Archive for December, 2008
Earlier this month I blogged about legacy preferences. I took a stand and wrote that if race preferences opponents want to be consistent in our arguments against skin color preferences, we must oppose legacy preferences. No individual should be discriminated against or granted preferences based on factors like race, sex, or whether his father graduated from the school and contributes money to his alma mater.
Shikha Dalmia of the Reason Foundation writes about legacy preferences in a piece titled, “Legacies of Injustice.” She notes that almost “every selective college, public and private, gives a sizable edge to underrepresented minorities” and the college admissions process contains many exceptions to grades and scores. Being the son or daughter of a graduate of the school is one such exception. But unlike race preferences, legacy preferences don’t seem to stir up much ire. They should.
According to Dalmia:
“Legacy preferences are the original sin of admissions, the policy that fundamentally compromises fair, merit-based standards. Universities can’t in good conscience tip the admission scales for the more privileged and then ask the less privileged to compete solely on merit. What’s more, eliminating race while keeping legacies will make the admissions process less fair, not more fair, because it will open up minority slots to competition by whites but not vice versa.
“Legacy preferences are an especially terrible idea for tax-supported public universities, since they make it possible for rich, white, and less qualified kids to take seats that are at least in part supported by the tax dollars of poor, minority families.”
Dalmia makes a fair point. Legacy preferences are as odious as race preferences in that both reward accidents of birth irrelevant to college admission. Why should someone born with dark skin be rewarded based on that skin and others rejected on the same basis? Why should the daughter of a Yalie be preferred by Yale over a student who is better qualified than the daughter of a non-Yalie?
How do we ban legacy preferences? One way is to append such bans to Ward Connerly’s state ballot initiatives. Another way would be to force tax-supported schools to pin down a definition of merit. That is, post on web sites grades and scores required for admission, which will put applicants on notice that admissions criteria apply to all prospective students.
Dalmia’s article should be read in its entirety. She discusses the free market’s influence on encouraging private colleges to eliminate preferences and whether there can be true meritocracy in admissions. She provides a thorough and convincing argument against legacy preferences and why race preference opponents should take a strong stand against them.
Filed under: Legacy Preferences, Ward Connerly | |5 Comments
Last Friday, the state appeals court in California ruled that Los Angeles may continue assigning students to magnet schools based on race, despite a 1996 law banning race preferences in government hiring, contracting, and admissions. (Source)
Unbelievable.
Los Angeles, like other cities across the country, were under court orders to racially balance government schools. In 1981, a California judge issued a desegregation order that directed the district to use race when placing students in magnet schools in L.A., based on a discrimination case dating back to 1963. Apparently, the 27-year-old order was exempt from the law banning race preferences.
Pacific Legal Foundation’s Sharon Browne criticized the ruling. The court “has told the students of Los Angeles that your race means more in defining who you are than your individual merit.” American Civil Liberties Union’s Catherine Lhamon said the ruling “sends an important message to school districts around the state that the districts can continue with their desegregation efforts.”
Since white enrollment in L.A. magnet schools is as high as 40 percent (although they represent just nine percent of the district’s population), the powers that be have decided that a little racial bean-counting is in order to “balance” out the skin colors. Unfortunately, remnants of racial discrimination will remain under desegregation orders.
Here’s the problem: segregation is a problem when decreed and enforced by the government. Segregation that is voluntary (in fact, segregation may the wrong word to describe it), i.e., based on preferences of individuals, is not a problem. See the distinction?
Racial imbalance is not a bad thing per se, and in any case not bad enough to justify racial classifications.
Filed under: General, Pacific Legal Foundation | |1 Comment
Half a century ago, America was embroiled in a legal and moral struggle to end government-sanctioned racial discrimination. Under a system known as Jim Crow, our government treated citizens differently based on race. Today, America still treats citizens differently based on race under a policy euphemistically known as “affirmative action.”
In 1961, President John F. Kennedy issued an executive order directing the federal government to take “affirmative action” to ensure that no person was denied employment based on skin color, but this policy evolved into racial bean-counting.
Read the rest at Townhall.com.
Filed under: Column, Diversity | |Comments off
Wise King Solomon once said, “of making many books there is no end.” The same could be said for studies. Every week there are new studies on a myriad of topics. People research, compile, interview, measure, and quantify to create studies about every subject under the sun.
Race relations and perceptions are popular study topics. The American Political Science Association has released one titled, “Asian American Identity: Shared Racial Status and Political Context.”
“Asian Americans are less attached to their racial identity than black Americans,” reads the press release. “This finding confirms that minority politics in the United States today is more complex than generally realized and that understanding the increasingly multicultural nature of the U.S. requires perspectives that incorporate, but go beyond, the black historical experience.”
In other words, the experiences of American blacks isn’t the only game in town. The experiences of other minorities are just as valuable in understanding how race influences one’s politics.
The study shows that a smaller number of Asians say race is important compared to blacks. Asians tend to integrate at higher levels than blacks or other minority groups. They exhibit an internal diversity that makes them difficult to pin down as a monolith, and they are not as constrained by negative racial stereotypes.
The 13-page study (PDF), based on a 2004 survey, showed that Asian American group identity is driven by state-sponsored racial classification, immigration policy, and racial stereotypes. Let’s examine the latter more closely. The researchers argue that Asian Americans are often stereotyped as the “model minority,” and this stereotype is perceived by Asians as an individual-level trait. Consequently, Asians are less motivated to form group racial identify than a minority group like blacks, for whom group identity is central.
Is strong group identity the main impediment to blacks supporting the dissolution of state-sponsored race preferences?
Filed under: General | |Comments off
About four years ago, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich said he hoped the GOP could capture 25 percent of the so-called black vote. “If we get [black] votes, [the Democrats] are in deep trouble.”
Four years and one newly elected biracial president later, Gingrich’s dream hasn’t come true. Democrats have had a lock on 90 percent of the black vote for years (regardless of how blacks self-identify politically), and I doubt that percentage will drop in my lifetime.
I believe conservatism is better for the country in general and for families in particular. I also believe black Americans would be wise to spread the vote around, so to speak, so that neither political party takes their votes for granted. At the same time, I loathe the idea of “reaching out” to black voters based on race and oppose any and all attempts by the Republican party to appeal to black voters on the basis of skin color.
Ward Connerly agrees with me. In an interview with The Weekly Standard, he said:
“I certainly think we should reach out to everyone. I am not a proponent, however, of trying to reach people on the basis of their color, race, or ethnic background, or circumstances such as that. Once my party starts doing that, it corrupts its own hard-core values. I have seen over the last 10 years enough things the Republican party has done to appear more attractive to blacks and Hispanics that violate the professed beliefs of the party that I shudder at using that kind of tactic.”
Corrupts its own hard-core values…that’s precisely why I oppose skin color-based outreach. If Republicans advocate colorblind government policy, how would they justify appealing to voters based on color? Appeal to me through my religion, value system, tax bracket, or personal interests, but don’t try to reel me in with “black” issues.
By the way, Connerly has a new book out: LESSONS FROM MY UNCLE JAMES: Beyond Skin Color to the Content of our Character. Great Christmas gift idea!
Filed under: Ward Connerly | |1 Comment
There are legitimate considerations of race. For example, factoring in a patient’s race when determining whether to prescribe certain medications and what dosages to recommend are legitimate uses of race.
Dr. Sally Satel says she takes race into account when diagnosing patients, despite criticism:
“Almost every day at the Washington drug clinic where I work as a psychiatrist, race plays a useful diagnostic role. When I prescribe Prozac to a patient who is African-American, I start at a lower dose, 5 or 10 milligrams instead of the usual 10-to-20 milligram dose. I do this in part because clinical experience and pharmacological research show that blacks metabolize antidepressants more slowly than Caucasians and Asians. As a result, levels of the medication can build up and make side effects more likely. To be sure, not every African-American is a slow metabolizer of antidepressants; only 40 percent are. But the risk of provoking side effects like nausea, insomnia or fuzzy-headedness in a depressed person–someone already terribly demoralized who may have been reluctant to take medication in the first place–is to worsen the patient’s distress and increase the chances that he will flush the pills down the toilet. So I start all black patients with a lower dose, then take it from there.”
We know that some diseases are more prevalent among certain racial groups. Sickle cell anemia, for instance, more commonly occurs in people of sub-Saharan Africa and their descendants, while cystic fibrosis is more common among Northern Europeans and their descendants. Additionally, blacks respond better to the heart drug BiDil than whites. The drug dilates blood vessels and replenishes a molecule called nitric oxide. For some reason, says Satel, “blacks are more likely than whites to have nitric oxide insufficiency.”
Whether cultural or genetic, some diseases and conditions affect one racial group more than others. When crafting civil rights initiatives, Ward Connerly included medical exemptions to racial consideration bans.
Check out this slide show of race-based medicine.
So, why would a race preferences opponent support race-based medicine? The answer is simple. Factoring in a patient’s race when diagnosing and treating illness is not even in the same neighborhood as a government institution hiring or admitting someone based on his race. One involves treating and curing, restoring good health, etc., while the other involves racial discrimination in the pursuit of skin deep-only diversity.
What say you?
Filed under: Exceptions | |Comments off
The Center for Equal Opportunity’s Roger Clegg blogs about goings-on at the U.S. Naval Academy in a post cheekily titled, “Rum, Sodomy, the Lash, and Racial Discrimination.”
The academy’s Board of Visitors urges members of Congress to nominate “top-notch” black candidates as officers and to help attract more black students. (Source)
How exactly does the board propose that members of the Congressional Black and Hispanic Caucuses achieve the goal? Expanding the recruitment net or lowering standards? If it’s the former, great! Knock yourselves out.
It’s worth noting that 28 percent of the class of 2012 are racial minorities, the highest percent ever at the academy. Together, blacks and Hispanics make up a quarter of the U.S. population. They are, by all accounts, proportionately represented in the class of 2012 at least. More, more, more!
“Maybe it’s just me,” Clegg writes, “but I’d prefer that our naval officers be chosen on the basis of, say, merit rather than, say, skin color. But maybe their duties are so unimportant that it doesn’t really matter.”
Young Mr. Clegg’s naïveté is refreshing!
Seriously, though, what can you do? Ward Connerly’s mission to ban state and local governments across the country from discriminating and granting preferences on the basis of race is a step in the right direction. There won’t be a nationwide uproar over preferences until governments revert to discriminating against blacks. Only then will people get it.
Filed under: Roger Clegg | |1 Comment
So it is written, so shall it be done!
Last week, Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman certified the results of the Nebraska Civil Rights Initiative (NeCRI) and officially enshrined the language of the initiative in the state constitution.
NeCRI executive director Doug Tietz said, “The voters overwhelmingly supported the Nebraska Civil Rights Initiative and now Nebraska’s state motto ‘equality before the law’ is officially the law of the land.”
On November 4th, Initiative 424 passed with over 58 percent of the vote.
Filed under: Doug Tietz, Initiative 424, NECRI | |1 Comment
A post title like that doesn’t have the same urgency as “New Haven Firefighter Denied Promotion Because He’s Black,” does it? We’ve come to this. Denying benefits and bestowing benefits based on skin color is acceptable, all in the name of “diversity.”
National Journal Magazine’s Stuart Taylor, co-author of Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case, dedicates a column to the case of Frank Ricci, a New Haven firefighter denied a promotion because he’s white. After Ricci bought the recommended books for the examination and received one of the highest scores, the powers-that-be scrapped the test results and canceled promotions because too few blacks scored high enough to receive promotions.
Ricci, 16 other whites, and one Hispanic firefighter sued the city, citing equal protection violations. After a district court judge dismissed the case, a three-judge panel of a federal appeals court affirmed the dismissal. Conservative judges on the court sought to have the case re-heard. Judge Jose Cabranes defined the issue this way:
“May a municipal employer disregard the results of a qualifying examination, which was carefully constructed to ensure race-neutrality, on the ground that the results of that examination yielded too many qualified applicants of one race and not enough of another?”
The appeals court declined to hear the case by a vote of 7 to 6. Ricci petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court, and we hope the court takes the case. The issue of race preferences will dog this country for years to come, but perhaps in the absence of Sandra Day O’Connor (who sentenced the country to 25 more years on “affirmative action” in 2003), the majority will make the right decision.
Food for thought: Is playing to the lowest common denominator the best government can come up with? I’ve often wondered why the focus is on lowering standards instead of raising them. Does it not occur to decision makers? The primary reaction to low achievement among minorities is to treat them like children and deny benefits to everyone. Most blacks don’t seem the least bit offended by this. Pity.
Filed under: Diversity | |1 Comment
Every day we see headlines and hear stories about disparities between the races: gaps in employment, academic achievement, incarceration rates, poverty, and on and on. It is politically incorrect to expect individuals to play a role in improving their own conditions or to accept most or all the responsibility for their woes. It is more profitable and mentally satisfying to blame third parties.
Based on numerous studies, not to mention a good dose of common sense and observation, family stability plays a huge role in whether a person ends up poor or spends time behind bars.
Kay Hymowitz, author of Marriage and Caste in America: Separate and Unequal Families in a Post-Marital Age, discusses this topic in “Reviving the fight against racial inequality, closer to home.” (Unfortunately, free registration may be required. Try username twincities@bugmenot.com and password bugmenot) She invokes Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s 1965 report warning about rising rates of illegitimacy in the black community. Branded as a racist for merely stating facts, Moynihan was drummed into silence. Forty-three years later, he’s a prophet. Seventy-five percent of black babies in the United States are born to unmarried mothers.
What’s the big deal, you ask? Fatherlessless begets many bad things. Children raised by unmarried mothers are less likely to graduate from high school, more likely to end up pregnant as teenagers, and more likely to spend time in the criminal justice system.
But I digress. Moynihan’s assumptions that racims and poverty caused social pathologies were shattered. Hymowitz writes:
“There were other puzzling facts. In 1950, at the height of the Jim Crow era and despite the shattering legacy of slavery, the great majority of black children — an estimated 85 percent — were born to their two married parents. Just 15 years later, there seemed to be no obvious reason that that would change. With the passage of the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act, legal barriers to equality were falling. The black middle class had grown substantially, and the first five years of the 1960s had produced 7 million new jobs. Yet 24 percent of black mothers were then bypassing marriage. Moynihan wrote later that he, like everyone else in the policy business, had assumed that ‘economic conditions determine social conditions.’ Now, it seemed, ‘what everyone knew was evidently not so.’”
As conditions worsened in the black community, no one dared talk about the real cause of the problem. As the government poured money into more and more bloated government programs, black women continued to have babies out of wedlock. Decades after government-sanctioned segregation, black families have the lowest median income, and almost 30 percent of black children are poor.
Rebuilding and strengthening the black family would improve conditions in black communities and, more importantly, for black children. Children of any color are much better off growing up in a stable household where the mothers are married, preferably to the children’s father. Can Obama, married to his children’s mother and living under the same roof, serve as a role model?
“Through the power of his own example,” writes Hymowitz, “Obama presents a chance to revive what Lyndon Johnson called ‘the next and the more profound stage of the battle for civil rights.’”
Filed under: General | |Comments off
« Previous Entries||
