What is Affirmative Action?
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The most aggressive programs go further: A company may use race as a tie-breaker. Some companies set aside a certain percent of slots in training programs for blacks. Sometimes an affirmative action plan will require that one black be hired for every white until a certain goal is reached. A school may set aside a certain number of slots for blacks. A city may decide to give a fixed percent of its contracts to black companies. I have concerns about some of the moderate policies, but I think the most aggressive programs are morally wrong. We can never get to a non-racist society if we continue to classify everyone by color instead of focusing on their character and competence.

Look at it this way. Hundreds of years ago Europeans began to build their empires. They encountered people of different colors around the world, and THEY decided that color was what mattered. They decided that color determined the character, capacities, and value of a human being. In a word, they were racists. Our most liberal reformers today think that they can undo the effects of racism by continuing to classify everyone by color: white, black, brown, and so on. They think they can play the same game that the racists played and somehow turn the results around. I'll tell you now, it's a dangerous game to play. They're kidding themselves if they think they can control the results. It will come back and bite them bad.
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