well, you gotta think, Andrew, Harvard started in 1636. Who was in America in 1636? There probably was, to be honest, a lot of white people. So they've probably got their name on libraries. They've donated. They probably managed the hedge fund. You know, all these colleges have hedge funds to like increase their coffers on the side as well. All those people correlated with that are white. So maybe, I guess in a pure capitalistic sense, they're like, yeah, we're just making a capitalistic equation. These kids gotta get in. Their parents made Harvard like 200 million or donated that much. Well, I mean, to play the devil's advocate for their side, I'm saying like, I guess that's part of the reason why people want to go to Harvard is because of the legacy. For the network. Without this network and legacy and all these connections and all these billionaires and co-founders and founders connected to Harvard, then why would you want to go to Harvard? You could also say that it's just maintaining essentially an invisible aristocracy in America because those are the people who are gonna go, what, the Zuckerbergs? Well, go ahead, tear it down. I'm cheering for you guys. Yeah, let's be for Vendetta this whole legacy system, man. Obviously, you guys, this is how capitalism works. Andrew, this well-meaning white guy had a really interesting perspective and he goes, wait, wait, wait. So guys, I'm a white guy who doesn't want to be racist. So should I be really happy that Asians are 6% of the population and represent 24% of freshmen class at Harvard? So they're overrepresented? Or should I feel bad that they actually deserve to be 42% and they're being down-ramped to 24? So that's racism. Or should I just be supporting race-blind admissions? But that's probably gonna hurt black and Latino students who deserve an extra bump due to a lot of socioeconomic and historical circumstances that their groups had to go through. So should I support them too? It's just so hard to not be racist in 2022, guys. What should I do? Yo, to this commenter. I have no good solution for you because at the end of the day, if you increase minority admissions in the Harvard, guess what that probably decreases? White admissions. So I guess as a white person, I don't, I can't tell you what to think, man. You gotta just make that decision on your own. But that's an interesting comment. Yeah, and almost, I guess like, how much built-in bucket do white people deserve for apparently like building up the Ivy Leagues too? Well, I guess there's some perspective on it. First of all, I think that Asians should get what they deserve in this country. If they work that hard and they groom themselves from day one to be a Harvard student, they should have a really good chance of getting into Harvard. I'm not, I can't say that you're entitled to it because at the same time, Harvard is a private institution and still can, has built its legacy the way it has. There is the argument of like, you'll still be fine. What, you're gonna get a full ride to Vanderbilt. You're gonna get a half scholarship to Duke. You'll be fine in life. But of course, you know, exclusion from hyper-elite institutions like Ivy Leagues, they can keep you out of high-level law, high-level finance, high-level politics, you know. Like, if I am not able to get into Harvard, even though I studied every day of my life, how will I ever wield the scepter of power in this in the Western world? I need to hear Max Lee tell me that he was trying to be the president of the United States. And he needed to go to Harvard for that. Now I'm just saying. Andrew, interestingly enough, at schools that do not allow legacies, Caltech, MIT, the schools are about 40 to 42% Asian, Andrew. They're even more Asian than they are white because those schools specifically being engineering schools, they're like, bro, you can either do the algorithm or you cannot figure out the algorithm. No legacies here. All right, David, I promised the people at the beginning of this video, we were going to propose solutions. No, Andrew, I got one last liberal but also educated Asian perspective. Okay, what is it? Yeah, maybe they are sick of Asian nerds, but why do we all got to be Ivy League Asian nerds? I went to a state school, I went to Berkeley, I went to U of Michigan or another school. I turned out fine. Asian, it's really on Asian parents. Why do they just like think that the first 17 years of life was the only thing that matters? It's almost like my cousin, who I resent, got into Ivy League school and they didn't even have to do anything else for the rest of their life, but what, they're the pride of the family? They're a piece of crap person. Nobody even likes them. Well, you can't join the Illuminati if you go to U of Michigan. It doesn't count. Yeah, I mean, it would certainly be an impediment to getting into the Illuminati if there was an Illuminati club. We need to be, can we build our own Illuminati? I'll say this, I'll say this, Andrew, what do you think of that perspective that a lot of more like liberal Asians have where they're like, yeah, they probably are down ramping like overachieving Asians, but like, why do we all have to be that anyway? I think that Harvard has a legacy and it's this old institution, it's the most sought after. I do think you have to cause a ruckus and complain and protest and let them know that we see what they're doing. We see you guys making 50% legacy admissions. We see you guys discriminating against us. We see you guys taking us on and accepting us when we hide our Asianists. I'm just letting you know. So Harvard has to take that on. Now, maybe they don't care because it's Harvard. They maybe they don't care, but like, I think it's good that people are causing a fuss about it. Right, but I guess these people are taking the, this like larger macro perspective and I'm not saying it's right or it's wrong. I totally get it where they're like, in comparison to what other groups are going through, this is minuscule. Oh, what, you got stuck in upper middle management. You couldn't break C-suite. Oh, you got stuck at University of Washington, UCLA, Berkeley, instead of Dartmouth and UPenn, like you deserved. Boo hoo, think about the world. You know, I'm just gonna tell those Asian parents, man, listen, you can groom your kid to go to Harvard, if they don't, just still love them, man. Just still love your kid if they don't go to Harvard, please. Ultimately, Andrew, I read like 500 different internet comments to break down all these perspectives and you know what I came up with, Andrew? What? There's no solution that's gonna satisfy everybody. No! Literally guys, you know how there's sometimes like a compromise solution that everybody can agree on? This one is just gonna be like somebody gonna be mad. Somebody's gonna get hurt, right? Yeah, somebody's- Asians are gonna get hurt. And then what, state school Asians are happy because they're overachieving cousin can't get in or they do get in or maybe you're trying to raise an overachieving kid that's trying to enter the elites of Western society so they cancel, you care so much and it's almost like so self-centered and based off everybody's individual exposure, how they're gonna feel about it, right? Because they're looking about their own self-incentive and their own impact on the group or constituency that they feel like they're a part of. If you look at getting into Harvard only as a scarcity mindset, which there are a limited number of seats, right? Then yeah, you're gonna be fighting over it and you're gonna get catty about it because hey, this person got in and when they weren't supposed to be, oh, you gotta let me in. Oh, this person's getting it all wrong. Now I'm losing out. Everybody's gonna have a perspective. David, what are some just solutions? Let's throw them out there to close out the video. All right. One of my solutions is that there's like a Harvard G League. So basically Harvard lets people know like, yo, we almost let this guy in but he was just too stereotypical. So like Vanderbilt or like another good school, like, hey, you see Berkeley, can you guys give him a full ride or like a 75% scholarship? Hey, Dartmouth, could you just make sure this guy gets in? Like, you know, he doesn't even have to apply to you. He just, so he's Max Lee's little brother. We found out what his brother pulled the previous year and just, we saw how his hair looked. That's not like what we want walking around Harvard Square. Can you just get him into MIT? All right. I got a solution. How about this? Harvard comes out and publicly says why they need the legacy admissions so bad. And they should just say, if this is true, hey guys, just to let you guys know, we have to reserve 50% for legacy admissions because the 50% of legacy admissions actually make up 80% of Harvard's funding. And that's the whole reason why you guys want to come to Harvard anyways. Between the business thing and the Illuminati thing, I'm pretty sure my hands are tied. Honestly, I also think that if Asians were able to maybe network with each other better and build these other systems, almost like a Y Combinator type thing, outside of just having these names, badges and upgrades and nameplates on us that say Harvard, Yale on us, then people would see a more auxiliary path rather than only focusing on their kid getting into these elite institutions. And again, man, Asian parents, just, you can push your kids, push them, push them, sure if that's your prerogative and that's how your family operates, but just still accept it. David, if the student doesn't get accepted in Harvard, they still need to be accepted by their parents. I think honestly, every single perspective made some valid points. Like literally, it's like just how you weigh it out and that's why it comes down to self incentive. Andrew, let's just end on this, man. This is a photo of a tiger mom. I can tell you that she has scrutinized every single one. Oh, Jingzong, that's a tiger mom name. GZ, or JZ, I'm sorry, that's the other JZ. That's the Chinese JZ, Jingzong. Should she relax or should she just focus that? I think parents need to give their kids other skills so regardless of whatever school they go to, they're going to be really successful and happy in life. That's what I meant to say. All right, Mrs. Dong, you heard us out. All right, everybody, let us know in the comments down below what you think about all this. Let's advance the conversation even beyond what it was six, seven months ago. Now there's new information and new cases and new anecdotes all the time, guys. Now again, this is an issue for some Asian families, not even all Asian families care about this because not all Asian families are trying to be like this. So I don't want you to think only all Asians think like this. Yeah, yeah, that's not true. If I have a kid, I honestly probably won't think like this. I would say all Asians generally know somebody who knows somebody who thinks like this. I would say this, guys, at the end of the day, it really depends what your parents are the var ball of. Andrew, have you ever seen people who become pro boxers at 17? You don't think that their dads were like the lavar ball of boxing and then like, you know, or the jing-tun of boxing. All right, everybody, let us know in the comments down below what you think. Thank you so much for watching. And until next time, we out. Peace.