Martin Luther said that humanity is like a man mounting a horse who always tends to fall off on the other side of the horse. This seems to be the case with Affirmative Action. Attempting to redress the discriminatory iniquities of our history, our well-intentioned social engineers now engage in new forms of discriminatory iniquity and thereby think that they have successfully mounted the horse of racial harmony. They have only fallen off on the other side of the issue.
I stand in the utter most opposition of the Affirmative Action Premise. Although the possible attacking points on the gross principle are endless, I will focus on just three.
1. Any Human can succeed!
2. Affirmative Action is illogical, and unethical!
3. Affirmative Action destroys equal opportunity!
I will first begin with an axiom*, ‘Your race, gender, and income does not hinder any mans ability and opportunity to peruse their own happiness.’ If this statement is false, then it implies that there is an inborn difference between minorities and other human beings. But, if this statement is true then affirmative action is not needed. I hold this to be true, for it is verified by science that race and genetics bear no scientific limitations to achieving success . . . Cicero of Rome once said, “We are all born for Justice, and our human rights are based, not upon men’s opinions, but upon Nature . . . In fact, there is no human being of any race, who cannot attain virtue”. . Affirmative action says otherwise, reasoning that members of minority’s are not unique individuals, but interchangeable members of a collective minority class; a minority class, that somehow hinders their capacity to achieve for themselves. Affirmative Action stipulates that only through a government program can minorities succeed. This notion is outrageous! This principle, taken on by Affirmative Action is not equality, its racism; this leads us to our next point.
Affirmative Action is illogical, and unethical. Affirmative Action supposedly destroys racism, but please note that, Affirmative action adopts a composition fallacy**, because it generalizes by status; promoting the idea that individuals should be categorized by arbitrary genetic traits, rather than their merit or ability—yet this only propagates racism. This is verified by two studies from New York University, and Stanford, which confirm that affirmative action harms minority students’ self‐image, and the image that society has for minorities. My first point proves that genetics are irrelevant to success, and the public knows this. In a report by the university of Maryland, they stated, Affirmative Action inevitably prolongs racism, because society recognizes there are only three things an employer needs to know about any “individual” applicant: (l) Does the person have ability and knowledge? (2) Is the person willing to try? And (3) Does the person have good character? All 3 of these criteria bear no credence to race or gender. And because this is true, Affirmative action goes against American tradition, Capitalism, and Natural Law.
Attempts to refute this point will most likely occur in the form of, the “Diversity premise”. Claiming that only through affirmative action, will business achieve the desirable diversity that is needed for racial harmony to exist. . . This is a pragmatic claim that has no Philosophical foundation. If diversity is the cure, however, why, instead of promoting racial harmony, has it brought racial division and conflict? The answer is not hard to discover. The unshakable fact is that you cannot cure racism with racism. To accept the diversity premise means to think in racial terms rather than in terms of individual character or merit. Taking jobs away from one group in order to compensate a second group to correct injustices caused by a third group who mistreated a fourth group at an earlier point in history is absurd on the face of it and does not promote justice; rather, it does the opposite. Singling out one group for special favors (e.g., through affirmative action) breeds justified resentment and fuels the prejudices of real racists. People are individuals; they are not interchangeable ciphers in an amorphous collective. Diversity is achieved simply by hiring varying individuals, regardless of their arbitrary genetic quality’s. This brings me to my last point.
Affirmative Action destroys equal opportunity! The Stanford encyclopedia of Philosophy states that “equal opportunity” is the process in which man can fail or succeed based on his own merit. So, let us be clear, no man is entitled to success, only in his opportunity to work for success. Affirmative action is not justified in the promoting of supposed “equal opportunity” because it does not promote it, it destroys it. Our founding fathers, and countless philosophers (Ayn Rand, John Locke, Voltaire) spoke about the right that every individual has: the right to the pursuit of happiness—not of the right to happiness. It means that an individual has the right to take actions they deem necessary to achieve their own happiness; it does not mean that others must make them happy. But Affirmative action disregards this Natural Law. For, it promotes equal outcome, and destroys equal opportunity . . . There is another ideology that supports equal outcome as well . . . its called communism. Affirmative action, like communism, concentrates on extrinsic status to award success, instead of intrinsic merit- even though it is evident that merit should be the primary factor in determining an individual’s value in a job or school.
Affirmative Action represents an enormous betrayal of America's founding principles. We are a nation founded on the concept of individualism, the doctrine that each person is a sovereign entity, an end in himself, possessing the same rights as every other citizen.
The affirmative action ruling undermines the principle of individualism. It asserts that people have special rights because they are members of a racial minority, thus elevating primitive tribalism over individualism. The claim that racial "diversity" is a proper goal of an institution is wrong.
The principle should be that the most qualified individuals--without regard to race, ethnicity or any other non-essential characteristic--are selected, whether the institution involved is in the field of education, business or the military. Selecting for diversity means endorsing racism--an ugly doctrine no matter what its purpose. Racism in any form should be abhorred by every American.
My axiom stands! ‘Your race, gender, and income do not hinder your equal opportunity to peruse your own happiness.’ Affirmative action is unethical and promotes more discrimination; it is illogical for Affirmative Action implements equal outcome and destroys equal opportunity. Affirmative action is by no means justified! Remember, our nation was dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal’ not that minority groups need an extra chance to be equal. They already are equal, and they can succeed just as I can, base on our merit and work.
*What is an Axiom?
An axiom is a statement that identifies the base of knowledge and of any further statement pertaining to that knowledge, a statement necessarily contained in all others, whether any particular speaker chooses to identify it or not. An axiom is a proposition that defeats its opponents by the fact that they have to accept it and use it in the process of any attempt to deny it.
** The fallacy of Composition is committed when a conclusion is drawn about a whole based on the features of its constituents when, in fact, no justification provided for the inference.
1. Individual F things have characteristics A, B, C, etc.
2. Therefore, the (whole) class of F things has characteristics A, B, C, etc.
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