It's worth bearing in mind that if affirmative action helped his father become a doctor, it also prevented someone else's father from becoming a doctor. I wonder what that person could have achieved.
Better to just remove race all together, and e.g. require college admissions by law to be judged without knowing the applicants name or ethnicity.
To me as an outsider, the US focuses wayyyyy to much on race. Race really does not matter, and no matter how much the US claims to be racism free, the degree to which it is focused on just proves that the US isn't free of racism. Even asking for ones race or ethnicity in my country would be considered descriminatory as there can be no purpose for collecting that information that isn't descriminatory.
Discriminating based on race (among other things) is forbidden in the constitution, and that is absolute.
It's not even reversed racism, it's just plain old racism. The only difference is the targets of the racism are European descended and Asian descended people instead of African and Latin American descended people.
In America, the socioeconomic class of people of non-white races has been systematically kept as low as possible, through racist systems. Affirmative action (race based admissions quotas) is one tool to breach that ceiling.
In an already racist system, doing something like economic class based support (example: 20% of college admissions need to come from poor households) would just mostly go to the privileged race and perpetuate the systemic racism.
Your post is also an illustration of what white privilege can look like. I know you said you’re not American, but the tone matches to a T. White people don’t realize the negative effects of racism on others and others family history and can’t even conceive of it. From having cab drivers not willing to pick you up, to not getting a job or being passed over for promotions, let alone going to schools that are under funded. And as a side effect of that racism towards non-whites, white people benefit by getting the can, the job, the promotion, the good schools that the non-whites, but equally qualified did not.
And as the head paragraph states, that gets embedded into society in the socioeconomic trajectory of the family.
According to this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_groups_in_the_U...
The per capita income for "whites" in the US is $36,962
The per capita income for the following groups is higher than that: Indian, Taiwanese, Japanese, Chinese, Korean.
Similar results for median household incomes.
I couldn't easily find the data but I've seen previous reports of sub-groups of "blacks" that also have higher median incomes than whites (as a group). Ahh, here is an article talking about the success of Nigerian immigrants, as an example. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/23780231211001...
Please explain how to reconcile this data with your statement.
I don't know what's right or wrong really but I can say that the rapidness of the shift was definitely shocking to me. There's a lot of disagreement between Gen X, Millenials and Gen Z on the topic because of it.
Believe me, this has been considered and tried in various contexts. The problem is that in the end schools and companies find out that they don't achieve the "right" mix of ethnicities and genders and so it's back to square one.
Minorities, like the Uyghurs, were exempt from the 1-child policy and they got extra points on the national college exam.
It is, but it is an attempt to right a wrong, which isn't an easy thing to do or measure. It's a moralistic endeavor and moralistic endeavors can become monsters in their own right.
>To me as an outsider, the US focuses wayyyyy to much on race.
It's become a political football, because of this, I think it's perpetuating it more than it would be naturally. Morgan Freeman articulated this well many years ago.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpnpIhqSLto
>Even asking for ones race or ethnicity in my country would be considered descriminatory as there can be no purpose for collecting that information that isn't descriminatory.
It's funny, this is done to ensure that historically oppressed races are measured for success / failure. It seems to support to your reverse racism comment.
>Discriminating based on race (among other things) is forbidden in the constitution, and that is absolute.
I agree, that's why AA was struck down. It's a clear violation of the 14th amendment. This was known at the time and known in the early 2000's (2003?) when this came up before. It's always been considered an emergency measure that would need to end because it was a clear violation of equal protection under the law clause of the 14th.
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
Even Clarence Thomas is referred as “the second black Supreme Court Justice”
Every time you will see this first black baseball player, first black governor, first latina… as if it were an achievement instead of an indictment on the country
Affirmative Action is talked about as positive discrimination, but it is still discrimination none-the-less.
Every decision is discrimination. Basis and purpose is what matters.
That is true, which is why it is illegal in my country to discriminate based on things that you are. In my country, we value equality and believe that everyone should be treated fairly and without discrimination. Laws are in place to protect individuals from discrimination based on factors such as race, gender, religion, age, disability, and other protected characteristics.
Discrimination based on who you are, such as your inherent traits or characteristics, is considered unjust and contrary to the principles of equality. The focus should be on a person's abilities, qualifications, and merits rather than factors that they have no control over.
I don't think Anatole France really had thought things through when he wrote that quote...
Snooping at your comment history, you're talking about Finland?
In general, there are massively fewer people sleeping under bridges in places that get seriously cold. How much of this is just climate?
(Ex: in the US, Boston and San Francisco have very different numbers of people sleeping rough, while both being very liberal places for the US)