Wrin wrote:
Rusty wrote:
Wrinwrin wrote:
( ... my text ... )
^_^ Rusty called me Wrinwrin!
Rustypoo wrote:
Actually...
Affirmative action is based on a bunch of things to determine a "realistic" model of people in an industry, then seeks to increase or maintain this balance. Provided that a company is putting forth a good faith effort and is using the "4/5ths rule" as a rule of thumb for composition and relative figures to meet, then they're fine. And while a minority applicant might try to sue for discrimination, provided the company can back up their interview/selection process with relatively high validity/reliability coefficients (Provided the selection procedures aren't biased to begin with). Also, to say businesses with all-minority employees don't benefit from following affirmative action, that is false. An applicant could quite easily sue based on reverse discrimination, because the company's composition would be nowhere near field average.
Also... Generally, affirmative action only really gets hammered in when the company does government work, or has had problems with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in the past due to discriminatory practices. And there are differing levels of affirmative action, ranging from passive nondiscrimination (Decisions on applicants cannot discriminatory in nature, and most common with companies not in hot water), to pure affirmative action (Where there is active recruitment of minorities, but we still hire the most qualified applicant), to affirmative action with preferential hiring (AKA Soft quotas, wherein minorities are prefered but not specifically hired), to affirmative action with selective hiring (AKA hard quotas, where minorities are hired to specific amounts as determined by the EEOC or whatever local body is overseeing the thing).
As you can see, things can get very messy very quickly.
I guess I see your point that an honest effort is put forth to make it non-racist by many people and their policies, but I think I'm a little too bias to continue the debate. Having been pretty poor for a long time (I'm lower middle class, now YAY!!) I've lost a lot of stuff because I was poor and seen families in similar (sometimes worse, sometimes better) situations get help just because they were minorities. Being a white male computer science major is, needless to say, extremely common. I get absolutely shit for scholarships and no financial aid whatsoever, I work for every penny of my college tuition, and I see people who are supposed to be minorities who don't work at all and have two to three times the amount of money for college that I do because of their ethnicity. I know there are other factors involved, but it's hard for me to be rational about it a lot of the time. Really, I know a lot of those people have a hard time at home and just live with less so that they can buy their books when I'm not willing to do the same thing; I'm sure a lot of them got lucky or knew better ways to go about getting the money than I did; none of that changes how I feel a whole lot. So, sorry guys but I think I'm out for now. It's not something I can honestly debate from a neutral position and I don't think I'll be swayed from my opinion that affirmative action goes way too far.
I applied for financial aid for school back in July of last year.
Between me and my ex, we made 19,000 in the previous year.
Because I am a white male, my expected amount of money I would be able to use on school was 4000, which exempted me from any financial aid from my school.
We sat down with a calculator for shits and grins.
Had I been a woman, I would have got a standard pell grant.
Had I been a minority, I would have got a standard pell grant and a couple others.
Had I been a minority woman, I would have got a couple grand a semester.
I don't understand the Department of Educations calculation process.