According to journalist and author Kenny Xu, progressives fail to grasp the importance of merit in academic admissions and degree conferral, particularly in medicine. While Xu supports the long-held liberal ideal of equal opportunity through education, he argues that the university is not the place to address group achievement gaps. Instead, educational interventions need to begin much earlier—ideally in kindergarten.

In this conversation, Peter Boghossian and Xu discuss holistic admissions vs. merit in medicine, overcoming “diversity statements,” calculating competence, the elevation of kindness over data, discrimination against Asian students, what the SAT measures, why merit requires objectivity, the humility of the scientific method, the unsustainability of “kind lies,” violence against Asians, and much more.

Kenny Xu is a journalist, author, and president of Color Us United, a non-profit organization advocating for a race-blind America. His forthcoming book is School of Woke: How Critical Race Theory Infiltrated American Schools and Why We Must Reclaim Them (August 1, 2023). Xu reported on academic discrimination against Asians in his former book, An Inconvenient Minority: The Harvard Admissions Case and the Attack on Asian American Excellence. Watch this conversation on YouTube!