Now that the history has been told at to how affirmative action came about, it is time to discuss what is today. It's main effects are felt on the campuses of our nation's colleges and in the offices of our businesses. A clear definition of what it means should also be discussed in order to properly discuss what its effects are. Presently, affirmative action is regarded as a policy or a program that seeks to redress past discrimination through active measures to ensure equal opportunity, as in education and employment. (American Heritage Dictionary) This does not necessarily mean a quota system, but only means that race and gender can be consideration for the evaluation of an individual applying for a job or to a university. Quotas differ slightly from this in that they require a proportional number of African Americans, whites, Hispanics, women, etc., in a given corporation or university. Quotas are generally regarded as unacceptable, but until recently, affirmative action was viewed as necessary. This is a seemingly contradictory situation. This will be ignored for now though as the purpose of this paper is too explore what affirmative action accomplishes, particularly in the field of education.
The quality of our nation's universities is astonishing. The majority of the most respected experts in all field are found on the faculty of the United States' elite colleges. The students at such schools then must also be of the highest standards. True? Unfortunately, not always. Universities are subject to the same critique as corporations in that if their campus is not approximately representative of the racial and sexual composition of this country, then that university is deemed as discriminatory in its admissions policy. It has become necessary for colleges to admit minorities and women that otherwise would not be accepted to escape public scrutiny and governmental actions. This practice has certainly increased the number of minorities and women attending the best universities this country has, but what has been the cost of this practice?
When my friends and I were going through the process of applying for colleges, most of us were applying to top colleges such as Cornell, MIT, University of Pennsylvania, University of Michigan, Rice, Duke, and of course Carnegie Mellon. One friend in particular, Eric, applied to the first five of the schools listed above. He was an intelligent young man, about twentieth in our class of four-hundred with SAT scores in the low thirteen-hundreds. Also, he was involved in a variety of after school activities. Another friend of mine, who I will refer to as Brian, applied to the same schools. He had nearly identical credentials, except for he was ranked tenth in our class. Both were well respected by the faculty and by their peers. Their families were both middle class. They lived on the same street and there were no major disparities in wealth between their families. The only major difference was Eric was Korean and Brian was Caucasian. Both were accepted at the universities they applied to, but the difference was that Eric was offered substantial financial aid at all the schools, even a tuition waiver at the University of Pennsylvania, and Brian was offered no financial aid except for a paltry $1000 low interest loan from Cornell.
How was this situation possible? Both students came from the same high school with nearly identical academic and extra-curricular standards, but yet Eric was given the oppurtunity at every school to attend at a significantly decrease cost, while the Brian was offered no such benefits. The difference must then lie in the fact that Eric is a minority and Brian is a white male. Both students were accepted, so they didn't bar either one of them from attending, but they made it clear whom they would rather have if only one of them were to come to that university. The universities saw an intelligent, well rounded minority and jumped at the chance to have him attend their campus. Unfortunately for Brian, this left him out of the picture. He was not able to attend those higher priced, more prestigious colleges, so he was forced to enroll in a state college.
What does this situation tell us? Does this mean that just because a student is a minority, that they deserve special privileges that a white male does not? Is this fair? Is this in agreement with the original purpose of the 1964 Civil Rights Act? Certainly not. The Civil Rights Act was meant to prohibit discrimination in the consideration of candidates, but it has instead encouraged it. Brian was the victim of discrimination. His credentials were comparable, if not better than those of Eric, but yet he was not given the same opportunity that Eric was given - the chance to attend an elite university without bankrupting his family. That is what the Civil Rights Act was meant to do; to ensure equality of opportunity, not necessarily equality of results. By giving Eric the substantial financial aid, the universities were trying to encourage his enrollment. They knew that there were plenty of worthy candidates that were white males from wealthy families who could afford the full tuition, so they did not have to worry about Brian's likelihood of not enrolling. Unfortunately, this is too often the case. Blatant discrimination against minorities and women is replaced with the more subtle reverse discrimination against the "established" white male.
The defenders of the practice of giving minorities and women special treatment still have not admitted that it is time for affirmative action to come to an end. In a particular case, Regents of the University of California vs. Bakke , the legality of the reservation of sixteen percent for minorities of the first- year class at the University of California-Davis Medical School was brought into question. The ruling handed by the Supreme Court struck down the special minority admissions plan, but at the same time stated that race could be used as a determining factor in who should be admitted.(Gill, p. 64) Most minority groups cried that the abolition of the minority program was a great loss, but such groups failed to realize that the second part of the decision was a great gain for them. Many minority groups did see this and applauded the decision for upholding the ability to be given the treatment that they thought they deserved.
Even worse than the continuation of affirmative action is the complete lack of concern over its effects on Caucasians and males. In landmark case, United Steelworkers of America vs. Weber , white worker charged that African American workers had been promoted before him even though he held more seniority. In its decision, the Supreme Court ruled that reverse discrimination was in fact "benign discrimination."(Roberts, p. 51) In a later case, Jonson vs. Transportation Agency, Santa Clara County , the issue was not the race of a white male, but rather his gender. Again, the court ruled against the white male stating that "job discrimination against a white male in favor of a woman with lower performance ratings was perfectly legal under Title VII (of the 1964 Civil Rights Act)."(Roberts, p. 51) It's no wonder that at workshops meant to sensitize managers to race and gender issues, they become restless and snipe to the trainers about reverse discrimination.(Lynch, p.32) Even worse than these cases is the 1991 Civil Rights Act. With this legislation in place, white males have no grounds for discrimination lawsuits until they are statistically underrepresented in management and line positions. (Roberts, p. 80) That is a scary thought. If that piece of legislation is liberally interpreted, it could mean that a white male superiority qualified for acceptance to a university, could be barred admission in order to let a minority attend the school even if that minority is not even nearly as qualified as the white male, and the white male can't legally do anything about it. The white male has no power in this situation. He is a victim of his circumstances.
All of this discussion sets the stage for the realization that affirmative action does not in actuality affirm anything, or at least not anything that is beneficial to anyone. The Civil Right Act of 1964 was meant to end discriminatory practices. When affirmative action was derived from this original law, its intent was perverted. By granting minorities and women special privileges, two things were accomplished, both negative things. First, it put into the head of African Americans who were accepted into the best colleges the notion that they were not admitted on the basis of their merits, but merely to make that university's racial statistics look better. What a blow this must be to that individual's confidence. Affirmative action laws mean that many individuals who are worthy to be admitted will question their ability when there is no need to. Second, affirmative action gave whites, male in particular, something be scared of. The white male is now the "minority". He is the one who is now discriminated against. They must be the very best to be admitted into a college, whereas the standards for a minority may be significantly lower. This has caused a great backlash. White males have become disgusted with reverse discrimination and they have begun to become resentful of the minorities that it benefits. This was not the goal of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. It was meant to prevent discriminatory thinking but instead it has perpetuated it while also alienating the white male from minorities. In essence, what affirmative action affirms, is exactly what it is meant to fight; that men, women, whites, and minorities are unequal. We all know that this is not true, so why allow legislation that promotes such thinking?
The call then is for the end of affirmative action. This isn't acceptable either though. Without affirmative action, there will most likely be a noticeable drop in the hiring of minorities and women. Unfortunately, the lessons that affirmative action was supposed to teach to corporations and universities will not have been learned by those who have discrimination in their blood. Unfortunately, not everyone believes that we were all created equally. There will always be groups of individuals such as the Klu Klux Klan that will not judge people by who they are, but simply upon the color of their skin or their gender to make judgments about them. It is for this reason that there needs to be some system in place to ensure that such individuals are not allowed to revert back to their discriminatory ways. To do this, a simple system could be enacted. Each corporation and university would be required to publicly disclose the percentage of minorities hired or admitted. In this way, the public would be the judge of who is discriminatory in its practices, and if long term abuses are noted, a government commission could evaluate its employment or admission standards. In the example of a university, the school is not required to admit a proportionate number of minorities from year to year, but if it is noticed that over a long period of time that minorities are not given the proper admission consideration, then the government would have the opportunity to investigate if the university is engaging in discriminatory practices in a manner in which the university would be unaware. In this way, there no quotas are required, no special consideration necessary, just fair evaluation of admission candidates based solely on merit.
This accurate description of affirmative action and what it means in today's society is given by Paul Craig Roberts.
The 1964 Civil Right Act, which undertook to eliminate race and sex from private employment decisions, has instead been used to make race and sex the determining factors. Reverse discrimination is now a fact of life. Indeed, in strictly legal terms, the situation today for white males is worse than the situation for blacks under Plessy v. Furgueson's separate-but-equal doctrine. In practice, blacks suffered unequal treatment under Plessy , but the decision officially required equal treatment. Under today's civil-rights regime, by contrast, whites can be legally discriminated against in university admissions, employment, and the allocation of government contracts.(Roberts, p. 80)The Bill of Rights was meant to be color-blind. Seemingly, it is civil-rights activists who reject this idea with their insistence upon the use of affirmative action to elevate the postion of minorities and women in society. Affirmative action seeks to correct the mistakes of the past by playing off the guilt of white males. It has taken over thirty years, but they have finally had enough and realized that they mistakes of the past are not their fault and that the white males of today should not be required to atone for the actions of white males of past generations. The government has decided otherwise and allows reverse discrimination as "benign". Unfortunately, this has led to the rejection of color-blind views of society. Equality before the law has been replaced by privilege before the law.