How is this not covert racism?
I was reading my university newspaper today and there was an article about awards being given to black students with a 3.5 GPA or higher their freshmen year and a different award for black seniors with at least a 3.5 GPA.
Now, why exactly should black students get a special award? Isn't that basically saying, "Look, we don't think as a race you are as intelligent and capable as the other students, therefor, we will give you something if you get at least a 3.5 GPA." WTF? How are they not insulted by this?
Not to mention it isn't difficult to get a 3.5 GPA your freshmen year at my school.
In my opinion, all special treatment based on race is discriminatory and racist. Why do minorities not come to this same conclusion?
How is this not covert racism?
Yeah I think the pendulum of social equality has swung to far to the left. I'm all for helping the minorities through the door of a college but once there its up to them to prove they deserve it.
How is this not covert racism?
What kinds of award? Are they scholarships, living expenses, trophies, recognition of achievement, etc.? Who is giving the awards?
How is this not covert racism?
The University gave them and it is only an award of recognition. I just skimmed the article, it annoyed me.
How is this not covert racism?
Quote:
Originally Posted by JaggedEdge
The University gave them and it is only an award of recognition. I just skimmed the article, it annoyed me.
...it's a guilt trip, from the old days.
How is this not covert racism?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dutch Pimp
...it's a guilt trip, from the old days.
More than likely, but shouldn't black people find this offensive? The tittle was misleading, I don't think the administration ever had racism in mind, but isn't the overcompensation a form of racism?
How is this not covert racism?
Quote:
Originally Posted by JaggedEdge
More than likely, but shouldn't black people find this offensive? The tittle was misleading, I don't think the administration ever had racism in mind, but isn't the overcompensation a form of racism?
...if your fathers and grandfathers? ...sinned badly?..(mine did)...how much should YOU compensate?
How is this not covert racism?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dutch Pimp
...if your fathers and grandfathers? ...sinned badly?..(mine did)...how much should YOU compensate?
I shouldn't compensate anything. I didn't inherit what they did over 150 years ago. And what the hell kind of compensation is a backwards compliment from a school? All this white guilt is ridiculous though. Why does anyone feel guilty about something they weren't even alive to participate in? Sure you could feel some embarrassment over your ancestors actions, but to feel guilty is a little overboard.
How is this not covert racism?
i dont believe that is right, you didn't do it, to me that is like saying muslims should say sorry for 9/11, or christians sayin sorry for any kkk events
How is this not covert racism?
here's another example of discrimination. and a link if you want to join the discussion.
Supreme Court decides reverse Discrimination! - myfoxdc Blog post - myfoxdc | WTTG FOX 5 News in Washington, DC
Justices to Hear White Firefighters?? Bias Claims
Published: April 9, 2009
NEW HAVEN ?? Frank Ricci has been a firefighter here for 11 years, and he would do just about anything to advance to lieutenant.
Joseph B. Muhammad, president of a black firefighters?? group, spoke in New Haven last month against the white firefighters?? suit.
The last time the city offered a promotional exam, he said in a sworn statement, he gave up a second job and studied up to 13 hours a day. Mr. Ricci, who is dyslexic, paid an acquaintance more than $1,000 to read textbooks onto audiotapes. He made flashcards, took practice tests, worked with a study group and participated in mock interviews.
Mr. Ricci did well, he said, coming in sixth among the 77 candidates who took the exam. But the city threw out the test, because none of the 19 African-American firefighters who took it qualified for promotion. That decision prompted Mr. Ricci and 17 other white firefighters, including one Hispanic, to sue the city, alleging racial discrimination.
Their case, which will be argued before the Supreme Court on April 22, is the Roberts court??s first major confrontation with claims of racial discrimination in employment and will require the justices to choose between conflicting conceptions of the government??s role in ensuring fair treatment regardless of race.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. has repeatedly noted his hostility to what he has called the ??sordid business? of ??divvying us up by race.? In 2007, diverging from an important Rehnquist court decision that allowed public universities to consider race in admissions decisions, the Roberts court forbade public school systems to take race explicitly into account to achieve or maintain integration.
??The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race,? Chief Justice Roberts wrote.
But those cases involved education, and it has been decades since the court last took an intensive look at the use of race in public hiring or promotion. Among the questions swirling around Mr. Ricci??s case are whether the law should treat diversity in the work force differently from diversity in the classroom and how it should handle hiring and promotion tests that have a severely disparate impact on candidates of one race.
The city says it was merely trying to comply with a federal law that views job requirements like promotional tests with great suspicion when they disproportionately disfavor minority applicants.
??The fact of the matter is it??s a flawed test,? said Victor A. Bolden, the city??s acting corporation counsel.
Mr. Bolden added that he had sympathy for Mr. Ricci. ??There??s no question that there are people who are disappointed,? he said. ??But disappointment doesn??t lead to a discrimination claim.?
The promotion exam was offered in the fall of 2003, and no one has been promoted since, Mr. Bolden said.
The suit brought by Mr. Ricci and his colleagues says that the city??s rationale for throwing out the test is illegitimate and that they were denied a chance for promotion on account of the color of their skin. Karen Lee Torre, a lawyer for the firefighters, declined to be interviewed and said she had instructed her clients not to speak to reporters.
John Payton, president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund Inc., which filed a brief supporting the city, said the case, Ricci v. DeStefano, No. 07-1428, must be understood against the backdrop of what he described as pervasive racial discrimination in firefighting and the pitfalls of thinking that a test can capture the qualities needed for leadership in life-or-death situations.
??Firefighting is a skilled job where all of the skills are learned on the job,? Mr. Payton said. ??It??s a really good job, and it??s been racially exclusive in most of our major cities.?
In a brief supporting the white firefighters, the National Association of Police Organizations saw the injection of racial politics into public safety. Promotion decisions should be based on merit, the group said. Race-neutral decisions foster camaraderie and a sense of fairness, it added, saying that people who work in public safety ??are, in the main, effectively colorblind.?
But Donald Day, a representative of the International Association of Black Professional Fire Fighters, questioned the value of the New Haven test, which included written and oral components. ??An individual??s ability to answer a multiple-choice exam,? Mr. Day told the city??s Civil Service Board, ??does nothing but measure their ability to read and retain.?
There are more important values, he added. ??Young black and Latino kids have every right,? he said, ??to see black and Latino officers on those fire trucks that are riding through their community. They have every right to look for a role model.?
According to the 2000 census, New Haven is 43 percent white and 37 percent black. African-Americans held 32 percent of the entry-level positions in the Fire Department in 2007, according to data compiled by the city, but only 15 percent of the supervisory positions.
In 2006, Judge Janet Bond Arterton of the Federal District Court here ruled that the city had not discriminated against the white firefighters. Since no one was promoted, Judge Arterton said, no one was harmed.
True, she wrote, ??a jury could infer that the defendants were motivated by a concern that too many whites and not enough minorities would be promoted.?
But the city??s motives were lawful, Judge Arterton said. They included fear of public criticism, the possibility of ??lawsuits from minority applicants that, for political reasons, the city did not want to defend? and a desire to promote ??diversity in the Fire Department? and ??managerial role models for aspiring firefighters.?
Judge Arterton ruled that city officials were not required to abide by the test results even though ??they cannot pinpoint its deficiency explaining its disparate impact.? It is enough, she said, that the test results ran afoul of federal guidelines that presume discrimination where the lowest-scoring group is promoted at a rate of less than 80 percent of the highest-scoring group.
A three-judge panel of the federal appeals court in New York affirmed Judge Arterton??s ruling in an unusually terse decision. By a vote of 7 to 6, the full appeals court declined to rehear the case and issued a set of heated opinions in the process. The six dissenting judges urged the Supreme Court to step in.
The test itself is not publicly available, but the court record offers glimpses of it. One question, for instance, referred to ??uptown? and ??downtown,? terms that do not make sense in New Haven.
But it is not clear what would have generated racial disparities in the results, and the six dissenting appeals court judges said the test had been ??carefully constructed to ensure race-neutrality.?
Blacks passed at roughly half the rate of whites and ended up low on the ranked list of possible promotion candidates.. Under the city charter??s ??rule of three,? as positions became available they had to be offered to one of the top three candidates then on the list.
In practice, this meant that no black firefighters would have been eligible for the available promotions to lieutenant. After a series of contentious hearings, the city??s Civil Service Board deadlocked by a 2-to-2 vote on whether to certify the lieutenant??s test and a similar one for captain. The tie had the effect of rejecting the tests.
With no one promoted since, ??we??re sort of frozen in time,? said Mr. Bolden, the city lawyer.
How is this not covert racism?
This reminds me of this law we have in Aus. You HAVE to have blacks, whites, hispanics etc. in your work place. To me this is just promoting racism. I find it hard to explain for some reason but I'm sure you get it.
It's like if there was a place without any racism whatsoever (which isn't Australia BTW) and they put this law in, it's acting like racism is rampant and people aren't gonna hire a black man because he's black. And maybe the white guy will be better for the job but because they need a black guy in the workplace by law they hire the black guy who in turn does a shitter job. Or vice-versa.
I mean, even if one place doesn't want 'minority' people there, there's always a tonne of places that aren't racist so just go there.
One thing that does piss me off though, is in supermarkets here, the guys pushing the trolleys into the trolley bay thing are almost always African. Which I can tell is major discrimination. But yeh that has nothing to do with this, just thought I'd add that in lol
How is this not covert racism?
So nobody is getting promoted because of all this. First of all, I see the merit in giving these tests in order for promotion. I'm not exactly sure what is on the test so I can't decide who is actually right. From what I gathered it is just testing your ability to read and write. Probably some questions relating to firefighting...
Regardless, I think it is important for the people being promoted to be able to read and write well. I would imagine those two skills are needed for those higher positions. Not to mention, if your going to be in command of others, you should be able to answer questions about your field.
I'm really interested in reading the test now.
How is this not covert racism?
Yeah, this is totally covert racism. I think even having a negro or minority fund is a good idea, as it only breeds racism. How does separating people, help then be closer together?
How is this not covert racism?
Quote:
Originally Posted by luciddreamer
This reminds me of this law we have in Aus. You HAVE to have blacks, whites, hispanics etc. in your work place. To me this is just promoting racism. I find it hard to explain for some reason but I'm sure you get it.
we have laws like that here in the US too, they're called 'Affirmative Action'
and require company's to meet quota's based on what the gov. felt was 'fair'.
Quote:
Originally Posted by JaggedEdge
So nobody is getting promoted because of all this. First of all, I see the merit in giving these tests in order for promotion. I'm not exactly sure what is on the test so I can't decide who is actually right. From what I gathered it is just testing your ability to read and write. Probably some questions relating to firefighting...
Regardless, I think it is important for the people being promoted to be able to read and write well. I would imagine those two skills are needed for those higher positions. Not to mention, if your going to be in command of others, you should be able to answer questions about your field.
I'm really interested in reading the test now.
i'm sure the test must be pretty difficult and loaded with fire science questions.
that's the whole point, if you're gonna put someone in charge, it has to be
because he really knows his stuff and not 'cause you need to hire a minority.
what that tells me is that the white guys that actually passed the test must
have studied more than the black guys who didn't pass the test.
which says further that the white guys deserve the promotions and the black
guys don't, period.
promotions should be color blind and awarded only to those that are actually
qualified.
How is this not covert racism?
it is a sad fact that racism is alive and well throughout the world.
How is this not covert racism?
I remember I saw a two panel comic strip once. On the first strip you see two characters. One of them is black and the other white. What they were wearing obviously depicted a master-slave relationship. The black slave was hunched over as the white white master climbed up onto a tree by climbing on the black hunched over black slave, nearly reaching a sitting position. The obvious message of this first strip is to show the efforts, pain and struggle that this black slave endured to push the white master up to his comfortable position. The white master says something similar to "You know what, now that I'm up here, I think that we ARE all equal and everyone SHOULD have the same rights and same opportunities to reach this great view" (none of my quotes are verbatim, I do not remember the exact quotes but what I do have quoted are my paraphrases).
The next strip shows the black slave reaching an arm up to the white master saying something like "hey, give me a hand up yeah?". The white master's reply is "Now how would that be equal and fair?".
I remember this comic strip because I think it describes the attitude that many have taken nowadays. Everybody promotes the idea of equality and push for full equality forgetting the obstacles that many have faced and CONTINUE to face. People get ANGRY at the fact that disadvantaged people get "handouts".
I am NOT defending the university. I do see how what they did can be deemed as offensive, but I also see what their intentions could have possibly been. Who am I to pass judgment based on hearsay and people's personal opinions? I need more info to make up my mind on this situation.
I write this post to ask everyone to be more critical of articles and situations. As cannabis smokers, many of us pride ourselves on seeing the world in a different way, oftentimes correlated to a more critical way. I do not roam these boards often, but come from time to time because there IS valuable information here. Unfortunately, I have read too many posts based on ignorance and simple assumptions. When looking at situations, we have to consider the historical, psychological, social, financial, moral, etc. aspects because everyone sees the world in a different way, not one single unilateral way. More importantly, everyone ACTS on this world in a different way. There are injustices at all levels of this world. We have to learn to see them and act to erase the injustices in the world so that we can truly achieve a more equal world today. We have to make up for past mistakes and continue to push forward with what we learned. We do not exist in a vacuum not matter how you cut it (race, culture, time, etc.).
Thank you!
:smokin:
How is this not covert racism?
Its all a joke. The fact that anyone could believe that we're all equals is ridiculous. How do you judge two or more people and say that they're equal? Wouldn't you first have to define what qualities are desirable and which are not? That being said, who determines what those good qualities are? Its all stupid. Some of us are better than other in certain ways and visa versa. The thing that people seem to ignore is that we're all people and we all deserve to be TREATED equally. Just because those black firefighters couldn't pass the test thats no reason for the white firefighter to not be promoted. He was clearly qualified for the position if he could pass the test. This is a big problem in America and its sending the wrong message to our children.
How is this not covert racism?
Quote:
Originally Posted by SocialDem
Its all a joke. The fact that anyone could believe that we're all equals is ridiculous. How do you judge two or more people and say that they're equal? Wouldn't you first have to define what qualities are desirable and which are not? That being said, who determines what those good qualities are? Its all stupid. Some of us are better than other in certain ways and visa versa. The thing that people seem to ignore is that we're all people and we all deserve to be TREATED equally. Just because those black firefighters couldn't pass the test thats no reason for the white firefighter to not be promoted. He was clearly qualified for the position if he could pass the test. This is a big problem in America and its sending the wrong message to our children.
we're all individuals with different mental and physical abilities but we all have
an equal right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. that's what they
mean when they say we're all equal.
How is this not covert racism?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Clever85
I remember this comic strip because I think it describes the attitude that many have taken nowadays. Everybody promotes the idea of equality and push for full equality forgetting the obstacles that many have faced and CONTINUE to face. People get ANGRY at the fact that disadvantaged people get "handouts".
What makes a person disadvantaged? There are certainly things that can make a person disadvantaged, but being black isn't one of them.
Quote:
When looking at situations, we have to consider the historical, psychological, social, financial, moral, etc. aspects because everyone sees the world in a different way, not one single unilateral way.
Fair enough, but that doesn't exactly apply to this topic. The award seems to presume all black kids are disadvantaged. It doesn't exactly portray equality, does it?
