<p>Nicely put Johnwesley. I agree with your post for the most part. However, the south might still be segregated but for “activist” politicians and judges who had the audacity to interfere with state’s rights. The present Court has the “audacity of nope” when it comes to social inequality, which it does not necessarily see as social injustice. Economic freedom tends to outweigh concerns over equality in this Court as opposed to prior more liberal courts. Thus, AA is in trouble.</p>
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Doesn’t affirmative action contribute to this in some ways? I’ve heard people say “Obama is only president because of affirmative action” etc, etc. Some African Americans would rather NOT have AA so that they don’t have to wonder if everyone is thinking that they are only successful because they got an extra hand up they would not have gotten otherwise. That’s another reason why it seems to me that AA ultimately has to be an historically temporary remediation. While we may not be ready to ditch it yet, the time will come.</p>
<p>Bogney wrote:
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<p>I see your point and I agree with it. The decision in <em>Brown v. Board of Ed</em> (1954) was not sufficient in itself to desegregate the South, particularly in the wake of Massive Resistance. Someone had to fashion enforcement mechanisms and, for the most part, that job fell to district level judges, many of whom became social pariahs within their own jurisdictions. But, people were able to wrap their heads around activist courts so long as they were in someone else’s part of the country. When southern politicians rightly pointed out that schools in the North were just as segregated as their’s, it was then that the movement began to swing North, and the idea of “integration” as a worthy, or even practical, national goal was effectively ended.</p>
<p>It’s fashionable nowadays for people to argue that “the problem” starts with K-12, and certainly that’s true. But, that’s also a little bit like saying, “the problem” of the escaped horse is with the barn door. Put another way, consider the amount of time and good-will we spend discussing what? A dozen seats at a public university? Multiply that by millions of seats in public schools across the country. We are not ready.</p>
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<p>That’s the interesting thing about this country; it’s so right wing that even when a liberal policy has a proven success story, a president who successfully tracked down and executed the murderer who planned 9/11 – that he can’t even be claimed as the poster child for affirmative action that he is.</p>
<p>[White</a> Affirmative Action](<a href=“http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0625-02.htm]White”>http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0625-02.htm) - thanks for that link provided a page or two ago.</p>
<p>I see myself in it, in the education my parents and grandparents had, in the government benefits they enjoyed, in the inheritance passed on to me that allowed us to buy our first home and on and on.</p>
<p>Certainly I know that my kids can drive a nice car and are unlikely to be pulled over and searched. They can walk into a store without security following them to be sure they aren’t stealing. They are unlikely to be arrested, then unlikely to be prosecuted and finally unlikely to be sentenced for their crimes, by something like 3 to 1 over a black or Spanish kid. The mostly white area they live in has a terrific public school. My son can apply for an after school job and get an interview because his first name isn’t something like “Tyrell”. When he goes to the interview, he’s one of a sea of other white employees, he fits right in in that important way.</p>
<p>It’s definitely not about “slavery ended 150 years ago so get over it”.</p>
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<p>I’m an ORM and did not benefit from AA when I applied to school. On the other hand, I had great parents that really valued education. It was made clear to me at a young age that not going to college was not an option, and we did things like go to the library or to science museums. And even though my parents weren’t that well off, they were willing to pay for things like music lessons and a car so I could take classes at my local college, and even for my college so I won’t be graduating with debt. Both of them are college educated, with multiple graduate degrees, so they were able to help me with my homework, even when I was taking AP and post-AP classes. I did not work a single bit to choose my parents, and I’m 100% sure that if it weren’t for them, that I would not be where I am now. Does this mean that I should prefer deadbeat parents that don’t care about my future, just so that I can prove to everyone how special I actually am?</p>
<p>Perhaps it should mean that you realize how fortunate you are, and be willing to help innocent children born to less helpful parents.</p>
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<p>My gosh…I can’t imagine why!
<a href=“http://■■■■■■■.com/youreangrytoo[/url]”>http://■■■■■■■.com/youreangrytoo</a>
<a href=“http://■■■■■■■.com/youreoveremotional[/url]”>http://■■■■■■■.com/youreoveremotional</a></p>
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<p>[url=<a href=“http://derailingfordummies.com/#hostile]http://■■■■■■■.com/yourehostile[/url”>A Guide to Derailing Conversations]http://■■■■■■■.com/yourehostile[/url</a>]</p>
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<p>It’s not, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned from Republicans, it’s that you should never let facts get in the way of a perfectly good soapboxing rant - and no rant gets soapier than “Somebody think of the good white people!” It’s amazing how the accusation of racism - even when nobody is accusing anybody of such - is more offensive to a lot of people than actual racism. </p>
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<p>On the flip side, my great-grandfather was one of many black soldiers who was denied his GI Bill despite being a WWII vet. (Which, according to a lot of “good Americans,” was his fault for being born black.) I wouldn’t be surprised if other soldiers of color also had problems, and I’d also like to know about whether women were allowed these benefits. An excellent Spring Break project for me!</p>
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<p>No. Bigoted, ignorant, uneducated attitudes do. </p>
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<p>See my last point.</p>
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<p>[url=<a href=“A Guide to Derailing Conversations”>A Guide to Derailing Conversations]http://■■■■■■■.com/myblackfriendsays[/url</a>]
Trust me, most African-Americans don’t lose sleep over whether our accomplishments meet the approval of random white people.</p>
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<p>The quote below was Maxine’s quote, and that is what I responded to (particularly the first part.)</p>
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<p>Try quoting the whole thing. </p>
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<p>Now, unless all whites in America are conservative, you’re grasping at straws. Perhaps I should have said “some” conservative white Americans. (My apologizes for assuming you had common sense.) Regardless, is this not true? Which group is the group that constantly fights against affirmative action, gay rights, women’s reproductive health and fair and equal treatment in the judicial system? Which group is constantly going on and on about how America is the land of the free and anybody can get a fair shake and blah blah blah bootstraps? Which group consistently supports bloated Oxycontin addicts and treat our president like he’s a Pullman Porter? And you have the nerve to be upset because I said something about a handful of white Americans? </p>
<p><a href=“http://■■■■■■■.com/wahwahiminnocent[/url]”>http://■■■■■■■.com/wahwahiminnocent</a></p>
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<p>I’m going to assume that you had a way to and from the library, and your library had adequate (if not up-to-date materials) to choose from. Meanwhile, my mother had to take me waaaaaaay downtown to the library, even though we had one not too far up the street from our home. We were lucky enough to have a car in a place with no DART access. Plenty of lower-class children cannot say the same, and plenty who can still cannot afford regular bus fare. And this is just one thing. </p>
<p>I’m not saying you are doing this, but your post suggests that those who did not accomplish what you have come from homes that did not value education, and that leads to that tired “poor people are poor because they don’t value education” trope. I wrote my essay into my four-year school on this very subject. Living in a ‘welfare neighborhood’ (I’m one of the few who pays full rent), I can tell you that this simply isn’t true. The people in my neighborhood are very proud of me. My meager associates degrees (I wound up with two) and current student status makes me one of the most educated people in this entire neighborhood - a fact that makes me want to cry sometimes. My piddly job as a teacher’s aide in a Title I district earned me the nickname of “teacher,” even though (as I’ve explained repeatedly) I am neither worthy nor qualified for that title. I can’t tell you how parents send their children to me for tutoring everything from elementary basis to high school algebra. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Seriously, if you want to know about the kinds of disadvantages one can have just by living in a poor neighborhood, there is TONS of information out there. I’ll even get you started. The question is do you truly want to know, or are you comfortable believing that your parents’ graduate degrees and your access to the good life (Music lessons? I was handed my uncle’s old guitar and told to teach myself, which I did) truly was not an advantage from every aspect in your life from cradle to now?</p>
<p>[The</a> High Cost of Poverty: Why the Poor Pay More](<a href=“http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/17/AR2009051702053.html]The”>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/17/AR2009051702053.html)</p>
<p>As A Framework for Understanding Poverty explains, it’s not that education isn’t valued; it’s that it’s so abstract that it’s virtually useless. I’m going to school to become a librarian, which requires at least one Master’s degree. With my circumstances and if all goes well, I’ll wind up with two - a Master’s of Education and another in Library Science. To the people in my neighborhood, I might as well be studying to become an astronaut. Do you think that we have an abundance of people with graduate degrees walking around here? </p>
<p>Consider this: your child attends craptacular schools, but they can’t move into a decent district (as my parents did), so your children get subpar educations. Your parents probably have high school educations, and maybe a couple of years of college, but they haven’t been exposed to anything remotely considered a “good” education, so they wouldn’t know the difference from, say, Roosevelt High and Plano East High. They probably have an uncle who got a college degree, but that’s about it. (My mother was the first to get a bachelor’s in 2008.) My high school was about six miles away from the high school I would have attended had we not moved out, and the difference in the average SAT score was over 140 points! Look at the average SAT scores from the students in Lancaster ISD (over 70% black) and the students in Highland Park ISD (approximately 95% white). Tell me, do you think they’re getting the same education and the same opportunities as you did - or even as I did? </p>
<p>Too many people either aren’t aware of this, or they simply don’t care. They’re all for “equality”…just as long as their privileges don’t get stripped away.</p>
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<p>So why try, right?
[How</a> to Supress Discussions of Racism](<a href=“http://coffeeandink.dreamwidth.org/435419.html]How”>Captcha Check)</p>
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<p>I really wish they would reteach the Movement. I think one of the problem is that whites who participated in the Movement are taught as greater heroes and get individually spotlighted as if they are somehow more important because they are white. If education would make it clear that there are heroes and martyrs in the movement of all races who all stuck their necks out (some far more than others, obviously), I suspect that it would help race relations in schools. Of course the contributions of non-blacks is great, but let’s not pretend that overall, their lives were just as affected as blacks for doing so (or not doing so). </p>
<p>Likewise, the old trope of “that’s just the way it was back then” as a way to excuse things like slave-owning presidents and white/colored bathrooms doesn’t help, either. The existence of Quakers and Abolitionists tells us that people knew even back then that slavery was wrong. I did a report in Texas History that outlined how many whites who were against the treatment of Native Americans and Manifest Destiny. (A famous poet whose name escapes me begged a president via letter - Taylor, I think - to reconsider the actions that later became the Trail of Tears.) John Adams, our second president, was firmly against slavery, and his policies reflect this. The NAACP was started by a mixed race group, and many historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) were started by whites. The desegregation of Montgomery buses was actually voted in favor 2-1 by the Alabama courts; it went to the Supreme Court because that verdict was appealed. And so on. Those things also need to be stressed, but they need to be mainstreamed into American History, not spotlighted.</p>
<p>I think there is far too much myth making about heroes and martyrs in history generally. It makes for compelling narratives but inevitably overstates some contributions and undervalues others. Movements are collective efforts, and some individuals make obvious contributions that would go now where without the support of unknown persons in the movement. Leaders are important, but they are not sufficient for movements to succeed.</p>
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<p>This is an effective argument for socioeconomic affirmative action, but that isn’t what this thread is about. </p>
<p>Personally, I think that racial affirmative action is more justified in places which are more of an old boy’s network and which rely more on connections. I’d say this applies to hiring in jobs more than college admissions, the latter of which is based on metrics as well as subjective assessments of performance (in the classroom and in extra-/co-curricular activities.) Of course, there is something of an old boy’s network in admissions at the top places–I don’t agree with legacy admissions, so-called development admits (giving $$$ for admission), admitting the children of VIPs, etc. I guess if racial AA is meant to counteract this, then its justified in that respect. However, the groups I just named who are part of the old boy’s network are a very small subset of the white population.</p>
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<p>Along with other agendas, I’ll bet that’s mainly fueled by class. Think about it: most of our great leaders are those who had educations. But like you said, movements take groups of people, and groups of people tend to be of all races, genders, educational backgrounds, etc. The idea is put forward that if you don’t overcome and don’t persevere, whatever happens to you is your fault. This is how we could be taught that Native American decimation was “inevitable.” (This is actually printed in my textbook.) The Natives should’ve just tried harder, that’s all. Yes, it’s wonderful that a brilliant, college educated preacher came to Alabama and sparked a movement (actually, he was summoned there by E.D. Dixon, a former Pullman Porter), but the movement would not have worked without all those regular people. </p>
<p>People of color, in particular, are spotlighted as having risen from adversity to have reached great heights. That’s true, but it also stresses an idea that most young blacks had hammered in our heads from birth: This is what we went through, so you have no right to complain. So if having crack cocaine results in a sentence that is 100 times greater (literally) than powder cocaine (“don’t do drugs!”), or the curriculum in majority-minority schools is inferior than those that aren’t ([“study</a> harder!”](<a href=“http://www.forbes.com/sites/quickerbettertech/2011/12/12/if-i-was-a-poor-black-kid/]"study”>If I Were A Poor Black Kid)) or that more students of color are suspended or expelled than white students regardless of offense (“don’t break the rules!”) or were steered towards subprime mortgages despite being equal in income (“buy a smaller house!”), that’s considered complaining. One of the best ways marginalize the experiences of people of color is to simply dismiss all of these things as making excuses.</p>
<p>Strangely enough, this seems to work in reverse when it comes to pre-Civil War era. We’re taught that Lincoln was from a humble log house (he wasn’t), Patrick Henry had a slew of failed businesses (true, but he was also a slave-owning lawyer), Christopher Columbus barely had money for his ships and died penniless (false), etc. If not for that, it’s all about religion - mainly Christianity. The pre-Civil War leaders are almost always Christian and almost always blessed by God for their success. And they’re always smarter and wiser than everybody, ignoring the fact that some of them were just plain lucky. For example, the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock because [they</a> just ran out of beer](<a href=“http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2625/did-the-pilgrims-land-on-plymouth-rock-because-they-ran-out-of-beer]they”>Did the Pilgrims land on Plymouth Rock because they ran out of beer? - The Straight Dope), Columbus died thinking he’d discovered a New World, despite people living all over it, and George Washington [was</a> hardly some military genius.](<a href=“ABA Journal - Google Books”>ABA Journal - Google Books)</p>
<p>But we’re going all around the mulberry bush now. It’s largely my fault, so to get back on track, I’ll post this essay on affirmative action by Robert Jensen - a UT professor, no less.</p>
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<p>(Cue for “My grandparents were Irish and…” in 5…4…3…2…)</p>
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<p>This is quoted from your link.</p>
<p>I would agree with all of these sentiments except for the “admission to a university” and that is the subject of this thread. (BTW, to the above list I would add that treatment isn’t equal in the justice system, something which you also said.) Is it your argument that admission to a university should compensate for the other forms of white privelege? Educational disparities are largely socioeconomic, so they don’t make a good argument for racial AA (rather, they support socioeconomic AA.)</p>
<p>“have to wonder if everyone is thinking that they are only successful because they got an extra hand up they would not have gotten otherwise.”</p>
<p>I think this is the least of African or black America’s problems. Not even top 25.</p>
<p>"Is it your argument that admission to a university should compensate for the other forms of white privelege? "</p>
<p>I don’t know about Maxine’s argument, but mine is that all racial perspectives, separate from socioeconomic perspectives, are important to some in the learning environment. Not important to all, but important to some. Schools that want to supply that environment may need to consider race in admissions. This is not supposed to be another FAQ thread, so it’s not appropriate to detail why, here.</p>
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<p>I’m assuming this is a question, but I have no idea what you’re asking. </p>
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<p>Who is the most disproportionally affected by socioeconomics in America? And please don’t start on the “poor white people” argument, either, because you will be hard-pressed to argue that poor whites have it worse than poor people of color if you want to go there. If you are poor and white, you most likely live in a poor, white neighborhood - which was unquestionably gutted and ruined by the economic policies of better-off white people. Even poor whites have strength and safety in numbers, and will largely have to answer to other white people. On the other hand, being a the only black child in any random school in a middle-class neighborhood or the only Latino family on your block is by no means a rarity. </p>
<p>And again, AA largely affects white women, not people of color. Nobody will touch this - why not? Only about a quarter of UT is black and Latino in the first place, and that’s WITH AA. And aren’t people complaining about too many Asians as well? Additionally, nobody can explain why Abigail isn’t upset with the white students who were “underqualified,” just the darker ones. Not to mention that all of this only affects the incoming freshman class, not students as a whole, nor does it affect student of any race going to college - merely students not being selected for their choice school. *Bawwwww, I wanna go to UT, Daddy, and I want to go [NOW!](<a href=“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRTkCHE1sS4]NOW![/URL][/I”>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRTkCHE1sS4)[/I</a>]</p>
<p>This entire AA argument boils down to one thing: there are too many young people of color going to college, and it’s obviously because they’re unqualified and taking spots away from white students. It must be stopped!</p>
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<p>Let me rephrase my question, though you may have read it before I edited it.</p>
<p>My question is: do you believe favoritism toward minorities in university admissions is justified because in other parts of life (e.g., treatment by justice system, getting loans, etc.) they are disadvantaged?</p>
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<p>So the fact that the parents of poor white kids in the ghetto answer to rich whites means that it is easier for them to do better in school and on standardized tests than poor minorities? This is a very weak argument.</p>
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<p>This seems to imply that affirmative action is justified because it is a form of retribution or punishment to the white race as a whole. This is a different idea than the notion of creating a level playing field.</p>
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<p>The two bolded quotes contradict each other. First you say AA is not about sending more kids to college, just to a more selective school. Then you say that people object to AA because they want less people of color going to college.</p>
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<p>I read the link you posted but since it’s labor-related, I wonder if this is the case in U admissions or just the labor market?</p>
<p>I ask because right now, women are having a slightly more difficult time than men in all but STEM admissions. There are simply more women applying to college with good stats than there are men with the same stats.</p>
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<li><p>Unequal treatment by the justice system needs to be (further) addressed whether we have AA or not.</p></li>
<li><p>Since a college education is one of the best ways to increase your income, I’d say yes. You’re less likely to need a loan and more likely to qualify for one if you have that.</p></li>
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