Inequality?

[newfoundsky]

Something has been bothering me for awhile now. In fact, it?s bothered me ever since I was five years old and over heard my parents talk about something called ?Affirmative action.? Affirmative Action, for those of us that don?t know, is a policy that basically states that if, for example, a white man and a black man both apply for the same position, and both are equally qualified, then the black man gets the job. You can substitute the example with a white woman, black woman, Latino, Indian, basically anybody that is NOT a white man, and as long as they are equally qualified they will get the job rather than the white man.

The policy of Affirmative Action was intended to force equality into the workplace by increasing the amount of minorities holding jobs. I am not here to discuss, the policy, no matter what I think about it. What I am here to talk about is the supposed racism, or sexism, or bigotry of not hiring ENOUGH minorities.

This has always seemed an awkward subject for me. I?m a white male, after all. If I speak out against a ?minority? getting a job over a white man, then I?m automatically labeled a racist. Or so my thinking goes, and I have been proven right many times. But I believe I can articulate my argument in such a way that if you were to call me a racist I would have every right to punch you in the face for failing to exercise reading comprehension.

I would like to start off by discussing the recent controversy surrounding the Daily Shows writing staff. The Daily Show, in particular Jon Stewart, was targeted with accusations of sexism and misogyny for not having enough female writers and staff members. There are two writers and I believe two correspondents at this point that are women. A show that has so few women, the argument goes, is obviously sexist and intentionally excluding women from the show. I think the argument is flawed on many levels, from assuming that the people in charge of hiring staff are sexist without actually knowing their views on gender, to just the plain ridiculous notion that that the people behind an arguably socially liberal comedy show still cling to outdated gender roles.

So, at a show like the Daily Show, a socially liberal show, hosted by a Jew (possibly not a minority, seeing as Jon Stewart IS white), there are only two possibilities as to why there are only a handful of women working on it.

The first reason, of course, is the lack of spots opening up to hire writers and correspondents. A business that wants to make money will only hire as much people as it needs. This is true in show business, in the supermarket business, and even in the military. These spots are usually only open when a writer or correspondent moves on to bigger and better things, simply because the show hires quality writers. This reason should be enough to settle the nerves of all the shaky equality people jumping for Stewart?s neck. But it?s not. Unfortunately, we must go on to reason number two.

Reason number two is a simply truth. White males are a majority, women, blacks, and Latino?s are a minority. That leaves white men as a much larger pool to garner quality employees from. Unfortunately for the ?Minorities,? their employment pool is much smaller. And lets face it, not everyone is cut out to be an actor or a writer for a comedy show. So, the sad truth we must face is that there is a lack of quality applicants that are minorities for the few positions that are available at the Daily Show, or anywhere for that matter.

Now, I?m not saying that there are NO quality minority applicants. I?m simply saying there are far less, which unfortunately is the burden of being a minority. But, one might say, shouldn?t companies then go out of their way to search for a quality minority applicant? To this I must simply answer: Of course not!

When a writer or correspondent position is vacant, then the show will suffer from the lack of extra talent and creativity. The position must be filled as soon as possible, as the show (or any business that is one worker down) is losing valuable work hours each day that the position goes empty. They shouldn?t have to wait for a minority to apply for the job before they decide who to hire. It is simply bad business, especially if they find the applicant nowhere near qualified to even apply for the job.

This is not to say that if a minority applies for the job and is qualified for it, the minority should not be hired. No, in fact, if they are the most qualified they should definitely get the job. But if they are equally qualified as the white man, who should be hired? An easy answer would be the one that works for less. A fairer answer would be the one that best gets along with the employer and the staff.

So which one is the right answer? Well, I guess it just depends on what type of work the Employer wants.

So Escapist? What are your thoughts on what I?ve just said?

Note: This is not, in itself, about JUST the Daily Show being accused of sexism. It is about the notion that it is racist or sexist not to hire ?enough? minorities.

 

[Danzaivar]

It's stupid and it's racist. Not really much else to add to that.

 

[tomtom94]

I would just like to say that I agree entirely, that this stupid policy of having "targets" of minorities to hire is bullshit; you just want the person who is the best candidate!

 

[Kenko]

Reason number two is fail. Theres more africans/blacks/negro's on the planet then theres people of a lighter shade.

 

[Jonluw]

The same thing has been bothering me. There's not really much more to say though, except, perhaps, that I wouldn't call women a minority.

 

[newfoundsky]

Reason number two is fail. Theres more africans/blacks/negro's on the planet then theres people of a lighter shade.

I am mostly speaking of the United States and only counting people of working age.

 

[newfoundsky]

The same thing has been bothering me. There's not really much more to say though, except, perhaps, that I wouldn't call women a minority.

Neither would I, however, they are counted as one, with different sub groups (white women are a majority to minority black women) for some reason.

 

[Hana_aoki]

I would have to agree. Proportionally, there are less minorities in the population, so it wouldn't make sense for there to be more of them in the workforce. Companies so desprate to hire minorities that they would overlook quality employees from the 'majority' would be much less productive. Companies should be completely indiscriminative when it comes to that, not hiring a black man over a white man simply because he's black, or a woman over a man simply because she has different genitals. The selection to hire employees should rest solely on the quality of work the potential employee is capable of.

 

[Lord Devius]

Reason number two is fail. Theres more africans/blacks/negro's on the planet then theres people of a lighter shade.

...Yes, but are they all applying for jobs in the US, where Affirmative Action is taking place?

On one hand, Affirmative Action was more useful and not-racist when the nation was racially biased and sexist, but now that we're starting to move out of that, it's losing its point and is just reversing the racism to a degree.

It's still racism, and that's what matters, but I don't know how people would react if it was altered now.

 

[Serenegoose]

You're perhaps missing the point of affirmative action - it's to balance out social inequalities capable of perpetuating themselves in society, so that in the future we won't need them.

For example, a reason that, in the US, black students might be in some cases given preferential placement over a white student is that black students do, on average, come from less privileged backgrounds than white students. From the very beginning their opportunities are not equal to a white persons. This means that they are less likely to garner equivalent qualifications, and ultimately, will likely come to reside in a lower social position than their white counterparts.Affirmative action tries to break this cycle by ensuring that black people are given a chance to achieve as much as their white colleagues, so that when the next generation rolls around, they will be, on average, as likely to succeed as white people, rendering affirmative action unnecessary.

 

[DeadlyYellow]

It's one of those backhanded ways the American government tries to show support for an issue. Kinda like how they wanted to honor Native Americans by carving a statue of Crazy Horse into a mountain doing a rude gesture.

 

[Jonluw]

The same thing has been bothering me. There's not really much more to say though, except, perhaps, that I wouldn't call women a minority.

Neither would I, however, they are counted as one, with different sub groups (white women are a majority to minority black women) for some reason.

I suppose women are minorities in certain professions, while in others they are not. For example, when it comes to nurses, even the caucasian man is a minority, and would perhaps be favoured if he applied for a job as a nurse.

My guess would be that the reason for the low percentage of women in the Daily show writing staff, is that their staff is representative of the gender distribution in that profession, rather than the employers' alleged sexism.

 

[Eisenfaust]

yeah, it's a little stupid... i reckon giving special priveledges to anyone on the ground of race is... well, racist... trying to appear like an equal opportunity employer and hiring someone because they're black is just as bad as hiring someone because they're white. the same goes with men and women and sexism, really

 

[Ironic Pirate]

You're perhaps missing the point of affirmative action - it's to balance out social inequalities capable of perpetuating themselves in society, so that in the future we won't need them.

For example, a reason that, in the US, black students might be in some cases given preferential placement over a white student is that black students do, on average, come from less privileged backgrounds than white students. From the very beginning their opportunities are not equal to a white persons. This means that they are less likely to garner equivalent qualifications, and ultimately, will likely come to reside in a lower social position than their white counterparts.Affirmative action tries to break this cycle by ensuring that black people are given a chance to achieve as much as their white colleagues, so that when the next generation rolls around, they will be, on average, as likely to succeed as white people, rendering affirmative action unnecessary.

So, the way I'm understanding it, if there is a rich black kid, he might get better placement than a poor white kid, just because he's black? That's stupid, they should look at the students background, not just go by averages.

Because that's the problem with American education, we go too much by averages, and barely focus on individual students. It should never be: people from x group have more trouble with school than people in y group, we'll always help someone from x group over someone from y, it should be, look at the students record, and see if they actually need help.

 

[scythecow]

Ah, affirmative action. From certain perspectives it sounds like a good idea, but in reality it probably promotes resentment when your skin color and/or gender can potentially rob you of employment.

Or, on the other side, they can guarantee you success when someone else was more qualified or it was the deciding factor when equally qualified and then you don't even know if you earned your position "fairly."

Affirmative Action is discriminatory by nature. I'd like to live in a world where gender and appearance are not factors in getting a job or getting accepted by a university.

Since so many people are biased, subconsciously or otherwise, even without affirmative action I'm not going to live in that world. But I don't think AA helps the situation. I think it actually hurts things because it supports the notion that there's a difference worth acknowledging in gender and ethnicity in the workplace.

Human beings are human beings. Obviously the fact that we can't just leave it at that illustrates a serious flaw.

Ignoring gender and ethnicity, you can look at wealth and privilege. Then it becomes an issue of economic stance. For education past high school? Socialistic ideals will say, help out the less privileged with government grants and loans. Capitalistic ideals will say the most efficient thing to do is to let it be.

 

[razer17]

Affirmative action is stupid. It's positive discrimination, so yes, it benefits minorities, but it's still discriminatory.

And the fact is that there is no such thing as "equally qualified". Even if, and this is incredibly unlikely, two people go to the similar schools, get identical results, work in similar jobs for similar amounts of time, they are still not equally qualified, because that's subjective. Maybe the employer just liked one more than the other, maybe one was scruffy looking and the other looked professional, there will always be differences.

 

[Serenegoose]

So, the way I'm understanding it, if there is a rich black kid, he might get better placement than a poor white kid, just because he's black? That's stupid, they should look at the students background, not just go by averages.

Because that's the problem with American education, we go too much by averages, and barely focus on individual students. It should never be: people from x group have more trouble with school than people in y group, we'll always help someone from x group over someone from y, it should be, look at the students record, and see if they actually need help.

He might because, after all, look at the reality of where you live. Is the entire workforce black, or any other minority? Were affirmative action so pervasive, then white men would be pushed out entirely. This is evidently not the case. Affirmative action is promoted as a bogeyman that means that only your race matters if you want to be employed. It's simply not true.

 

[Xojins]

You're perhaps missing the point of affirmative action - it's to balance out social inequalities capable of perpetuating themselves in society, so that in the future we won't need them.

For example, a reason that, in the US, black students might be in some cases given preferential placement over a white student is that black students do, on average, come from less privileged backgrounds than white students. From the very beginning their opportunities are not equal to a white persons. This means that they are less likely to garner equivalent qualifications, and ultimately, will likely come to reside in a lower social position than their white counterparts.Affirmative action tries to break this cycle by ensuring that black people are given a chance to achieve as much as their white colleagues, so that when the next generation rolls around, they will be, on average, as likely to succeed as white people, rendering affirmative action unnecessary.

So, the way I'm understanding it, if there is a rich black kid, he might get better placement than a poor white kid, just because he's black? That's stupid, they should look at the students background, not just go by averages.

Because that's the problem with American education, we go too much by averages, and barely focus on individual students. It should never be: people from x group have more trouble with school than people in y group, we'll always help someone from x group over someone from y, it should be, look at the students record, and see if they actually need help.

It's not actually like that though. If you look at school systems, they are given money by the state for high performance, and ones of low performance are not well funded. Over time this creates a cycle where the low-performing schools can't hire better, well-qualified teachers, or even as many teachers as they need. These schools tend to be in lower-income areas, which just so happens to consist of more minority students. In contrast, the wealthier suburban areas typically perform well, and get money to pay enough good teachers. These schools also just so happen to consist of more caucasian students.

Is the low performance an inherent quality of minority students? No, it is the failure of the school system to provide them with the same quality education. So if anything, the way the entire system operates needs to change. Of course, that's 'too much effort' and 'too expensive'. So I have to agree with Serenegoose on this one.

 

[Ironic Pirate]

You're perhaps missing the point of affirmative action - it's to balance out social inequalities capable of perpetuating themselves in society, so that in the future we won't need them.

For example, a reason that, in the US, black students might be in some cases given preferential placement over a white student is that black students do, on average, come from less privileged backgrounds than white students. From the very beginning their opportunities are not equal to a white persons. This means that they are less likely to garner equivalent qualifications, and ultimately, will likely come to reside in a lower social position than their white counterparts.Affirmative action tries to break this cycle by ensuring that black people are given a chance to achieve as much as their white colleagues, so that when the next generation rolls around, they will be, on average, as likely to succeed as white people, rendering affirmative action unnecessary.

So, the way I'm understanding it, if there is a rich black kid, he might get better placement than a poor white kid, just because he's black? That's stupid, they should look at the students background, not just go by averages.

Because that's the problem with American education, we go too much by averages, and barely focus on individual students. It should never be: people from x group have more trouble with school than people in y group, we'll always help someone from x group over someone from y, it should be, look at the students record, and see if they actually need help.

It's not actually like that though. If you look at school systems, they are given money by the state for high performance, and ones of low performance are not well funded. Over time this creates a cycle where the low-performing schools can't hire better, well-qualified teachers, or even as many teachers as they need. These schools tend to be in lower-income areas, which just so happens to consist of more minority students. In contrast, the wealthier suburban areas typically perform well, and get money to pay enough good teachers. These schools also just so happen to consist of more caucasian students.

Is the low performance an inherent quality of minority students? No, it is the failure of the school system to provide them with the same quality education. So if anything, the way the entire system operates needs to change. Of course, that's 'too much effort' and 'too expensive'. So I have to agree with Serenegoose on this one.

I guess I just misunderstood him.

 

[Kenko]

Reason number two is fail. Theres more africans/blacks/negro's on the planet then theres people of a lighter shade.

I am mostly speaking of the United States and only counting people of working age.

Right then, euro-fag here. But I get it now.