by Matthew Schuster | Discriminatory policies won't eliminate discrimination.
Lyndon B. Johnson, one of the 20th century’s most dedicated and courageous civil rights activists and signer of the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964, once said that, “Until justice is blind to color, until education is unaware of race, until opportunity is unconcerned with the color of men’s skins, emancipation will be a proclamation but not a fact.” This strong sentiment in favor of a color-blind society embodies the intellectual foundation for equal rights in our time. Nonetheless, it has become fashionable in academia to look down upon the case for colorblindness, arguing that it ignores the real institutional prejudices that continue to oppress black people. Here at Tufts, the Lincoln Filene Center hosted a symposium on race and education, entitled, “Race and School Integration: A Critique of Colorblindness,” featuring three panelists who all argued for the necessity of racial preferences in society.
Ian Haney Lopez, a professor of law at UC Berkeley, presented the keynote address, speaking for over an hour in the Granoff Music Center. Lopez used the June 2007 Supreme Court case, Parents Involved in Community Schools vs. Seattle School District No. 1, to anchor his diatribe. In a 5-4 ruling, the court ruled that it was unconstitutional for schools to use race as a deciding factor for admissions. Chief Justice Roberts argued that, “The school districts have not carried their heavy burden of showing that the interest they seek to achieve justifies the extreme means they have chosen—discriminating among individual students based on race by relying upon racial classifications in making school assignments.” In other words, the potential benefits of race-based affirmative action (which will from here on be referred to as affirmative action as it is the most widespread version and the practice that was advocated by Lopez) did not make up for the discriminatory practices that the policy employed.
Lopez, however, argued that affirmative action is needed to “break the connection of race and character through elevating the black position in society.” According to the professor, the type of discrimination in which affirmative action is rooted is fundamentally different from that of the racist policies of the old South which sought to maintain the existing societal power structures through “debasement” of blacks. “One is based on integration,” he said, and “one is based on segregation.”
Lopez ineffectively argued that affirmative action is acceptable because discrimination is prevalent in many other aspects of American life. “What’s wrong with discrimination?” he asked. Public schools discriminate, he claimed, because they only allow students within a distinct district to attend the school. Similarly, state schools show a strong preference for in-state residents. The only problem with this argument is that these schools are funded by state tax dollars. It makes sense that a service would only be provided to those who pay for the service. Lopez then brought up familial wealth as a determinant in school enrollment. Once again, however, his argument falls flat on its face. Tuition for a good education, like any other desirable commodity, is governed by the rules of capitalism; perhaps Lopez would prefer to live in Cuba. Lastly, Lopez brought up gender-based public restrooms as an example of widespread discrimination. Judging by the giggles emanating from the audience, even the choir did not buy this sermon.
On the other hand, Lopez condemned colorblindness as a type of white supremacy, or “modern racism” inseparable from the bygone segregation policies that oppressed blacks many years ago: “Colorblindness is both a sword and shield…the same sword that the South used in the 1960s [to oppress blacks]…and a shield to continue racism without explicit ethnic slurs.” Colorblindness seeks to “protect the status quo of white racial dominance…and provide new justifications for racial hierarchy.”
This attempt to paint a history of colorblindness as racist ideology is patently absurd. Surely Lopez understands that a certain position cannot be dismissed because of a warped interpretation or implementation thereof some 50 odd years ago. While some have arguably tried to skirt the race issue to avoid integration, it is deceptive of Lopez to assign the same motives to those who now advocate colorblindness as the natural policy of a liberal, meritocratic society. If Lopez is able to distinguish between different forms of discrimination, he should also be able to evaluate the legitimate arguments for a color-blind society without dishonestly dismissing its merits. Lopez’s hateful, spiteful rhetoric eschewed any logical examination of alternative solutions in favor of blind ideological adherence.
Throughout his lecture, Lopez relied on similarly misleading and deceptive arguments. Instead of giving an honest assessment of the various policies that have been proposed to “elevate the black position in society,” Lopez attempted to appropriate integration as an outcome that only proponents of affirmative action support. Colorblindness, he argued, is “de-facto segregation.” This black and white interpretation is of the sort that liberals proclaim to disdain; this time, they burst into applause.
Moreover, Lopez’s insistence on using affirmative action to dissociate the political and societal connection between race and character is illogical. The affirmative action that Lopez proposes is based precisely on an inseparable conflation of man’s race with his character and individual characteristics. Under implementation of this affirmative action, a rich black man with a plethora of opportunities is given a leg up on a poor white man with no such opportunities. To whitewash all blacks as needy and poor does a disservice to the work and success that they have achieved through decades of strife and prejudice. Furthermore, how would individuals of mixed race be treated under affirmative action? For example, Barack Obama is considered black, but he had a white mother who came from a family of slave owners.
Lopez was right about one thing: we need to evaluate colorblindness and affirmative action as “policies in terms of the context in which [they] are applied and the effects [they] ultimately produce.” Affirmative action has been in effect for decades, but its successes have been negligible at best. A 2005 study conducted by the non-partisan CATO Institute’s Center for Educational Freedom found that black students’ earning potential depends less on their college degree than on the academic credentials they achieved before college. If two students are equally qualified, they will likely have the same success rates without regard to their degrees.
Affirmative action is not only detrimental to the white and Asian students who are disadvantaged by it but also to the black students that it purportedly assists. The fundamental premise of affirmative action is that blacks need preferential treatment to achieve academic and professional success. Affirmative action proponents imply that, unlike the Irish, Jews, Asians, and other minorities who have risen out of poverty and overcome discrimination, blacks do not have the intellectual capacity to do so. This racism of low expectations instills doubt into the minds of both whites, but more importantly blacks, about their true merits.
Many proponents of affirmative action condescendingly proclaim that many black students who supposedly benefit from affirmative action would otherwise be on the street and involved in drugs and crime. This too is false. Since affirmative action in California was eliminated in 1996 by Proposition 209, the number of black applicants and students in the UC system actually increased. While the elite schools in Los Angeles and Berkeley may have experienced decreases in racial diversity following the measure, overall enrollment and graduation rates were boosted as a whole in the state, according to a UC spokesman.
Thomas Sowell, a world-renowned economics and education scholar, explained that,
“At the flagship University of Colorado at Boulder, test score differences between black and white students have been more than 200 points -- and only 39 percent of the black students graduated, compared to 72 percent of white students. Meanwhile, at the University of Colorado at Denver, where the SAT score difference was a negligible 30 points, there was also a negligible difference in graduation rates -- 50 percent for blacks and 48 percent for whites.” It appears that affirmative action does not “elevate the black position in society,” but further increases the national racial divide. Blacks would be better off following the lead of other national minorities, who gradually made their way up the social ladder.
There are many alternative methods to integrating blacks into society that do not contradict the liberal meritocratic principles that are responsible for success of the civil rights movement. In the Philadelphia area, an enormously successful program called Greater Philadelphia First, combined the efforts of city officials, social workers and company employees to teach inner city youth basic marketable skills. In Florida, Jeb Bush instituted the One Florida program that ensured admission to state universities to the top twenty percent of every high school. Similarly, in Texas, the top ten percent of students in all high schools are guaranteed admission to state schools. Each of these efforts has assisted all disadvantaged youth by encouraging hard work and self-reliance.
These alternative strategies, however, were outright rejected by Lopez and the rest of the panel. In fact, when Lopez was asked to address the policy proposals of prominent black conservatives, the supposed scholar nearly leapt out his seat to declare his disgust for conservatives who have the gall to propose their own solutions to pressing national problems. The audience, of course, burst out in thunderous applause.
Although she spoke for less than 10 minutes, fellow panel member, and Cambridge public schools affirmative action officer, Ms. Smith-McLaughlin, beautifully illustrated the close-minded and bigoted attitude that many elitists hold toward black conservatives. McLaughlin went as far as to proclaim Justice Thomas a “disturbing individual…a sell-out.” A black audience member lamented his exhaustion at having to listen to black conservative intellectuals, whom he labeled as “part of the cottage industry” in America. According to him, any black man who wants to can acquire a position in a prominent conservative think-tank if he chooses to oppose discriminatory racial preferences. This reactionary labeling of blacks who dissent from the mainstream as Uncle Toms characterizes black people as intellectually inferior commodities, incapable of making decisions on their own.
Affirmative action breeds racial division, contradicts fundamental American principles, and treats blacks as if they are needy children dependent on white patrons. More discrimination is not the path to integration. Chief Justice Roberts puts it most succinctly: “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.” Never has progress been made by embracing unenlightened principles. Through intellect, hard work, and perseverance, blacks will continue to achieve academic and professional success.
They certainly don’t need the white man.
Mr. Schuster is a senior majoring in Russian and East European Studies and Psychology.
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