As Kenji Hosokawa '98 pointed out in his Opinion piece on January 8, not only Caucasians but also a number of black intellectuals endorse the view that affirmative action "perpetuates African Americans' dependence on the government." There's a reason they endorse it: because it's right.
I'd be shocked if people, especially students and faculty here at Dartmouth, weren't appalled by Hosokawa's suggestion that belief in "the strong individual" has disappeared, destroyed by a "modern world [that] no longer resorts to such a platonic vision."
The basis of Hosokawa's argument rests in the belief that since individuals are supposedly no longer capable of coping with their own destiny, society must embark on an evangelical mission to ensure that "the number of African Americans who are executives [is] proportionate to the number of African Americans in the population." Forget the idea that they might actually attain that position on their own. They must need help, he asserts. And he argues that this doesn't perpetuate dependence?
The error that underlies the entire affirmative action program is that it attempts to look at the broad picture and it fails. After hundreds of years of persecuting and isolating African Americans the government introduced affirmative action, a sad excuse for an apology, when, as many black intellectuals including Clarence Thomas have realized, the program serves only to further persecute and isolate. African Americans end up victimized because affirmative action treats them like dependents; white males end up victimized because they are denied equal opportunity. In the end both groups become further isolated from each other.
Be wary of those who subversively engage in social engineering. The natural course of society, as free as possible from programs which artificially shape demographics, is the only entirely equal and objective course for a nation to follow.
In order to stifle racism we must eliminate programs which acknowledge its existence, thereby freeing African Americans and other minorities to attain positions of power by the virtue of their own merit rather than by the color of their skin. What started as an impressive gesture of magnanimity has now come full circle back in our faces: by acknowledging racism we have mistakenly condoned it. The only option now, in order to truly preserve equality among all people, is to eliminate the program.
The most convincing argument for affirmative action I have ever come into contact with was set forth by Ronald J. Fiscus in "The Constitutional Logic of Affirmative Action," published posthumously in 1992. In his introduction Fiscus quickly dispenses with the argument for affirmative action based on compensatory justice -- the idea that African Americans are entitled to benefits based on historical injustices. That would assume that whites today, in particular white males, should suffer for what whites in the past have imposed on African Americans.
Fiscus is correct in discrediting this argument: the logic fails. Penalizing whites of today for what whites generations ago did is inherently racist and therefore without justification.
The foundation of Fiscus' argument appeals instead to what he calls "distributive justice," which he defines as the idea that "whatever advantages are allowed under fair conditions be allowed to everyone, regardless of race or gender."
He goes on to assert that today's society lacks these fair conditions: "...only racism, if not of a direct and tangible sort then of an indirect and subtle sort, can explain the failure of racial minorities to attain their deserved proportion of the society's important benefits that they would have on the basis of their numbers in society."
The main weakness of Fiscus' argument lies in his assumption that it is society's responsibility to ensure that minorities "attain their deserved proportion" and that the attainment of this goal justifies violating anyone's rights.
Bestowing any sort of benefits to any group is to abandon equality and to limit freedom; the government did it before with separate but equal and it is doing it again now with affirmative action. At one time the idea of separate but equal was considered a radically new and extremely humanitarian idea. After it became an institution its inherent faults appeared and the move to desegregate began.
Now affirmative action has become the institution and its faults lay glaringly open: instead of creating diversity it has perpetuated division. No social mission, no matter how lofty, can be faultless when it violates our basic rights as free individuals.
By definition affirmative action is racist, and we cannot justify combating racism with racism.
