Seriously thoughtful Affirmative Action

[wodin]

To paraphrase George Orwell, I don't mind anyone being equal but I don't want anyone to be more equal!

I believe this quote was attributed (incorrectly) to George Carling: "My granddaddy never owned a slave, and never was a slave; and neither was yours!"

[Greg Anos]

It was after Bakke that I gave up trying to get into Med school and finished out as a programmer...In 1979-1980, companies would hire a trained chimp if he could code...

[slayda]

Ironically, in the USA, the law makers had to explicitly specify in the Affirmative Action law that it did not violate previous Anti Discrimination laws in order for it to not be overturned in courts.

Personally I maintain that instead of 2 groups (A & B where group A seems to have had the advantage in the past) there are really 4 groups Aa, Ab, Ba, & Bb where in the past Aa & Ba got the jobs/promotions (perhaps not equitably) and Ab & Bb did not. So to correct the problem we do not punish the Aa group for having the advantage, we punish the Ab group instead.

To me that seems like punishing one of your sons because the other son cheated your daughters. This is not "reverse discrimination" it is "discrimination", plain & simple.

I doubt anyone in the "black community" would agree that we need to increase the number of white athletes in the Olympic field & track area because blacks have an overly large proportion of participants.

[Elfwreck]

I agree with Steve--the idea addresses some horrible imbalances, but the laws as written were designed to address the imbalances that existed decades ago. We have not fixed the imbalances, but they have changed, and those laws no longer seem to fit the job and education worlds as well as they did.

I'll believe it's "reverse discrimination" when Congress is over 35% people of color. That's when I'll believe that people are actually being selected for their jobs based on ability, without undue regard given to race. While I don't believe elected officials should perfectly follow the nation's general demographics, I'm also not buying that somehow, white males, who are barely over 40% of the population, are somehow so innately qualified for leadership that they just happen to be elected to 85-95% of the nation's highest decision-making positions.

Note that when Sotomayor was chosen for the US Supreme Court, it was questioned whether she could make decisions "without undue influence from her own personal race." But nobody asks whether white candidates are unduly influenced by their race... it's as if we're supposed to believe that "white" is a default, neutral condition, and only being different from that is "racial."

Affirmative action brings the awareness that race exists to a lot of white people who like to think that "race" is something that belongs to "those other people." It's perceived to be unfair, because many of those white people think that the previous conditions were fair, that if there's no outright hatred and overt discrimination encoded in law, there is no racial bias in decision-making, nor in the background that leads up to those decisions.

A bias towards spoken dialects that were taught in neighborhoods that, for over a hundred years, fought to keep any people of color out, isn't considered to be racist; it's "preference for good education." A bias against dialects that sprang up in ghettos isn't bias against race... it's against the ignorant, right?

[Sparrow]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Why not? It doesn't suggest they have to be exactly alike. Multiple people being equally suitable for the same job is easy, depending on the listed qualifications (mind you, there's often some estimation involved, especially if neither meet the exact qualifications).

In the UK, much of the debate has focussed on the (un)likelihood of having identical candidates, in the sense of being exactly alike.
It is easy to 'weight' the discrepancies to get the candidate you want. For example, some employers say they can't afford to hire women who might go off on maternity leave. So they look for the distinguishing characteristics of their applications, and apply the appropriate assessments to justify turning them down for other reasons.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Sparrow

For example, some employers say they can't afford to hire women who might go off on maternity leave. So they look for the distinguishing characteristics of their applications, and apply the appropriate assessments to justify turning them down for other reasons.

That's happened to my wife in the past, here in the U.S., so I know whereof you speak. No, things are certainly not perfect yet, and we all have a ways to go before we achieve that.

Many of the arguments against AA are essentially claims that the law is "intentionally unfair" to those whom it is not designed to benefit (namely, in most cases, European males). Although AA has never been perfect, it's intention was never to give people jobs who did not deserve them, regardless of how the laws were written or their results interpreted. They were designed to give those whom the system openly or silently refused to serve on unfair grounds, the chance to get ahead on fair merits.

However "fair" the AA laws have been, there is no denying that they have had the profound effect of integrating our workforce, something that America needed on a psychological basis: What better way to prove that we are all the same, than to demonstrate how well we can all work together? This very fact has served to transform America on a basic level, to the extent that we can now sensibly debate whether AA laws need to be changed or abolished. What kind of a country would we be if those laws needed to stay the same as they'd always been?

But there are still people in America who look down on other people for purely superficial and specious reasons, and who deny those people things they should otherwise have access to. America is still not 100% "fair"... and probably never will be. That's why laws, like the AA laws, are needed: Because, if you live in this country, everyone is supposed to have an equal chance at Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.

(FYI: As I often do this time of year, I watched 1776 at home. It helps to clarify the point of this country to me, and why we do the things we do (or should do the things we should do).

[Jaime_Astorga]

If you want an idea of just to what length institutions will go to in order to be perceived as "diverse," just look at the 'shops below. When "diversity" is in such high demand, it is a sad but foregone conclusion that affirmative action will be implemented.





Incidentally, Cory Doctorow's article on the second image can be found here.

[Greg Anos]

Hmmm.....I'm going to give a concrete example that occurred in 1974, then I want to ask a coupe of questions.

Slum school, barrio of south San Antonio, Texas.

Two students.

Student A - Father was a low level manager, wife worked. First son was in the top 4 of talent the class. Modest extra-curricular activities.

Student B - Parent went broke in 1955. Father worked as a flight line mechanic. Mother had suffered from chicken pox encephalitis, with resulting organic brain damage. She was unable to work. Family income 1/3 of Family A. Third son did as much, if not more extra-curricular activities. Student B was also in the top 4 of talent, and had superior SAT scores...


One of these students was a minority. Which one?

One of the students got a free ride to Yale. Which one?

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by Jaime_Astorga

If you want an idea of just to what length institutions will go to in order to be perceived as "diverse," just look at the 'shops below. When "diversity" is in such high demand, it is a sad but foregone conclusion that affirmative action will be implemented.

Those both look like examples of places trying to *avoid* affirmative action by claiming a diversity that doesn't actually exist. In the second case, it's pointed out that the actual demographics are plenty diverse--but the stock photography isn't, and it's easier to photoshop a change, than to find a picture that shows the diversity they want.

That's the reason for affirmative action--because a lot of businesses are quick to say "of course we support diversity! Look at [program X]!"... as long as the diversity doesn't involve actual inclusion of people of color. Fictional inclusion is fine; no white person had to give up his seat at the game for that; no photographer had to find a mixed-race family to photograph.

That's the crux of the matter: jobs and education are not infinite resources. If some people are being squished out of them by discrimination, and that's to be rectified, some people who are currently secure will have to be excluded. A great deal of the anti-AA rhetoric sounds a lot like, "how dare someone make it less likely that I (or my children) have access to this?"

Claiming all jobs should be merit-based only is a nice idea, but it's not true. If it were, credit unions where the clients are all entirely phone-based wouldn't require female workers to wear skirts and hose and banks wouldn't require suits (there's nothing about a t-shirt that makes a person incapable of punching buttons, or untrustworthy in handling money). If jobs were entirely merit-based, you'd see a lot more overweight newscasters. AA acknowledges that the decisions aren't always based on merits, and forces employers to notice qualified candidates they might've passed over through unthinking bias towards "how it's always been."

Education should be merit-based, too. When college applications don't ask for gender, race, or the location of high school, and only look at grades and the application essay, perhaps I'll consider them to be merit-based. AA is a method that allows them to acknowledge unconscious biases and work around them, rather than trying to remove all bias-inducing data from the process, which would leave universities in a position of holding a lottery every year among qualified candidates for lack of specific information.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

Hmmm.....I'm going to give a concrete example that occurred in 1974, then I want to ask a coupe of questions...

My answer:

So... the world isn't a perfect one after all. How 'bout that?

Now, if the kid who'd gotten a "free ride" to Yale had had a 1.9 average...

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

My answer:

So... the world isn't a perfect one after all. How 'bout that?

Now, if the kid who'd gotten a "free ride" to Yale had had a 1.9 average...

Or got into Medical school with .5 less GPA???


That's the nasty point. AA is it's own form of racism, and always has been. It's just that the formerly oppressed group is now receiving the bennies - in the name of fairness. OK, if 40 years isn't enough, will 400 be? 4000?

Now, the terms of correction for past errors could have (and IMHO should have been) defined on economic terms (at least in education). This would have still disproportionately benefited minorities, closing the gap, but it would not have racist in it's definition. The idea that and work and achievement mattered even more, because you could accomplish things even if you were poor.

But after 40 years of playing the Race card and the White Guilt card, to say this is to make one be treated as someone to the evil side of Lucifer....

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

AA is it's own form of racism, and always has been.

No, it's not. Racism is the prejudice that members of one race are intrinsically superior to members of other races (Princeton), encouraging actions accordingly to maintain their intrinsic superiority.

AA laws are designed to compensate for the racism that still exists in this country. Give it a thought for a minute: White men wrote those laws. They were not created by Black men to "put Whitey in their place," as so many would like to believe.

Calling AA "racist" or "reverse-racist" is just a knee-jerk reaction to the law by people whom it has not directly benefited, or who may have lost an opportunity that they believe might have otherwise gotten--but notably, it is rare that are they able to prove their assertion.

And it is an indication of the continued existence of racism in this country that the law in some form is still needed. Think about this: The discussion is about Affirmative Action. That includes, race, color, sex, nationality, sexual preference, and religious preference. How did it become centered on race?

[Bilbo1967]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

No, it's not. Racism is the prejudice that members of one race are intrinsically superior to members of other races (Princeton), encouraging actions accordingly to maintain their intrinsic superiority.

AA laws are designed to compensate for the racism that still exists in this country. Give it a thought for a minute: White men wrote those laws. They were not created by Black men to "put Whitey in their place," as so many would like to believe.

Calling AA "racist" or "reverse-racist" is just a knee-jerk reaction to the law by people whom it has not directly benefited, or who may have lost an opportunity that they believe might have otherwise gotten--but notably, it is rare that are they able to prove their assertion.

And it is an indication of the continued existence of racism in this country that the law in some form is still needed. Think about this: The discussion is about Affirmative Action. That includes, race, color, sex, nationality, sexual preference, and religious preference. How did it become centered on race?

I would agree with most of the above, however, the fact that AA, or 'positive discrimination' (an oxymoron if ever I heard one) as it's called in the UK, is described as being necessary to compensate for the racism that exists worries me.

I don't for one second deny that racism exists - it surely does - but if all we do is pass laws to compensate for it, then all we are doing is exacerbating the problem and potentially disaffecting innocent people with good intentions in mind.

Racism (or any form of discrimination) is an evil that needs to be tackled at root cause, not legislated around to mitigate the symptoms of.

[pshrynk]

Originally Posted by Bilbo1967

I would agree with most of the above, however, the fact that AA, or 'positive discrimination' (an oxymoron if ever I heard one) as it's called in the UK, is described as being necessary to compensate for the racism that exists worries me.

I don't for one second deny that racism exists - it surely does - but if all we do is pass laws to compensate for it, then all we are doing is exacerbating the problem and potentially disaffecting innocent people with good intentions in mind.

Racism (or any form of discrimination) is an evil that needs to be tackled at root cause, not legislated around to mitigate the symptoms of.

I think that a case can be made that AA does attack the root cause by decreasing the "strangeness" of associating with those who are not like us.

[Sparrow]

Originally Posted by pshrynk

I think that a case can be made that AA does attack the root cause by decreasing the "strangeness" of associating with those who are not like us.

I think that is a good point.
One of the best arguments I've heard for positive discrimination is that employers tend to hire people like themselves; not through any deliberate prejudice, but because it's human nature.
This results in the perpetuation of inbalance - positive discrimination might be a way to break the log jam.