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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Sam Spade (talk | contribs) at 21:18, 21 August 2004 (→Self-Moderated Contributions: Your ideas are good). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

I moved this one off the page:

A common misconception is that affirmative action is automatically synomous with benefits for minorities. However, majority groups have been afforded affirmative-action advantages, such as for the Fijians in Fiji, and the Malays in Malaysia.

That seems counter to the very definition of affirmative action. By this criterion, the anti-Jewish laws in early Nazi Germany were affirmative action, as were the Catholic penal laws in England in the 18th century?

I don't think so. Affirmative action is action to improve representation of an under-representative class. I do not know anything about the Malay situation, but in Fiji many high positions and political posts were held by ethnic Indians, who were in the minority but privileged. I think that the criteria for affirmative action are:

1. The recipients of the affirmative action are under-represented.
2. The action aims to achieve equality, not to go beyond it and favour the recipient group.

-- Chris Q 07:43 Apr 7, 2003 (UTC)

Political correctness

There's some content in political correctness that may be better off here. For example:

One central issue in the culture wars surrounding political correctness concerns what has come to be called affirmative action. Critics point out that the racism inherent in any such benefit based on race is counter to modern values. The defenders of affirmative action argue that affirmative action is necessary in order to redress problems of discrimination at a broader level. Others suggest that affirmative action for one group (such as women) can in the same 'subtle' way be detrimental to less popular groups (such as black men), and that the strength of politically correct ideology tends to stifle an open and rational analysis of such situations in the popular media. Clearly this is a subject of some debate.

I'm going to be doing a massive re-write of that page soon (it's having NPOV problems), so if you want to grab that material after I've done so, go back in the history to the 7 March 2004 version.

--zandperl 23:54, 8 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I think it's very important to point out that affirmative action does not receive popular support from the public. In many polls, the general public overwhelmingly agrees that race based reward schemes are wrong. These types of policies have been forced onto the public by the legislative action of judges (and/or those who've got the judges in their back pocket) who don't seem to care for the democratic process. This policy is a race-based solution to what it's proponents claim to be an issue of financial means. Financial-based solutions are easily applicable, yet do not receive consideration from the legislative bodies.

"only racists consider race"

Regards, DMG

added paragraph to end of purpose section

which by the by the way indirectly address above comment (made by DMG)

"ignoring issues of race and class does not make them go away"

-- LegCircus

after my edit there was an additional edit that basically says affirmative action history is illogical

I don't know how to refute this without disrupting the page and turning it into a blog, and I'm loathe to just delete a contribution.

-- LegCircus

POV in Purpose section

The Purpose section ends with the following two paragraphs:

In the US, affirmative action was originally designed by the civil rights movement to correct the history of oppression against all working and low-income people. Though the civil rights movement is associated with racial equality, the original scope of affirmative action was not limited to race. Conservative opponents of affirmative action successfully framed the policy in terms of race in order to inspire opposition in an important part of their constituency: low-income white men. By excluding a portion of those the policy was designed to help, conservative opposition was then able to criticize using the idea of reverse discrimination. This rhetoric would have made little impact if coming only from those in obviously advantaged social segment.

The preceding argument appears insensible, however, in light of the overwhelming emphasis on race that took shape in the legislation. It is folly to contend that opponents of affirmative action would craft affirmative action legislation at all, let alone legislation which would create preferential status for non-whites, thereby alienating and disenfranchising this "important constituency" of low-income white men. An electorate which antagonizes its constituency does not get re-elected, and so the paragraph above does not stand to reason, and may be regarded as revisionist history with a communist/socialist agenda.

These are both POV, coming from opposite sides. You don't correct POV with more POV. :p I'll take a crack at fixing it.

- Korpios 22:08, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I left in the part about the American civil rights movement's original intentions, and otherwise killed the remaining parts outright. They're dripping with both POV and allegations badly in need of being backed up. Anyone else should feel free to try to work more criticisms/counter-criticisms into the article, but please use the above as an example of how not to do it. :) - Korpios 22:23, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

"Perceived"

LegCircus was kind enough to explain via email their change to their following paragraph:

Though affirmative action in the US is primarily associated with racial equality, the American civil rights movement originally intended it to correct the perceived history of oppression against all working-class and low-income people.

LegCircus removed "perceived" from the preceding paragraph, under the rationale that no one disagrees with that these groups have been "oppressed". I must disagree here; oppression is an inherently POV concept, with dictionary definitions including subjective qualifiers such as "cruel", "severe", and "unjust". Furthermore, I will offer myself as an example of one who disagrees (not to start an argument, but merely to make the case that it's a POV concept).

I won't change it back just yet; I'm willing to hear arguments first. :)

- Korpios 15:09, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

To offer a rebuttal to my own post... *lol*... I just ran this by a friend on the phone, and she offered yet another angle: "perceived" is redundant, since "oppression" here is merely an objective descriptor of the subjective feelings of various people. Under this reasoning, it's NPOV to talk about people being "oppressed" because all it means to "be oppressed" is to feel oppressed; tacking on "perceived" may give the impression that a person's feelings aren't legitimate, which certainly isn't the intention here. I found this sufficiently persuasive to give me pause... thoughts? - Korpios 16:31, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

While I think in general that the feeling of being oppressed is a good indication of oppression, oppression is not a feeling. Oppression is a situation in which one individual or group uses another individual or group to the detriment of the used party. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights gives a pretty solid diagnostic to identify oppression.

-- LegCircus

Since you linked to oppression, I'll quote from there:

"Oppression is the arbitrary and cruel exercise of power."

"Cruel" is absolutely subjective (because suffering itself is subjective), and "arbitrary" isn't too far behind.

The definition you give is subjective as well: what constitutes "uses" depends on the observer, unless it's held to be so vague as to include all interaction on any level whatsoever, and "detriment" is subjective from the perspective of the party being, as you put it, "oppressed".

Don't even get me started on the UN; IMHO, they're a bunch of annoying loonies the United States would do well to walk away from.

Anyway, what this basically comes down to is that we have a difference of opinion (which is fine and good at Misplaced Pages!), and this should be reflected as much as possible in NPOV wording of articles.

I'm interested in input from others as well — anyone want to jump in here?

- Korpios 20:59, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Edit of Intro

changed

Affirmative action (U.S. English), or positive discrimination (British English), is action affording, to groups considered by some to be victims of social discrimination, "preferential" or "equal" (depending on one's point of view) access to an environment or benefits, such as education, employment, health care or social welfare.

to

Affirmative action (U.S. English), or positive discrimination (British English), is specific consideration given to groups considered by some to be victims of social discrimination. This may consist of preferential access to education, employment, health care, or social welfare.

-- LegCircus

RV Wars

Several people have been reverting the article back and forth. Let's get the discussion over it here, rather than going around reverting it all the time. Firstly, what are the reasons for the two versions, let's call them the RoseParks and the SamSpade version. Clearly, the bunny rabbit article was unnecessary, and meant by Spleeman to illustrate that it is perfectly appropriate to delete large blocks of text if they do not belong in the article, suggesting that the SamSpade block (originally contributed anonymously, correct?) did not belong. Allegations by SamSpade and myself are that it is strongly POV, uses weasel terms to thinly veil racist opinions, and isnot only biased but wholly an opinion piece, and is therefore impossible to simply NPOV the text, necessitating its removal. I would appreciate comments on this before anyone goes around RVing again. -- Yitzhak 11:55, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

change of criticisms

changed

It can also be argued that with lower university entrance standards for minority members, those from the minority who do get in may be less able to complete the course, leading to a higher drop out rate and a greater public perception that they are not up to it, defeating the stated aim. In fact the very notion that minorities need lower entrance standards reflect a unconscious racism that still is prevalent in society.

to

It can also be argued that with lower university entrance standards for minority members, those from the minority who do get in may be less able to complete the course, leading to a higher drop out rate. Evidence for this argument is wanting.

justification:

I know of no hard evidence for higher drop out rate argument. As for "unconscious racism" this states an uncommon opinion as a fact.

--LegCircus

The opinion is far from uncommon, and is in fact a central basis for reverse racism charges. I think this article has big issues. Sam 18:19, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

No it is not the basis for reverse racism charges. The basis for reverse racism charges is an idea that the dominant party (in America, whites) becomes victim to the same oppression they are being charged with. Two wrongs don't make a right, similar to the idea that the criminal justice system should not kill folks to teach other folks that killing folks is wrong.

The "unconscious racism" idea is that affirmative action actually hurts those it is supposed to help. That, while it may also be reverse racism, affirmative action propagates racism by setting a lower bar for some. This idea is not wide-spread because a) it's incorrect, affirmative action does not set a lower bar, b) most people do not think that giving specific attention to a candidate hurts that candidate (on its face it is contradictory), and c) most folks recognize, in one form or another, a historical disadvantage that persists to this day. --LegCircus

who decides?

who decides when a page is protected?

and who arbitrates the dispute and make the final decision?

--LegCircus 8/21/04

Self-Moderated Contributions

Why don't we self-moderate a little better? We could put contributions on the talk page, allow people to discuss them, and then gauge whether it's worth including or not. It makes sense to work by consensus, since anyone can just go and RV, we should find something that all can agree to. I'm sort of new to Misplaced Pages, so I'm not sure how acceptable/practical/effective this may be, but I think it's worth a shot. But as long as the page is protected, we might as well give it a shot. In this spirit, I submit something to add to Criticism (usual rules about not editing what someone has put into talk obviously don't apply, so feel free to edit as much as is beneficial):

Your ideas are good. I made an edit to your text below to show my support for, and cooperation with your proposal. Sam 21:18, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Criticism

Opponents of affirmative action differ widely in background and criticism. While most critics are members of the majority and see themselves as being subject to reverse racism by affirmative action, there are also members of the minorities that affirmative action is intended to help who reject it for a variety of reasons.

Some members of the minority who are favored by affirmative action claim that this reduces credence in their own abilities, as it suggests that without government intervention, they could not achieve on their own merits. They fear that affirmative action will cause others to view their own accomplishments merely as an effect of affirmative action, and sometimes argue further that this could lead to increased resentment.