Posted on 02/24/2005 10:51:15 AM PST by billorites
Confusion over Africa and its relationship to black people in this country may be coming to a head very soon. We now find that more Africans than ever are immigrating to the U.S. and that their presence may dramatically change the discussion on affirmative action.
Over the years, affirmative action has become a free-for-all grab bag that anyone who is not white - or not male! - can use as a precedent for special treatment by the government or the job market, especially where public funds are distributed. That is not, however, how affirmative action was conceived, rightly or wrongly.
Almost a decade ago, I attended a conference called by then-Vice President Al Gore, in which many people spoke on issues of color and ethnicity. One of the most important was Richard Goodwin, who had been involved with affirmative action when it was conceived.
Goodwin said affirmative action had been applied in a number of cases that were not part of the original mission, which was to address the fact that only one group in America had spent more than 200 years enslaved and that its descendants deserved some consideration because of that. It was not intended for people from India, from Africa, from Latin America, from Asia, the Caribbean and so on.
To many, this is a jarring argument because, during the intellectually fuzzy 1960s, black nationalism took such a strong position that there was an aggressive argument for black people to deny their American experience and reach out for Third World identification. Black Americans were supposedly displaced Africans whose identity had been hidden from them.
The impact of this thinking is directly behind the problems that black Americans, especially those in what is called the underclass, face with growing emigration from Africa. Now the threat is coming from their African cousins - not from their brothers and sisters. Actual Africans, hot with immigrant ambition, could now become another "model minority" and displace black American low achievers.
As actual "African-Americans," they could take advantage of affirmative action, which would make even more obvious the limitations suffered by those in the black underclass who are not motivated.
Affirmative action will continue to be discussed, but the debate over American identity is just beginning.
It will be revealing to see just how soon black Americans begin to realize that their American experience is unique and has little to do with the limited subject of color alone.
When black Americans actually throw away sentimentality about Africa and begin to assert their historical identity as Americans and elevate their aspirations along the lines of drive we find common among immigrants, we will see our country improve remarkably.
A refreshingly blunt article.
Sucks to be whitey...
The vast majority....quite a few mulattos.
The whites were exterminated in one of the many bloody episodes of Haiti's early independence.
But, I never thought that affirmative action would lead to a new form of discrimination where anyone with some claim to a different skin pigment would go to the front of the line no matter where they were born or whom they were descended from. I never envisioned ghettos populated with crack addicted children having babies that would always be dependent on the government and the liberal politicians for their very existence.
BUT LIBERALS did! LIBERALS ALWAYS DID!!!
But, I never thought that affirmative action would lead to a new form of discrimination where anyone with some claim to a different skin pigment would go to the front of the line no matter where they were born or whom they were descended from. I never envisioned ghettos populated with crack addicted children having babies that would always be dependent on the government and the liberal politicians for their very existence.
BUT LIBERALS did! LIBERALS ALWAYS DID!!!
This just goes to show that one of worst (among many) problems with our current, largely accidental, and most unwanted policy of unending mass immigration is its collision with racial preferences specifically, and affirmative action generally (I say that because even if there is a preferences-less aff action program, it makes no sense to offer special outreach to people who choose to come here of their own volition).
I think what happened back in the late 70s was that the pro-preferences crowd realized the 'correcting past wrongs' rationale just wasn't going to cut it for immigrants who could not point to slavery. So they then came up with the 'Diversity Rationale', whereby they said achieving diversity was a compelling state interest, so much so that it justifies the use of prefernces against native-born whites.
Now, it seems it is also being used against native-born blacks.
To grant to people the privilege of immmigration to this country, and then favor them over native born groups in the name of diversity is insane, but thinks to Sandra Day O'Connor that now has the official approval of our high lords on the Sup Court. Well, actually, she simply allowed for it instead of mandating it, so legislative and popular tools can still be used to ban preferences.
Its funny how conservative supporters of unending mass immigration, like the WSJ, President Bush, et al, never address this obvious collision between immigration and preferences. To the extent they do, they ususally offer up the solution of getting rid of preferences, but keeping mass immigration; and that would be fine if not for the inconvenience that the latter reinforces the former by increasing the numbers eligible for them, and thus the politicians who support them.
It lessens the accomplishments of intelligent, hard working blacks when the left continually assumes these blacks couldn't have possibly achieved what they have without a white liberals help.
BTTT
You are of course right about the cloud affirmative action places on non-whites, and that should be listed as one of the reasons to get rid of it.
But it is not the most important reason. There are plenty of poor-lower middle class white kids in this country, who have no more of a head start in life than their black and latino counterparts of the same economic status. The unavoidable message of the diversity rationale is that it says that the presence of these white kids on a campus is less valuable than that of a non-white kid, even if the white kid has equal or greater academic merit. This is pure discrimination.
The GOP should not be afraid of pointing this out, as it is a much more powerful indictment of racial preferences than the one you mention, valid as it is.
Good. Then there is some hope that the progeny of American slaves may finally perceive once more that they are simply American rather than forcing the public to continually see and acknowledge their color code.
The verbiage has been interesting. I believe we have been required to call them by a string of different apellations over the many years of my life. Strange thing is, there was not more dignity in any of them over the simple term "American" which is the right for which at least some of us would die.
Why are you trolling FR? Do your own research. Don't troll people into race discussions. Bad etiquette, you look foolish, feel lucky this thread didn't turn into a large discussion.
Not everyone... many Haitians are black Africans, but there are the elite few who are Haitian white who either still live in the hills behind gates or have left.
I suggest less underachieving.
Your response to that freeper doesn't make sense.
My sister was in a research program for the 'financially underwhelmed'. It was a program for 'fiancially disadvantaged' and 'historically underrepresented minorities' and half the group were white students.
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