I would suggest that much of Justice Thomas’ rationale for his decision is based on the principles of “thinking stereotypically but acting individually”. Justice Thomas notes about the flawed logic of fellow Justice Brown-Jackson:
Worse, the classifications that Justice Jackson draws are themselves race-based stereotypes…
This, she claims, locks blacks into a seemingly perpetual inferior caste. Such a view is irrational; it is an insult to individual achievement and cancerous to young minds seeking to push through barriers, rather than consign themselves to permanent victimhood… What it cannot do is use the applicant’s skin color as a heuristic, assuming that because the applicant checks the box for “black” he therefore conforms to the university’s monolithic and reductionist view of an abstract, average black person…
And their race is not to blame for everything—good or bad—that happens in their lives.