Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!usc!orion.cf.uci.edu!uci-ics!tittle From: gazit@cs.duke.EDU (Hillel Gazit) Newsgroups: soc.feminism Subject: Re: More on AA Message-ID: <8906292203.AA17632@lear.cs.duke.edu> Date: 29 Jun 89 23:54:55 GMT References: <18425@paris.ics.uci.edu> Sender: news@paris.ics.uci.edu Reply-To: gazit@cs.duke.edu (Hillel) Organization: The Piranha Club Lines: 246 Approved: tittle@ics.uci.edu In article <18425@paris.ics.uci.edu> djo@PacBell.COM (Dan'l DanehyOakes) writes: >In article <17833@paris.ics.uci.edu> Hillel Gazit writes: >>*If* [balancing for unequal opportunity] was the AA target then the >>decisions should be based on income levels, education opportunities, >>living condition etc . You (feminists) prefer to base them on >>gender. >Gender? Yes. Also age, ethnic background, etc. AA is unfortunate in >that it constitutes a quota system. But if you think that it is only >based on gender, you haven't bothered with much research. I thought that in soc.feminism we suppose to talk about "the feminist agenda", and that AA *for women* is part of it. Sorry for my mistake. >The most famous anti-AA lawsuit in history was filed on the basis of a >racial AA program, not a gender-oriented one: I am, of course, >referring to the 1970's Alan Bakke decision in which it was determined >that a white man should be given a spot in a medical school because he >was more qualified than a black candidate who'd made it in on an AA >quota. When I had a similar debate with Miriam (in soc.men) last year we talked about that case too. Sorry to disappointment you... >>Are you afraid that if you will base your decisions on the above >>criteria, you will get a bunch Vietnamese refugee's kids instead of >>nice middle class white women? >Well, no. I might take umbrage at the implications of that statement, >but Cindy T. tells me this is not an appropriate forum for umbrage. >So I'll simply point out that you have no basis for making it, that >it is somewhat insulting, and ask, very gently, that it be retracted. I claim that: 1) The effects of giving preferance to people in one group are the same as discrimination against people which are not in this group. 2) If you push AA for women, but not to the Vietnamese refugee's kids, you *discriminate* against them. 3) If you will explain how AA for women is not a discrimination against the Vietnamese kids I'll appologize, if not then not. Anyway I run all this debate before with Miriam in soc.men, about a year ago. Since I'm too lazy to write a new article, I'll quote the old one. The debate was about the question of "is AA == discrimination?". "About a year ago there was an article in L.A. Times about the enrollment to the engineering school in Berkeley. They have a problem: too many Asian students, not enough Black students. Therefore they put a quota for Black students (kind of affirmative action). The result is quite interesting. There are cases were an Asian student and a black student finish the same high school in the same class. The Asian student was in the top third, the Black student was in the bottom third. The Asian student was rejected by Berkeley, the Black student was accepted. The data was collected from the high schools, because Berkeley was not willing to give a clear statement/data about its policy. This sounds to me like a system goes crazy. If California wants to increase the number of Black student than the obvious way is to improve the schools in Black areas. They don't do it because: 1) They don't want to give Black students a fair chance and/or 2) They too dumb to think on the obvious action and/or 3) It will be too expensive. I don't know enough about ca.politics to give the exact reason. Punishing Asian students because of their race seems to me unfair and unjustified. The refusal of Berkeley to disclose its policy means that it is afraid to defend this practice in the court. The reason? There was a case were a student who was not accepted to a medical school proved in the court that a less qualified Black student was accepted. The court ordered the university to accept him. My bottom line is the following: If you support affirmative action, insist that the exact procedure of acceptance be in "public domain". So if someone rights are violated he/she will be able to ask for help from the court. If you don't do it, you send a clear message: "Acceptance of people from my race/gender is so important that I'm willing to violate other people rights for it". This is a message I can't agree with." BTW Dan'l remember that you still have to explain why this practice is not discriminations against the Asians... >We were *not* told that this was because we were mcwms. We were led >to believe that this was America, the Land of Opportunity, and anyone >could "make it" with hard work and honesty. >[mcwms = middle-class white males --Cindy] >We'd had something all our lives, and believed we had it because we >deserved it . Then came along the various civil rights movements >(ethnic, gender, gay, etc.) and pulled that rug out from under us. >We were so comfortable in large part due to the exploitation of others. >Would you find that an enjoyable thing to learn? Would you like to >believe that you were the beneficiary of others' misery? I certainly >did not. I don't think most people would. And you decided that AA for women and minorities will solve their problems (and your guilt feeling)... >>1) The force is not opposite (men who had not good education opportunities >> are the losers of AA, not the upper middle class WASPs). >Feh. Even in a situation where gender *was* the only factor >considered, men with no good educational opportunities would *still* >be losers; the ones who had those opportunities -- i.e., mcwms -- >would get the good jobs and the lower-class and/or non-white males >would be S.O.L. You (mcwms) will always be a winner, the open question is who will be the next in line. You prefer women over those who "would still be losers". That's your choice, my choice is different. >Given that it's damn near impossible to verify the educational >"opportunities" of an individual, AA is the next best thing: it takes >identifiable groups with identifiably lower opportunities and >compensates by giving them additional opportunity, thus giving them >the ability to live in better areas and pass on their opportunities to >their kids through education rather than AA. Would you mind to explain why the number of women in engineering goes down? (I guess Cindy still has a copy of her article in soc.women about the subject). >This is the clue to "how long will AA go on," by the way: when a given >group is raising its children with educational opportunities >equivalent to those of white middle-class males, then that group >should be eliminated from AA lists. Till then Liberalism will have such a bad name that a real strong reactionary movement (can you say Reagan && Bush?) will send us all 50 years back. Ignoring the reality does not change the reality... >An alternative to AA would be to provide good education to every >child. In fact, this would be the preferred alternative. >Care to suggest an implementation plan for *that* that would cost less >than AA? Or even within an order of magnitude? Yes. A real EEO with stiff fines to the managers who don't hire/promote the best candidates. A $10,000 fine will hurt these managers more than $1,000,000 fine to the company. A plan like this may "kill" the "glass ceiling", and I may benefit from it too. But somehow I don't think that you and the rest of the Old-Boy-Network are going to like it... >>2) The forces are expensive to the society at large. There are useless >> workers who float around in a company just to be in the AA quota. >Since you insist on limiting AA to gender, your statement boils down >to this: "Women are more lazy and/or less productive than men." >Are you sure you want to be saying that...? If you'll force a company to hire whites, you'll get lazy whites. If you'll force a company to hire Blacks, you'll get lazy Blacks. If you'll force a company to hire women, you'll get lazy women. The point is that people who know that they are "safe" will not try harder. Is it sound soooooooo strange? >Huh? I have real trouble parsing that last -- but I *think* you're >saying that AA is unfair to (say) lower-class white males. It may be. >Society is certainly unfair to a lot of different groups, including >the lower class white male. AA is intended to correct *some* of the >injustices. Do you have a suggestion that will do a better job? As I said above, a real EEO with stiff penalties. >>You prefer not to answer >>questions like "how long will AA last?" and it seems suspicious. >Only to people who think every question that does not have a simple >and immediate answer is de facto cause for suspicion. This filter worked fine for me too many times... >Okay, why am *I* trying to sell it? What do you think I get out of >it? You've claimed to understand. Put up or shut up. Two possibilities: 1) The Old-Boys-Net losing ground. They have to give up something, and they need a middle class that will help them. Women are good candidates. 2) Guilt feeling. In your case I think that 2) is true, in the case of the government officials who push AA I think that 1) is true. >What I *am* saying is that making sweeping statements about members of >a group is dangerous and should be done only with the greatest caution >and forethought. Saying "Feminism says," is painting a widely varied >group of people with a single brush. It's as if you were to say I say that most feminists support AA for women. Do you agree or disagree? >I'm not a feminist, by the way; I'm a peopleist. As a result, I Do you try to say that you support *me*? Answer Yes or no please. >>Do you claim that ERA was an big issue between men? >>So tell me who were the men leaders of the movement for ERA... >I could name some names but I suspect that you've never heard of them. >One of the more flamboyant was Harlan Ellison, who (among other BTW I posted an article of Ellison on the net. Did you see it? >the state. (He also volunteered literally hundreds of hours speaking >for the ERA on campuses and other places that would have him.) That's all you can find? Try to list the female leaders of the ERA movement, maybe you'll find more... >The Partially Political Pundit-Roach Hillel gazit@cs.duke.edu "Golems are *goyim* that always wanted to be Jewish. But they never suffered enough guilt." --- ("From A to Z, in the Chocolate Alphabet", Harlan Ellison)