ipl-logo

The Pros And Cons Of Affirmative Action

1100 Words5 Pages

Unbelievably, there was a time where it was very difficult for minorities to get equal opportunities in just about every facet of life. Whether it was landing a good job, going to a prestigious school or even getting housing opportunities it was very difficult for minorities to attain these things. Mostly affecting Africans Americans, many other minority groups that were also affected from not getting equal opportunities in everyday life were the Italians, Irish, Jews, Mormons, homosexuals, and women. With all the unrest and civil action by these groups, things were bound to change to give them a chance to have equality in these areas. Soon enough a new law was passed by President John F. Kennedy called Affirmative Action. This new policy was …show more content…

Affirmative action aims to promote hiring and recruitment of minorities and women to close the gap of what some would consider social injustices that has plagued the United States of America for many years.

Since Affirmative Action has been in place many believe the impact, it has had on minorities in undeniable. Proponents of Affirmative Action believe it promotes equality and really does give minorities a chance to be included in certain jobs, schools, and housing they otherwise would likely not get into. Minorities and women have seen an increase of opportunities to pursue the career school and house they want equally without discrimination or bias. Meaning now women can pursue jobs in men driven fields such as engineering, construction, and politics. The same goes for men also being able to pursue careers in women driven fields such as nursing, cosmetics, fashion etc. Opponents Affirmative Action says it lowers standards and promotes complacency among the minority groups. Meaning since there are a certain number of minorities that need to be accepted into Affirmative Action programs, they do not need to work as hard to get into schools and …show more content…

Gary Becker a college professor at the University of Chicago states that “Affirmative Action laws hurt individuals who are supposed to benefit from them and does more harm than good.” (Becker) Becker states “individuals less qualified perform poorer than their more qualified peers in school and in the workplace.” (Becker). Both sides each have valid points to make and evidence to support them. Groups that support and confirm Affirmative Action and there polices are The American Council on Education. This party strongly supports Affirmative Action Policies and has implemented them since 1995. They believe strongly in diversity and that it breaks down barriers and stereotypes that eventually can have a positive impact on someone's life. The also believe in economic equality, especially for minorities and women that have faced hardship for hundreds of years. Another group who supports Affirmative Action policies is the American Association for Affirmative Action. This group was solely assembled for the prosperity of Affirmative Action and everything thing it stands for. With professional and leadership training, they have promoted understanding advocacy of Affirmative Action policies. With years of experience at their helm, they are one of the premier groups

Show More
Related
542 Words | 3 Pages

Tyna L. Steptoe’s book, Houston Bound: Culture and Color in a Jim Crow City explores the significance of Wheatley High School, a public secondary school located in the heart of Fifth Ward, Houston, Texas, established in the 1930s to serve black and Creole students during the Jim Crow era. Despite being segregated, the students at Wheatley did not let this hold them down and instead made the best of the situation by getting heavily involved in their school. Wheatley High School gave their black and creole students tools for advancement and helped strengthen their cultural identity and in a historic period in which racial discrimination attempted to curtail their political and economic potential. In this Jim Crow era, the institutions of the city were divided by the racial categories of white and black, which would force everyone into one or the other category, even if they did not necessarily associate themselves with it. Accordingly, racially ambiguous people would either receive the benefits that accompanied the white label or the grim treatment that accompanied the black label.

Read More
675 Words | 3 Pages

Two kidnappers steal a little boy from a small town to get rich off of the ransom. Soon they realize that the little boy is so aggravating, and irritating that when they try to return him, they have to pay a ransom to give him back. In the “Ransom of The Redchief” by O. Henry, situational irony is in use throughout the story. Most authors like O. Henry uses situational irony to make us have a sudden emotion. In “The Necklace” by Guy De Maupassant situational irony makes the reader feel pity for the characters.

Read More
508 Words | 3 Pages

Affirmative action in the United States I believe that affirmative action negatively affects on both minorities and majorities. From a minority’s perspective, the idea that minorities can receive benefits from others due to their race, ethnicity, or gender can cause them to feel segregated against anyway. Since the term, ‘minority,’ no longer applies to every females or person of color today, female students or students of color with affluent backgrounds may feel segregated and devalued even when they did not get any special benefit from affirmative action policies. Majorities, in this case, male or white students, will also get discouraged because this can be regarded as a form of reverse discrimination, especially with racial affirmative action programs.

Read More
845 Words | 4 Pages

After all, it gives minorities what some would call, an unfair advantage. One point Anne Hull makes in her article “Affirmative Action Hurts White People” concerns readers that affirmative action is unconstitutional. She goes into detail by telling the story of a girl named Jennifer Gratz, a white applicant rejected from her dream college. Jennifer claimed that though she had worked extremely hard to have polished credentials, she fell short to a minority student with the same GPA and test scores all because of race. After being rejected, Gratz pursued a lawsuit against the University of Michigan, raising the question if affirmative action is still need in higher education (Hull 31).

Read More
1184 Words | 5 Pages

Affirmative Action: Pros and Cons As for the racial inequalities, it is worth mentioning that it was the matter of great concern for the black population; despite the fact they deserved to have same human rights, it still appeared impossible goal for this category of people that the dominating whites considered as inferior to them. The race issue could be solved in case the government were interested in settling on a solution to it. All in all, white people were not intended to acknowledge the human rights of black citizens. All this has lead to bloody massacres, discrimination, and humiliation of the black population.

Read More
921 Words | 4 Pages

Affirmative Action is a program that was established in the 1960s to help minorities and women representation in the higher-leveled education and career workplace. Affirmative Action, even today is still designed to give economic and academic opportunities to minorities and women who lack representation with the academic and career field (Brown 1).Throughout time, affirmative action has caused controversy with those disagree with the program saying that it limit opportunities for others. Although, many believe that the program is discriminating against non-minorities, there are many others to believe that the program is a equality of opportunity for minorities and women, which sparks the question of whether it should be abolished (Jackson 1-3).

Read More
727 Words | 3 Pages

In the United States of America, affirmative action was established in the 1960’s in order to redress the disadvantages of minority and historically excluded groups. Specifically focusing on issues in education and the workforce, affirmative action aimed to make these public institutions more representative of the population that they served. However, while affirmative action was meant to level the playing field, some argued that it brought about reverse discrimination against those who were not disadvantaged in this nation. Opponents asserted that affirmative action policies favor one group over another based solely on race rather than qualifications. No matter the argument, the Supreme Court debated this issue and attempted to accommodate

Read More
1684 Words | 7 Pages

Affirmative action was implemented to make sure that work place and colleges had diversity, protection against discrimination and equal opportunity for all minorities. Over the year affirmative action has helped black and other people of color to obtain a higher education. According to the data by the National Science Foundation, Black men who earned a science and engineering doctorate grew by 25 in 10. The undergrad graduation percentage of

Read More
1263 Words | 6 Pages

My controversy is "Is the Affirmative Action having a positive effect on the United State society or Affirmative Action just not the right thing to do since it makes the society unfair to lots of people?" Affirmative action was once founded to help those people who have been suffering under segregation and domination to obtain representation in society and to balance the income disparity. Among all of the famous newspaper, the Washington Post believes that affirmative action program is "a careful effort to ensure diversity and brings more opportunities to minority. " Their editorial board thinks that the decision Supreme Court has made is a right decision and government should keep forcing Affirmative Action thorough admission among the universities.

Read More
1640 Words | 7 Pages

Subsequently, already-overrepresented races such as whites would be represented in an even more disproportionate manner. This is not ideal because as in today’s modern world, all races are equal, but this disproportionality undermines that characteristic. Affirmative action helps colleges and universities work towards true diversity, which would be equal representation of all racial groups. However, while that would be a challenging task to accomplish in a short period of time, affirmative action helps jumpstart the journey by providing a means to slowly introduce more diversity on college campuses. Affirmative action is not an end-all solution, but it helps improve the lack of diversity present in colleges and universities today, an issue that needs to be tackled to fulfill the idea that all racial groups should be equal, including in education.

Read More
169 Words | 1 Pages

The reason why Affirmative Action policies are necessary is because diversity creates a better learning and work environment. Recently, it was proven that being in a diverse setting has some educational advantages. “College students who experience the most racial and ethnic diversity in classrooms and during interactions on campus become better learners and more effective citizens, according to an analysis conducted at the University.” Says the officer of communications at the University of Detroit, from the news article Affirmative Action: Good or Bad? Due to the interactions with people of other cultures, students develop sympathy and a better understanding of other classmates’/co-workers’ feelings and ideas, which later in life makes them

Read More
668 Words | 3 Pages

According to “Race, Socioeconomic Status and Health: Complexities, Ongoing Challenges and Research Opportunities,” it is said that, “The data reveal remarkable increases in education over time with the percentage of blacks completing high school increasing fourfold from 20% in 1960 to 82% in 2006. Similarly, the percentage of whites completing high school doubled from 43% in 1960 to 86% in 2006. In 2006, the disparity between whites and blacks in high school graduation rates had narrowed dramatically from earlier years” (Williams). This data shows that not only a minority group has benefitted over time. Affirmative action may be targeting minority groups, but it is only doing that to help everyone be an educated, working member of society.

Read More
310 Words | 2 Pages

Affirmative Action is a practice that is needed in college admissions in order to better represent racial minority groups in institutions of higher learning. The United States is one of the most diverse countries in the world, however, it is not so diverse when it comes to the education system. Racial minority groups are underrepresented in the education system for a multitude of reasons. The main reason behind this is that students from racial minority groups often have to go to very segregated public schools. The issue with the segregated public schools that minorities attend is that, “Students in segregated schools typically perform considerably worse on test scores party because 90 percent of highly segregated minority schools confront

Read More
1011 Words | 5 Pages

The fear is that without this policy, diversity will not always happen if left up to chance. It is true that schools and other organizations have discriminated against women and people of other race. This problem created an unfair advantage for males of the superior race. Supporters also charge that without affirmative action African Americans would have a more difficult process of being admitted into prestigious and predominately white universities (Hopkins, 2010). Affirmative Action allows minorities to reflect different areas of study and work that otherwise would have never been considered.

Read More
441 Words | 2 Pages

Affirmative action was created as an outcome of discrimination which helped African Americans and Latinos, and of course women. Since the launch of this action, it has spread to all races, pretty much everyone. In the eyes of many, this action is no longer authentic for the original purpose. Another strong point is the Affirmative action policies “lower standards and make students less accountable.” Affirmative action may be unconstitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment; which may be illegal under title 6 of the CRA (Civil Rights Act) of 1964.

Read More

More about The Pros And Cons Of Affirmative Action

Related Topics

Open Document