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`Another “popular” idea that shows just how much people want to forget our country’s history and tendency toward highlighting the physical, mental, racial or gender differences, or using those differences to establish and maintain a social hierarchy, is the product of the “Barack Obama Effect,” which has lead a surprising number of American whites to believe that hundreds of years of social injustice and racial prejudice are somehow corrected now that we have a black president. I’m going to spell this out for you.
First, the black population did NOT get Obama elected. Unless you were living under a rock between January of 2001 and November of 2008, you are probably aware that Obama’s predecessor, George W. Bush, was perhaps (if not literally) the worst president in our nation’s history, so when election time rolled around, the electorate was making every effort to get him and a good percentage of his fellow Republicans out of Washington.
November 2008, as the result of perceived incompetence by conservatives, ended up becoming a critical election, or an election that shifted majority power to the Democratic Party. The point is, that even if Hilary Clinton had won the Democratic Party’s nomination as the party’s presidential candidate, chances were very strong that a Republican would not be the president in 2008.
I’m also of the opinion that Americans wouldn’t be so quick to believe that sexism died in America if Hilary Clinton would have been elected president.
Second, the black population did NOT get Barack Obama elected. Racial minorities constitute approximately 33 percent (about 13 percent of the population being black) of the country’s population, making, if my math is correct, the other 66 percent of the country white. This means that there aren’t enough black people in the country to get ANYONE elected when it comes to a national popular vote. So what race group made up the majority of Obama supporters? I’ll let you fill in that blank.
I would understand (somewhat) if the argument was aimed at the level of individual responsibility and accountability involved with getting ahead and using the legislation for its true purpose, to improve the chances of success for those who were historically disadvantaged and disenfranchised classes of our society. This is why I personally believe that the legislation should be amended to reflect the issues that inhibit social equilibrium.
This is reflective of a notion that I’m sure many would agree with, namely, the idea that everyone should have equal opportunities to pursue whatever social, political and economic endeavors they so choose without fearing that their race, gender, or physical hindrances will prevent them from getting ahead if they are willing to work to do so. I shudder to think that there are still people who will simply regurgitate something that they may have seen on “news” networks like FOX News or MSNBC, or heard from their parents, relatives, fellow churchgoers, instead of actively seeking information about a particular subject and forming an opinion that actually makes sense.
The fact that pieces such as the article in question are actually published in a newspaper that represents the opinions of young “educated” people honestly disgusts me to no end. I hate to make it seem like other race groups don’t deal with inequality, because they do; but as an African-American male who comes from a community that sends more people to jail than to college, it is quite difficult to see beyond the obstacles of my own race-group (though I try very hard to do so).
People who don’t think or care to educate themselves on these types of issues only perpetuate the need for Affirmative Action, and allow the ignorance and discrimination to continue. I am very much an advocate of free speech, but I sincerely hope that this is the last time an article of this nature sees print, and hope that the author of the article addressing Affirmative Action takes time to investigate topics prior to forming an opinion on them in the future. Oh, and for those who didn’t know, Native American Heritage Month is in November.
To Chester Holland,
Affirmative action is supposed to help minorities gain acceptance into colleges and acquire jobs. But should they receive these on the expense of others? The legislators who enacted affirmative action laws are high ranking members of society, these law makers are all Ivy league graduates. They have “unofficial” acceptances ready for their kids to get into college. So enforcing affirmative action laws doesn’t really affect them as much as the rest of the population. Would you rather have somebody else take your child’s seat in college if it were the only one left? Affirmative action is a step backward in progressing, the US is competing with a global market, in doing so we need the best people for the job, we need hard working people the move this country forward. I would accept affirmative action if it actually worked, a large portion of students with affirmative action acceptances still manage to fail in college wasting the chance for someone else to succeed as well as wasting government and scholarship money. There are cultures that are geared toward education more than others, for e.g. Asian’s and Asian Americans tend to have higher grades than everyone else, since they clearly had no involvement in slavery and suppression of African Americans why should they pay a price? I think if someone truly believes in affirmative action, or have direct link to slave holders my suggestion is that you donate money to minorities, or perhaps give up your job if one is truly passionate about it, but by all means do not deny other people’s hard work. If a group of people want to move forward in society, they should stop blaming, hating, and play a victim, and start working hard. If you set your mind in the negative all the time, that will stop you from progressing anywhere.
Clayton,
There are deeper problems in America other than Affirmative Action, once again, I believe that it should be amended to fit the current social inequalities that exist within our society, but to say that it doesn’t work is flatly false. Within the last 40 years, we have actually seen a great deal of progress within our nation, but you would have to look beyond the African-American community to find it. White women have actually gained more, and are currently make the greatest use of Affirmative Action protocol, and the Asian community, which was discriminated against just like everyone else, no longer requires protection under the legislation because their families and communities have surpassed whites in just about every way (check the 2008 report by the US Census Bureau that I cited in the first part for exact figures). Black people in America still deal with disparities across the board, and (speaking specifically about education since you referenced it) are often under-prepared, to face the challenges of higher education… not because they’re black, but because they live in terrible neighborhoods where few jobs are available and the tax base is horrible/non-existent; and attend schools that are reflective of this. It has never really been about how hard someone works in this country, it has almost always about who has access to what, and, historically speaking, people were once denied access to the most basic things because of their skin color… If you really believe in hard work and equal opportunity, send your child to the type of schools that I came through and see what happens… So I pose a similar question to you: why should I or anyone like me be left to get a poorer quality education and be expected to work twice as hard to meet the same standards as others mainly because of where I live? Affirmative Action has nothing to do with slavery, so I recommend you truly look at American history and consider the hoards of people who were qualified but omitted because they look different and tell me if it wasn’t necessary and what its true purpose is. I recommend that you consider the people that might actually BE “qualified” to take these “spots” we all work so hard to get if things were as equal as you THINK they are… I, much like yourself, am an advocate of hard work and have striven to be the best that I can possibly be despite the fact that I’m black and from a system that doesn’t work for most people that are left to deal with it; but I wish that I could be more positive about the condition of my people, but you’re dead wrong to believe that we are simply “playing the victim.” The point is that the systems in place don’t even meet us half-way, which should be the case. They don’t allow to people to own anything at the levels necessary to get ahead, or even present people with the level playing field that should exist in our “progressive” society even with affirmative action in place.