We have a similar problems here that over the last 10 years or so has just gotten worse and worse it seems. Despite the affirmative actiosn taken by the government in regards to trying to "make up for past wrongs" it doesn't seem to be working.

We still have large groups of Aboriginal Australians roaming the streets at night (I am referring to 13 - 14 year old girls as opposed to adults) during the week and yet I am aware that a portion of the taxes I pay goes to monetary incentives for their parents to send those same kids to school. Yet despite those rewards I know most of those kids don't, that they will drop out after year 10 (our last compulsory year of schooling) if they haven't already stopped going.

Do the affirmative actions of governments around the world need to be looked at in regards to how we treat minority groups - yes they do. In some cases they are not effective and merely encourage the types of behaviours that we are hoping to avoid, but at the same time as long as you have people out there like the KKK still active - as long as people like Nelson Mandela (I know the man won a peace prize but look at a few of his less savoury actions in Africa and you'll see what I mean) are held up as being wonderful despite their actions towards those they should have the most sympathy for how can anyone claim that affirmative action should be stopped?

There are those out there in minority groups who do take advantage of the systems put in place to aid them but there are those out there that are caucasian or asian who do exactly the same thing (look at the dependenacy payments single mothers get for example or unemployment benefits). So that can't be put down to their sex, race or religion because unfortunately people from all walks of life seem to enjoy screwing others over.

Do I have any ideas on how to fix these problems - honestly no I don't. I don't have the background information, the statistics or the true understanding of what life is like for those people to be able to make an informed decision and I think very few out there really do.


****

I know some people those paragraphs would describe perfectly with just the substitution of one word for another (obviously the bright green one) does that mean that I should tell my government to remove all benefits received by young white men and women?

Those types of views Timalkin are exactly why affirmative action is still necessary, as long as you are stereotyping the African American community Barrack Obamas election means nothing.

Please point out where I said that ALL black people are like X. I'm specifically talking about the inner city black youths that were previously mentioned.

I don't think anybody would say that white people are not guilty of the same things. The difference is that a white person can be a huge fuck up and sit around doing drugs, drinking, and committing crimes and not claim that "the man" is holding him down. Describe a black person with those terms, and it's a racist viewpoint with the institutional racism holding him down.

There is a huge double standard between the two, and they are both equally worthless regardless of the color of their skin. Frankly, I don't want my taxpayer dollars propping up welfare queens and other non-contributors whose full-time job consists of figuring out ways to scam the government at every opportunity without having to work a day in their lives, no matter what color they are.

We are in the 21st Century. Time to get off your ass, get a job, take care of the kids you created, and stop blaming faceless white people for everything that sucks about your life.

As an aside, if anyone knows of any lending institution that discriminates against minorities, please report them to the authorities. There are federal laws against such things that are taken very seriously.

So it's not all black people, just all inner city black youth?

Again, you jump right to the simple answer.....because it is illegal, it probably is not occuring.

Employment discrimination exists even though it is illegal. It is just not as overt as in the past.

And lending discrimination exists even though it is illegal, just not as overt as the past because of a variety of factors, including the fact that in many cases, the laws dont require lenders to collect or provide personal data, including race.

From a June 2008 GAO report:
This is not from a generation or two ago.....this was six months ago.

I guess that since "most research suggests...and available studies indicate..." is not 100% conclusive or irrefutable, you have your out.

If you accept even the possibility that available studies indicate that African-American owned small businesses are denied loans more often or pay higher interest rates than white-owned businesses with similar risk characteristics....how is that the fault of the black community?

I honestly dont understand why you cant see that the issue of discrimination and racism is not as simple (or black and white as it were) as you suggest at every opportunity. It is simply wrong, in no uncertain terms, to blame it all on the black community.

What do you think happens more often:

1) A black guy is picked over a white guy because of AA.
2) A white guy is picked over a black guy because of racism.

I don't know which happens more but i'm sure they both happen. The AA system is no where near close to perfect but at least it is trying to solve a real problem. I personally think AA needs to focus more on social programs and education. But that would be crazy socialism and the right would say the world is coming to an end.

I agree with you, that whats I mean by the problem starting well before the exams. The answer isnt to change college standards. The same studies we are both talking about shows there is a common relationship between the scores of the exams and how well students do in their freshman year.

Actually, I know plenty of white people who would do exactly that. Like the couple I ran into in Missouri who got into trouble for running an erotic haunted house. There are also plenty of lazy, stupid white people who blame not being able to get a job on AA. So I'm not sure that there's any sort of real difference between black people and white people here.

There are human beings who like to work as little as possible and blame their lack of success on an oppressive force bigger than them. So far in this thread, I'm not convinced that there's anything racial about that.

But go on, timalkin. Convince me. Your whole argument rests on that being a "black thing". You know, like fried chicken and hip hop. You understand The Blacks so well, please, explain it to me.

I just went to a Q&A with Baz Luhrman who spoke about the undertone of his recent epic Australia and that he wanted to bring forward the idea of the "stolen generation" which went on until the 1970s.

The Stolen Generation - TIME

It has been very interesting to me to learn about this "new" concept.

I'm not sure, but I find both bothersome because we are talking about race being the deciding factor.

Now that you've read the above article and noted that it came from the Jewish World Review, take note that it was written by Larry Elder, a black man known as the Sage from South Central, who somehow managed to rise from poverty and attend Brown University.

Making thing about race continues to focus on race.

cyn....I am still interested in your thoughts on a meritocracy based on the questions I raised earlier:

Is the college admission system based on a meritocracy?.....when according to the preponderance of studies on the subject, standardized admission tests may have a bias against minorities?....or when legacy admissions are given to kids whose parents or grand parents attended the university? or that affluent white kids are more likely to be able to afford pre-test tutorials, with sample questions from previous tests and buy the opportunity to achieve a higher score?

Is it a meritocracy when white small business owners are more likely to get loans at better rates than minority small business owners? (see post #44).

Regarding women and AA....before Title 9 (an AA program) provided some level of equity in athletic scholarships, was it a meritocracy that boy soccer players or swimmers or tennis players or golfers had access to full athletic scholarships and girl soccer players or swimmers or golfers did not?

BTW, Larry Elder has often said he benefited from AA.
-----Added 30/11/2008 at 03 : 01 : 39-----
Here is example on another issue....disparity in prison sentencing and the criminal justice system based on race.

Generally, a state issue; this is from the Wisconsin State Sentencing Commission, but similar results can be found in many states:
While other factors (such as access to expensive, top quality legal counsel as opposed to inexperienced public defenders) may influence sentencing, should the racial factor be ignored?

No it isn't and wasn't based on meritocracy... when I didn't get into a UC school because a black student was black and had lower scores than I did.

The article I quoted states that it isn't in the current fashion.

As far as testing materials is concerned. Parents make sacrifices. How is it that immigrant parents seem to have values where education is important and their don't buy a bunch of namebrand crap?

How is it that immigrants learn how to game the system AS IT IS? They too many know know the bow of the ship, but they LEARN what the requirements are and learn how to participate within those confines. Yet, the black community continues to decry being educated as being a bad thing.

Now this article by a gentleman from Nassau writes it up better than I can. Why can't the group take care of themselves as others have?

Another example from last year's Bush State Department report to the UN CERD.

While the report righfully touts much progress in confronting discrimination in all areas and at the same time, IMO, sugar coats the administrations enforcement effort in ending discrimination, this section on housing discrimination shouldnt be overlooked.:
-----Added 30/11/2008 at 03 : 26 : 43-----
No other immigrant group was brought here by force and lived through 200 years of institutional racism that still persists in many areas.

Damn...why is that so fucking hard to understand?

You just dont want to acknowledge that white high school kids have an advantage in college admission testing.....you dont want to acknowledge that white small business owners have an advantage in access to lending....you dont want to acknowledge that white defendants are likely to fare better in the criminal justice system....you dont want to acknowledge that housing discrimination based on race still exists.

I give up!

This is the crux of the issue right here. Sadly, the US as a whole is so dysfunctionally obsessed with rugged individualism that it's impossible for many to comprehend that what was done to parents and grandparents, and even great grandparents, has an effect on the upbringing, opportunities, and life of the child. We're even seeing this on the biological level as we continue to learn more about epigenetics. It shouldn't be hard to recognize that it also exists culturally.

AA will no longer be necessary when the dumb son of a black president is elected president in turn.

Twice.

You don't want to understand that it's not IMPOSSIBLE for a black kid to succeed. I'm stating that while there are still problems, I don't beleive that it requires construction of OTHER INSTUTIONAL RAICST mechanics and mechanisms that are an AFFRONT to other races.

and if your statement is IN MANY AREAS then those areas should be targets SOLELY and dealt with individually.

A blanket mechanical system isn't to the benefit of those of other races that aren't in the black/white situation.

You don't want to understand that I was discrimated against because a BLACK person was picked someone who earned it fair and square. There are people who today are being discrimated against in NEW racist practices built on by AA and diversity programs.

You don't want to acknowledge that institutional racism, if it exists, has less of an impact on a black person that actually cares about making their life better. You can only blame the system up to a certain point. After that, personal responsibility should kick in.

It's easy to blame the system. It's hard to actually take responsibility for your own actions and actually do something with your life.

Several years ago, I had the good fortune to serve on the DC mayor's citizens commission on community and race relations.

It was a diverse group with diverse points of view, but there was general agreement that complex problems arent solved with unilaterally solutions like "take more personal responsibility" and a general recognition that institutional issues had to be addressed as well.

We made numerous recommendations and many were adopted and small steps taken since then to improve race relations. Serving on the commission was time well spent.

Here....I feel like I'm just banging my head against the wall.

If you think AA is a racist solution rather than a necessary remedy (albeit perhaps overdue now for rethinking and revision), there is nothing more for us to discuss.

If you think its simply.."Obama succeeded despite the barriers, so why cant the rest of them", there is nothing more for us to discuss.

Fuck it....its just not worth it. I'll save for where it might make a difference.

I think these race relation commissions are a waste of time and nothing more than a feel good measure. Any person of any race on such a commission can't say what they really feel if they're against something like affirmative action.

Just look at some of the responses in this thread that imply that I am a racist. That kind of attitude makes a lot of people shy away from speaking their mind for fear of being incorrectly labeled as a racist. When someone calls you a racist, what can you say? "I have a lot of black friends?" That line always goes over real well.

We have to eventually face facts as a nation if we want workable solutions. The biggest thing holding a lot of black people down is themselves. Some aspects of popular black culture are detrimental to success in the United States, unless you consider success to mean selling the most drugs and having killed the most rival gang members. White people can't change this culture.

racist definition | Dictionary.com

I prefer the American Heritage dictionary myself:

dc....how do you define racist? the dictionary I'm using affirmative action applies, since it discriminates against other races.

If you can explain how further discrimination against OTHERS who weren't part of the white/black sitaution and how they should feel when finite resources are given to someone because they are a different race is does not further and perpetuate racist beliefs and discrimination... because so far, all you're saying is that AA doesn't do those things.

I'm telling you that it does, and there's an Asian person who is suing because of it.

What is this case of an Asian person suing over an affirmative action policy?
My guess is it's bullshit like your anecdote about not being accepted into a UC because a black kid was accepted with lower scores.

I call your story bullshit because there is no possible way for you to know why your application was rejected...review boards don't release that information. Furthermore, it's against the law to release another student's application data. So unless someone personally called you up, you couldn't even say what you wrote in the above post. But IF someone did bother to call you up and say things to you like you relayed into this thread about some lower achieving black person taking "your" admission slot, I'd suspect it's someone like timalkin who wanted to pass bullshit information to you due to his own personal agenda.


In all honesty, the reason your app was rejected was more likely due to a failure to demonstrate abstract analyses, which is required above the Master's degree. If you only needed a Master's, you are better served by the Cal State system. If you were applying to a Bach's degree at the UC level, I'm not aware of an actual admission's board but I won't say that there isn't one. There are a few ways to guarantee admission into a UC from high school or a community college in California, being black is not one of them. Your writing samples and statement of intent have more weight than test scores since they demonstrate the levels of analyses a candidate is demonstrating at the time of submission. SAT and GRE scores are correlated with one's success in regards to completion, but they do not indicate goodness of fit with a given program. Hence, they are used as a floor, but not a ceiling. That is, test scores get you in the door, but they are never the reason a candidate is rejected or accepted into a program.

In the UC system, once a candidate meets the objective requirements for consideration, the subjective portions are compared for merit. If you have a 4.0 and a 1600 GRE score, and I've got a 3.6 with a 1380 GRE score, so long as the minimum reqs are 3.0 and 1300, our applications have equal standing in the admission pool at the graduate level. The choices are made based on the subjective portions of the tests and applications. If it wasn't at the graduate level, then it's done by the numbers. AFAIK, there isn't a feasible way to personally vet 20,000 incoming freshman, so I'm fairly confident it's an impersonal process where if you have the minimum scores and there's room, you're admitted. I'm not even sure anyone is even turned away, I'd have to ask some of my undergrads...given that some of my students have not been able to register for classes they need I suspect it's open admission and the registration per classes per quarter are on a rolling admission basis (registration windows open depending on seniority).



Why do you consistently misuse the term "institutional" when discussing racism? It's not an action, or a set of policies. I already outlined it in a thread a few hops down. I don't know why you don't or can't get the understanding of it correct, but the way you are describing it is not reflecting that you have an accurate understanding of the concept.

This thread is exactly what I predicted would happen...the same people who posted in the other thread would rehash it in this one without any indication that anything written in the other thread was even considered. I am surprised it happened this fast as the other thread is only a few posts down. People usually wait a few months so the memory of what has already been discussed fades a bit...so in this sense it's odd.

Found in this post

smooth, again, you'd like to make it equitable by putting races at seats of the table so that each table can be equally represented, and each race has to struggle within their own ranks to get those "saved seats".

I don't believe such a thing. Ever.

That may depend on multiple factors:

Alphabetical order (last name): James Bradshaw
Alphabetical order (first name): D'Andre Jackson
First received: indeterminate
What order they are on the stack: indeterminate

You're putting up an argument for which there are insufficient facts on which to form a conclusion.

Furthermore, your argument is inherently sexist, and probably racist as well (it assumes explicitly that the HR person is a man, and implies that he's a white man). However...

• What if the HR person is black?
• What if he's Chinese, Japanese, or Latino.
• What if the HR person is a woman?

My point is this: You're ASSUMING that a bias exists for any HR person, but your argument makes other assumptions that may or may not exist.

smooth, this better explains why I believe that the best of the best should be allowed to bubble up to the top, and why I don't agree with AA. If I was still a voter in CA I would have voted for 209 to pass as it has.

Based on our conversations here, do you feel that 209 should not been passed?

How does what you posted in that blurb support your claim that:
The "because of it" implies that the student is suing because he was denied acceptance based on the fact that he is not black, according to the substance of your paragraph. I don't see anything like that in the chunk you quoted. I don't even see any evidence that he was rejected based on race at all. Is there any?

And what did I say that leads you to claim this:
I'm at a loss as to the basis of your conclusions in both of those instances.

As written, the bolded portion is a non-sequitur. Would you fill in the premises that link affirmative action with not alllowing the best of the best to bubble up?

So long as there are mechanisms that are in place that allow for people to be given an opportunity to advance because of race, or given exception because of race, then some people will always SUSPECT position/achievement/ to have come from such mechanism.

So perfect SAT and 1% yet still doesn't make the cut? Not necessarily black, but not one of the "required" diversity.... in other words, maybe they had too many Asians already?

If AA requires that the candidates be from diverse pools as opposed to the best of the best, then how is it that they will be allowed to succeed when someone who has earned a spot but is given a denial because the spot needs to go to someone more diverse, allowing the best of the best to be represented?

In regards to the race for Mr. Li here's an article from NJ.com.

Right. Completely ignore the rest of the resume....

I've interviewed two dozen applicants for a job recently in Sales. Two dozen more never even got an interview because their resume was mis-spelled, poorly written, or all-caps (my personal favorite). I never even bothered looking at the names until I was dialing their phone numbers to schedule the face-to-face interview.

Nice job at calling us, but not really calling us, racist.

cyn--admissions to princeton etc is not simply a matter of grades and sat scores.
there's alot of emphasis placed on recommendation letters and personal experiences/abilities as well. and that's not a bad thing---in my travels through schools like that, i found that being able to do well and being interesting in the classroom are not necessarily the same thing. i doubt seriously that mister li's suit will end up winning.

but if you want to be snippy about ivy league admissions policies, try taking a look at legacies. the kids of alumnii, particularly alumnii who give money to the universities, are not the same as for other people. it's an example of class discrimination, but because it requires actually addressing class, there aren't a whole lot of lawsuits that get press, and still fewer that get press which includes commentary from that nitwit ward connerly...

let's try again

Your question is a strawman and an appeal to emotion.

You want the answer "James Bradshaw, because who the fuck would hire a person named a ghetto black guy named D'Andre Jackson when I could have safe, suburban whitebread Jimmy?" As others have pointed out, the answer of who he calls first (or hires) may or may not have anything to do with race. Certainly for some individuals, they might be wary of hiring a D'Andre Jackson because they harbor some prejudice or because they're just straight up racist, but there's no good answer to the question that makes any difference in this conversation.

I don't doubt the legacy items as I could have easily gone to Notre Dame University on that kind of ticket and I chose not to, too cold I thought when I was still living in sunny So. Cal.

I imagine that going to Yale and then transferring to Harvard is just as much the same as going through those hoops you speak of. Yet couldn't make the mark at Princeton? I think there's a little more to it than you or I care to understand, I can agree with you on that.

I'm not saying every HR person would do that (most wouldn't), but to think that Obama as President means no one ever will again is naive.

As is it naive to think that AA has any effect other than to reinforce making choices based on race.

AA is a clumsy band-aid to the serious problem of cyclic poverty and lack of education in poor neighborhoods among certain minorities. The problem is lack of funding to public schools. The problem is a lack of cohesive family structures among minority populations. The problem is poverty severe enough that the opportunity cost of an education is outweighed by the "ease" of either working a menial job to pay the bills or a life in a gang or in the world of selling drugs. AA does not and never will address those problems in any way-it simply punishes some people for being of one race (gender) and rewards other people for being of one race (gender). That's an intellectually bankrupt system if you're trying to solve the problem of people making decisions based on race.

Bias assumes equal ability. The vast majority of differentiation on tests scores can be correlated to difference in ability.


I wonder why school systems have a problem getting teachers to teach in poor, urban schools populated by mostly black students. Hint, it has nothing to do with racism.

The response to this, of course, is that it's not specific, individual oriented racism in the hatred of other sense of the word but rather the systemic, structural racism that's omnipresent in our society (I say that with as little value judgment attached to it as possible). That's more the problem I noted in my previous post, and, unfortunately, it's one that's a motherfucker to solve. So instead of trying to solve it, we gave up and said "we'll just compensate for lower scores/grades/aptitude by giving them a handicap." It works ok in golf. It doesn't do a good job of helping groups of people improve their situation.

So I take it you'd support a renewal and modernization of Johnson's Great Society/War on Poverty? Because if that's the case, then I'm all for it.

Unfortunately, the people who are vehemently against affirmative action are often the same people who are against many of the other things we can do to combat poverty. If we're going to be serious about tackling this issue, we need to take a multi-pronged approach, combining affirmative action - which works to help the current generation make up for a weak foundation - with a full-scale War on Poverty that strengthens the foundations for future generations.

You're right: affirmative action is just a band-aid, but I don't see many people supporting the overhaul that it would take to truly address these problems.

I really have no interest in affirmative action as a concept or any part of any plan to combat anything. It's a bad solution, and a solution which, in my opinion, does as much harm as it does good.

I think poverty as an endemic problem with a capitalist system, so I don't know that a "War on Poverty" would do any more than a "War on Drugs" does. There are always going to be lazy people, unlucky people, stupid people and incapable people. And those people are going to be poor. Without turning this into a giant discussion about the virtues of capitalism, I think what we need to figure out how to fix are why specific communities of people find themselves trapped in a pattern which makes it substantially harder for them to achieve than others.

Anecdotes being what they are, my family is Jewish and my great grandfather immigrated here with the clothes on his back from Ukraine just before WWI. Four generations later, his progeny are almost without fail all professionals. My wife's family is Chinese and immigrated here with nothing after the CCP literally stole all their assets and they had to flee the country in the wake of the revolution. Two generations later, they're all going to college.

So here's what I'm saying. Slavery is not all that far past, and laws upholding race-based discrimination are even more recent. Depending on how you want to count, we have at most three generations (probably two, though arguably one) since Brown and separate is not equal. I would not claim even in the slightest that racism is "gone" or dead, but there's something...bigger...going on than simply racism. It's a convenient scapegoat, because it looks ugly, and it is ugly, but it's not the only cause.

People need to be willing to help themselves, even as we build social programs to help them. There is an unquestionable glamorization of the thug lifestyle-bling, bitches, cars, power, respect-and being a traditionally well-educated and productive member of society doesn't fit anywhere in it. That leads to kids without fathers or families. It leads to cyclical violence. It leads to substance abuse. It leads to a lack of positive role models that people can relate to. I honestly don't know if a kid from inner city Detroit can relate to Barack Obama as being someone he could aspire to be. I feel like I know a lot of pretty WASP-y kids who seem to me to have a pretty similar life history to Obama.

I think the solution would take an enormous amount of local, community energy and support in the context of a larger framework. And if we could make it happen, I would happily support it, but a lot of people-and not just white bigots-need to change their attitudes to make that a reality. In my opinion, all affirmative action does is reinforce the concept of us and them and reinforce race as being an appropriate way to sort people. When they came up with it, I can see how it was necessary, but I think it has run its course.

And, as an aside, I don't think the election of Barack Obama has the slightest bit to do with why AA needs to go away. The fact that a half black man was elected president is certainly historically and symbolically important, but it doesn't mean anything. AA was bad before, and it's still bad and it will continue to be bad, because it lets people feel like we're doing something about the problem, when we're not, and we're hurting people who have worked hard and have achieved simply because they have the wrong chromosomes or skin color.

Anyone who claims there aren't a multitude of factors at play here is either ignorant or disingenuous. But I'm not a black parent raising a kid in the inner city, so it's not worth my time to concentrate on what that person should be doing. More focus on our own part of the puzzle and less on how we think other people should live their lives would benefit us all. Not to mention, it's a bit of a chicken/egg scenario: it's easy to glamourize the thug life when you feel your society doesn't care about you, and it's easy not to care about people who glamourize the thug life.

So, how about focusing on the things we can implement as a society, because that's something we as voters can have a direct impact on?

We have an unfortunately small window through which to look with regard to the War on Poverty, but it does appear to have been headed for some degree of success. When Johnson introduced the Economic Opportunity Act in 1964, 23% of children (below 18) lived under the poverty threshold. By 1969, that number had dropped nearly 10 points to 14%. Unfortunately, that's also when Nixon took office and the War on Poverty began to be dismantled. By 1983, the child poverty rate had risen back to 22.3%, and in 1993 it was 22.7%. Thankfully we've improved some and the child poverty rate was "only" 18% in 2007.

Of course, Johnson's plans for a Great Society weren't perfect, and we know much more now than we did then. That doesn't help much if we treat our current knowledge the same way we've treated uncomfortable revelations in the past. Carter tried to warn us about our energy policy 30 years ago. In 1972 a study was released showing limits to growth that could lead to global economic collapse mid-21st century if we don't create a more sustainable lifestyle. It was ignored and panned and people preferred to feel happy and hopeful about the future... and now it is being shown that we are still on the trajectory that the study predicted. The point is, we can fight these problems - poverty, energy, climate change, food - if we have the courage to accept that they exist and that they require comprehensive attention. Fluttering between having a War on Poverty for 5 years and then having Reaganomics 10 years later, or between having solar panels on the White House roof and then seeing them as useless, does none of us any good. These problems haven't gone away, and they're not going to.

The War on Poverty is a start, but we have over 40 years of new experience and technology at our disposal to make it even more effective. There's no reason why we can't or shouldn't see this issue as one of the top challenges we face. We always should have.

Idealistically, I absolutely dislike the idea of affirmative action, but until we have a real, comprehensive initiative to fight poverty, I'd rather have a faulty band-aid than nothing at all. I think we agree far more than we disagree.

Anyway, Christian Science Monitor has a pretty decent article on the subject as well: Affirmative action's evolution | csmonitor.com

(And sorry if this post is somewhat incoherent - it is 4 am after all!)

Fixed that for you. It isn't just young black people that look up to musicians and athletes.

Nice one there. You're following the pattern of a racist. Start with white guilt questions and then blame their social status on the myth that the hip hop subculture (whose following is just as white as black).

i think the premise of the thread is absurd.

the counter-argument would point to institutionalized or structural features of racism---the last few posts outline the case for this pretty well (frosstbyte, smeth & kutulu)...so i figure at this point, it's incumbent on the timalkin to make a coherent argument that structural racism does not exist.

failing in that, there's nothing left to talk about so the game is over.

Yes, SM, I think we do largely agree, AA just leaves a very bitter taste in my mouth conceptually.

I think you're being somewhat disingenuous, kutulu. Even though timalkin is oversimplifying the problem, there remains a not insignificant problem that the hip hop subculture is idolized in a lot of the same neighborhoods who would also be prime locations for people to benefit from an affirmative action program. And that image does not promote education or mutual respect or helping your community. Those musicians and athletes are role models and their attitudes and actions are emulated. Certainly it is not the only reason why inner cities have problems getting kids to go to school, to stay in school and to be motivated to succeed in school where they can be competitive in applying for colleges without affirmative action. But it is a factor and it does contribute to an impression that education is not the way to survive and get respect from your peers.

This is a complex problem and it needs a complex solution and denying that the hip hop subculture contributes to the problem simply because suburban white kids like it too or because it's just a symptom of the problem isn't going to get us anywhere.