Affirmative Action ReWrite

Alex Cusumano
Dr. Gibson
AEW 1st
20 November 2009
Reverse Discrimination
Two well qualified men apply for a job that involves a variety of skillful qualifications, experience, and a respectable educational background. One of the men surpasses the other in every field needed to become successful in the industry except one—his skin color. The noticeably less qualified man gets the job simply because of his minority background because the employer would be guilty of a statistically significant underutilization of ethnic groups if it hired another white male. The company becomes forced to not only hire but also maintain a diverse group of people based on race and gender, regardless of which group of people are best fit for the job. Many opportunities are given to underrepresented racial groups in circumstances where they are clearly not experienced enough to succeed. Affirmative action programs are intended to ensure equal opportunity for minorities and women. However, the invisible quotas force employers and colleges to hire and admit a selected number of minorities and women, which results in discrimination against well-qualified, white males.
Affirmative action and related policies have become a source of growing discontent and division in society since the late 1960s (Yates 1). There are people who encountered the country’s long and poor treatment towards racial minorities and women. Affirmative action’s ideological goals advocate the repair and compensation of the past treatment by ensuring equal employment opportunities in the present and near future (Yates 2). The Executive Order 11246, signed by Lyndon Johnson in 1965, required equal employment opportunity. The order prohibits federal contractors from discriminating on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin (Executive 1). Many people today with mixed ethnic background are utilizing affirmative action programs, even when they are capable of finding jobs on their own. The original goals of affirmative action programs were supposed to temporary level the playing field (Pachon 3). But since a specific time period was not written in the law, people still abuse and reap the benefits of government protection. Minorities have more than enough chances to make it in the opportunistic American culture. The anti-discrimination programs have dragged on for almost 45 years and are now abused by many minorities who obtain jobs because of their skin color and not because of their abilities.
Affirmative action has replaced discrimination against women and minorities with unfairness against white men. Theoretically, the programs have good intentions, but, in practice, they have come to hide the unjust, equally harmful, and unconstitutional practices that give preference to some at the expense of others (Shelton 1). White males face the consequences that affirmative action programs deem acceptable. Some of the practices applied by affirmative action programs have stripped individual rights with group entitlements. Even though determining a specific set quota of ethnic groups has been ruled unconstitutional, it is the only way to determine if a business discriminates towards a certain ethnic group (Polyne 1). The hidden produced quotas in the workplace and college admissions have based hiring and acceptance on race rather than merit, respectively (Yates 3). If a company has a deficient workforce of people, they are required to hire a certain number of racially underrepresented people regardless of if they are qualified or not. Incongruously, hiring the less qualified person actually creates a deficient workforce.
A privately owned company has the right in determining which applicant would be the most useful and successful man or woman. The race, color, sex, or ethnic background should have nothing to do with deciding who to hire. If a white man is better than a black man at a job, give it to the white man; if a black man is better than a white man, give it to the black man. People who use their race as a way of obtaining benefits strip the non-colored American people of their opportunity. In January of 1995, a number of well-functioning companies in San Diego, California, came to discover that they had a deficient work force. The prognosis of their companies had come overnight, and had nothing to do with the intelligence of the workers, their level of education, their attendance, or their dedication. The workers were still able to repair jet engines, write computer programs, perform surgeries, run DNA tests, and even sweep the floors. The reason for their deficient workforce was because the new Equal Opportunity Ordinance claimed they were guilty of a “statistically underutilization of ethic or gender groups in any occupational category” (Billingsley 1). The companies were forced to file a Work Force Report, which indicates the number of ethnic groups, races, and gender groups their companies employ. The Employment Program Manager deemed these companies to have underrepresented groups of people. The female manager of the group has a team of 17 employees, 14 of which are female, to permanently correct the violation and establish an agreeable time for the companies to hire their underrepresented groups of people (Billingsley 1). Ironically, the team of 17 employees has 14 females doing the investigation. The team that enforces diversity in race in gender in the workplace contradicts what they believe in by their own staff of employees. A comparable circumstance would be if a police officer arrests a man for stealing, and then the next day the police officer himself steals. Their argument and policies appear illogical and unfair.
Many minority groups today call affirmative action programs racist. The opportunities given to an inner city school student and a private high school student will never be equal. Affirmative action programs do nothing to help the inner city students. Programs should be established in order to prevent uneducated high school students. The chain of education is flawed from the start. If the private high school student attends a university, he should be well-prepared because of his private high school experience. On the other hand, the inner city student will most likely be ill prepared for a university and fail because his lack of preparation for a serious education (Garces 2). One worker from the Institute for Justice, William Mellor, argues that many of the people who benefit from affirmative action programs do not need it. He says, “It helps those who need it least. For those in the inner city, it’s at best useless and at worst creates a climate of hostility from other workers” (Billingsley 3). Mellor recognizes that for some inner city students, the chances of succeeding are slim because of their lack of previous education. The only people who benefit from the affirmative action programs are already well-off middle class minorities. Equal opportunity programs intend to help all minority groups in America, especially underprivileged races. But, most of the time, helping underprivileged races has no affect because of their lack of previous education.
Many successful minority group leaders disapprove of affirmative action programs. Black journalist and media consultant Deroy Murdock, whose parents were impoverished immigrants from Costa Rica, voiced his opinion about affirmative action saying, “The underlying philosophy behind affirmative action is the notion that blacks and Hispanics aren’t smart and aren’t prepared. We must help these little brown people, and the black, that’s where affirmative action programs come from” (Billingsley 2). Murdock claims that affirmative action programs are racist for trying to help minorities. Many minority workers that have made it on their own try to set examples by showing that they do not need programs to help them succeed. One popular black economist Walter Williams says that, “affirmative action is demeaning in many ways and even those who support it would find it insulting if told that the reason they have a job is because of affirmative action” (qtd in Billingsley 2). The successful variety of color people know that other races can make it on their own. The affirmative action programs are there to simply create an illusion that racism is being resolved.
Good reasons exist as to why the critics of affirmative action have better arguments, but the struggles to eliminate racial quotas from our legal system have failed so far. The defenders of affirmative action programs somehow continue to prove that the programs do not create quotas and those complaints about those quotas are racist. The exact opposite is the case. They do create quotas for how many minorities to hire. If the quotas are not met, they are sometimes forced to hire that minority group and apologize for discriminating against them in the first place. The affirmative action programs are clearly outdated in our color blind nation. They have devastated the lives and careers of countless hardworking, well-qualified white males because they encountered the reverse discrimination of affirmative action programs.


Works Cited
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