I remember when it was called publically "positive discrimination", but I guess it's not part of the newspeak, because everyone can see it's actually a discrimination even if you slap there "positive" to make it look better.
"affirmative action" has been in use since the early 60s, are you that old?
Easy now, I’m sure there are plenty of people on this forum that can remember the 60s.
anyway I don't get what has official name since 60s to do with how people commonly called it up until recently, at least in 90s it was frequently called positive discrimination, heck I even remember when black people could be called black and not african american
judging by the response I assume "positive discrimination" ain't mainstream anymore in the US