An Inspection of Affirmative Action

Affirmative action describes action taken to award a certain demographic to remedy under-representation and/or discrimination. Attending a school built on liberal principles, many in our community take affirmative action’s being good for granted. In this article I will be inspecting it under a raking light and try to disenchant affirmative action so as to engage with it in a logical way.

There are three premises that proponents of current-day affirmative action must support. The first is that individuals who are being ‘affirmed’ are disadvantaged in the first place. Without this, affirmative action would be immoral. It would be an arbitrary selection process, or worse, discrimination in its own right. The second premise is that taking opportunity away from the more advantaged and giving these to the disadvantaged is a fair thing to do. And the final is that these ‘reparations’ should be paid to the extent they argue.

Are these supposedly disadvantaged groups actually disadvantaged? This is the first question to ask. There are two tiers to this question

• Are these groups actively being discriminated against in the present?

• Were these groups discriminated against in the past and especially in such a way that puts them at a socio-economic status lower than they would otherwise have been in?

These questions are much too broad to answer conclusively in this article, as there are so many groups that have a claim to affirmative action, however, I will point to some evidence for race-based discrimination. The overwhelming evidence on the internet seems to say yes: according to the U.S. Department of Education, the rate of black student suspension is disproportionate to the percentage of total black students (35% to 15%). 88% of police stops in New York involved black or Latinx people, despite 70 percent of the individuals being innocent while only 10% involved whites. Black women are 3 to 4 times more likely to die in childbirth than their white counterparts of similar education and income. Further, blacks are twice as likely to be unemployed compared to whites. (1) All of this must mean that black people are disadvantaged? Yes, but it may not be in the way that you would expect. Out of these statistics only one can be said to point to present-day discrimination. Rate of suspension often points to a lack of education in parents or a lower income leading to students’ inability to excel in school. The source gives no statistics on rates of accuracy for white arrests in New York, and unemployment is also highly based on the economic, social, and educational environment of their upbringing. This only leaves the statistic on child birth standing. It seems that present-day discrimination is not the main cause of the socio-economic disparity, but rather a history of it. (2) The purpose of this paragraph is not to explain away such statistics with my conjectures. The two main purposes are rather to reconsider the extent to which these events occur, and more importantly to take the stigma away from discussing such topics with open curiosity. In this school it is uncommon for students to openly question the official positions the school holds on racism, especially with most teachers holding similar left-wing views. If these questions are asked with the pursuit of truth in mind rather than to justify a preconceived view, it is important to answer them. To be shushed and frowned upon when questioning these things will only lead to distrust and skepticism in said views and an inability to think independently in the future.

Now onto the second premise: is affirmative action moral? I don’t plan to go through a philosophical justification or criticism of affirmative action, but rather compare them with other intuitive examples which are widely accepted to be just. Using fairness as common ground, we can accept some schemes of reparations as a basepoint for ‘Rightness’. Is it morally right for me to have to pay you $10 for spilling your $10 frappuccino? Let us say yes. If I commit a wrong, I must right it. However, there are a few crucial differences between this example and the propositions of affirmative action today. First is intergenerationality. Modify the above situation so that I refuse and/or am unable to pay you $10. Is my daughter morally obliged to take $10 out of her pocket to pay for a wrong she never caused? I cannot find a logical justification for this. Perhaps some may say that whites have benefitted from the unjust treatment of blacks in the past. So let us modify the situation once again: I do not spill your Frappuccino, I steal it and give it to my daughter. Even here, my daughter seems to have no responsibility for what has transpired between you and myself. I have yet to find convincing responses to this.

The second difference and third premise is that of accuracy and extent. Unlike the clear-cut example above, it is very difficult to pinpoint who in history have been discriminated against, and to what degree. Should recent immigrants from Africa who were not affected by the slave trade have the same benefits as those who were? How about the great great grand-son of that Russian peasant whose money was extorted from him in the late 19th century, causing a chain reaction causing his descendents to work as janitors rather than media moguls as those of his overlords had? Doesn’t he have the same moral ground to claim reparations from the great great great great grand-daugher of the overlord? Such questions become especially pertinent if, as statistics suggest, the power disparity is largely to do with institutional momentum and historical legacies. Sure, I don’t think that reparations should be cancelled just because they cannot be 100% accurate. However if accuracy is being questioned, there should be more discourse as to how much action can be taken without being assertive or illogical. Some may argue that such atrocities have no limit to the retribution to be meted out to its aggressors and their affiliates, but there is, I believe, a “too far” in this fight for justice (throwback to when some Austrian artist overreacted to the humiliating terms if the Versailles Treaty). Even social attitudes and legislation meant to rectify a wrong must be brought about with caution, for fear of grave imbalance in the future.

Affirmative action takes many forms and is supported by many people for a plethora of reasons. I think, however, it is a shame that people in our community rarely give it much time to discuss it critically and rationally. As many students have recognized, especially in light of the school’s recent push for diversity, equity and inclusivity (DEI), they cannot simply proclaim allegiance to the trendiest movements on liberal instagram in order to solve its problems. My purpose in writing this is for readers who support affirmative action to think critically about their views; perhaps to re-affirm their support, this time with stronger justification, and for opponents of affirmative action to also reassess their reasons for their view. It would be my most ambitious hope for readers who may have been riding the bandwagon of trends to hop off for a while, take a walk, and examine the scenery.

(1) “11 Facts About Racial Discrimination.” DoSomething.org, DoSomething.org, 6 Mar. 2021, www.dosomething.org/us/facts/11-facts-about-racial-discrimination.

(2) Williams, Heather Andrea. “How Slavery Affected African American Families.” Freedom’s Story, TeacherServe©. National Humanities Center. March. 2. 2021 <http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/tserve/freedom/1609-1865/essays/aafamilies.htm>

Special Thanks to: My dad for inspiring me to think about this topic and Kairavi and Aditi for editing.