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From: cramer@kontron.UUCP (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Re: Discrimination
Message-ID: <169@kontron.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 17-May-85 15:55:52 EDT
Article-I.D.: kontron.169
Posted: Fri May 17 15:55:52 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 18-May-85 09:41:46 EDT
References: <354@iham1.UUCP>
Distribution: net
Organization: Kontron Electronics, Irvine, CA
Lines: 59

> > 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.
> ************

You left out one issue that is worth considering when this notion that
white males of today somehow are responsible for the injustices committed
in previous years --- my ancestors, and those of a lot of other people
in this country, gave lives in the Civil War to end slavery.  If anyone
seriously thinks that "equity" requires some accounting for the effects
of past injustice, it would be wise to consider adding in the costs that
were born to end some of those injustices.