RE: Answering pro-affirmative action comments.
Robert McIntosh (McIntosR@nwrel.org)
Mon, 1 Jun 1998 08:45:50 -0700
John,
It's so easy for white males to take an anti-affirmative action
position. It's so easy for them to rail against the injustice of it
all, to complain about how unfair a system that doesn't treat all people
equally is. It's so easy for them to ignore the 400 or more years of
blatant and pervasive affirmative action benefits they have received in
this country. Affirmative action in all phases of life, from education
to jobs to housing to business loans. You name it. Meritocracy is a
myth, John. Your father and all his white friends and his father and
all his white friends and you, have all benefitted big time from a
system of affirmative action for white men. So, what is justice? What
is fair? What constitutes compensation? How do we balance the scales?
Do you have a suggestion that would bring about true equity?
Sure, two wrongs don't make a right. But do we just continue to
perpetuate a system in which white males hold all the power and make all
the decisions. I can just hear you, a white male, saying "Why not?"
Well those of us who have been the victims of 400 years of
discrimination are fed up, that's why not.
Bob
McIntosR@nwrel.org
>
> Since when does your race matter? My final comment is that I hope
> that true
> equity is achieved by the choices of each and every human being living
> in
> the United States, not by a courts mandate or a bureaucrat's whim. My
> dream
> is for an America in which no man or woman raises his or her hand
> againt
> another. Something that we definitely will have to do if we are to
> ever
> compete in the world market. Our foreign competitors won't even use
> or care
> about affirmative acction; they'll just care about burying us by our
> own
> tools.
>
> John Meyer (libertarian)