A positional Paper on Affirmative Action
I both agree, and disagree with what the author is saying in this article. He starts by saying that our chances of succeeding are influenced by the generation of our family that came before us, and by our network of friends and acquaintances. He applies the term "social capital," to this. He then goes on to say that the government needs to take responsibility for ensuring that everyone has an equal opportunity get a job, be accepted into a university, or move up in their company. The next five paragraphs are spent arguing against "color-blind absolutism," that is, the idea that we should ignore race altogether. To this point in the article, I could not agree more. I believe most rational thinking people learn from their parents, older siblings and even their extended families. They see the mistakes that their families made and want to do better. In my family for instance, I am the youngest of six children. My parents grew up in farming communities and had little or no education. I was the first in the family to go straight through high school and graduate. Only the four youngest of six children received a high school d
I have to disagree with the remainder of the article. He has taken offense, apparently, to the perception that blacks need to be given preferential treatment to achieve a degree of success. I believe that he is arguing that affirmative action is demeaning to blacks, but what he should be arguing against is not affirmative action, but white society's perception of affirmative action. Used as it was intended, affirmative action does not give minorities preferential treatment, it gives them an opportunity to compete with other applicants of equal qualifications. Human nature being what it is, opportunities do not always present themselves solely because of a persons skills, qualifications, or persistence. I recently read that a high percentage of positions are filled not through newspaper ads, or recruiting agencies, but through word of mouth. The best place for employers to look for new employees is often from their current employees. If this is true, then unless your work place is already racially diverse, most of your new hires are likely to come from similar racial or ethnic background as the majority of your workforce.
Some common words found in the essay are:
, affirmative action, arguing affirmative action, conscious effort, arguing affirmative, setting goals, preferential treatment, six children,
Approximate Word count = 763
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
|
