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"The Republican Party chose the first black national chairman in its history Friday, just shy of three months after the nation elected a Democrat as the first African-American president."
--http://www.realclearpolitics.com/news/ap/politics/2009/Jan/30/gop_elects_first_black_national_party_chairman.html
So now, in one way or another you could say that both major political parties in the United States are being led by a black man. This caused me to ponder the future of and the need for race-based affirmative action in this country.
Now, this thread should not be a debate over whether or not there are racists in America still. There are plenty of people who hate Catholics, Mormons, Jews, LGBTs, and any other subgroup you could name. The question is whether racism is still such a strong force in our country that the government must require institutions to accept or hire a certain number of minorities even if the institution feels there are not enough qualified applicants of that race.
Lets focus on affirmative action as it is now, namely using quotas and race as the dividing factors which President Obama has stated he is against:
I still believe in affirmative action as a means of overcoming both historic and potentially current discrimination, but I think that it can't be a quota system and it can't be something that is simply applied without looking at the whole person, whether that person is black, or white, or Hispanic, male or female. --Barack Obama
Here is a poll and I want to hear all opinions.
Poll: Race-based affirmative action should be..
(Vote): Eliminated. Decisions should not be based on one's race
(Vote): Kept the same. It is having good effects.
(Vote): Kept but significantly changed.
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Sadly I'm too ignorant to have a justifiable opinion on this.
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I'm not American but i think that affirmative action is a really bad idea.
Why the government should help more a poor black guy than a poor white ? It should help both or none to be fair.
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I heard some shit on Michael Steele this afternoon on NPR. They made a lot of reference to the barak the magic negro parody song on youtube.
I heard some affirmitive action stuff the other day, basically what they said was that although in the lower ranks there are much more diverse employees, still at the top it is 90% dominated as white male. So affirmitive action imo is just some bullshit corps use in order to look good. like the whole 'green' environment friendly shit they try to play off when in reality the dollar still rules (so maybe they are GREEN after all, lol).
Can someone even tell me the suggested benefit of affirmative action in the first place? It's just capitalist bullshit.
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I think affirmative action based on race, gender, or religion is no longer needed. However, there is still an argument that can be made to use affirmative action for students that come from poor areas with schools that are not as good among other disadvantages.
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affirmative action is racism, just inverted. But the fact that it's racism still holds true. Screw it. It just does more harm than good
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On January 31 2009 11:02 CharlieMurphy wrote:
So affirmitive action imo is just some bullshit corps use in order to look good. like the whole 'green' environment friendly shit they try to play off when in reality the dollar still rules (so maybe they are GREEN after all, lol).
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The company i work for (a grocery store) recycles everything they use, mostly because its cheaper to reuse all the stuff you have (pallets, shrink wrap, plastic wrap for cases, cardboard) than buy new. So for them, its like, public sees they recycle, and the public is happy they are contributing to the environment, yet the company is happy because it costs less for them, meaning they keep more profit.
I myself think that affirmative action is extremely bad for the system because it should be skill based. If a black man is more skilled at the job i do he should deserve to get it over me because of his skills, not his color.
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This reminds me of South Africa where rugby union teams are required to have a minimum black players in their side. This policy must be counter acted over time but it has had good effects because people have realised that black people actually are often very good and today the RSA team would be no where near as good without the black players. Sometimes you need to have regulation to trigger the initial change and make people realise their mistakes, then regulation can be removed.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
kept. only change if you have a replacement in place, some kind of class based aa
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I only vote for black politicians.
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CA10829 Posts
i hate race-based AA. they say it's to help minorities, but what about asians who only make up approximately 5% of the US population? imo, you can't pick and choose minorities. (and yes i'm aware of the "model minority" reasoning... it's bs.)
also, i had a few friends that were part native american in high school. they weren't stupid but they were definitely not brilliant by any stretch. and without stellar stats they got accepted into every single university they applied to. their families were well-off and lifestyle-wise, they were practically white.
i don't see why people like this should be favored over asians or whites in an applicant pool. it annoys me because i know a lot of white/asians who are lower middle class and are struggling to get by, and yet somehow they get looked over by the current AA system.
i am for socio-economic class based AA but not this racial AA bs.
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Affirmative action should of never been brought about. It's discriminatory against white people, and unfortunately a lot of people have gotten into school's they simply would not have gotten into based on merit. I mean, to me, Affirmative action always seemed to be a thing about achieving equality in America [and Canada]. But why is it even race based? Theres a lot of minorities who are doing extremely well, and a lot of whites who are not. If you are going to have ANY kind of aa form [and I dont want that anyways, but im just saying], the only one that has any degree of legitimacy is simply helping the poor, as it would increase social mobility.
I think I remember an interview a few months back, where Obama said he was going to keep affirmative action. Hopefully he rethinks the decision.
Edit: Discriminating against Asians as well. I had no idea they were not getting the benefits of affirmative action. Now thats even more ridiculous. Society had a hugely negative view of asians just a century ago. They worked hard, perceptions changed, and now they are doing fairly well off, generally. The same can be done for any other race of people. They arent anymore incapable than anyone else.
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On January 31 2009 11:26 Choros wrote:
This reminds me of South Africa where rugby union teams are required to have a minimum black players in their side. This policy must be counter acted over time but it has had good effects because people have realised that black people actually are often very good and today the RSA team would be no where near as good without the black players. Sometimes you need to have regulation to trigger the initial change and make people realise their mistakes, then regulation can be removed.
haha i hope they will do the same for white basketball players in the US.
Oh wait maybe it is retarded to pick a player because of his skin colour ?
Btw South Africa won two WC with almost full-white team except for few players ( like Habana ) who deserved to be in the team not because they are black but because they are skilled.
This new legislation is quite stupid.
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Whenever people say how affirmative action is so good in bringing minorities to higher levels a lot of facepalming goes on -_-
I don't support affirmative action, but I wouldn't mind if it was changed to help those in poorer areas. Race and especially sex-based affirmative action is retarded. We have people clamoring for greater women representation in math and science (49% is not enough!), but what about male representation in english? lol
There is a facebook group that demands that racial percentage to population should be mirrored in college admissions (idiots)
if that were true, asians would be fucked so hard. Like UCB is 49% asian and the population is 5%. If this were to happen... some P.C. AA lovers are going to get ripped a new asshole, lol
This is another example of how giving somebody a lunch is equivalent to taking away someone else's without their permission
and if there is affirmative action for "underrepresented minorities" in college and work there should damn well be affirmative action for asians in sports.
Every sports team must start at least one asian! New AA policy!
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United States20661 Posts
Asians continually screwed. Should not be race-based if it's kept at all. Socioeconomic makes SO much more sense.
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Affirmative Action should be kept, but recalibrated to favour white students. As minority students largely gain a competitive equality through being raised in abusive patriarchal households, limiting their entry into higher education will lower the parents' incentive to abuse their children.
Furthermore such a system will once again favour natural talent, over the inflated admission of en rote learners.
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It's horrible. There were discussions about affirmative action towards the handicapt. Mentally, psychologically, sensory, physicly. Where do you draw the line.
Turning someone down because he is white is just as wrong as turnuing someone down because he is black. Two wrong don't make it right but double wrong.
Hi Moltke, haven't seen you post in a while.
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On January 31 2009 11:31 LosingID8 wrote:
i hate race-based AA. they say it's to help minorities, but what about asians who only make up approximately 5% of the US population? imo, you can't pick and choose minorities. (and yes i'm aware of the "model minority" reasoning... it's bs.)
also, i had a few friends that were part native american in high school. they weren't stupid but they were definitely not brilliant by any stretch. and without stellar stats they got accepted into every single university they applied to. their families were well-off and lifestyle-wise, they were practically white.
i don't see why people like this should be favored over asians or whites in an applicant pool. it annoys me because i know a lot of white/asians who are lower middle class and are struggling to get by, and yet somehow they get looked over by the current AA system.
i am for socio-economic class based AA but not this racial AA bs.
On January 31 2009 12:00 Last Romantic wrote:
Asians continually screwed. Should not be race-based if it's kept at all. Socioeconomic makes SO much more sense.
Being Asian makes you (me) an "honorary white", but being an honorary white is about as good as having an honorary degree when it comes to any of the benefits.
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United States10774 Posts
On January 31 2009 12:00 Last Romantic wrote:
Asians continually screwed. Should not be race-based if it's kept at all. Socioeconomic makes SO much more sense.
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On January 31 2009 11:03 Bosu wrote:
I think affirmative action based on race, gender, or religion is no longer needed. However, there is still an argument that can be made to use affirmative action for students that come from poor areas with schools that are not as good among other disadvantages.
I think this is essentially what Obama's stance is as well
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EPT
