From the comments section on Black Boy in a White Land.
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Kurt says:
I bet that these people all remembered they were black when they filled out college applications in an effort to receive undeserved racial set-asides.
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Jackie replies:
Once upon a time in America, in order to become a lawyer all you had to do was pass the bar. Somewhere around 1896, a black man did just that and became the first person of color to practice law legally in the United States. The response of the academic community was to mandate that a bachelor’s degree was required before anyone could pass the bar. The few people of color who could afford higher education took their new BAs to the their bar exams, and when they passed, a new mandate was set forth that only people who’d acquired a law degree could apply to the bar exam. Deliberate economic prohibitions were placed as obstacles in the path of those seeking lawful, gainful employment. Set-asides would never have been necessary if the playing field were not deliberately made inaccessible by classism, based on racial prejudices.
See all our posts On Race, here.
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Why don’t schools offer minority scholarships for us? Oh yeah, we’re too small a minority.
Vivien Theodore Thomas, born in 1910, attended a segregated public high school. Economic hardship derailed his plans to attend medical school. When he was laid off from his carpentry job, he was able to secure work as a research technician for Dr. Alfred Blalock. Within several years, he was doing the work of a postdoctoral researcher, despite receiving a janitor’s salary. Thomas’s research in association with Dr. Blalock directly lead to the development of the procedures–and the physical instruments–for open heart surgery. Because he was black he was not permitted to perform the operation he developed. He stood on a… Read more »
This need of a bachelor’s degree is the rationale for Joel McHale’s character’s inclusion on the show Community. Let’s all acknowledge that sometimes a good thing can come from an unjust law. In this case, a great thing… the character Jeff Winger on the show Community.
On a different note, a few states allow legal professionals to take the bar exam without a JD. Serial conman Frank Abagnale passed the Louisiana bar exam on his third attempt without any legal training. However he was required to have a law degree which he forged.
The logic of disparate impact requires equality of outcomes independent of anything else. This results in a mass lowering of standards, home lending standards for instance, and inequality of opportunity. The lowering of lending standards helped contribute to the housing/finance bubble that fueled our current economic meltdown. Affirmative action is a double edged sword. Take any advanced degree, like an MD for example. Affirmative action allows for more black doctors but the significance of an MD for black doctor is reduced. On paper as far institutional policies go, there would be zero difference between a black and white MD or… Read more »
My father always said that he had to be 200% better than any white doctor in his class to get the respect of his peers. Clearly, he was right. Oh and he was. He graduated from a POOR POOR high school in Mobile, AL (which would explain his LOW college application test scores–let us not forget these disparities that create the so-called inequalities), worked his way through two years of community college, transferred to a major AL university with a 4.0 and graduated in the top 20% of his class, of which he was one of 5 minorities and 2… Read more »
Your father could have probably become a doctor without affirmative action. My point is that there are doctors (or lawyers,etc) who otherwise couldn’t. To map out for a profession that will X amount from group A, Y amount from group B, etc is not a meritocracy.
Dear DD,
I’m lovin most of what you said (but why keep asking this guy to masturbate?)
To impress others in our own field we do have to be better. Do you wish your dad had stayed away from the South, from that heartbreak? Or did he want to, need to, be there, be at home?
cool story, bro
Oh and the name (please don’t pat yourself on the back)–just an obvious reference to your backward ass beliefs.
Affirmative Action only helps people get into the institution, it does not do their homework for them. I think that’s the main flaw in your argument. So what if there are a higher number of X race in a certain major because of affirmative action at the BEGINNING of the term? They surely won’t make it to the end of the term if they cannot or are unwilling to do the work. They are doing the same coursework as everyone else in their major. So if there are more black doctors because of AA, it prolly helped reduce an initial… Read more »