Last night we were unable to get into the Michigan League ballroom for an
affirmative action discussion that was supposed to be televised.  The hallway
outside the ballroom was full of loudly protesting students.  Did anyone
attend?  If so please tell us what happened.

The Michigan Daily states that Rep. Deborah Shyman (R-Canton) has worked with
other legislators to bring two lawsuits against the University targeting its
use of race as a factor in its admission processes, and plans to petition to
put a proposal on the ballot to ban affirmative action across the state. 
"This will be a grassroots effort to repeal government discrimination".
        The proposal mirros Californi'a Prop. 209, which banned the use of race
and gender preferences in college admissions and other government-funded
operations in California in 1996.     "We feel that people should compete
based on merit and ability and nothing more", Whyman said.

How do you feel about affirmative action?  Have you had any personal
experience with it?  Is it actually helpful for minorities, or does it get
people into situations for which they are not qualified, to everyone's
detriment?

4 responses total.

My mother worked for the Boston Public Schools, as the only Jew in a mostly
Irish Catholic system, and experienced resentment at first because people
assumed she had been hired to fill a quota.
        My neighbors are black.  The father was a plumber, the mother has done
domestic work, and the daughter, despite predictions to the contrary,
completed nursing school, worked ten years, then was accepted to the U of M
Medical School, where everyone assumed she had been accepted because of
affirmative action, not because of her abilities.  She graduated in the top
few percent of her class despite people's attitudes.  She would have preferred
people assuming she had been accepted on her own merits.  She chose not to
work in an all-white suburb of Detroit, possibly because of problems with
people's attitudes due to affirmative action.

In 1969, I worked on a survey crew on I-80 construction.  A black bulldozer
operator was fired and later the NAACP took the matter to court and won his
job back with back pay.  This particular operator was lazy and should have
been fired no matter what color he was.  I saw him "drive" a dozer about 3/4
mile in low gear half throttle. And he was reclining in the seat with his feet
propped on the steering clutches.  There were other black workers there, who
worked like everyone else and with no problems.

Years ago I read a statistic about the number of black millionaires.  The
number of such between the civil war and the 20s or 30s exceeded the number
from that date to the present.  Whites and Asian millionaires exceeded the
former numbers for the same time period. 

I think affirmative action has hurt more than it helped.

I think that we have to look the human been like God's capital we can't have
prejudices because it's ignorance of our part we need each other to survive
in this world.the world is a big system that each pieces are important .no
matter about color of your skin it is just a external character the human been
is more than it.we are looking for liberty or think that you are free but if
you have prejudices ot taboos you are a prisioner of it.

I think that prejudice can't go on in the third millenium the humanity need
evolution but not material evolution we are needing speritual evolution,this
is the way.

Do you think that people in Brazil are prejudiced against people of different
language groups?  I have heard that skin color is not important there.  Are
there many ethnic groups in Brazil?  Is it harder for some people to find good
jobs or to be allowed to study?  There is a big debate right now about whether
people from 'disadvantaged backgrounds' (whose ancestors were not treated
well) should be accepted to the university here if there grades are lower.
Is there much immigration in Brazil, from other countries or from the
villages to the cities?

Response not possible - You must register and login before posting.

- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss