Yours is an interesting point. It’s patronizing to minorities tom insinuate that they need preferences. No one picks up on this. There is extremely little racism against people of color any more, especially by whites.
The whole idea was that they needed a leg up a while back (not so much for “past injustices” as much as the lack of opportunities at the time); the leg up has becaome an institutionalized crutch as generations of blacks, Hispanics, and women pass through higher education and can still use what the government seems to consider their apparent genetic disability to be overcome by legislation.
It has made things difficult for those in the “disabled” classes who actually belong there; they are treated as less serious tokens who are simply hired to keep lawyers at bay. Inflating school grades or employee evaluations for this purpose, while seemingly financially beneficial to the recipient, in the long run do a lot more harm than good. When times get tough, the least productive workers are let go, and that often includes a lot of people who may not have been qualified to begin with. White males have to work harder to keep their jobs and earn their pay, and the result is a much better white male workforce than the victims of the soft bigotry of lowered expectations.