Time To Scrap Affirmative Action?

This link makes the case.

http://www.economist.com/news/leade...be-colour-blind-time-scrap-affirmative-action

quote:
“…a study found that at some American universities, black applicants who scored 450 points (out of 1,600) worse than Asians on entrance tests were equally likely to win a place.”

“…affirmative action reduces the number of blacks who qualify as lawyers by placing black students in law schools for which they are ill-prepared, causing many to drop out.”

“…people can be 87 times richer than the average American family and still be deemed “disadvantaged” if their skin is the right colour.”

“…such rules, once in place, are almost impossible to get rid of.”

Taxcutter says:
The link author couched the case in international terms but I focus on the US case.

If it hasn’t worked in a half-century, when will it ever work?

 

Even though affirmative action comes from a good place, it ultimately hurts everyone more than it helps. You can't legislate any kind of long term quality change within struggling minority communities. That change can only come from within with a change of attitude. If you really want to help these people, reach out to them on a personal level. Get involved in their communities and interact with them face to face. Show them that you care by working with them directly. This will have a much greater positive impact than simply voting Democrat and then going back to your life for the next four years and not thinking twice about them.

Stop trying to give them training wheels and throw money at them. That's not what they need. They need personal empowerment. And every time you lower the standards for them and treat them like children, you're doing exactly the opposite.

 

Or as Justice Roberts so elegantly stated it,

 

So should we stop providing 'affirmative action' for children of alumni?

 

Actually going from the OP/Ed piece to the actual article- it says it may have worked- but it may be time to end it.

Diverse opinions

Real progress was made during the era of affirmative action. A 1998 study conducted by William Bowen and Derek Bok (former presidents of Princeton and Harvard) found that in 1960 5.4% of blacks between the ages of 25 and 29 had graduated from college; by 1995 that share had jumped to 15.4%. Blacks went from barely 1% of law students in 1960 and 2.2% of medical students in 1964 to 7.5% and 8.1% by 1995. They almost doubled their representation among the nation’s doctors and almost tripled it among America’s engineers and lawyers.

That being said- it may be time to end the last remainders of affirmative action- I would be for it if we scrapped the 'affirmative action' many universities still have for children of alumni.

 

Yes, and the rights explosion.What a shame it's too late for this place.

 

Are you kidding? With all the racists we see on boards like this one? We are a long way from a "colorblind" society and IMO we will probably always need some form of affirmative action to make up for it.

As SFJeff pointed out, there is evidence it has in fact made a big difference in improving the black middle class.

 

This is absolutely correct...We do a lot of church ministry work helping those in need, and it means getting your hands dirty. Go to their house, or quite often their "ghetto" or homeless shelter, get to know them, let them know that there is more out there...quite often these people unfortunately get into such a rut that its hard for them to even figure out where to start to get their life together...sometimes all they need is a little inspiration and a short rope to help climb out of the hole their in so that they can get up and running. in my experience, its mostly church groups and ministries that are willing to take on this "hands dirty" approach, most other groups just want to give them 10 bucks and walk away...give a man a fish...
We worked with one family for over 4 years, trying to help them get it together, we learned after a while that they had no intentions of trying to improve their life, but just wanted free stuff. we continued to stay involved with them because we had gotten to know them and their children and where worried about the children. We would bring them clothes, diapers, formula, food etc. primarily to make sure the kids where okay. eventually DCF decided to remove the children from the home and was going to split them all up into different foster homes. We didn't want to see them all get split up so we took them all...that was about a year ago. they where 5 yrs, 2 1/2 yrs., 18 months, and 3 months old. I can assure you, with all those diapers, that my hands got real dirty every day, but I wouldn't change a thing. Just throwing money at them just keeps them in their bad habbits and in their poor decisions.

 

Now THAT's what I'm talking about! God bless you, man. That's awesome.

If more people would really get active and do stuff like this, we'd see monumental improvement over time. This is the right course of action for helping toward prosperity.

 

But what about all those white females, hispanics, or native americans that use.....oh nevermind, I forgot that people here see Affirmative Action as " African American"...

 

How about we expand our education system up through the graduate level so that everyone who wants an education can get one without acquiring a lifetime of debt? Then we can get rid of Affirmative Action and never look back.

 

Affirmative Action is one of America's most important assets. Without it, America would have no black or female medical doctors, scientists, etc. America would have no black or female military officers.

 

I think its kind of a mindset that unfortunately most, or at least many, don't have. Just this morning I was standing at the end of my driveway getting tools and materials in my truck when a guy came walking down the street talking on his cell. just as he got right at the end of my driveway, just a few feet away from me, I overheard him saying "I don't know what the name of this street is but its the first right after...", so I looked up and said "its ******* road". "What"? he said, "I said the name of this street is ***** road"...."Oh thanks " he says, then he finishes his conversation and comes over and starts talking to me. Within one minute of our conversation he professes to me "I'm a drunk and a drug addict and I'm staying at a recovery house up on new haven ave but I'm 4 months clean and sober". Now I would guess that at this point in the conversation most people would try to politely end the conversation and turn their back on him and walk away, but thats just not how I roll. At that point I expressed to him that I too was an alcoholic and drug addict but that I've been clean and sober for about 12 years, we then talked for about 20 minutes and my beautiful wife of 15 years handed him a booklet about Christ and salvation, and I wrote in the book, our names, our address, and "Tuesday nights @ 7:00". I then explained to him that he was welcome to join us on Tues. for dinner and a bible study. Hopefully he will come.
My point to all this is that if I had just given him 10 bucks, maybe it would buy him lunch, or maybe it would have enabled him to give in to his addiction as he walked past a package store.... But I didn't give him that, what I gave him was a half hour of my time, what I gave him was my respect, and in congratulating him on his 4 month achievement hopefully I gave him some shred of dignity, and what I offered him was a home cooked meal and 1 night a week of good solid fellowship, friendship, and some biblical wisdom and guidance. It would have been easy to just hand him 10 bucks but he needs, and deserves, much more then that.

 

There's a special place in Heaven reserved for people like you. You've inspired me just by reading this. In fact, this might be the best post I've ever read on this forum. I'm going to do something awesome for somebody else tomorrow. I don't know what yet, but I'm just going to reach out to a stranger and try to put a smile on their face. This is too cool.

 

You are saying 1 of 2 things with this post... 1. The majority of Americans are sexist and or racist, 2. Minorities and women aren't good enough to get ahead on their own skills without affirmative action. Either one is BS and thus so is your post.

 

Awesome...maybe we will start a trend. What do they call it? the "butterfly effect"? LOL

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agreed

 

But that would require that these leftist (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*)s get off their lame asses and do something other than occassionally vote for a black guy provided he doesn't ahve an R after his name. You can't help people by buying there souls at tne cents on the dollar with some one elses money.

 

"How about we expand our education system up through the graduate level..."

Taxcutter says:
How are you gonna do that without increasing the already intolerable level of government spending?

 

.The last time I did the numbers, it is a scant 20% of the population that are on the SACRIFICIAL side of Affirmative Action (male, white, culturally Christian, non-Hispanic, law-abiding, middle class,.....). (The THEM to everyone elses US, If you will.

Any form of Affirmative Action should be stopped immediately until this segment is sufficiently represented in government,
.
.

 

White males are not sufficiently represented in government? By what measure?

 

White males in the government (political class) (or their kids, or anyone who throws them a few bucks,,,) would NEVER be on the sacrificial end of AA. It was easy to pass on the blood libel to other peoples kids, not their own.

I'll amend my definition to include "unconnected". Thanks

 

Without Affirmative action there would be no African socialist President. He made his way through Harvard because of Affirmative action, and without that resume American's would have never elected him President.

So a conservative Supreme Court may scrap Affirmative action when it comes to their table, although the Chief justice did allow Obama care to pass.

 

White males are not sufficiently represented in government? By what measure?

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Another racist post. You're on a role.

Feel free to prove that Obama got into Harvard because of AA.

 

If Dorthy Boulding Ferebee M.D. were still alive, she may disagree with that.
If Samuel L. Kountz M.D. (performed the first successful kidney transplant) were still alive, he may disagree with that as well.
If Dr Charles Richard Drew (The first Director of the Red Cross Blood Bank, and Chief Surgeon at Freedman's Hospital) were still alive, he may disagree with that too.

Perhaps Madam C. J. Walker (the first female self-made millionaire in American … not just black) might have some ideas as far as Affirmative Action is concerned, and what it takes to achieve your goals in life.
Maybe Percy L. Julian (Master's Degree from Harvard, PhD for the University of Vienna) could have given us some insights on Affirmative Action instead of figuring out how to synthesize cortisone to treat arthritis and inflammatory diseases.

Believe me when I say the list could go on for days ...

It is a shame we can't ask them because they were dead long before “Affirmative Action” was well under way.

 

Let's not forget that today's AA is no longer equal opportunities but equal results, an impossible dream.