“You are insisting that the University of Texas at Austin denied your application for undergraduate admission because they were required to fulfill a federal diversity quota, which subjected you to bias. In blaming affirmative action for that denial letter, you are disregarding your responsibility as a college applicant. It is much easier to fault affirmative action than to hold up a mirror and see that you just weren’t qualified. You told The New York Times that attending UT had been your dream since the second grade, so before submitting an application, you had to be aware of the admissions requirements. You knew that the institution automatically accepts the top 10 percentile from every high school in Texas and that the average SAT score is in the 1200s. It is common knowledge that UT is one of the most prestigious institutions in the United States, so it is challenging to be gain admission. Before securing those letters of recommendation and forking over that expensive application fee, you knew that despite your legacy as the child of UT graduates, a spot on the coveted honor roll and a lifelong affair with the cello that admission wasn’t guaranteed. In blaming affirmative action for that denial letter, you have failed to mention that you graduated number 82 in a class of 674 with a 3.59 grade point average on a 4.0 scale, which alienated you from the automatic admissions bunch. You conveniently omit that you scored an 1180 on your SAT, which is way below UT’s average, so that automatically diminished your chances of being accepted. You suffer from selective amnesia, Abigail. You are aware that the University of Texas at Austin uses two indexes, the Academic and the Personal Achievement, to determine admission for students. You know that the Academic Index combines grades and standardized test scores while the Personal Achievement Index considers the submitted essays along with extracurricular activities and special circumstance (which can include race). You have been told that these two scores are combined and plotted on a graph and that everyone above a certain combined score is admitted while everyone below is rejected. This leads to one conclusion: Affirmative action is not the issue. Now, before you attempt to bash me as another black woman benefiting from federal mandates, let me clarify: I scored a 1680 on the SAT and I was accepted into every undergraduate institution that I applied to. I graduated from Bennett College Summa Cum Laude and valedictorian with a 4.0 grade point average and I’m on a full ride merit-based fellowship for graduate school. From academic to academic, it’s time to wake up and smell the ashes Abigail. You were not accepted into the University of Texas at Austin because you’re white. You were not qualified. But of course because African-Americans students were chosen for admittance and you were not, it must be reverse racism in the form of affirmative action. I’ve seen this time and time again. It is owed to the prevalence of white privilege, which leads to unwarranted entitlement. You do know what white privilege is, right?”
—Evette Dionne, “An Open Letter To Abigail Fisher,” Clutch Magazine 10/11/12when people complain about Natives getting "free college from the government"
first let’s clear the popular misconceptions :
- the US government doesn’t pay, it’s the TRIBAL governments.
- not all nations offer scholarship programs.
- it doesn’t pay for everything, no scholarship does.
- over 95% of natives quit high school & don’t qualify for college.
- Natives are statistically the poorest population in this country.
now let’s break down where that money is going :
- Natives only make up 1.37% of the population.
- only 1% out of the native population attends college.
- only part of that 1% uses a scholarship.
- “your” taxes do not pay for that scholarship.
What you’re really saying is “how dare 0.0001% of the citizens, from the poorest population in this country, get a scholarship from their respective Native Nations!!”
do you feel silly now? you should feel silly.
“The interviewees in my study who were most angry about affirmative action were those who had relatively fewer marketable skills — and were therefore most dependent on getting an inside edge for the best jobs. Whites who felt entitled to these positions believed that affirmative action was unfair because it blocked their own privileged access.”
—How Social Networks Drive Black Unemployment - NYTimes.com
“…despite complaints about “reverse discrimination,” my research demonstrated that the real complaint is that affirmative action undermines long-established patterns of favoritism.”
Why Whites Hate Affirmative Action
Lack of knowledge on the actual policies. Very few people actually understand the original executive orders, subsequent judicial decisions and legislation beyond sound bites via “news” that is insistent upon painting this as “taking stuff” from Whites for Black people (as if it is “just” about Black people). Honesty, how many White people have reviewed the actual history of why this is needed? It’s almost as rare to find as anyone who calls themselves “patriotic” who has actually read the Constitution or a Christian who has read the Bible. Media soundbites shaped by bigotry (in a White supremacist capitalist patriarchal society) absorbed by many Whites whose life ideologies have been shaped by bigotry is not going to produce the nuance and thought necessary to understand affirmative action. (Even so, these two simple, non in-depth cartoons explain this almost as well as the complex legalese: 1 and 2.)
Anti-intellectualism. Piggybacking on the first point, the current culture of anti-intellectualism doesn’t encourage most White people (and Americans at large) to actually investigate things they are “for” or “against.” It’s much simpler to decide to be “for” anything shaped by a legacy of White supremacy and White privilege and against anything that appears to be contrary to the former. Whites are used to being a “baseline,” the “norm,” or not considered a group at all, but those whom other groups are compared to. Sociopolitically, many Whites are having a “day of reckoning” moment by even being classified as a “group,” or a “race” as Tom Scocca pointed out so well in a recent article about Romney’s overwhelming support from Whites. These factors contribute to the resistance to affirmative action.
Ahistorical views on race. If a White person takes the “why isn’t there a White history month” and “why isn’t there a White Entertainment Television station” stances on Whites and the media, it can be safely assumed that they are either uneducated or being willfully ignorant about the role of race in America and why certain spaces exist for Black people amidst the media, public discourse and culture itself. By pretending that the tide of history has no racial element, they can then infer that if everyone “is equal” (as if being equal means being treated equally) Black people are “unfairly” getting “goodies” through affirmative action. This also ignores the fact that even with said theoretical ”goodies,” unemployment, health care, finances, real estate, and more is markedly worse for Black people (and other people of colour) versus White. The latter is written off as Black “character failures” in the ever so common victim blaming ideologies such as American “exceptionalism” and even “patriotism” at times. This is where LIES about “poverty culture” come about as a way to praise greed, wealth and Whiteness and demonize suffering, poverty and Blackness.
The concept of what “greatness” is. The inherent racism involved in assuming that someone White is always “more” qualified, as if being White is a skill itself, is common in everything from college admissions to employment applications. The idea is that some “stupid” minority “stole” a slot from the perfect White knight on a horse who deserved things because he “worked” for them prevails. Further, the idea that perhaps a series of advantages afforded by White privilege is “hard work” would be even more humorous if it wasn’t despicable. Said privileges often place Whites ahead in spaces by sheer virtue of the luxury of Whiteness, not any actual work. The myth of meritocracy is a plague on the American psyche. (Christopher Hayes wrote about this oh too well in his book Twilight Of The Elites - America After Meritocracy. Also, I recently read a fascinating study about the REALITY of financial aid versus the myth that “stupid” minorities “take all of the college monies,” and other assorted lies.)
A zero/sum view of racism. Ultimately, many Whites feel that any joy, success or progress in Black life means misery, failure and regression in White life. Period. This tunnel vision view is rooted in racism and fear. Research has revealed that many cisgender heterosexual White men feel like the “real” victims in America. Even if they are victims, would that not be at the hands of men just like them, except of a higher social class? Not to them. Racist social narratives involve the worship of “job creators” (the same ones who fire these men) as heroes because after all, they share Whiteness even if they don’t share class, status or cash. Other research has revealed that while some Whites view past times (during and pre-Civil Rights era) as a time more racist against Blacks, they view today as “more racist” against Whites. Of course this is false and has more to do with the idea of some Black people not suffering and Barack Obama’s existence more than any in-depth study of how race is a primary factor to consider when examining socioeconomic status. The enlightened exceptionalism involved in some who even choose to praise Oprah or Beyonce or LeBron James is what allows them to pretend that life for the average and for most Black people has dramatically changed, when for many, it has not. Claims of “reverse racism,” which doesn’t exist, are more common now than ever.
People who benefit from affirmative action also want it destroyed. While more than anyone else White women have benefited from affirmative action, many of them stand with White men against affirmative action while simultaneously benefiting from it. Most people now know the name Abigail Fisher and know it well. Further, many older Black people (primarily men from what I’ve seen) want it dismantled despite the fact they benefited from it in the past. They clearly knew that in their time especially, being qualified was not enough. Assumed inferiority blocked their way.
Related Posts: CEO? Have A Seat. Kthanxbai., Black Woman? Want A Job? Register On Monster.com As A White Woman, False Equivalence, Kerry Washington Talks Affirmative Action On Real Time
“It's so bizarre how when Affirmative Action is brought up, it more often then not ALWAYS leads to this specific dichotomy between the capable white person vs. an incapable minority - and it's always this comparison. ”
—comment left on one the article that points out something I’ve been trying to articulate for a while.
And the use of this argument doesn’t even stop at Affirmative Action I’m seeing it being repeated time and time again with “why would they hire a black person with poor acting skills rather than a great white actor?” or that one time an anti-sj determined that white students earned their scholarships while people of color are handed them.
For some white people, it’s still troubling to think that a person of color might not be incapable or that they themselves might just be mediocre. Probably will get back to this later.
Race Didn't Cost Abigail Fisher Her Spot at the University of Texas
theatlanticwire.comAbigail Fisher is the charming young lady suing the University of Texas for not admitting her because she’s white. Ultimately, she’s challenging the legality of Affirmative Action. But as the Atlantic Wire points out, she had a lot of things working against her in her UT application - none of which were her skin color.
In 2008, the year Fisher sent in her application, competition to get into the crown jewel of the Texas university system was stiff. Students entering through the university’s Top 10 program — a mechanism that granted automatic admission to any teen who graduated in the upper 10 percent of his or her high school class — claimed 92 percent of the in-state spots.
Fisher said in news reports that she hoped for the day universities selected students “solely based on their merit and if they work hard for it.” But Fisher failed to graduate in the top 10 percent of her class, meaning she had to compete for the limited number of spaces up for grabs.
She and other applicants who did not make the cut were evaluated based on two scores. One allotted points for grades and test scores. The other, called a personal achievement index, awarded points for two required essays, leadership, activities, service and “special circumstances.” Those included socioeconomic status of the student or the student’s school, coming from a home with a single parent or one where English wasn’t spoken. And race.
Those two scores, combined, determine admission.
Even among those students, Fisher did not particularly stand out. Court records show her grade point average (3.59) and SAT scores (1180 out of 1600) were good but not great for the highly selective flagship university. The school’s rejection rate that year for the remaining 841 openings was higher than the turn-down rate for students trying to get into Harvard.
As a result, university officials claim in court filings that even if Fisher received points for her race and every other personal achievement factor, the letter she received in the mail still would have said no.
It’s true that the university, for whatever reason, offered provisional admission to some students with lower test scores and grades than Fisher. Five of those students were black or Latino. Forty-two were white.
Neither Fisher nor Blum mentioned those 42 applicants in interviews. Nor did they acknowledge the 168 black and Latino students with grades as good as or better than Fisher’s who were also denied entry into the university that year. Also left unsaid is the fact that Fisher turned down a standard UT offer under which she could have gone to the university her sophomore year if she earned a 3.2 GPA at another Texas university school in her freshman year.
I highly recommend reading the article, because it starts with a stunningly similar historical case - the Brown v. Board of Education decision that ended Jim Crow laws. Abigail Fisher, like the plaintiff in favor of segregation laws, is a cute innocent-looking white girl who’s the perfect public victim for the evils of Affirmative Action. But as the Atlantic points out, she’s just another prop for racists trying to uphold white supremacy.
I'm about to lose my fucking cool.. I need to say this one thing.. and Ima take a little break after I'm done and gather my cool back up.
Ima White woman or man and I’ve been passed over for jobs/colleges because of affirmative action…..
BULL-FUCKING-SHIT!!!!! You lame excuse for a human being… name ONE motherfucking job or college that told you that they passed over you because of affirmative action!!!!???!
White people.. You can’t fucking on one hand say that Black people want free shit from the government and don’t want to work and also act like Black people are stealing my employment/education opportunities!! It’s completely contradictory and on top of it all, it’s bullshit! Pure, simple bullshit.
And, I’m sorry to curse this much, but that’s the only word to describe it. Utter bullshit. You’re full of shit and it’s leaking out and spilling everywhere.
You live in a shit-ful dream world. Here’s reality:
And you want to talk about discrimination? Talk about this shit….
Study which found that “White names elicit about 50% more callbacks than African-American names” with the same credentials. And even when the credentials were made better on the Black resumes, it didn’t significantly improve the callback rate.
This study sought to understand how the mass incarceration of Blacks effected Black employment. What they found was that “Blacks with criminal records are less than half as likely to receive consideration by employers, relative to their White counterparts with criminal records. The study also found that even Blacks with no criminal record were least likely to be employed than Whites with prior felony convictions.
Based on 78 interviews with White employers in Atlanta, this study reveals that many White employers use a complex but widely shared stereotype of Black working-class women as single mothers to typify members of this group in order to explain their lack of Black women in their workplaces.
- Pew Research: Blacks and Hispanics Laid off/Fired at Double the Rate of Whites (2008)
- Economic Mobility of Black and White Families
Black children are less likely to be able to maximize the wealth of their parents.
Not even a college degree helps Blacks with employment during the recession.
- Bill Clinton Presidential Website: Affirmative Action Report - Justifications for Affirmative Action
This is a compilation of random studies about the discrimination practices of White employers, compiled by the Clinton administration. Here’s the full report.
Talk about stealing opportunities?….. FUCK YOU you privileged slime. You think you’re so fucking great so everyone must want something from you. But, I don’t want a damn thing that you have because obviously everything that you have hasn’t benefited you at all since you’re completely self unaware and totally ignorant of the world around you.
So, just to reiterate… fuck you and fuck every person on this planet who cries these White and empty tears.
Study: White Students More Likely to Win College Scholarships
colorlines.comVia colorlines:
A new report that analyses the distribution of grants and scholarships by race found students of color are less likely to win private scholarships or receive merit-based institutional grants than white students. The report found that white students receive more than three times as much in merit-based grant and private scholarship funding than students of color.
White students receive more than three-quarters (76 percent) of all institutional merit-based scholarship and grant funding, even though they represent less than two-thirds (62 percent) of the student population, according to the report published by Mark Kantrowit, the financial aid guru behind Fastweb.com and FinAid.org.
Kantrowit believes that the myth that there aren’t enough scholarships for white students comes from highly-qualified white students being turned away and those students in turn assuming the money went to students of color.
The myth that students of color are taking all the scholarship money is so prevalent that policies like California’s Proposition 209 and Michigan’s Civil Rights Initiative (Proposal 2) include mentions that scholarships and financial aid should be awarded solely on the basis of need and ability, not race
what? affirmative action ISN’T the object of your missplaced anger at not receiving a scholarship to college? REALLY?
I’ bookmarking this study so I can bring it up anytime ANYONE says that they didn’t receive a scholarship because they were white. If you don’t get on the internet and do a google search and spend your days looking for scholarship money (that you aren’t even entitled to anyway) then STOP BLAMING PEOPLE OF COLOR.
This study shows that white students are both the majority of students going to college AND students who receive scholarships. This just tells me that we need to spend MORE time & money making sure underrepresented groups can actually afford going to college.
Honestly, this excites me cause the next time I see some ignorant “my baby can’t go to college cause we’re white and its NOT FAIR” post anywhere in the world, I will straight up go irate on a muthafucka.
spread the word
I understand Affirmative Action and the reason it helps a lot of people, but it makes me uneasy.
It’s unnerving that on college applications they ask you for your ethnicity, and there’s a chance that they’ll turn you down or accept you for that alone. (Note: I’m not saying it’s oppressing white people.) The fact that race has anything to do with whether you’re accepted into a college or not is unsettling. Didn’t Martin Luther King Jr. say that people should be judged by merit, not skin color?
