Time To Scrap Affirmative Action?

True in the fact that to the small minority of us on the victim side of AA, the "Anti-Discrimination" laws (equally mis-used) are simply AA's, eviler sister, but racist?

I may have missed a post or two, but there seems to be near universal agreement that AA in and of itself has merit, but has been taken too far in some cases, fix it and keep it.

So where are the racists?
.

 

"Southern "Democrats" during the Jim Crow era were fundamentally "Republicans" wearing a different hat."

Taxcutter says:
They were big spenders, just as Democrats always have been.

Just because you say "Democrat = Republican" does not make it so.

 

I would actually recommend reading the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth survey results as opposed to posting charts probably created by racists using highly selective data (I was unable to locate these charts on the NLSY website and no link was provided).

Please note that employment is unrelated to IQ tests (I've never been asked to take an IQ test for employment) and the AQFT test was developed by the US military for job placement and is highly questionable in measuring the actual intelligence of an individual (i.e human intelligence remains generally undefined and lacking a definition it cannot be accurately measured). We also have no information presented on the charts that is of much value for analytical purposes related to racial discrimination in employment hiring practices and job advancement.

How about some simple statistics from the NLSY survey. For those tracked starting at ages 16-19 "Blacks and Others" (which includes ALL minorities) only have an 84% job "accession" (employment) rate of "Whites" and have a "separation" (lay-off) rate 163% when compared to "Whites" in Table V. Less likely to be hired and more likely to be layed-off from a job.

http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsb2254.pdf

In actually reading the NLSY survey results where race is addressed the results of racial discrimination in employment are highly evident.

 

We still have the false claim of "coercion" by government related to Affirmative Action.

AA only affects a small percentage of all private sector employers (i.e. government contractors and subcontractors) and no educational institution is required to comply with the AA guidelines.

We still no documentation to date of any lawsuits filed by the Federal government based upon failure to comply with Affirmative Action so where is the coercion?

Over 90% of private sector employers aren't even required to comply with the Affirmative Action guidelines so where is the government coercion?

Affirmative Action does not advocate reverse discrimination so where is the coercion?

The "government coercion" argument appears to be completely mythical as there appears to be no evidence that actually supports the claim.

 

Why would someone blame "Affirmative Action" for the few cases were there is enough evidence to support a lawsuit based upon "racial harassement and discrimination" addressed by the anti-discrimination laws if they didn't have racial prejudice? Affirmative Action does not relate to the anti-discrimination laws, period. They are two completely different issues.

Racial prejudice is growing in America today (increased from 49% of the population to 56% between 2008 and 2012) and while racial prejudice does not imply over racism it does affect our actions. While racial prejudice is not limited to any specific group (32% of Democrats expressed explicit anti-black racial prejudice) it is overwhemingly a "social-conservative" trait (78% of Republicans expressed explicit anti-black racial prejudice) and it's the "social-conservatives" that are continually demanding an end to Affirmative Action and making false claims about it in their arguments.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2012/10/27/poll-black-prejudice-america/1662067/

If the opposition to Affirmative Action isn't a reflection of racial prejudice (i.e. racism) then try to explain it in other terms.

Certainly Affirmative Action can be improved and it should be. It affects so few people today that it is, as expressed in an earlier analogy, like trying to bail out a sinking boat with a coffee cup but not fixing the hole that's letting the water in. Affirmative mitigates the effects of racial prejudice but in such a small manner and can't address the problem at all. Affirmative Action needs to be improved to eliminate the few problems but it also needs to be expanded as it covers virtually no one today. When only 125,000 people are effected per year while adversed discrimination effects many tens of millions of people daily Affirmative Action simply isn't doing enough.

When it comes to the problem of invidious racial prejudice it's up to us, the American People, to address but living in denial of the fact it exists is the first problem we need to overcome. If we end the prejudice then we can eliminate Affirmative action and that needs to be the goal for all of us. As I mentioned it's very similiar to government welfare that mitigates the effects of poverty. If we want to reduce/eliminate goverment welfare we need to reduce/eliminate poverty (or privately fund charities so that they can mitigate the effects of poverty instead of government doing it).

Address the PROBLEM and when it comes to Affirmative Action the problem is individual PREJUDICE.

 

Affirmative Action is racial discrimination.

If it did not affect people in large numbers, it would not generate the resentment it generates. 125,000 is a statistic. It fits disraelis dismissal as being something beyond a "damned lie."

Beyond the numbers you "125,000" underestimates, Affirmative Action discriminates hardest against people who bust their hump to get ahead and favors goof-offs. Even in small numbers that is as counter-productive as policies get. The old USSR's biggest problem was that it favored party hacks over producers. Viz: Suppression of the kulaks. Affirmative Action is analogous to the suppression of the kulaks under Lenin and Stalin.

 

Look what it produced. An incompetent lying alien in the White House.

 

Discrimination against whom?

There are no statistics indicating any discrimination against "whites" related to either education or employment in the United States and Affirmative Action does not endorse reverse discrimination against "whites" in employment or education. "Preferential treatment" for one person does not imply discrimination against another person.

 

This leads me to question whether there is a direct connection between the racist birther conspiracy theories and opposition to Affirmative Action........

 

I actually had doubts about those charts that were displayed. I did find them at a NLSY site but any chart showing Blacks doing better than Whites income-wise doesn't agree with any other survey. The selection process has to be suspect. The survey seems to use disadvantage youths who have never gotten into trouble. I am sure that it is harder to find disadvantage black youths that have never gotten into trouble than it is to find white disadvantage youths. Also I think that blacks are weighted with inner city youths where whites are weighted with outside city youths.

The blacks in the inner city without problems would be overachievers while the whites could be average kids in suburban or rural settings. Any survey that follows a group as they age can be useful but I do not see this one as really having that much to do with race.

 

Why do you keep using the number "125,000". That was the number who answered questions. Out of that group only 12,000 fit the criteria that those who were performing the survey. you have to look at the criteria to determine what the survey is for.

 

“Discrimination against whom?”

Taxcutter says:
Whites and Asians, mostly.


"Preferential treatment" for one person does not imply discrimination against another person.”

Taxcutter says:
In any zero-sum game that is exactly what is implied.

 

If there was no affirmative action, there would be no President Obama or Supreme court justices Clarence Thomas or Sonia Sotomayor.

These great leaders came from preferential treatment, so it is positive discrimination rather than negative discrimination as intended here.

 

Positive or negative, discrimination is discrimination.

In any zero-sum game, positive discrimination equals negative discrimination.

 

You say:

If the opposition to Affirmative Action isn't a reflection of racial prejudice (i.e. racism) then try to explain it in other terms.

How about respect for the Bill of Rights?

It's a very slippery slope, letting the Government take away rights for any reason, even if you think it's a good one.

.
.

 

There are numerous problems with such surveys some of which are noted. As I also noted IQ has fundamentally nothing to do with employment or income anyway and the charts related to IQ which is fundamentally an irrelevant criteria to use related to employment and income. Why would someone post a chart based upon an irrelevant criteria being applied if it isn't being done to rationalize racial prejudice?

We know that law enforcement is highly prejudical against African-Americans so the statement that more "blacks" have criminal records than "whites" is highly accurate. We can also note that in a general survey that the sample size for a minority is proportionately smaller and less accurate. For example in the survey mentioned the statistics for "whites" are roughly seven-times more accurate than for African-Americans just based upon demographics of the population. For accuracy the same number of "whites" and "blacks" need to be compared in identical situations such as the "hiring" statistics where resumes, interviews and criminal records were the same for both and that study reflected that a white person was 2.4 to 3.4 times more likely to be hired than a black person when all factors except race were identical.

 

Please provide the scientific studies that reached a conclusion that Asians and Whites are discriminated against in the United States related to employment. We have literally dozens of scientific studies establishing discrimination in employment related to women and African-Americans so please provide any reconginzed scientific studies that establish discrimination against Asians and Whites in America today.

If there is discrimination against Asians and Whites in the United States then prove it by providing scientific evidence of it existing.

While at it also provide any evidence of the US government filing a lawsuit against a private enterprise based upon enforcement of the Affirmative Action guidelines. I've found many lawsuits related to violations of the anti-discrimination and harassment laws but I've never found a single lawsuit based upon enforcement of Affirmative Action. This would be especially interesting if such a lawsuit existed related to a "small business" because "small business" reflects the vast majority of private employment in the United States.

Bottom line if there is government "coercion" related to Affirmative Action, which has been repeatedly claimed, then prove it by documenting lawsuits by the government to enforce it.

 

If there is no coercion, why can Affirmative Action not be ignored?

 

It's time be honest and stop using the ridiculous Orwellian euphemism "affirmative action" and call it what it really is, institutionalized racism.

 

Well, something needed to be done for a society shaped by oppression and injustice; and I think that no one with any good sense thought that it would be 'painless'. Affirmative Action is surgery/medicine... not meant to be "pretty" per se, but effective. After all, how does a nation right the kinds of wrongs we can name in our history? And what would be the ultimate consequences of NOT trying to correct and reconcile such grave sins as those which came before?

That is BS and you should realize it.

 

Every job opening is a zero-sum game. One winner, everyone else is a loser. Discriminate for one and against the others.

Why was MLK, Jr.'s vision of a color blind society so impossible? Jim Crow is gone and we've tried "reverse Jim Crow" for half a century. Why not let government go neutral?

 

"Time To Scrap Affirmative Action?"

how about some Affirmative action against foreign outsourcing

.

 

Agreed, Its time for the West to try something different, imo

* no min wage
* negative income tax
* full private education and health using voucher system
* get private and lobby group money out of politics
* reduce govt handouts to business and red tape restrictions
* reduce corporate tax

Much out of the Friedman/ Sowell school of thought, but i think they're spot on. Nobody spends your money more efficiently than you, hence the voucher schemes allowing you to purchase the health/ education you see fit.

No min wage by itself would seem certain to fail with the high welfare (no incentive). However the negative income tax replaces those entitlements, gives everyone a set amount no matter how much you earn. For example get -10,000 when you earn 100k you get taxed on 90k. Earn nothing you get 10k. While that might not be enough to cover everything you want as a low skilled person you can now go out and work for $5/h (40h per week) for another $10,400 per year. Now the low skilled person is in the workforce and gaining skills for which makes them more valuable. This would be very beneficial for those that struggle for high grades at school for whatever reason.

Then of course, think of all the industry that would come flooding back!

A level playing field for everyone and recognize different people have different strengths/ weakness. Not good at school but a strong work ethic - this gives realist path into the middle class and possible small business owners due to the boom in economic activity. AA is a useless racist tool that address nothing.

 

Is Affirmative Action not an example of what old English law called “corruption of blood.” Corruption of blood was a penalty passed on the heirs of one described in a Bill of Attainder.

http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Corruption+of+blood

quote:
“…lost all rights…to transfer any property rights to anyone, including heirs…”

“…The Constitution of the United States…by art. 3, s. 3, n. 2, it is declared that "no attainder of treason shall work. corruption of blood…”

Taxcutter says:
Affirmative Action approaches a “corruption of blood.”

Under Affirmative Action a person is discriminated against, not because of his/her own actions but by either someone in the past discriminated (Jim Crow) or some other nebulous class of people indulges in discrimination.

Corruption of blood is specifically and explicitly forbidden by the Constitution, and is unheard of in modern statute.

Affirmative Action says to the job applicant: “Back in your great-grandfather’s day somebody discriminated against “colored people.” Therefore to balance that out we arer allowing you to be discriminated lo! These many decades later. That nobody claims you personally discriminated or even any of your forebears could be proved to discriminate is irrelevant. Somebody discriminated back then so the penalty must be paid today.”

This is the rankest injustice. No wonder the Framers forbade corruption of blood. That the corruption of blood is done by administrative means rather than legal means is not particular important (in the aggregate). It is still being enforced by some form of the coercive power of the government and it is still injustice.

Even under draconian Tudor law,a corruption of blood required treason as cause. Today's job applicant is treated as badly as the progeny of English traitors.

 

Related to the vast majority of private enterprises in the US Affirmative Action is ignored because it doesn't affect them at all.

Since Affirmative Action affects so few enterprises, doesn't really cost the taxpayers anything, doesn't impose any significant cost burden on enterprise, there is no statistical evidence of reverse discrimination, and is actually beneficial for the enterprise then why does anyone oppose it.