Affirmative Action

Okay btw I love your bunny picture I really want a mousey as a pet but whatever uh... this debate is experimental. As of now I am undecided about affirmative action, but hopefully this debate will help me make up my mind 1) Diversity is needed One of the main goals of Affirmative Action is to increase cultural diversity "'We, and all colleges, are under pressure by industry to increase diversity,' Stephen W. Director, dean of the College of Engineering at the Michigan's Ann Arbor campus, told the Chronicle. 'We constantly hear from companies that they appreciate what we have done, and would like to see more.' Bob Jerich, a spokesman for Lucent Technologies, is unequivocal in an interview with the Chronicle: 'It is important to understand that diversity is really a critical piece of our overall business strategy. As a global company, we really feel that our employee body needs to reflect the diversity of our markets and customers.'" http://www.sptimes.com... 2) Affirmative Action has been practiced wrong plenty of times, which is why everyone gets the wrong idea about it. One of the goals of affirmative action is to expand multiculturalism. America was built on immigrants and America was always the land of opportunity. America was THE land and still is to have an opportunity in life that an immigrant couldn't achieve in their own country. It is false to say that affirmative action promotes terrible job performance because people will rather hire a minority with no credentials than a white man with more merit. A scenario of an IDEAL affirmative action job hiring: There is a black man and a white man both wanting to get the same job. The black man is poised, professional and polite. He has all the right merit to get into the job. The white man is also polite, poised and professional and has all the right merit to get into the job as well. But what if the company lacks cultural diversity? The company works like supply and demand. The company is trying to recruit more minorities because there is a demand for more diversity and one of the merits that will fill that supply and demand, is being a minority. So technically in the company's eyes, the black man is the person with more merit. Saying this is unfair wouldn't make sense Since companies need more cultural diversity, then it would make sense for the company to hire the black man over the white man since it is what they need. 3) Saying that Affirmative Action is "reverse discrimination" is a straw man fallacy The main point of Affirmative action is to provide less privileged groups the same opportunity as the more privileged white middle class. "'Do affirmative action programmes in colleges and universities ask for more leeway on things like test scores? Yes, they absolutely do, and there's a reason for that: People in oppressed classes are less likely to do well on standardized tests, for a whole lot of reasons ranging from unequal access to educational opportunities to biases built in on the tests themselves. This means that, yes, when an applicant identifies as poor, for example, that the school will weigh that in the student's application and will consider the impact that poverty might have on test scores and academic performance. The school won't say ‘oh, we should let a clearly unprepared student in because she's from a lower class background,' but the school will say ‘this student clearly has potential, even if she's not there yet, so let's give her a chance, given that she's had an uphill slog to get to the point where she can even apply for college.'" http://disabledfeminists.com... 4) It is false to say that "they all have the same opportunities so it is unfair to give preferential treatment to them." This is what opposers think affirmative action is like: Joe is Black and Frank is White, but they both have the exact same opportunities, it's not like Joe has any obstacles in his way or any negative history pertaining to his background, he has it easy just like Frank. See how ridiculous this is? It is like a denial of history by saying that Joe and Frank have the same exact opportunity and that there is absolutely going to be no prejudice in job opportunities. It is denial to say that they are in the exact same playing field: this includes minorities, women and people with disabilities. Truth is that frankly, they aren't. Affirmative action's goal is to level the playing field so that everyone, no matter what background they are from has a fair push up and equal opportunity as a person with a more privileged background. http://mahdzan.com... 5) Affirmative action improves the society of America Affirmative action when practiced correctly temporarily, will level the playing field and provided underprivileged groups with opportunities to be highly successful. Not by solely their background, but by the extra lift done to provide the underprivileged person an opportunity to increase their highest potential. America is the land of opportunity, and Affirmative Action will work its part to increase that opportunity for everyone