Protest Warrior HQ

Affirmative action is a patchwork solution that applies a superficial "fix" to the problem. It's impossible to prove that it has been helping at all recently (and vice versa, I realize). But either way it is the wrong action to take to fix the problem correctly.

One question I think we should be asking is why so many Asians and Indians come to the US, with these HUGE language AND cultural barriers, and yet do so well (as a whole). They are minorities, aren't they? Don't they have an even worse handicap than someone who has been here and at least knows the language? (Don't underestimate how big of a deal a good grasp of English is, to succeed in the business world.)

AA is currently the wrong solution to a problem that should be addressed in a completely different way, IMO. It's not as simple as "giving poor minorities good jobs and the problem will fix itself".

Maybe instead of saying AA is the incorrect solution, perhaps say AA is not a complete solution.

Affirmitive action does help people overcome some barriers. It is therefore good. Many companies Have been requitred to be Equal Oppurtunity employers to get gvoernment contracts, Many Minority run businesses need Afrimitive action to compete. Many schools let in applicants that had AA not existed minorities would have been underrespresented.

Pointing to the sucess of some minorities and then claiming that other minorities are not as hard working is , frankly, discriminatory.

As far as why - its more complicated. A couple of possible things. Inter City American school are inferior to Schools from many of those Countries you described. Some immigrants have money all ready before moving to the US. Additionally is a matter of numbers. The minorites raised in the US greatly outnumber those in the examples you described.

I used to have a less firm stance on Affirmitive action .. I wondered as many posted, how effective it was.

Then I had a long talk one day in the late 90's with an Engineer in his 50's who we had a contract with. He was in his 50's , extremely well read and African American. He explained how when he got to college the admissions councillor told him that there was no way he was he going to become an engineer. He was told Black people arent good at it, even though he was a Straight A student in high school and had outstanding test scores.. This was in the 1960's. He explained how much more difficult it was for him to suceed becuase of this.

He explained to me that Affirmitve Action isnt for the Exceptional, the exceptional and ambitious would find a way. Affirmitive action is to help those that could suceed with just a reasonably even chance. This is a large number of people. People who had been born in different cirmcumstances would have suceeded just fine. But becuase of the color of their skin traditionally didnt.

To say that America has reached a level where minorities all have an even chance is not correct. Affirmitive action is right now, a tool to help. You cant remove it without replaceing it with something at least or more effective.

One reason I say it's "wrong" rather than incomplete is that it HURTS anyone who isn't a minority. Rather than do this, doesn't it make more sense to HELP those who need it in a way that enables them to compete in FAIR competition for a job?


Asians and especially Hispanic populations in the US are much higher than you seem to recall

I don't really see raw populations as an issue, anyway, I think percentages and other statistics tell a better comparative story.

Many immigrants have had very little resources and still succeeded, I don't know what the numbers are, with respect to how well off immigrants are financially. They were not "exceptional", they just worked their asses off. Usually this means that their kids end up with the real opportunities, I personally can give real life examples of this.

As I said before, we can agree that it is complicated, and a simple law like this probably does little or nothing to solve the overall problem. Partly because the problem isn't simply JOBS, there's a whole host of things you need to address to raise someone's quality of life, right?

I don't believe AA is a TERRIBLE idea, and it wasn't back in the 60's when you had people telling future engineers that they couldn't become an engineer. (You will be hard pressed finding evidence of this occuring in the present day.) But I don't think it is a "correct" solution and certainly not a good one.

I haven't said that everyone has an equal chance, and that will NEVER be the case as long as we remain a capitalist nation... what we do have now is alot less racism than we did decades ago. And at least now judges and law enforcement are willing to fight it. Exceptions can be found with everything but I believe the public as a whole has learned from the past.

I doubt the main problem is simply work ethic though... in the case of black Americans I think it's mostly influences of things like popular culture or the disregard for decent values and morals that is hurting the most.

Many have gotten sucked into this trap and this "poverty cycle" and for some reason they've stopped trying to succeed, it seems. But that's the whole problem. The government CANNOT HELP you if you are unwilling to lift a finger to help yourself, because you've been sold this crap where you "can't succeed because of reasons x, y, and z which the government needs to fix first". What if the government *can't* fix x, y and z problems? The government can't stop drug use, it can't prevent a lack of parenting, and can't force others to try their hardest. The main thing it can do is give you a check--a handout. Which DOES help if it is taken advantage of, but it's probably not happening often. If it was, we probably wouldn't be having this discussion. Is there still a lack of minority-only college funds, and such? (Honestly I don't know, I'm not saying there isn't.)

Look into what Bill Cosby has been saying about the subject, he's hit the nail on the head but I guess everyone is too afraid to admit it. I think if you stay away from the bad things and the "pop culture" distractions, set reasonable goals, and work reasonably hard you'll eventually succeed.

Good discussion though, it's a challenging problem.

I know you are posting this in off-topic and I know that there is nothign wrong with that but I have to say this kind of heavily biased political "smooth talk" makes me sick.

Why, why, why, would anyone want to drag all this evil nonsense into the lovely world of SL?

These kinds of slanted and political discussion threads are practically *designed* for grief and destined to up the argument factor by a hundred.

This is like poking a wounded bear with a stick to post this kind of thing.

Again... why? And why here?
What has any of this to do with second life even in an off-topic kind of way?

I will not participate. (but I am sure that is more of a relief to you)

SL and the SL forums attract predominantly liberal-minded people, and the Protest Warrior Manifesto requires that Protest Warriors come to places where liberal-minded gather and "debate" issues with them.

Unfortunately...



And never...



(The above definitons are not on the PW website, I put them in quotes for readability)

Well, I try to follow the latter, because it's more informative, but things don't always work out.



Well, "off topic" means it has nothing to do with SL, think about what you just said.

But I semi-agree....this is why we NEED a SERIOUS off topic discussion forum, and a SPAM/CASUAL off topic forum. Sometimes you just aren't in the mood for this kind of crap, I know I'm not all the time.

Damn am I glad I don't live in the states where you're only ever a traitor or a patriot.

Unless of course you're like me and couldn't give a rats ass.

I think that was a joke.

Crap.

I always miss jokes.

AA is discrimintion. Period. And state sanctioned discrimination to boot. Everywhere else in this country we are fighting AGAINST discrimination. But apparently the only good discrimination is the kind that gets Liberals elected.

Discrimination is wrong.

BTW, Collette, I'm half black and I never needed a white man's help pulling myself up (cept from my dad when I was little, but that's different). None of the black members of my family believe in AA, nor do most of the blacks I've spoken to. The only people who seem to think it's a good thing are white Liberals and poor minorities.

-Kiamat Dusk

AA is attempt to help end financial discrimination agaisnt minorites. It arguably does discriminate agaisnt those who do not receive AA, this, however AA is inherently desinged to be temporary.

The gentleman I referred to in my previous post was a Liberal Black man, not white. He was not poor he was a professional Engineer working for a fortune 500 company. He had no reason to lie about being discrimated against in the 60's going to College.

I think there are plenty of liberals who believe in Affirmative action of all races, it was after all passed, and has been used since its inception. Many companies have thrived from contracts they never would have otherwise gotten, etc.

From the Constitution of the United States Article 3, section 3. --

Clause 1: Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.


Id would really like to see how Liberals are traitors?

Please .. make your case.

Desent is not treason.

I do

(Dianne breaks her own rules and posts to the evil thread anyway)

Check out the facts.
Terrorism overall, worldwide in 2001 (compared to earlier years and including sept 11th) as a function of:

1) number of attacks - down!
2) number of lives lost - down!
3) amounts of money lost to terrorism - down!

The year 2001 ...

(including ALL people lost on Sept 11th and ALL monetary losses)
one of the LOWEST years on record since the 70's for terrorism in terms of the above indicators.

The US killed over 10 times the number of "innocents" that died in Sept 11th in Afghanistan when they invaded. This does NOT include the "combatants" (and some canadians) they killed, just pure civilian INNOCENT targets.

If you add in the number of innocent Iraquis killed the numbers get kind of astronomical.

All of those attacks were illegal by international law, and by the current US Administrations own admission, intended to "terrify" the oponents into submission.

So who is the big terrorist then?

Begins with a "B".. ends with "SH"

Terrorism is actually "up" now, but as a RESPONSE to the US invasion of Iraq and the attempt to root out Al Quaeda. To say that the US is responding to terrorism is to put the cart before the horse in fact. It is clearly the other way around.

Result of "war on terrorism"?

- less freedom
- more violations of human rights
- constant permanent surveilance of all US citizens
- police state environment in most US cities
- rest of world breaking economic and other ties with US
- spiralling economy
- promotion of terrorism worldwide

Okay now that *was* the last post I will make on it.

Do you just make this stuff up? Have you paid attention to any business shows? No one is breaking any economic ties with us-that would be suicide considering we're still the world's largest consumer economy.

And your number of innocents killed in Iraq an Afghanistan-how do they compare with the numbers killed by the Taliban or the terrorists in Iraq? What about the numbers slaughtered by Saddam before we went in? Seems like we turn up a mass grave every other day, but that's ok with Liberals because you can only find it in you to be outraged about death when its our troops doing it. The difference is, the civilians killed by our troops were by ACCIDENT.

If you're gonna jump into this pit, you need to back up your allegations.

-Kiamat Dusk

I don't know. Why don't you give us some hard numbers? Your "liberals condone killing" bit is tired rhetoric, but thanks for trying to tell other people what they think. Some of us don't happen to believe in an eye for an eye and think that ALL killing is immoral and wrong. Do you also think we should start using suicide bombers since they did it to?

Liberals have consistantly sided with America's enemies and fought against the best interests of this country. From the glamorization of Communists after WWII, to Ward Churchill refering to the victims of 9/11 as "little Eichmans" or Michael Moore's blatant rooting for the Iraqi isurgency to prevail against our forces.

No matter how many people a dictator kills, you can trust the American Left to root for them before their own country. (see my post about the hypocrisy of the Left)

The dust hadn't settled over Ground Zero before the Liberal apologists went into full gear with "We brought this upon ourselves." The Left never fails to Blame America first.

You're not spitting on troops, yet, but you've got people like Dianne up there accusing our troops of premeditated mass murder. Sounds like aid and comfort to me.

-Kiamat Dusk

Well, Chip, we already know where *you* stand. You've already stated that you would rather see EVERY AMERICAN DEAD than go to war. And, if you think killing is so bad, why is your own country the ONLY one that warrants your ranting?

-Kiamat Dusk

Back to that old straw man eh? You're really not very good at this. When either through ignorance or malice you twist what other people say and ignore any attempt at reasoned debate, you come across as nothing more than an extremist. What I meant in the context of that discussion, which you know but choose to ignore, is that I would rather risk a catastrophic loss of American lives than slaughter innocent civilians in an attempt to prevent something that might happen in violation of international law. In the case of the Iraq invasion which was the context of that original conversation I am more than comfortable with my position. There were no weapons of mass destruction. There was no imminent risk to American lives. And we're now responsible for the slaughter of tens of thousands of innocent people. Sorry, but the "but the other kids were doing it too mommy!" excuse is just lame. Though it's amusing watching you try and rewrite history after the fact.

Right. Better to have lifted the sanctions, allowed Saddam to rearm, continue killing his people, and ONLY after he lobbed a WMD at the US, after we lost NY or LA or DC, THEN MAYBE we'd have your permission to go to war.

Big maybe there.

Which brings me back to my original question way back when. How many does it take, Chip? How many dead Americans before you are prepared to fight back?

Me? I say 1 dead American is too many. And, judging by the election results, I'm not alone.

You keep throwing around terms like "slaughter of innocents" but where is your proof? Do you honestly believe that our troops are in their "slaughtering" innocent people, Chip? And why don't I ever hear you railing against terrorists who really ARE slaughtering innocents? Could it be because the terrorists have a habit of shooting back? Better to kiss the ass of the guy who might shoot you than support the guy defending you, eh, Chip?

-Kiamat Dusk

I know you say that. You believe American lives are somehow more valuable than anyone else's. God's chosen and all that I guess. Personally, I believe ALL human lives are of equal value. I will fight in self defense. I will never support starting wars. I have a higher regard for humanity than that, sorry. If you want to continue to promote and condone killing people, be my guest. I'm sure Jesus thinks you're great.



Very large bombs dropped from very large planes have a way of killing a whole lot of people. If you think everyone we're killing is a combatant who had it coming, that's your own delusion. But yeah, yay for killing. Go team go and all that.

Get back to me when you have a clue what you're talking about. Clearly you know nothing about modern warfare or our military. It's really easy to be a pacifist when you're tucked safely behind the American military.

-Kiamat Dusk
...no chip on *his* shoulder...

Tomahawk missiles, while accurate to a meter, are millions of dollars each.

Bottom line, if you want to win a way you need to put boots on the ground to back up your technology. That means incidental civilian casualties, and that's unfortunate. The US military does a terrific job at avoiding them, and it would be nice if the US Government would do a better job at avoiding war.

I think every sane American would prefer peace to war. But the fact is, sometimes war is NECESSARY.

So far war has ended slavery, facism, saved the South Koreans from the same fate that befell the South Vietnamese, and toppled to despotic regimes. These were all worthwhile endeavors.

Yes, whenever possible, diplomacy should be used. But how many thousands of people were slaughtered every DAY in Africa while we waited for diplomacy to win the day. How many are STILL dying?

The current North Korean nuclear threat is the direct result of Clinton's overuse of "diplomacy". The nuclear plants they are using were built by the US as a part of a treaty Clinton signed with the North Koreans in '93-an agreement they promptly broke.

And, yes, I believe that it's better to get them before they get us provided there is reasonable evidence that they are out to get us. I'm not talking about invading every country on earth because they MIGHT POSSIBLY attack us SOMEDAY.

-Kiamat Dusk

Please refer to my comments here:

/120/1f/47357/1.html

No,

You lack historical persepective on the term "Aid and Comfort"

It has nothing to do with opinions or political beleifs.

Its much closer to "food and lodging" or "Resupply and equiping"

Besides that obvious error, liberals arent actually Aiding or providing comfort any way - Just becuase they know there is desent in America does not equate to either of those.

Even accusing the troops of murder does not aid the Insurgents. Aid and Comfort would have be a direct action to help the enemy.

It might be other things, you may find it very distasteful. BUT it is NOT treason.

Treason is a crime punishable by death, it must be PROVEN in a manner prescribed by the constitution.

You are WRONG and INSULTING to call liberals traitors. To accuse us as such makes me consider you incapable of reasoned discourse.



Furthermore,

Extreme liberals like you have touted are not "ALL liberals" do you pretend that the more right wingers are "All conservatives" .. from you other posts, do Sean Hannedy and Bill Oreily speak for you all?