Why is affirmative action not racist?

Question

Is affirmative action simply not considered racist because it helps minorities and hurts the majority?

Answer 1

It is racist insofar as it purposively benefits some races over others (minorities over whites). However, the SC ruled that it was a legitimate _corrective_ policy. The need to correct racial injustices placed on minorities by whites trumps the racism inherent in affirmative action, according to the logic.

However, as a corrective policy, it should be short term (i.e., should be disengaged as soon as the problem has been corrected/replaced), and thus should not be a permanent fixture in hiring/admission/etc. We'll see how permanent it becomes, however.

Answer 2

I would say that affirmative action taken to the extreme, meaning you hire a certain quota of each race is beyond a shadow of a doubt racist (it has also been found to be a violation of civil rights). Hiring or admitting SOLELY on the basis of race would be racist. If you have a program which gives EQUALLY QUALIFIED minority candidates preference and that program only lasts for a short period of time (three to five years), I believe that it would be an acceptable way to create a more diversified workforce. I would say such a program must possess a few important details:

1. More qualified non-minority candidates are not rejected in favor of less qualified minority candidates.
2. The program only occurs for a short limited time frame.
3. Race is the LAST criteria used to hire or promote someone, after work experience, education, references, performance reviews, tenure, and interview are all considered, it is the last tiebreaker between two equally qualified candidates. In this case, race will be used to decide a hire or promotion on very rare circumstances.
4. The goal of the program should be to create a colorblind institution where race is not an issue, not to make up for past discrimination.

Answer 3

An interesting question - though I'd challenge your assumption that affirmative action "hurts the majority". Arguably, everyone benefits when society is made fairer.

And that's the key word: fairer. American society as it currently stands is not fair: the US was born was racism, and it remains a society deeply ingrained with racial prejudice and institutionalised racism. This is what you have to bear in mind when judging the rationale behind so-called "affirmative action" programmes. If the US provided a level playing-field for all its citizens, affirmative action would be utterly undesirable. As it stands, it is simply a way of trying to help up those who are disproportionately represented at the bottom. It may be racist, but that's the American way.

Answer 4

it rather is real user-friendly, if me and a white guy of equivalent qualification bypass right into a room and the enterprise is white (it rather is the case ninety seven% of the time) ninety seven% of the time the black guy won't get the interest because of the fact white people basically like white people greater advantageous. it rather is not consistently the case yet while a white guy sees a black and a white guy he's familiar with no longer something approximately the two he will generally choose the different white. this could properly be real in each and every race as you factor out, yet i do no longer locate that extremely real among the black race. specifically because of the fact maximum black people have a team of white acquaintances while maximum white people have a million black pal. Plus black persons are no longer racist like that in the time of favouring their very own race. look on the history, has black people who run significant agencies have all black workers or distinctive places of work. Even adult men like Dr. dre hire rappers like eminem or jin, non black adult men. without affirmative action the only way for a black guy or woman to get a job from a white enterprise is to be ridculously over qualified, which skill black people could desire to constantly settle for jobs under the place they could desire to be. this means that preparation isn't any longer the great equalizer interior the rustic and all of capitalism will become at disadvantages once you have communities who're going to be maximum persons (black and latin) who're habitually denied jobs they are qualified for. this means that they are going to assert this methodology is broken and that they are going to start to look someplace else as we've already seen those 2 communities are dispropotionately socialist than others. The objective of affirmative action is to keep away from the latter yet greater importantly to get rid of itself. while blacks and whites are the two employed interior the place of work, the races extremely white would be much less racists and we can get rid of affirmative action You do improve some intresting factors.

Answer 5

Affirmative action is a social program
Racism is a psychosis.

One could in-fact have an affirmative action psychosis; but it is not a absolute condition of either issues.

Go big Red Go

Answer 6

Incorrect question. Affirmative Action IS racist.

Answer 7

It's designed to counter racism. For so many years, minorities have been locked out of higher employment and schools, etc., because of their race. Affirmative action says, "you must hire/admit X number of minorities." After awhile, we whites get it through our dense heads that Blacks, etc., can do the job and aren't contaigious, and we are no longer forced to associate with them because we've gotten beyond external differences.

Answer 8

affirmative action was first created not to help minorities it was to help Caucasian women have equal rights as Caucasian men and the way it was written it just so happened to effect minorities

Answer 9

It is racism, just in another form.

It is giving preferential treatment to people. Holding one person above another is a form of discrimination. That and programs like affirmative action breed a whole new level of racism being based in resentment and frustration.

Answer 10

AA is NOT racist because it does nothing to hold any race down. It is a fact that schools do not enroll students who are not capable, and companies do not hire people who are not capable. It is a fallacy to think that white people with "better credentials" are passed over for improperly trained minorities. Do your homework--read up on the subject.

White men, just by the fact of being white men, have had tables tipped in their favor for hundreds of years...AA just wants to even that out some.