The Real Effects of Affirmative Action
It’s not fighting “racism,� though it was at one time. All too often, it’s what we all know: Affirmative action is not ensuring people get where they deserve, but rather, helping them get to where they don’t deserve.
Inside Higher Ed reports,
The percentage of African American, Hispanic and Native American students admitted to the University of Michigan Law School for next fall fell from 39.6 percent for those students whose applications were considered before enactment of a state law banning race-based preferences in December to 5.5 percent thereafter [… ] “ I would expect that the percentage of students who were getting racially discriminatory preferences in their favor would go down when those preferences stopped.� That doesn’t mean that those students won’t go on to lower-tier law schools or even to become successful lawyers, Clegg said — referencing research by Richard Sander, of the University of California at Los Angeles, finding that by admitting poorly qualified black applicants who would perform better at less prestigious institutions, top law schools actually do them a disservice.
“That’s the point, Clegg said, “that kind of discrimination should stop. And … when that discrimination would stop, of course there are going to be lower admit rates to the University of Michigan.â€?
One of the strangest lies of the domestic left is the mythical supreme benefits of diversity. We have been trumpeting these fantasies for so long now, we forgot we made them out of thin air. Then we go to test them, and it turns out they’re not true, and we’re as surprised as the protagonist in “Angel Heart.”
The NY Times writes,
But what if diversity had an even more complex and pervasive effect? What if, at least in the short term, living in a highly diverse city or town led residents to distrust pretty much everybody, even people who looked like them? What if it made people withdraw into themselves, form fewer close friendships, feel unhappy and powerless and stay home watching television in the evening instead of attending a neighborhood barbecue or joining a community project?
This is the unsettling picture that emerges from a huge nationwide telephone survey by the famed Harvard political scientist Robert Putnam and his colleagues. “Diversity seems to trigger not in-group/out-group division, but anomie or social isolation,� Putnam writes in the June issue of the journal Scandinavian Political Studies. “In colloquial language, people living in ethnically diverse settings appear to ‘hunker down’ — that is, to pull in like a turtle.�
In highly diverse cities and towns like Los Angeles, Houston and Yakima, Wash., the survey found, the residents were about half as likely to trust people of other races as in homogenous places like Fremont, Mich., or rural South Dakota, where, Putnam noted, “diversity means inviting a few Norwegians to the annual Swedish picnic.�
More significant, they were also half as likely to trust people of their own race. They claimed fewer close friends. They were more apt to agree that “television is my most important form of entertainment.� They had less confidence in local government and less confidence in their own ability to exert political influence. They were more likely to join protest marches but less likely to register to vote. They rated their happiness as generally lower. And this diversity effect continued to show up even when a community’s population density, average income, crime levels, rates of home ownership and a host of other factors were taken into account.
I understand that we don’t want anyone in our society to be denied opportunity because of race, gender, or whatever. But that doesn’t mean diversity itself is really anything special. In fact, overall, it may be more of a liability.
Regardless, I’m simply not going to pretend it’s the most important thing to accomplish in every facet of work, education, and life. It isn’t. And affirmative action is one of the most egregious ways of cheating to get just that.
5 comments
It is as if you titled this “Hey POLJ want to write back about this?”
Diversity is important. While AA did not work as well as it was planned, it was a good ideal. The benefits forced diversity in higher edu may not be the best move for the quality of the education and those who benefit from the placement but the needs for diversity in elementary and high school is paramount. If we don’t learn about those who are different we will not know things about them, and I think that is a problem (my argument might be a bit off tonight, my jaw is killing me).
The ‘trust’ argument is also weak. Clearly there is more mistrust over all in major cities…not just of diversity. If you are trying to blame AA and busing and the like for the lack of trust in big cities you have more issues than your clear hate of people of color (just kidding). There is higher crime, more trash and other gnarly stuff; all the bad stuff in cities causes people to get pissed and less trust worthy.
Here is the deal, the most important lessons I learned in college were from people I worked with and learned with, most of them who were not Jews or white or men. That is all I got…time for better pain killers.
“While AA did not work as well as it was planned, it was a good ideal.”
Good ideals don’t cut it. You know that. Don’t make me throw overused trump cards.
“Diversity is important.”
Why?
“the needs for diversity in elementary and high school is paramount.”
Paramount? Not really. The harder aspects of education are paramount, not the social ones.
“If we don’t learn about those who are different we will not know things about them, and I think that is a problem.”
so do I. That’s why I want a geography curriculum reinstituted in the school system.
“Here is the deal, the most important lessons I learned in college were from people I worked with and learned with, most of them who were not Jews or white or men.”
In college? I would expect they weren’t men.
Feel better, POLJ. And save a couple of those pills for me — they seem quite potent.
“Here is the deal, the most important lessons I learned in college were from people I worked with and learned with, most of them who were not Jews or white or men.”
But that’s not the deal. It’s an anecdote. If you’re going to try to defend affirmative discrimination through anecdotes, then all you’re offering is a subjective reaction. You need more than that.
Now that the funny pills are out and the pain in my jaw is making my writing pointed, I must say a few more things:
1. The most important lessons we learn in school are not those that are present on the test. They are the social lessons. If you can tell me with any honesty that you remember what you learned in 4th - 9th grade and that was useful to you, you are lying. It is important to learn to read, but what you are reading is just as important. Who you read with, what they have to say about it is also important. Reading about slavery in an all white classroom really doesn’t cut it.
2. I know Ideals don’t cut it but policy based on facts and values is what this country is all about…if it fails we need to re-evaluate. Just like other failed polices, sometimes it takes a long time to stop. For example: The Iraq War, Wire Taps, the USA Patriot Act, (you get the point).
3. My comments are anecdotal, however, if you speak with teachers (I am a teacher as well) you will hear that classrooms made up of a divers group of kids tend to grasp at bigger concepts than homogeneous ones.
4. I don’t hear any retort about the weak use of the big city vs small towns argument from the Times. Was I just right or were you being nice cause I was on the funny pills?
“1. The most important lessons we learn in school are not those that are present on the test. They publiare the social lessons.If you can tell me with any honesty that you remember what you learned in 4th - 9th grade and that was useful to you, you are lying.”
I went to a shitty grammar school where they didn’t know what to do with me except make me a teacher’s aide, send me to higher grades for math, and eventually let me languish. While I was in a specifically lower-middle class white area, I would have been much better off not with more ethnic diversity, but with more intellectual and class diversity, regardless of race or religion. I do not consider most public schools in the U.S. particularly good places for anyone above average, and the only thing diversity is going to achieve is to dumb down places like Stuyvesant that service the smartest kids in the public school system in favor of looking like an EOE brochure.
“4. I don’t hear any retort about the weak use of the big city vs small towns argument from the Times.”
In order to refute you, I need to find a big city that is not “diverse,” and see the data. I don’t have that, so I can’t refute you.
Also, I am partial towards cities, and personally prefer ethnic diversity. But that isn’t because I am morally superior or liberal. That is because I am a bit of a Bohemian, and personally find other cultures fascinating, like to get out of my own sometimes. But — and this is important — I make no claim that I find all cultures equally interesting or that they add any real value outside of friction (which does create art, motion, etc) and cultural value, as Koreatown does add points to Manhattan’s megalopolis.
However, none of that transfers over into the workplace. It really doesn’t make a whit of difference if Joe in accounting is Korean and Kyle in the IT dept. is Spanish. That doesn’t matter. It just doesn’t.
To compete as a world class city, diversity does add something in terms of culture. Because I like cities, especially big cities, I would vastly prefer to live in one with it. However, that is as in adult, and it is a personal preference. And I mean diversity as in real ethnic and cultural diversity, not massive, endless, low-income housing for blacks. That is not “diversity.” Those are ghettos. Even when its just three towers side by side on W. 90th st.
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