Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site spar.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!whuxlm!harpo!decvax!decwrl!spar!ellis
From: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis)
Newsgroups: net.women,net.politics
Subject: Re: Discrimination and AA
Message-ID: <369@spar.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 27-Jun-85 10:26:44 EDT
Article-I.D.: spar.369
Posted: Thu Jun 27 10:26:44 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 29-Jun-85 23:43:01 EDT
References: <483@gargoyle.UChicago.UUCP> <189@fear.UUCP>
Reply-To: ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis)
Organization: Schlumberger Palo Alto Research, CA
Lines: 71
Xref: watmath net.women:6149 net.politics:9644
Summary: 

> Robert Plamondon   >> Richard Carnes   >>> Geoff Sherwood

>>> If you pursue racist policies against racists, it is still racism.
>>
>> So what?  This is what I have repeatedly asked without getting a
>> straight answer.  Supposing that affirmative action is "racism"
>> according to your favorite definition of the term, how does that
>> prove that AA is wrong?
>
>Many people believe that using immoral means in a good cause is immoral.
>Or, in more childish terms, "two wrongs don't make a right."

    We, using our government, `take' things from many groups of people
    and `give' them to others, using methods as diverse as social
    security, special services for the handicapped, free school lunch
    programs, subsidies to farmers for NOT growing crops, welfare,
    and so on. 
    
    Are these methods truly `immoral'? And what is `immoral'? When
    FDR first tried to implement graduated income tax, it was viewed
    as `immoral', or at least illegal, society's equivalent to `immoral'.
    Going back further, so was the organization of workers into unions
    for purposes of withholding labor from their employers.
    
    The first strong forms of AA were, by definition, `immoral', ie.
    unconstitutional, I suppose, as a result of the Bakke ruling. 
    
    Our society was doing something new here, and no doubt there will be
    many who will see things both ways for some time to come. I, for one,
    believe the necessary legal and social framework can and will be created
    in the interest of a higher social justice. Then strong forms of AA
    will be `moral' again. 
    
    No doubt, those who are rigidly `rule oriented' are certainly appalled 
    by such thinking. So be it. Perhaps your viewpoint will win out in the
    end. But our government forces me to do many things I consider immoral,
    like paying taxes to an evil war machine. 
    
    Yet by definition, being government sanctified, my forced contribution to
    such an evil cause is not `immoral'.

    Now you claim that the present castrated form of AA is `immoral'. Which
    do you mean?
    
    1) AA violates your personal moral code
    2) AA violates society's moral code, established by consensus, called law
    
    If (1), then our personal codes differ, and we will argue forever.
    If (2), you are wrong, because the current weak form of AA IS law. Period.

>>  But to look
>> for a rational argument here is to miss the point.  The only reasons
>> I can discern that net-posters keep saying that "AA = racism" are:
>> (1) to score debating points on the net (no difficult task), and (2)
>> to annoy liberals.  To quote Ayn Rand out of context:  "Philosophy:
>> who needs it?"
>>
>Cute.  But the whole concept of affirmative action is based around
>fallacies.  One is that passing laws is going to eliminate racism.  I
>suspect that laws to eliminate racism will be just as effective as
>Prohibition was at eliminating drinking, or the immigration laws at stopping
>illegal immigration.

    Any advocate of AA who believes that the program will cure existing
    bigots of racism/sexism surely has rocks in their head.  And opponents
    who claim this is the goal of AA are simply demolishing their own silly
    argument.

    The goal of AA is to compensate for the EFFECTS of racism/sexism.   

-michael