Affirmative Action programs: Good or Bad?

[Immortal Goat]

I hate Affirmative Action programs. Not that I do not agree with what they stand for, but it is NOT a good way to go about doing it. Take this situation. A company is hiring for one, and ONLY one, position. A white man and a black man go out for the job. The white man is more qualified, but because the company is not meeting the required quota of minority employees, they hire the black man instead. How is that right? Tell me honestly, now. If you agree with Affirmative Action, tell me how that is right?

[GAsux]

Affirmative action is wrong, but not for the reason you've cited. You will lose the whole "it's not fair to white folk" argument every time. Because it's not supposed to be fair to whites. Affirmative Action isn't intended to create equality individually, as in your example. It's intent is to level the board across society as a whole and compensate for discrimination minorities currently face.

And again, it's not wrong becuse Joe Whitey didn't get a job he deserved in Podunk, Alabama because they gave it to Tom Blackie instead. That's beside the point.

IMO it's wrong for two reasons. First, although the Supreme Court disagrees with me, I don't believe it's constitutional, beneign or not. Race based classifications in law are just wrong, if you ask me. And that's what AA is, a race based classification.

Second, I believe that AA is it's current form has marginal value. It only affects a small percentage of minorities, and has virtually NO impact on the most disadvantaged people who need the most help. Additionally by using race as a classifiying factor, it will continue to serve as a flashpoint for both whites and blacks and will never end or even relieve racial tensions.

To me, using AA to create equality is like using your spare tire to fix a flat. It's a temporary fix that doesn't solve the problem. And we've been using the same spare tire for 30+ years now.

[Immortal Goat]

I hadn't thought of those reasons, but you, too make a valid point. I still think it is not fair bacause of the reason I said , but yours work too.

[CaptainBubba]

AA is wrong because it is government enforced racial discrimination. Simple as that.

Goat: You continually say that you believe the most qualified should be hired, regardless of any other factors. Who is to judge who is most qualified? How would you suggest it is decided who is hired for jobs and who is not?

[O71394658]

I don't support Affirmative Action in the least bit. I believe its a fallacy and an inherently rascist part of the American system.

Not to mention the fact that "De Jure" segregatio was ended with Brown v. Board of Ed., and the respective Amendments, AA itself is a perfect example of rasicsm (also being Unconstitutional).

Some people call it "reverse segregation" or "backwards rascism". Instead of subjugating minorities, it instead subjugates them hidden over the facade of giving them assistance. For instance, take two people. Let's use the Joe Blackie and Tom Whitey analogy just used. Just say they want to work for a major corporation. Let's just call it 07 Inc. Now, the people at 07 Inc. have to pick between Joe Blackie and Tom Whitey. In using Affirmative Action, the corporation itself is saying, "Without Affirmative Action, this black man will not get hired. Because he is black, he is automatically below the white man in terms of getting a job." AA is telling minorities that they cannot get good jobs without help. This defies the whole concept of equality in America.

[GAsux]

Bubba,
That's exactly what I'm getting at. It took two hundred years of social legislation to REMOVE race based classifications from the legal system. AA puts it right back. AA allows the fine folks on the Supreme Court to determine what is "beniegn racism" and what is not. What happens when the court is filled with bitter angry white men who decide they've had enough of the darkies? Or when the court is filled with blacks who decide to "stick it to the man"?.

Race should not be a factor in any legal preceeding in my opinion.

[Immortal Goat]

Originally Posted by CaptainBubba

Goat: You continually say that you believe the most qualified should be hired, regardless of any other factors. Who is to judge who is most qualified? How would you suggest it is decided who is hired for jobs and who is not?

Simple, that is why we use resume`s, to show how qualified for a job we really are. If we do not have the required skills, or have less experience doing something than someone else, then that will show up on a resume`.

[CaptainBubba]

So, just to get this right. You belive there should be some uniform system of resume which can be measured in terms of quanity, (as quality is an abstract concept which would require an actual decision by the employer) and those who wish to be hired simply present their scorecard and the one with the highest score gets the job? Explain in more detail. If your "qualified employee" program hopes to be taken seriously it has to have more detail than simply, "thats what resumes are for".

[Immortal Goat]

It is really a simple concept, Bubba. Resumes should be looked at for only a few things, not race, creed, or even sexual orientation. They should be looked at for the amount of time in a relevant field to the new job opportunity, the legal history of job hopeful (such as arrests and soforth), and then the previous employers need to be called and asked about this person's reliability and more importantly, ability to get the job done right. Yes, I know that companies supposedly do this already, but the fact that AA exists proves that it is NOT being done often enough, and that people are getting special treatment due to race and gender.

[Jeanette X]

That is a very general question Evil Robot. Are we talking about hiring minorites over whites, hiring quotas, or job opportunity, or what?

[GAsux]

What if person lied? Or even just embellished the truth a little? God forbid someone not tell the complete truth on their resume!

According to my resume, I helped defeat communism. That should put me ahead of most of my peers right?

[Vibecrewangel]

What about the interview process? Should that be completely eliminated?

Resumes get you in the door, but the interview is what gets you the job.

[theapportioner]

1) It is naive to think that eliminating race-based classifications from the law will eliminate them from society. The contribution from affirmative action to racial divisiveness is trivial, and I would argue that racial divisiveness would be exacerbated if such a program were removed.

2) Meritocracy is an illusion. There are plenty of deviations from the ideal (as if the ideal could possibly be commonly agreed upon), and for various reasons, people myopically obsess over affirmative action.

3) Affirmative action, though flawed (and it is flawed), promotes diversity, something that is supremely essential in this interconnected age.

4) Choosing between eliminating affirmative action and keeping it, it is better to keep it, in spite of the flaws. And even better to improve upon it, to engender diversity rather than racial niches.

[GAsux]

Have you ever had a shitty boyfriend/girlfriend that you knew wasnt great for you? You know, the type you know you could do better than? But you stay with them, thinking it's better than nothing so you'll keep it until something better comes along? But than nothing better ever really comes along because as long as you have a bf/gf your not going to meet/get a better one?

That's sort of the argument your making. My point is, you don't have to have one or the other. Why not find a program that DOES work better and DOES meet all those societal needs rather than hanging on to a process that doesn't do much good and is admittedly flawed, just because it's "better than nothing".

You're never going to get that working system as long as you keep being satisfied with the current crutch.


**EDIT** Also, you're right. It is niave to think that eliminating race from legislation will eliminate from the minds of men. I'm not sure who's arguing that. I said there is no place for it in law because according to the constitution and various pieces of subsequent legislation, laws should be created with equality in mind and not racial, ethnic, religious, gender, sexuality classifications in mind. As a result, racism is SOCIETY's problem to fix, not the GOVERNMENTS. Until society takes ownership of the problem, government legisation will never be anything more than a band aid.

[theapportioner]

What do you propose is better? Bush's "affirmative access" program is, in my estimation, worse.

[GAsux]

I'll be the first to admit that I don't have a clue. But here is my thought.

Let's use college admissions as an example. The idea behind AA in college admissions is diversity. So question #1 ought to be, why is there no diversity in schools? Is it because white college administrators are preventing minorities from attending? I don't think so. I think the common argument is that admissions standards (ie. GPAs, standardized tests, etc) unfairly discriminate against minorities who typically are schooled in substandard educational programs, therefore they aren't able to compete favorably against white peers. Hence the need to "level the playing field" by allowing different standards for whites and minorities.

What I'm saying is that this in essense is a crutch that avoids the root of the problem and as a result will never solve them. I do not propose any specific social program to enact the change, but I'm thinking that the focus ought to be creating a time in the future when minorities ARE competitive with whites, and therefore no longer need the the government or administrators to give them a boost.

This, in my mind, is the ideal situation. To find away to ensure that at an elementary/secondary education level, all students regardless of race or economic standing are receiving somewhat comperable educations. This will allow minority students to have the same educational tools that whites have, and allow them to compete favorably against whites ON THEIR OWN merits.

I would think that by attacking the root of the problem, it would benefit all the side issues. Again I am hardly intelligent enough to solve the problem, but it seems to me that we're focusing our energies on stop gap measures like AA instead of finding a way to eliminate the problem entirely.