[Jaime_Astorga]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Can you explain what you mean by "affirmative action", please? It's an expression that I'm not familiar with.

Thanks

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_action

The basic idea in the white-dominant countries where it is usually implemented begins with the fact some minorities perform worse than whites and other minorities in employment tests or university qualifications. Without affirmative actions, this leads to some groups being "underrepresented" (that is, present in a lower ratio than a random sample from society would indicate; for example a college that is 3% black in a country where 10% of people are black because blacks perform worse on the metrics the college uses to measure student achievement) while other groups tehttps://www.mobileread.com/forums/newreply.php?do=newreply&p=513565nd to be "overrepresented" (so whites and minorities like jews and asians get to be in the same college in a greater number than their percentage of the population would indicate due to superior performance in such metrics).

The assumption is that this worse performance comes from "stumbling blocks" to the performance of the underperforming minorities while whites get preferential treatment. These "stumbling blocks" include poverty, racism, lack of connections, single parent households, etc... The idea is encapsulated in these political cartoons.



Either in order to right perceived injustices or in an effort to "increase diversity" (incidentally, be sure to read Maddox's hilarious rant on the subject), affirmative action policies and laws favor giving preferential treatment to members of the underperforming minorities (mostly blacks and hispanics, and women in some cases), while not giving as many spots to whites, asians, and jews. Part of the mindset of the "diversity" is that people feel uncomfortable in environments dominated by one race and are much less likely to take a position, even if favorable, in an job or college that has a tiny number of people of their same race. I call those people "racists."

On a level playing field with a population of 80% African and 20% European, you'd expect to see roughly that proportion of African and European hires.

What do you consider an "even playing field?" It seems many people will only believe a playing field is fair when an after-the-fact count of people who are accepted to the positions in question seems to reflect the race ratios present in the source population, but this assumes that all populations of all races and all cultures (which tend to correlate with race) are equally capable and conductive to academic and job success. That is not necessarily the case, in these or in other pursuits. Is not there a higher rate of blacks in professional sports and college sports teams in the U.S. than there is in the regular population? Might not this be indicative that american blacks are, on average, stronger and more athletic than other race populations in the U.S.? And if so, is too much of a stretch that there might be other differences between populations of races?

We should strive for equality of opportunity, not equality of result. If the process is fair, we should not decry the outcome as "unfair" because it does not fit our preconceived notions of what the outcome will be. Instead, maybe we should examine those notions more carefully.

And don't forget: Despite the existence of such affirmative action "quotas," the laws do not support hiring people who are not qualified to do a job, just to satisfy a racial quota. That kind of thing has been challenged and upheld in court, so most employers take care to make sure the people they hire are qualified for that position.

But "qualification" is only a bottom line, a minimum required in order to qualify. People can and do perform better than that. Affirmative action favors denying people who performed better a spot in an organization or educational institution in favor of someone who performed worse purely based on the color of their skin.