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"They go somewhere, and they are instantly assumed to be less competent."

So, why are "they" the majority of the workforce, a clear majority of college graduates, and trending up in both cases?

At some point it's time to stop arguing about theory and look about you. It's over. The male-WASP free ride is over. Maybe we've hit balance, maybe we haven't, but if we don't want to shoot right past the balance we better start looking around a bit before blindly spouting arguments from the 1960s. At some point you get to active discrimination against male-WASPs. Note how I carefully failed to phrase that as a question. And if it's not time to at least discuss the matter in light of the facts of my first paragraph, when will it be? Give me a concrete criterion for when we know we're finished.

Had I asked that question 20 years ago, one imagines the answer would be "When parity is reached", but since we've shot past that and it's still not enough, apparently that's not the real criterion.

This is a broad problem with politics right now; nobody knows when to say enough! Enough money has been spent on education, enough pension benefits have been given, enough has been spent on the military, enough affirmative action has been done. There has to be enough sometime.

     def enough_done_for(policy, effort):
         return False

is not a policy, it's a recipe for suicide.

Exactly. So you believe your life would be better and easier if you were black or a woman, right? Would you agree to be black if it were possible right now?

Were you planning on even engaging with my point? I'm not sure why I should try to engage with yours if you're not going to engage with mine and instead fire back trite gotchas.

Apparently as a black woman I'm more likely to get a degree and more likely to get a job, so what was your question again? Deprogram yourself and look around you. You're running old code. If there is still vast reservoirs of systematic racism and sexism floating around they sure don't seem to be very effective!

That's basically the problem - you don't understand. You don't understand that black men can't just go into the clubs that white people can, you don't understand that when white people meet black people, their faces are slightly less relaxed.

Take a trip as a white guy to Asia or Africa or somewhere. You are the pinnacle of society.

And we're not even talking Barack Obama mixed race, try being a real black person for a while. The systematic racism and discrimination is still there.

And when it comes to women - how many of your elected officials are women. That's democracy - the people choose the men.

If the world were equal, I would happily say all form of positive discimination should be abolished. But it's not equal - it's still a terribly unjust place.

Ah, moving goalposts. Now affirmative action is not done when it fixes the US, it's only done when it fixes the world.

May I humbly suggest that screwing around with hiring policies or college acceptance policies in the US is extremely unlikely to have this effect? If the US refused to employ anyone but black women in any position, anywhere, I do not see how that will solve your problem with the world.

You're still not engaging with my point, either. When is it enough? Give me a criterion for when I know we're done. And since we're not talking about "the world" but the US, when are we done in the US? Now you want 50/50 parity in politics, specifically, to add to all the places where "they" are ahead and still gaining? Can we finally stop if we actually get there, can we finally stop if male-WASPs are underrepresented in all parts of the job market and in all degrees, or will that not be enough either?

I really hate to say this, but this is the sort of argumentation we get on this topic. You refuse to engage with your opponents because you're used to just winning. Wave the flag of racial discrimination and watch the opposition just melt away. You don't have to engage. When discrimination in the US was rampant and it showed in the job market and college degrees, that was probably reasonable. But if you want to explain why we need these policies when we've exceeded proportional representation and are still trending away from proportional representation, you're going to have to actually engage. Why aren't we done here?

(And I don't care about fixing the world for the purposes of this argument. I'm pretty sure that being an American and believing that I must solve the world's racism with my policies is not generally acceptable, rightly so. Now we shouldn't dismantle affirmative action policies because that wouldn't be sufficiently culturally imperialist?)

As a WM I would have no problem becoming a BM. At 30 it's less of an issue, but at 18 it would have been very helpful.

A woman (and a black guy) have institutions against them. They go somewhere, and they are instantly assumed to be less competent. That's why these things are given to them - to help out the weak, not to push YOU down. Those things are legs-up to equalise the playing field - you, as a WASP already are at the starting line, asking to get those things is to get another 10 yards.

Allowing this for the sake of argument, at what point do you stop "giving" things to disadvantaged groups? If a group makes up 60% of the population of college graduates, is it time to start punishing them as well?

When the playing field is very clearly level. And right now, it's really not. Go to small towns in the U.S south and see how black people live. And go ask women how they are treated in companies.

I agree, there's a lot of racism and sexism in small southern towns. Unfortunately, we can't do much about that until all of the older generation living there die off and younger people are born without being taught their ignorant ways.

What I disagree with is the idea that we can cancel this racism and sexism out by giving them advantages in the big cities. Life should be based on merit, not genetics.

Actually, I've seen far more racism in the rural/small town north than I've ever seen in the south. And I have lived in the smallest of small southern towns. It probably has little to do with where precisely the town is located and more to do with what is happening (sudden influx of other races).

Go to small towns in the south and see how white people live. Poor is poor.

Disclaimer: I've only really lived in TN, and NC in the south and rural NY in the north. In laws are in small town IA (which as a southerner I classify as "north").

They go somewhere, and they are instantly assumed to be less competent.

That's a correct assumption for many groups (e.g., college students) due to the effects of affirmative action.

By lowering the standards/imposing quotas for group X, that group will probably not meet the higher standards of everyone else. Thus, everyone will have to assume that members of X are less competent.

Oh, to answer your question: if I could become black, I would.

Well, good for you, because being Black in america is a choice. You can choose to select black as your race. Why not do it? You would have the advantages of affirmative action and none of the disadvntages of actually having black skin. Surely the perks are worth crossing that 'black' checkbox in the forms?

You can choose to select black as your race.

How, precisely, is this true? Aside from giving yourself cancer via tanning-bed-overdose? The first person to see you would notice you lied on your form. Not typically good for getting hired.

> Oh, to answer your question: if I could become black, I would.

Out of curiosity, what do you see as the pros and cons?

Pros: At this point in my life, the main benefit would be with women. Black guy, white girl poses little problem, while white guy, black girl is difficult [1]. Honestly, this dwarfs everything else.

Affirmative action might have been helpful when I was in school, though it's probably irrelevant to my life now.

Most ethnic groups besides whites have secret networks unavailable to white guys. Their quality tends to be lower than more focused networks (random HN reader or random lisp user > random black guy), but they are still useful.

In the future, the prospect of selling to government under the WOB and MOB (woman/minority owned business) quotas might be useful, though I doubt I'll actually get into that sort of business.

Cons: Racial profiling. Since I rarely shop or drive, this isn't much of an issue for me.

More difficult to live in the still-racist parts of the country. Even as a white guy, I'd like to avoid them.

The main reason I answer so readily is that being white isn't a significant part of my identity. So it would take only a very minor perk to make me change.

[1] This only applies to black American women, African women don't seem to have any real problem with white guys.

[edit: genuinely curious why I'm being downmodded.]

> The main reason I answer so readily is that being white isn't a significant part of my identity.

This is what I'm wrestling with myself. I feel like it is some kind of wrong to say I would not want to change my race. Yet, while being white is not really part of my identity, it IS a part of my self image, the same as how I am blond. I feel like I would be kind of unsettled if my body image suddenly was radically different from reality.

I also like the physical ramifications of my ethnicity; the blond straight hair, potential for awesome silver hair later, and cool red facial hair. My body build is similar to that of African runners (though MARKEDLY less muscular and fit), so that at least wouldn't be very different.

Now that I think about it, your point about women is pretty valid too, though in my case that would actually be a con. I have met some black women I find extremely attractive, but that is not the mode, and I have never (personally) seen a black man with an asian woman.

All that said, I wouldn't fight a race change. I just don't think I'd seek it out.

On the topic of [1], since I've moved to a an area with a greater distribution of black women, this problem has been seriously brought to my attention.

My dating pool has effectively been cut down, with an advantage having gone towards black men since there is little or less difficulty with a black man and a white woman.

Having discussions with friends from outside of the US, especially those who live in Africa, have mentioned this exact situation - that African women have no problems dating a white male but blacks in America show little interest.

Here's an institution against WASPs, based on your very argument:

If you're a male-WASP, you don't need X because you are clearly capable of getting it via another method. So pick someone you can (supposedly) help more: the people with "institutions against them".

I've encountered this EXACT behavior in employers and have been skipped over for jobs several times. When I asked if there was a reason they picked someone significantly less qualified (they said I was the best qualified), they stated explicitly that I should be able to get a better job somewhere else, so they picked someone they felt needed the job more, and would be capable enough.

But if that's the case, why in God's name was I applying there in the first place?

axle:

I'm with you. Don't let HN's pro-kyriarchy[1] mob mentality get to you. Most of them somehow missed the fact that 1 in 5 women are still raped in college[2]. They also fail to realize that rape is HEAVILY underreported on most college campuses. They don't realize that women (and girls) are often blamed for causing their own rapes, blamed for "participating" in the crimes committed against them[3], or that rape of women is still part of male lore[4][5]. Find me the "balance" in that. Tell me when exactly we've hit it.

They fail to realize that we're not "done" solving the real issue of ingrained prejudices just because women are getting educated and have jobs. They don't realize that self-hating racism and sexism is just as ingrained in the underprivileged minorities. They don't realize it, of course, because white men have never been underprivileged minorities. They don't realize that it's a lifetime struggle not just with a world, to accept you for who you are, but with yourself[6][7].

They don't realize that unrealistic body image expectations are eroding women's sense of self worth[8]. They don't realize how it warps the mind, changes priorities, and restricts what choices women make, despite any actual or supposed abundance of choice. They don't realize that in many dark-skinned nations there is now a separate "white" beauty standard that competes with the beauty standard that makes sense for them, culturally[9][10].

If you think that being liberal and educated absolves you of playing into this kyriarchy, then it's possible that you've never even heard that color blindness theory creates racism[11], and you've probably never heard of anything about any moral credential bias[12]. You've probably also never heard of the myriad ways in which the patriarchy actually hurts men[13].

They fail to realize that for someone else to gain some power, the currently privileged must give up some of that power[14]. They're not whining because "we're missing the balance", they're whining because they're personally losing some privilege. In a fight for equality, that's supposed to happen, but they hate it. They see it, take note, and fight back. They don't realize that other men are already fighting back[15][16][17]. They don't get what they, presonally, did to deserve losing anything.

If you think there's no unjustified racism in Arizona[18], you must be kidding yourself. Or, I guess, you must be a privileged Arizonian. If you think there's no sexism despite your one-claim-trumps-all job statistic, you must be joking. Or, I guess, you must be a white male. The most important privilege that you have is the privilege to ignore your own privilege.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyriarchy

[2] http://www.cpbn.org/program/where-we-live/episode/wwl-sexual...

[3] http://bluemilk.wordpress.com/2010/06/05/but-why-shouldnt-sh...

[4] http://yesmeansyesblog.wordpress.com/2009/11/12/meet-the-pre...

[5] http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2009/10/rape-culture-...

[6] http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2008/08/worst-enemy.h...

[7] http://refusethesilenceblog.com/post/631417596/intern-blogge...

[8] http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1247008...

[9] http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/FaceOff/weight-debate-fat/st...

[10] http://stuffwhitepeopledo.blogspot.com/2010/05/expect-black-...

[11] http://news.illinois.edu/news/10/0421online.html

[12] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_credential

[13] http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2009/06/in-which-anot...

[14] http://finallyfeminism101.wordpress.com/2007/03/11/faq-what-...

[15] http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2007/10/explainer-wha...

[16] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Collier_Township_shooting

[17] http://contexts.org/socimages/2009/08/14/guest-post-dead-gir...

[18] http://wonkette.com/415809/arizona-school-demands-black-lati...

Oh, and HN? I'm utterly ashamed of you for voting axle down so vehemently. In the future, when you speak from a position of privilege (and I don't just mean white privilege or male privilege, because privilege comes in many shapes), please, please also do your research before spewing knee-jerk nonsense.

> the white will likely get more jobs than the black guy.

All else held equal, that is simply not true in modern America. There are very powerful incentives to hire the equivalently qualified black guy in order to avoid lawsuits.

Anyway, all this affirmative action stuff will have to be dismantled in the next twenty years when whites are a minority. It will simply become impossible for institutions to function if they have to make sure their loans/admissions/hires correspond to the new population profile.

An the lawsuits are there because people recognized that if the place were left as it were, discrimination would persist.

Replace "are" with "were" and nearly everyone would agree with you.

For today, "are" is what's in question. A vast amount of laws exist simply because they did exist. How many worthless laws lie around, outdated by 100 years? Is it really that hard to believe that a law could obsolete itself in the past low-double-digit years?

All else is most definitely not equal, but you know this.

> All else held equal, that is simply not true in modern America. There are very powerful incentives to hire the equivalently qualified black guy in order to avoid lawsuits.

What about the audit studies that would appear to indicate otherwise? For example, an audit study from 2004 states in its abstract that "White names receive 50 percent more callbacks for interviews. Callbacks are also more responsive to resume quality for White names than for African American ones. The racial gap is uniform across occupation, industry, and employer size."[1], and earlier experiment would appear to show that white applicants with criminal records are called back slightly more often than black applicants without one[2].

1. Bertrand and Mullainathan: "Are Emily and Greg More Employable than Lakisha and Jamal? A Field Experiment on Labor Market Discrimination" http://www.economics.harvard.edu/faculty/mullainathan/files/...

2. Devah Pager: "The mark of a criminal record" http://www.irp.wisc.edu/publications/focus/pdfs/foc232i.pdf