With the increasing emphasis on affirmative action goals by the Obama
administration, I have a fundamental question about how we are going
fairly label everyone? I think it is usually easiest to label a
person a man or a women, but when it comes to race it is a far
different story. Affirmative action historically allowed individuals to
“self-identify”. At Pacific Gas & Electric (where I worked for 13
years), if I identified with the Hispanic Culture I was a code 3. By
the way if I was from Spain I would be considered a White not a
Hispanic. If I self-identified with the African-American culture I was a code 1.
If I self-identified with the White culture I was a code 0 (seems a
bit derogatory doesn’t it that my culture is called a bunch of zero’s)
but I will get over it. Those that were of Asian or of Pacific
Islander descent were code 2’s and finally those of Native American
ancestry were Code 4. If I self-identified as a White but I was obviously of African
American ancestry, the Personnel Department would go ahead and label
me as a Code 1 because the company was always at risk for receiving
the wrath of the racial police if they were not adequately represented
with certain minorities in management and overall employment
statistics. But as we see more and more economic set-asides and quotas established
(the left won’t call them quotas but that is what they are), it seems
to me that we need to ask the question how do we identify the
exact qualifications for these racial perks? Also we have more and
more marriages of mixed ancestry (I think this is great). Few
Americans that have been in this country for more than a couple of
generations are 100% of anything. Obama is half African American and half White. So does he get half
the credit for the Women and Minority Business advantages when he
opens his laundry mat in his next gig. Tiger Woods is frequently described as African American but his mother
is of a mixed Thai, Chinese and Dutch Ancestry. His father had a
mixture of African American, Chinese and Native American ancestry. So
all told Tiger is one-quarter Thai, one-quarter Chinese, one-quarter
African American, one-eighth Native American, and one-eight Dutch. He
has all the codes covered except Code 3. If Tiger was not a golfer and instead had to work his way up a large
publicly traded corporation, he would have to self-identify his race.
You only get one choice here. It sounds like he would self-identify
as African American, even though he has twice as much Asian ancestry
as African. But in the racial quotas and affirmative action game,
being of Asian ancestry gets one virtually no advantages. He would
actually get the best treatment if he self-identified as Native
American because big companies have had the least success in filing
their senior ranks with Native Americans. And how about Tiger’s children with his Sweedish ex-wife? These
wealthy kids (Sam & Charlie) are 1/4 Asian, 1/8 African American, 1/16
Native American and 9/16 White. Should they qualify for a racial
preference when they apply to Stanford or Harvard? I recently heard an African American leader say that because they are
perceived as “African American” because the way they look, that they
should qualify as “African American” in the racial perks department.
So is he suggesting a skin pigmentation test to determine
qualifications for racial set-asides? Many Asians from the Indian
Subcontinent and Fiji for example are of Asian decent but have far
darker skin than many African Americans have. Heck, my darkest
freckles have more average dark pigmentation that the average African
American. Are we going to continue with this “self-identification” system which
is so open to inaccuracies and games to drive the distribution of the
racial quota and affirmative action spoils? What if we required a DNA test to determine the racial profile of the
individual? These tests now show the breakdown of individuals based
on what part of the world their ancestors were from and should provide
a more independent and analytical method for spreading the racial
perks. But even if we used this scientific method, we would still
have to decide if one would have to be 1%, 10%, 51%, 90% or perhaps
100% of any ethnicity in order to qualify for the racial bonus. Certain groups get no racial perks at all – in fact they have to score
higher on entrance exams to get a job or get accepted to Medical
School than the disadvantaged categories. If a high school student is
trying to get into the UCLA School of Engineering being of Asian
decent doesn’t do a darn thing for the poor kid. It helps an
applicant about as much as being a Jew when applying to Law School. And when we broaden the discussion to those that are protected classes
in employment (in other words we can not discriminate against them in
hiring, firing, pay and promotions because of a certain factor) we can
not discriminate based on sex, race, age (if you are 40 or older),
religion or sexual preference. So the only poor schmuck that you can
mess around with is the heterosexual white man under 40 with no
religious affiliation. In the US the White population is about 66%;
men make up roughly 50% of the population, my estimate of the
percentage of the population between 18 and 39 (not protected by age
discrimination laws) is about 25%, the heterosexual population is
perhaps 95% (Wikipedia reports it anywhere from 2% to 13% are
homosexual), and the number of men in this group with no religious
affiliation is perhaps 50% (my estimate). This means the percentage
of Americans that have no special laws to protect them against
discrimination is 66% X 50% X 25% X 95% X 50% = 4% So all of these
laws are designed to protect everyone against this minority of 4%. Actually here is a better idea. Let’s forget about these factors
altogether. Let’s shut down all the quotas, set-asides, government
contract "programs", affirmative action programs and hire, promote,
accept for college and give contracts to the ones that are most
qualified. Let’s stop this institutional “racial, sexual and
religious profiling” and treat all people based on their own
individual merits.
administration, I have a fundamental question about how we are going
fairly label everyone? I think it is usually easiest to label a
person a man or a women, but when it comes to race it is a far
different story. Affirmative action historically allowed individuals to
“self-identify”. At Pacific Gas & Electric (where I worked for 13
years), if I identified with the Hispanic Culture I was a code 3. By
the way if I was from Spain I would be considered a White not a
Hispanic. If I self-identified with the African-American culture I was a code 1.
If I self-identified with the White culture I was a code 0 (seems a
bit derogatory doesn’t it that my culture is called a bunch of zero’s)
but I will get over it. Those that were of Asian or of Pacific
Islander descent were code 2’s and finally those of Native American
ancestry were Code 4. If I self-identified as a White but I was obviously of African
American ancestry, the Personnel Department would go ahead and label
me as a Code 1 because the company was always at risk for receiving
the wrath of the racial police if they were not adequately represented
with certain minorities in management and overall employment
statistics. But as we see more and more economic set-asides and quotas established
(the left won’t call them quotas but that is what they are), it seems
to me that we need to ask the question how do we identify the
exact qualifications for these racial perks? Also we have more and
more marriages of mixed ancestry (I think this is great). Few
Americans that have been in this country for more than a couple of
generations are 100% of anything. Obama is half African American and half White. So does he get half
the credit for the Women and Minority Business advantages when he
opens his laundry mat in his next gig. Tiger Woods is frequently described as African American but his mother
is of a mixed Thai, Chinese and Dutch Ancestry. His father had a
mixture of African American, Chinese and Native American ancestry. So
all told Tiger is one-quarter Thai, one-quarter Chinese, one-quarter
African American, one-eighth Native American, and one-eight Dutch. He
has all the codes covered except Code 3. If Tiger was not a golfer and instead had to work his way up a large
publicly traded corporation, he would have to self-identify his race.
You only get one choice here. It sounds like he would self-identify
as African American, even though he has twice as much Asian ancestry
as African. But in the racial quotas and affirmative action game,
being of Asian ancestry gets one virtually no advantages. He would
actually get the best treatment if he self-identified as Native
American because big companies have had the least success in filing
their senior ranks with Native Americans. And how about Tiger’s children with his Sweedish ex-wife? These
wealthy kids (Sam & Charlie) are 1/4 Asian, 1/8 African American, 1/16
Native American and 9/16 White. Should they qualify for a racial
preference when they apply to Stanford or Harvard? I recently heard an African American leader say that because they are
perceived as “African American” because the way they look, that they
should qualify as “African American” in the racial perks department.
So is he suggesting a skin pigmentation test to determine
qualifications for racial set-asides? Many Asians from the Indian
Subcontinent and Fiji for example are of Asian decent but have far
darker skin than many African Americans have. Heck, my darkest
freckles have more average dark pigmentation that the average African
American. Are we going to continue with this “self-identification” system which
is so open to inaccuracies and games to drive the distribution of the
racial quota and affirmative action spoils? What if we required a DNA test to determine the racial profile of the
individual? These tests now show the breakdown of individuals based
on what part of the world their ancestors were from and should provide
a more independent and analytical method for spreading the racial
perks. But even if we used this scientific method, we would still
have to decide if one would have to be 1%, 10%, 51%, 90% or perhaps
100% of any ethnicity in order to qualify for the racial bonus. Certain groups get no racial perks at all – in fact they have to score
higher on entrance exams to get a job or get accepted to Medical
School than the disadvantaged categories. If a high school student is
trying to get into the UCLA School of Engineering being of Asian
decent doesn’t do a darn thing for the poor kid. It helps an
applicant about as much as being a Jew when applying to Law School. And when we broaden the discussion to those that are protected classes
in employment (in other words we can not discriminate against them in
hiring, firing, pay and promotions because of a certain factor) we can
not discriminate based on sex, race, age (if you are 40 or older),
religion or sexual preference. So the only poor schmuck that you can
mess around with is the heterosexual white man under 40 with no
religious affiliation. In the US the White population is about 66%;
men make up roughly 50% of the population, my estimate of the
percentage of the population between 18 and 39 (not protected by age
discrimination laws) is about 25%, the heterosexual population is
perhaps 95% (Wikipedia reports it anywhere from 2% to 13% are
homosexual), and the number of men in this group with no religious
affiliation is perhaps 50% (my estimate). This means the percentage
of Americans that have no special laws to protect them against
discrimination is 66% X 50% X 25% X 95% X 50% = 4% So all of these
laws are designed to protect everyone against this minority of 4%. Actually here is a better idea. Let’s forget about these factors
altogether. Let’s shut down all the quotas, set-asides, government
contract "programs", affirmative action programs and hire, promote,
accept for college and give contracts to the ones that are most
qualified. Let’s stop this institutional “racial, sexual and
religious profiling” and treat all people based on their own
individual merits.
