Affirmative Action - Colin Powell and Condoleeza Rice

[jameseb]

Rampant no, exists, yes.

Yes, but it will always exists in ALL racial groups. There have been white applicants turned down by black-owned companies.. in fact, there's one right here in Arkansas that suffers from that problem. However, these are never going to go away... there will always be small incidents of this happening, but I don't think Affirmative Action is needed these days. As I said before, I think it breeds resentment by those who might be disqualified from getting a job because the company had to meet racial quotas.

 

[Doctrine1st]

Are you sure? Perhaps you should look again at your post where you mock my reply to Roc.

Well my apologies if I offended you. As a black man my father taught us growing up that we would have to have a little thicker skin to survive.

For the most part, yes, I do believe that... and I'm sure it isn't hard to Google up sites claiming that its still rampant in this country.

You are free to believe whatever you wish, and just I tried my best to dig up sites that were not bent on showing that.

 

[Zoot]

I haven't read all of the responses in this post, but in my country there's a bit of a rabble-rousing attempt by a politician to get middle-class folk annoyed that people with indigenous blood can get preferential treatment for certain things. Nothing as extreme as affirmative action (though, we don't have anything as extreme as institutionalised slavery in our brief history).

Anyway, my response to "equal rights not special rights" is the same for African Americans as it is for Maori. Would the proponents of "equal rights not special rights" think that South Africa, one generation from Apartheid, should have no state policies which favour the education and employment of Black South Africans? After all, everyone has the vote now. Surely everything is equal, and there are plenty of children who weren't even alive during Apartheid.

Would you think that in 30 years' time, things will be equal enough to say "equal rights, not special rights"? How about a time in the future when there is not a single South African who was alive during Apartheid? Do you really think that things would be even then?

It's no coincidence that descendents of colonised indigenous people and descendents of slaves are over-represented in crime, in substance abuse and addiction, and poor education and poverty. It's not a genetic cause, it's a socio-economic cause. Circumstances are not now equal simply because slavery or apartheid or colonial wars ended years ago. Those socio-economic causes are a direct result of the inequality of the past.

Like international law, intergenerational justice is too abstract a concept for many average people, but it shouldn't be too abstract a concept for policy-makers.

 

[jameseb]

Well my apologies if I offended you. As a black man my father taught us growing up that we would have to have a little thicker skin to survive.

And as a Republican, its a must for me as well. Your post came across as a jab, but if I misread your intent, then I too offer you my apology.

You are free to believe whatever you wish, and just I tried my best to dig up sites that were not bent on showing that.

Its been my experience in the corporate world (and my father's own company) that corporations are going to hire the best people for the job, not the color of their skin. Profit is the bottom line of every corporation. If a pink man with purple poke-a-dots will help increase company profits, he's going to get the job. As a "white man" on the inside, I'd think I would have heard such comments from my white colleagues about keeping blacks out, but I've never seen it, nor heard of it. Of course it happens, just as it happens to whites as well, but I don't think it is common enough to warrant Affirmative Action these days. Again, this is of course just my opinion, and I would not be so presumptuous to declare it a fact.

 

[Doctrine1st]

And as a Republican, its a must for me as well. Your post came across as a jab, but if I misread your intent, then I too offer you my apology.

No need to apologize it was I who was haphazard.

Its been my experience in the corporate world (and my father's own company) that corporations are going to hire the best people for the job, not the color of their skin. Profit is the bottom line of every corporation. If a pink man with purple poke-a-dots will help increase company profits, he's going to get the job. As a "white man" on the inside, I'd think I would have heard such comments from my white colleagues about keeping blacks out, but I've never seen it, nor heard of it. Of course it happens, just as it happens to whites as well, but I don't think it is common enough to warrant Affirmative Action these days. Again, this is of course just my opinion, and I would not be so presumptuous to declare it a fact.

Well, I commend your father, however, I don't think anyone would leave a traceable record of discrimination, unless they're really stupid. But indeed, there are some of those who still have the mentality of the Texaco execs in the human resource departments across the nation. Absense of evidence is not evidence of absense.

 

[praying]

I haven't read all of the responses in this post, but in my country there's a bit of a rabble-rousing attempt by a politician to get middle-class folk annoyed that people with indigenous blood can get preferential treatment for certain things. Nothing as extreme as affirmative action (though, we don't have anything as extreme as institutionalised slavery in our brief history).

Anyway, my response to "equal rights not special rights" is the same for African Americans as it is for Maori. Would the proponents of "equal rights not special rights" think that South Africa, one generation from Apartheid, should have no state policies which favour the education and employment of Black South Africans? After all, everyone has the vote now. Surely everything is equal, and there are plenty of children who weren't even alive during Apartheid.

Would you think that in 30 years' time, things will be equal enough to say "equal rights, not special rights"? How about a time in the future when there is not a single South African who was alive during Apartheid? Do you really think that things would be even then?

It's no coincidence that descendents of colonised indigenous people and descendents of slaves are over-represented in crime, in substance abuse and addiction, and poor education and poverty. It's not a genetic cause, it's a socio-economic cause. Circumstances are not now equal simply because slavery or apartheid or colonial wars ended years ago. Those socio-economic causes are a direct result of the inequality of the past.

Like international law, intergenerational justice is too abstract a concept for many average people, but it shouldn't be too abstract a concept for policy-makers.