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One counterargument to meritocracy is that majority or minority populations don't like it when they're outperformed and seek redistribution or expropriation. From a naively utilitarian point of view, it makes sense to sacrifice a little bit of meritocracy to achieve a bit more stability, or to find an equilibria somewhere you can get a good amount of both.
See Malaysia's temporary-cum-permanent introduction of affirmative action. For example, Malays get access to higher-paying government bonds, they can buy cheaper property in new developments, their companies are privileged for govt contracts, they can more easily get into universities... There's a similar system in India as self_made_human points out. In Australia, Indigenous people get their own special job pathways and a great deal of govt expenditure focused on their communities.
Personally, I think this is a bad idea that leads to long-run instability. Opening up and strengthening divisions in the population of the country is a bad idea. If you have meritocracy, then you will have groups of winners and angry losers. If you have affirmative action, then you have new, state-defined groups of winners and angry losers, a recipe for toxic politics. Better a nation-state without such dividing points. Or, if you can't have a nation-state then at least try to avoid huge divisions in ability between populations, if you have to import people then aim for similar levels of skill to the general population.
Malays get this so that they don’t riot against the Chinese minority who dominate the country’s economy, as they already have before. For the Chinese, bumiputra is a price they are willing to pay for the preservation of their economic power (and its associated privilege, as it’s not as if they’re less clannish than the Malays are), a fig leaf that minimizes racial hostility. The alternative might well be being kicked out of Malaysia entirely, and while that would be bad for the Malays, it would also be bad for the Chinese affected.
As I've heard it told, the founding story of independent Singapore involved the parliament of Malaysia voting unanimously (absent members from Singapore) in 1965 to expel Singapore from its state involuntarily. This seems related to the fact that the island was, unlike the mainland, a majority ethnic Chinese. The difference in outcomes of governance in otherwise-adjacent states is, um, certainly notable.
Ditto the inverse. The standard HBDer take is that culture doesn't matter, and that by extension Lee Kuan Yew's efforts at economic and cultural integration were a waste of time/resources, and yet (as you yourself observe) the differences in outcome are notable.
I imagine that someone will be along in a bit to argue that if Singapore had massacred all the ethnic Malays on the Island rather than integrating them they would have been even more successful but I don't buy it. That's the kind of policy that causes "unrest"
This is a laughable assertion. The standard HBD take acknowledges that culture and environment can cripple any person or set of persons, just that asserting those things apply to some situations is also laughable.
No it is not.
Near as I can tell, the sort of view expressed by @Folamh3, @self_made_human, and others here that...
...is not an extreme or hyperbolic take, it's the median.
Charitably you are engaging in a very blatant Motte and Baily where you try to play the "group differences in outcome" card right up until someone asks how exactly you determine group membership for the purposes of determining group differences. IE Is a dark-skinned man who votes Republican "black" or is he, as Joe Biden and the Hosts of the View assert, "white". (Edit: See Slate and the LA Times' treatment of Clarence Thomas and Larry Elder)
Less charitably you are simply lying.
In my follow-up comments to the comment you linked, I made it abundantly clear that when I said "it's all genetics" I was exaggerating for rhetorical effect, and I do not, in fact, believe that culture plays zero role in educational outcomes. My hyperbolic assertion that "it's all genetics" was intended to contrast with the attitudes of certain education researchers who do, apparently, believe that genetics plays no role in educational outcomes, and that educational outcomes are entirely determined by culture, upbringing and school quality.
I've made my actual position on this matter abundantly clear to you, and I think it's rather tiresome and dishonest of you to quote this off-the-cuff comment out of context. You seem convinced that this off-the-cuff comment I made in passing was some sort of "mask-off" moment for me, and all the follow-up comments I made expressing my actual position in more nuanced detail were simply lies. I don't know how you arrived at this position and I don't appreciate being misrepresented.
I would greatly appreciate it if you would knock it off and stop involving me every time you want to make a point about how evil and wretched HBDers are. And don't tell a story that you're only pinging me because I'm "one of the Motte's most prominent HBD proponents" or whatever: I barely discuss the issue at all, and the comment you linked is from seven months ago. In the interim, out of the dozens if not hundreds of comments I've posted here, I've discussed HBD in any capacity a grand total of three times, in one case because you were pinging me about it, in another case to explicitly refute the claim that HBD is the cause of disproportionate homicide rates between ethnic groups in the US. It's not a topic I know much about, claim any expertise in or discuss with any great frequency.
If you're so convinced that rabid, unqualified endorsement of HBD is the median position on this site, it shouldn't be remotely hard for you to find a better example to illustrate your point than me, a guy who has never claimed any expertise in the topic, doesn't find it particularly interesting and barely talks about it. Given that you know all of the foregoing, it's really obnoxious of you to repeatedly bring me up any time you're trying to score points in a HBD debate, especially now that you've been explicitly requested not to do so in future.
My read of that interaction is that you were trying to use arguments as soldiers and then got pissy when they got slaughtered to a man because you'd marched them into a killbox.
This is far from the first time that you and I have done this particular song and dance. You'll make some blanket claim about X-outcome is entirely explained by genetics and then someone usually myself or @FCfromSSC will point out that all the genetics in the world won't teach kids to read, or turn a flabby sack of dough into NFL athlete if they don't eat well and go to the gym, at which point you accuse your interlocutor of misunderstanding what you plainly said and/or quoting you out context. Rinse, wash, repeat, every 3 - 4 months.
Simply put, if you don't want to be used as an example of HBDer's poor behavior, stop providing such good examples.
Edit: See also my replies to @DaseindustriesLtd, and @hydroacetylene.
Get lost and stop trying to involve me every time you have a debate about HBD. I'm not particularly interested in discussing this topic with anyone, and certainly not with someone as obnoxious and inconsiderate as you.
The last time I provided you with a good example of the poor behaviour of HBDers was seven months ago. If I had provided a more recent example, you would have used it. I haven't, which is why you have to keep bringing up a comment I posted seven months ago. You have this bizarre fantasy that I'm constantly posting about HBD, but you have to trawl through seven months of comments I've posted to find one that illustrates how awful you think I am. And you know what? I think it's sad, I really do.
How long, exactly, do I have to not post a HBD-related comment before you will stop pinging me every time you have a debate on this topic? A year? Two years? Three? You're demanding that I "stop" providing you with good examples of HBDers being obnoxious, but please tell me: what the fuck does "stop" mean to you if not "hasn't done it for seven months"?
If you want to think I'm a horrible wretched human being, fine, go nuts. Just extend a tiny modicum of common courtesy and stop pinging me every time you have a debate about HBD with someone. It's really not hard and I don't see why you have to be so gratuitously obnoxious just because I don't share your opinion.
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