AA isn't so much about racist people, but racial inequities. I do not feel it necessary at the point of employment any longer, but I do feel it necessary at the point of higher education.

Everyone does, right now, accept whomever they want. It's being done right now, as we speak. There is no need to tell you what the negative "could be". The only reason they keep track of color is for the purposes of protecting themselves in the case of a racial discrimination suit is filed.

I couldn't tell you what would happen if racial discrimination suits became illegal. I'm in the south east, so things are bit different than they are in Jersey, and much more skewed toward my point than yours, if you catch my meaning. I do predict that the effects would be wildly different in different parts of the country tho.

But at the sametime, what if there were never any racial discrimination suits ever? Would be closer to where we are now, or closer to the 50's? I predict much closer to the 50's. The only reason we are where we are now is because of the tremendous work done in the 60's. I also predict that the children of the 60's will have to have great grand children before we are as close to where you think we are.

 

why, because then jesse jackson, al sharpton and the naacp will be dead by then?

 

Thats lame.

We all have the same text, same homework and same teacher. People need to take personal responsibility, not only for themselves, but for their education as well.

Quit blaming and complaining and DO SOMETHING POSITIVE.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18426890/

 

no matter your race almost all kids I knew of all races , economic backgrounds , family structures were public schooled. we all had the same opportunities

 

Ok, so racism is JJ's, Sharpton's, and the NAACP's fault? Won't somebody be around to replace them? Will they be worse or better?

Or maybe it's because by then people like JJ and Sharpton will marginalize themselves to the point of obsurdity. They are fairly close to that now. or maybe it's because as more and more people come on board to this planet, who grow up in an increasingly less biased atmosphere, the need will dissapate.

Let me explain exactly why AA is currently needed, and will be needed for quite some time: Primary Education. Right now, AA is a band aid fix, and a poor one at that, but it's the best thing we've got so far. The wound of primary education is a severed torso and it's been hemoraging for quite some time now. Band aids don't fix severed torsos. We have to fix and equalize primary education before I will accept that AA is no longer necessary. And no, the answer isn't more money.

 

Uhm, on what universe? Because I'm fairly certain that you probably didn't have the same teachers I had, or the guy above you had, or the guy below you had. If education were equal, why do people spend 3 times the area's home price to be in a better school district?

agreed

I thought we were having a debate here? and I am doing something positive, I'm championing the good of being able to choose whatever school your kid goes to, so you don't have to spend 3 times the areas home price to get a good education.

 

this already happens. blacks get to choose where they goto school in the seattle schol district, and it sucks and is racist. like i said, because some black kid has chosen to go to some school 15 miles away, a white kid who lives across the street from his high school, can't go. f-that. rich, poor whatever. The school districts spending money to bus a student or two some 10-15 miles, or giving bus vouchers to kids of certain colors and giving special privileges based upon race, is racism. Yes, even if the kids are black.

You seem to want to equate white's getting special treatment = racism
but black's getting special treatment = good

I hear that type of b.s. from black leaders, where the only way they want racism "fixed" is to hold whites back from jobs for ATLEAST as long as their ancestors were discriminated against.

Look, blacks are 13% of the population. Based on that, they should get only that percentage of various jobs, IF they have the education and skills for the job. If they don't, we shuoldn't make an exception, becuz they chose to not get that education.

But instead of realising they are just 13% of americans, they think they should get an equal say as the 60+% of whites. Black's complain about the lack of tv shows "made for blacks", that are designed to make white's not really related to or like them. Well if you made tv shows would you aim to reach only 13% of people, or 70% of people? if you chose 70% are you racist?

 

have you heard about the AA like stance the air force has with pilots and women?
The airforce puts unqualified women as pilots to meet quotas, and those women lose their lives because of it. Read up on jet pilots that you can land on aircraft carriers(one of the hardest things to do as an airforce pilot). Only like 1 woman in history has consistently done it, and yet we've wasted billions on letting dozens of unqualified women try it so nobody looks sexist.

This type of "let's bend the rules to make sure no one thinks we're sexist/racist" attitude is ignorant.

 

What you are refering to is an old system of bussing kids from underpriviledge areas to more affluent areas in the hopes of equalizing education.

What I am refering to is the idea that parents get to choose whatever school they want to, regardless of area or race, and for schools to limit their seats and induce a competitive enviroment for those seats, if the school is that good. In a competitive enviroment, more schools will emerge that can do the same or better for less, thus attracting those students and the tax dollars associated with each child and thus easing the burden of only one or two schools that every parent will want to send their kids to.

You may have heard of this refered to as "Vouchers". And it only works if everyone gets to choose, and if the tax dollars are attached to the kids. What you are refering to has been in place in many cities across America and isn't close to the same thing, and isn't anywhere near as effective.

As far as your other issues there, they are simply that, your issues and I'm not getting in to that because we have different perspectives based off of living seperate lives. IOW, I don't see what you are refering to, but if you see it, then so be it.

 

bending the rules and lowering standards is not what I'm for. What I'm for is the notion that if you want more representation from a particular sector of society, then you market to them, and in the case of a tie, give them the nod.

The notion of allowing 50% less push ups and the like in qualification drills for military/emergency staff in the interest of bringing women on board is absurd.

 

I guess I didn't clearly point out how it works. ALL kids, regardless of race, in the seattle school district "choose" where they want to go to school, just like you said, but they use race as the tie breaker(and since all schools are overcrowded, white's don't actually get much of a choice), instead of whoever's closest in proximity to the school.

they do this voucher thing in the seattle school district as well.

 

If the vouchers are not allowed at Charter and Private schools, then that's the problem.

If they are, then there's obviously room for explosive growth in the industry in your area.

 

I went to public school for 9 years, busted my ___, and was accepted into a great private school.
The week following the mailing of acceptance and non-acceptance letters, there were literally 50 black women, men, and children marching out in fron of the school.
They were all complaining about the racial injustice in my school by accepting some 245 odd white students and not accepting but only 5 black students.
The parents sued the school and a 6 month fiasco followed.
Now, i went to the exact same school and had the exact same teachers and opportunities that the other kids had, but i was accepted over them.
Come to find out, out of all of the black students that applied from my public school, not one of them had over a 3.5 GPA. A 3.5GPA is pretty good, but i had a 4.0 GPA.
Those parents were screaming for AA, and i was pretty ____ed. Had one of them been accepted over me with a 3.5 GPA while i had a 4.0 GPA and a great athletic record, I'd be enraged.

If your not as qualified as someone else for a position, you should not be given it.

 

unless they have darker skin, right guys?

 

Uhm no. But when the qualifications are equal, then there is room for debate.

 

why? if qualifications are totally equal, flip a coin.

 

We aren't there yet. That would be akin to making the statement that racism is 100% gone, and I'd venture to bet that the relatives of James Byrd would beg to differ.

 

racism is not 100% gone but in many places other than the south it is.

 

Ahh, but there is more racism in your neck of the woods than you realize.

Wanda Sykes has great bit about how ingrained our prejudeces are, including on the black side of things, so I'll paraphrase.

"When I see a black man running down the street, my first thought is, 'oh no, what did he do?', but when I see I white man running down the street I think, 'Isn't it nice that he's trying to keep in shape.'"

Just look at the Katrina photos: Pics of white people with stuff = white folks surviving. Pics of black people with stuff = black folks looting again. These were AP photos and the stuff in each group of people's hands were nearly identical: food.

We are far far far away from 100% gone. We have come absolute light years from where we were, but we've still got a long way to go.

 

Im not sure about where everyone else lives, but in my neck of the woods no one would ever think half the things wanda sikes says. I live in MD, and on our local news, which is mostly baltimore and washington DC, both of which are highly diversified, you will rarely ever see anything concerning racial issues. The whole race issue is definately much more prevalent in the south than it is in the north.

And about the katrina pictures. I saw something on real time w/ bill mahar about some of those photos. Those photos used to show black people stealing and white people surviving are totally biased. The black people had forcefully taken their food at gunpoint while the white people stole their food from a community cornershop. Theres a big difference there. Ok, there may have been some prejudices there, but a lot of the pictures on our tv screen were making stories that sell, by twisting the truth.