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From: cbd@iham1.UUCP (deitrick)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Discrimination
Message-ID: <354@iham1.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 13-May-85 11:01:47 EDT
Article-I.D.: iham1.354
Posted: Mon May 13 11:01:47 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 14-May-85 20:25:31 EDT
Distribution: net
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Lines: 51

> Imagine a highway 10 miles wide and stretching from coast to coast.
> Further imagine that there's a silver dollar on every square foot of
> the highway.  Now in 1776, we all started a race to see who could get
> the most money.  Except that all black men, all women, and all
> foreigners were tied up , effectively preventing everyone except white
> men from getting more than a mile down the road.  So now, 200+ years
> later, it's time for the referees to prevent discrimination.
> 
> Now what exactly do you mean by "discrimination"?  Do you mean we
> should no longer prevent anyone from proceeding down the road?  Or do
> you mean we should give everyone equal access to the wealth?  They're
> different goals.  Simply cutting the people at the starting line loose
> will certainly allow them to proceed, but it doesn't give them any
> hope of *ever* getting equal access to the money.  Those that have
> gone before have too much of a head start - they've picked up too much
> of it.
> 
> --JB                                             "The giant is awake."

I'm going to get toasted to a fine turn for this, but it has to be said.
Why do *I*, as a white adult male of Northern European descent, have to pay
for what *someone else* did more than 200 years ago?  My ancestors came to this
country 130 years ago from Germany and started farming in Pennsylvania. Anyone
who has done it can tell you that farming is NOT the same as picking up stray
silver dollars from the highway.  I am only one generation removed from that
farm, am the *first* person of the entire clan to graduate from college, and,
while life is modestly comfortable, am not what one could call privileged or
powerful.
	So, why do *I* have to pay for something *I* didn't do?  *I* didn't
hold any slaves, *I* didn't force any Orientals into ghettos in San Francisco,
*I* didn't lynch any black people in the South, *I* didn't put the phrase
"No Irish Need Apply" in help wanted ads, *I* didn't block any women from the
workplace, *I* didn't sweat any illegal aliens in unsafe working conditions,
*I* didn't do any of the things people cite as the reasons for this reverse
discrimination. I hadn't even been born when most of these things were
happening. So why do *I* have to pay? And don't give me any of these
arguments based on the notion of 'original sin' -- I gave up Catholicism along
with bubble gum and comic books.
	I think that the only legitimate criterion for choosing a person to 
receive something (job, scholarship, promotion, access to certain schools,
whatever) is merit.  Legalistic gyrations aside, *ANY*, and I do mean *ANY*,
such decision made on the basis of any other criteria such as race, color,
religion, sex, or national origin is discrimination. Period.

					Carl Deitrick
					iham1!cbd

************
The opinions expressed herein are entirely my own and in no way
reflect the opinions of AT&T Bell Laboratories.
************