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From: robertp@fear.UUCP (Robert Plamondon)
Newsgroups: net.women,net.politics
Subject: Re: Discrimination and AA
Message-ID: <189@fear.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 13-Jun-85 16:53:42 EDT
Article-I.D.: fear.189
Posted: Thu Jun 13 16:53:42 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 17-Jun-85 03:43:23 EDT
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Xref: watmath net.women:5852 net.politics:9436

> Geoff Sherwood:
> 
> > If you pursue racist policies against racists, it is still racism.
>
  Richard Carnes: 
> So what?  This is what I have repeatedly asked without getting a
> straight answer.  Supposing that affirmative action is "racism"
> according to your favorite definition of the term, how does that
> prove that AA is wrong?

Me:
Many people believe that using immoral means in a good cause is immoral.
Or, in more childish terms, "two wrongs don't make a right."

Richard Carnes:
>  But to look
> for a rational argument here is to miss the point.  The only reasons
> I can discern that net-posters keep saying that "AA = racism" are:
> (1) to score debating points on the net (no difficult task), and (2)
> to annoy liberals.  To quote Ayn Rand out of context:  "Philosophy:
> who needs it?"
>

Me:
Cute.  But the whole concept of affirmative action is based around
fallacies.  One is that passing laws is going to eliminate racism.  I
suspect that laws to eliminate racism will be just as effective as
Prohibition was at eliminating drinking, or the immigration laws at stopping
illegal immigration.

Another is that having the government separate the population into classes
and treating them differently will have the effect of having each individual
treated according to his personal merits. (I'm not sure that is the
assumption; it may be that Mr. Carnes considers personal merit and
individualism to be inconsequential.)

A final one is the assumption that it's horribly difficult for a woman to
get a good job.  My wife actually had very little difficulty landing her job
as an R&D Physicist at a start-up company in Santa Clara.  Certainly the
company she works for has a high enough "minority" population to not be
affected by AA guidelines.  I know a number of other women in professional
positions here; none seemed to have more trouble finding  jobs than men did.
-- 
		-- Robert Plamondon
		   {turtlevax, resonex, cae780}!weitek!robertp