One possible way to end Affirmative Action?

[Tmy]

Affirmative Action says that we need quotas for people of certain races. In other words, we need to discriminate on the basis of race.

.

Find me an AA program that has quotas? If there are then its cuase they were found to have discriminated in the past and the AA is a remedy for that.

AA is not forced on any school/company. If it is then its cause they had previously did wrong.

 

[BillyTK]

Find me an AA program that has quotas? If there are then its cuase they were found to have discriminated in the past and the AA is a remedy for that.

AA is not forced on any school/company. If it is then its cause they had previously did wrong.

Aren't quotas illegal in the US?

 

[Tmy]

Aren't quotas illegal in the US?

I think so. I seem to remeber soem cases where police or fire departmenst were required to hit a certain %. But that was a result of lawsuits. Not really an AA program.

 

[kerfer]

This is my last explanation of all this, so whoever doesn't get it, too bad I guess.

Let's use a race as an analogy for society.

Okay, lets. It's a flawed and faulty analogy, but okay.

BTW: I'm ignoring your condescending attitude.

I also note that you didn't address my assertion that AA is racist...which is the only thing that I said in the post that you replied to.

Our system works on competition, just like a race.

Let's say that everyone starts on the same line and the race starts and everyone runs the exact same speed. In that case no one will pass anyone and it will be a tie.

But in a real, actual race, inthe real,actual world, don't you think that everyone would really start on the same line, and some contestants will run faster than others, and the fastest runner (the athlete most qualified for this event) will win the race?

That's how it's been in all my races lately.

Let's say that we have a race where one person gets a 10 foot headstart and everyone runs the same speed, we can expect then that the person with the headstart will be the first across the finishline and lead by 10 feet.

If somene starts behind another person in the race the only way they can catchup to the other is if they are actually faster, i.e. more competative. So if you start at a disadvantage the only way to imporve your position is if you are actually better than the competition and in that case you still may not catchup, depending on how far back you are.

Now back to the real world, where some people will run faster than others. If you give person A a head start and he crosses the finish line first, and person B finishes in second place, by 3 milliseconds, does that mean that person A is a more qualified athlete? No, person B is the more qualified athlete, but person A gets the gold. Hmm...that doesn't seem fair to me.

Now let's say that instead of actually having the race, everyone lines up, and based only on the color of the contestants shoes, a winner is selected. Does that seem right?

The problem with this is that the contestants can choose the color of their shoes, so perhaps we should change that to something they can't choose, like the color of their eyes, or hair, or skin. Is that right?

Note that the winner of the race is selected without the race even having occurred.

That's Affirmative Action.

Or, perhaps, there's one team that always seem to win, due to several reasons...they have better training facilities, a great coach, and a larger student population from which to choose a team, perhaps. Without trying to put words in your mouth, it seems as though you'd have that team carry a canoe, just to make it fair.

That's Affirmative Action.

I would suggest that the other teams need to train more, get a better coach, etc, so that they can compete fairly and competitively. Oh. And actually run the race.

"I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." -- M.L. King August 28, 1963

That's all I'm trying to say.

AA, as a concept, is counter to this.

 

[Tmy]

Think of AA as a controled burn. Techinically its a forest fire. And burning forests is not a good thing. But your fighting fire with fire, the point is to prevent a big out of control blaze. So the result is a good thing for the whole forest.

We tend to simplythe whore AA thing. Its not like "YOU HISPANIC ,YOU IN". As for the "best qualified". See my eairler posts about that notion.

 

[kerfer]

Find me an AA program that has quotas? If there are then its cuase they were found to have discriminated in the past and the AA is a remedy for that.

AA is not forced on any school/company. If it is then its cause they had previously did wrong.

Okay, perhaps, quotas is a bad choice of words. But they just call it something else. A certain percentage of applicants to certain jobs/school slots/other opportunities are filled not on merit, but are ensured to be filled by perhaps not the most qualified and deserving applicants, but rather a set of applicants who fit a particular profile, based on their race.

They don't call them quotas. They can call them potatoes, if they want to, but a rose of a different color would still smell the same.

And I disagree that present racist discrimination policies are a remedy for past racist policies. To argue that is to argue that two wrongs make a right.

 

[Tmy]

How do you measure merit?? I think its false to say they did not get in based on merit. You make it seem like the shools just grab the first black guy that walks by the school.

How do you fix past (and present) racism? Do you have a better solution. Its not like the racism is this one time event that has no bearing on the future.

Do you really belive that people who are hired are the most qualified. That if you replaced the human services officer wh another person, they would hire the exact same applicants?

I dont think thats realistic. For example go down to the local police departemt. Im sure youll find people who are related or who come from a family of cops. There are all sorts of tests ect. top becoming a police officer but they dont just hire on the test. If your dad was a cop, theyll get you in. Fair?

 

[Dancing David]

Why worry about white people? The groups AA harms are the groups being "helped".

Remember AFDC? Who got "helped"? Unless you wanted to breed what is now 4th generation rioters.

Uh gee hamme I thought you knew your history better than that, the school lunch program and eventually the AFDC was started becuase there were too many recruits who were four F during WWII due to malnutrition.

I suppose a fed rioter is better than the starving rioter.

And AFDC dies under Clinton, there is now a five year limit on TANF, so all those poor people will become the responsibilty of the states soon.

Shame on you. Promoting starving and homeless children. I suppose you think the postal service is a joke too. Oh well , I also worry about the old people who don't apply for foodstamps and are malnourished.

I always find it amazing that it was the arch conservative LBJ who started the Great Society!

 

[JAR]

Didnt you here? According to the 10,000 people didnt get into Harvard last year the reason was because their slot was taken by an AA case.

Life is a breeze when you have brown skin. That's why tanning salons are so popular.

My dad told me that the guy in the news called Geraldo(I think that's how you spell his name) has said that he isn't really Hispanic. According to my father, Geraldo said he changed his name to an Hispanic one because he felt that in this modern world of politically correctness, having an Hispanic name would help get him jobs.

[Edited to Add: A person on this page:http://jumptheshark.com/g/geraldo.htm says that Geraldo's birth name is Gerald Miguel Riviera, so the claim that he's not Hispanic might be a myth, assuming his birth name is Gerald Miguel Riviera.]

 

[Malachi151]

kerfer

You confirmed my suspicions.

Well, first of all you totally did not understand the analogy at all, which was a very simple analogy in the first place, so I guess that now I have to explain that to you as well. I'll try to dumb it down more for you as much as possible

The startign positions refer to realtive socieoeconomic status of groups in America, in this case races, but it can apply to any group. The speed of the racers refers to the level of success of the groups in our economic and social system. If a group starts out well behind everyone else, as blacks did then even with no descrimination at all we would expect that group to stay behind forever, unless that groups was actually more successful the the rest of society. If that group is equally as sucessful as the rest of society then they will simply maintian their position wherever they are at. The average performance of any individual in society will result in no change in ther socieoeconomic status. If are are born poor and do average you will die poor. If you are born rich and do average you will die rich. If you are born poor the only way to become rich is to perform significantly better than those people who are already rich. The only way to ever move up in society is to perform better then those above you in society.

So for a group of people who were about 90% in poverty about 5 years to move up into the ranks of equality with whites, they as a group would have to actually outperform whites, i.e. come from behind.

Now back to the real world, where some people will run faster than others. If you give person A a head start and he crosses the finish line first, and person B finishes in second place, by 3 milliseconds, does that mean that person A is a more qualified athlete? No, person B is the more qualified athlete, but person A gets the gold. Hmm...that doesn't seem fair to me.

Exactly the point. Duh.

The point is that blacks as a group have been started out way behind the rest of society. They started out as the lowest class of people in America by a long shot.

From that position, way for behind, the only way for them to catch up to the rest of society is if they are better than everyone else, OR if they are given assistance.

The fact is that we have not all started on the same starting line. Whites started off with a huge head start. From that position we can expect that even when people are given equality under the law everyone's relative positions will stay the same in society unless A) the people who started behind are actually better then the rest of society and can catch up on their won due to being better then the others, or (B) the race is restarted with everyone on the same starting line, or (C) the people who started behind are given some kind of boost to help them catch-up.

You're so off base in understanding what I'm saying that I'm not going to waste more time on the issue. I've already explained it in previous posts, if you don't understand sociology, that if the fault of your teachers and yourself, not my fault.

 

[c0rbin]

A certain percentage of applicants to certain jobs/school slots/other opportunities are filled not on merit, but are ensured to be filled by perhaps not the most qualified and deserving applicants, but rather a set of applicants who fit a particular profile, based on their race.

That's something that people like to mythologize about AA--that somehow the bar is lowered.

Universities get thousands and thousands of applicants who meet the criteria for acceptance. It is only good for a society to spread the opportunity around--to give a minority a chance.

White people aren't going to suffer unless they shirk the investment that is inclusion--and that's in the long run.

JAR, are you worried that you won't be able to attend a university because of AA?

 

[hammegk]

Uh gee hamme I thought you knew your history better than that, the school lunch program and eventually the AFDC was started becuase there were too many recruits who were four F during WWII due to malnutrition.

Can you cite a source for that assertion?

http://www.lectlaw.com/files/fam11.htm

Between 1960 and 1988, the number of births
to unwed mothers doubled.

......In 1974, Senator Russell Long perceived a connection
between "fathers who abandon their children" and a growth in AFDC spending. This led to the original federal child support and paternity legislation enacted in January 1975, as Title IV, Part D of the Social Security Act.

What group do suppose had a doubling of unwed mothers? The easy fix was "1 bastard, zap you're sterilized". Too bad the chance was missed. You think AFDC did anyone any favors? I don't.

I suppose a fed rioter is better than the starving rioter.

DEAD rioters at least stop recidivism.

And AFDC dies under Clinton, there is now a five year limit on TANF, so all those poor people will become the responsibilty of the states soon.

Shame on you. Promoting starving and homeless children.

The "plight" of a black in the USA today is so incredibly much better than the fight for day to day survival faced by much of the worlds population, that it makes their compalints -- and continuing inability to join the first world -- an absolute farce.

I suppose you think the postal service is a joke too.

Actually yes, basically because the people hired seem incapable of doing useful work.

I always find it amazing that it was the arch conservative LBJ who started the Great Society!

Yeah, his descent into insanity was tough to watch.

 

[c0rbin]

The "plight" of a black in the USA today is so incredibly much better than the fight for day to day survival faced by much of the worlds population, that it makes their compalints -- and continuing inability to join the first world -- an absolute farce.

AA wouldn't apply to someone in th "world's population" outside of the US.

 

[Dancing David]

Can you cite a source for that assertion?

You think AFDC did anyone any favors? I don't.

The "plight" of a black in the USA today is so incredibly much better than the fight for day to day survival faced by much of the worlds population, that it makes their compalints -- and continuing inability to join the first world -- an absolute farce.

I will have to research the start of the food assistance programs, I heard a military historian talking about how there was a twenty percent 4-F because of malnutrition during WWII

AFDC does favor to the children, the way the system was set up was a mistake but the children still need the help. The parents shouldn't get cash, but there should be ways to help the kids.

AFDC /TANF mainly benefits people with children, I am not sure what it has to do with race, it is socio economic.

 

[JAR]

[snip]
JAR, are you worried that you won't be able to attend a university because of AA?

I'm a lazy worthless kind of person which is exactly the type of person that affirmative action is designed to help.

I wouldn't go to a university because I would flunk my classes and it would be a big waste of money. I also don't want to get a job, because then I would have to work, which is something I don't like to do. But don't tell my parents that because they pay the bills and still think I'm actually attempting to go somewhere with my life.

 

[JAR]

There's two types of people who like affirmative action. They are con-artists and shmucks.

 

[c0rbin]

I'm a lazy worthless kind of person which is exactly the type of person that affirmative action is designed to help.

Sheesh.

There's two types of people who like affirmative action. They are con-artists and shmucks.

Sheesh, troll.

 

[Malachi151]

The "plight" of a black in the USA today is so incredibly much better than the fight for day to day survival faced by much of the worlds population, that it makes their compalints -- and continuing inability to join the first world -- an absolute farce.

Again. Do you say then that this is a genetic situation that cannot be fixed by social engineering? Are you saying that blacks are simply racially inferior for modern society and cannot be helped and are simply doomed to be the lowest class of American society no matter what?

There are only two things that determine development, genetics and environment.

Genetics cannot be changed (well , sort of), but environment can be. Are you against changing the black environment in ways that are thought to improve their social situation?

What is your recommendation then, knowing that people are a product of their environment, to help blacks improce their socioeconmic status in America, which was, aferall created through the process of slavery and oppression after slavery, which didn't really begin to stop until the 1960s.

 

[Malachi151]

I'm a lazy worthless kind of person which is exactly the type of person that affirmative action is designed to help.

Ahh, yes, AA is designed ot help lazy worthless people. You don't even have any idea what you are talking about.

Of course I assume then that you think that Colin Powell is a lazy worthless person, I think he'sa liar, but not lazy, after he is worth around $30 million. He did get where he is today becaue of AA, which he acknowledged. Would society be better had he perhaps not been helped nd instead been a low wage ditch digger?

 

[JAR]

I'm a lazy worthless kind of person which is exactly the type of person that affirmative action is designed to help.

Ahh, yes, AA is designed ot help lazy worthless people. You don't even have any idea what you are talking about.

Of course I assume then that you think that Colin Powell is a lazy worthless person, I think he'sa liar, but not lazy, after he is worth around $30 million. He did get where he is today becaue of AA, which he acknowledged. Would society be better had he perhaps not been helped nd instead been a low wage ditch digger?

I don't think Colin Powell is a lazy worthless person. I'm wrong that affirmative action is supposed to help lazy worthless people, although it does a portion of the time. I do know that I'm a lazy worthless person and that affirmative action and welfare are my only hope to get anywhere in life. But I don't intend to go anywhere, because I don't like work. I could live under a communist government and I'd take good advantage of it by being lazy, skipping work and getting paid just as much wages as my hard-working comrades.