Archive for date: September 26th, 2014

This week’s reading was very interesting. I am still trying to process my thoughts about it. Before the reading I felt that Affirmative action, while not entirely fair, is necessary in America. I feel that it is needed because there are still many prejudice infrastructures in American companies that disqualify minorities from opportunities in the workforce.  I am referring to situations where qualified individuals are rejected on the basis of gender and, or ethnicity. I am not referring to the caricature of affirmative action that gives a minority a whopping advantage over an equally qualified white male. I do not believe that in any situation the minority is given a huge advantage. I do  have to recognize the fact that if two people are equally competent it is unfair to give that position to a minority simply because they are the minority. I recognize the problems with affirmative action, but still find it useful. I do not think that the reading has changed my opinion, but rather given me more to reflect on and opened my eyes to the complexity of this issue.

Is affirmative action unfair? I would argue no. I brought up the point that it is unfair to give someone a position for being a minority over a non minority, and it is, I am not contradicting myself. The problem is that while the scenario presented above may occur it most often does not, in fact the opposite is what realistically occurs, it is for this very reason that affirmative action was created. The intentions of affirmative action are to create an even opportunity, not an advantaged opportunity, for the minority.While there are scenarios such as the case of the Regents of The University Of California v. Baak (who was not admitted to the University of California at Davis in spite of his academics to leave room for minority applicants) we can not ignore the fact that in other scenarios, such as finding employment, the majority of the time Baak has and will be chosen over those very minorities that were admitted into UCD instead of him.

It is important to note that the largest beneficiaries are not people of color, but women. Also the second largest group of recipients of affirmative action are middle, and upper middle class people of color. The evidence of these two groups being largest beneficiaries of affirmative action is important for two reasons. Firstly because it deconstructs the argument that inept people of color are being handed opportunities that they are not fit for. People of middle and upper middle class status, and women in America are generally educated, so it is unfair to argue that they are given these opportunities without merit. Secondly this evidence tells us that affirmative action is not enough to create equal opportunity, education is. If minorities are not meeting the required academic results needed to receive higher education America needs to fix inequalities in education at a much earlier level and stop attempting to take shortcuts.