White Affirmative Action

Inclusive Activism

Teaser: You know what sucks? When people get something for nothing! When people get ahead of you but they didn’t earn it they didn’t go their fair share. Or when people are just unjustly favored just because they are part of the club which you are not. There needs to be standards, and unless you do it and get your spot from your hard work you DON’T BELONG. Affirmative Action Sucks.

Today’s podcast the History of Affirmative Action for White people

Today we will talk about:

What is the notion of Affirmative Action?

What is the history of Affirmative Action? Was there any examples of Affirmative Action for white people?

Does Affirmative Action even work now?

Welcome back to the podcast! This podcast is written while I am on winter break over the holidays so I might not have as much to talk about when going into depth about my personal live or the podcast .

As far as the podcast goes I am toying with the idea of having Sara on the podcast as well as Michelle to do a year in review just to hear some different voices. These folks I see as the most invested people with the Inclusive Activism Podcast and I think that hearing from them about how the podcast started, if we are seeing progress with the podcast or not might be interesting. If you would like to be a part of that conversation – Please remember you can email me at [e-mail] or leave me a voicemail at 860-576-9393. I would love to hear your thoughts!

Also remember to rate and review us on iTunes, or Stitcher, or if you could please share the podcast on social media, All these things go a long way to making a significant difference for us here at the inclusive activism podcast. Also please subscribe to our podcasts on iTunes, Stitcher, Overcast, Player FM, Pocket Casts or Google Play as these are great ways for me to show “proof of work to potential sponsors”. It would also go a long way in getting my producer Sara paid for her work someday too!

So checking in on my Activism:

My current activism is podcasting and rest honestly

Checking on my classes for Spring

Learning how to promote podcast

Self Care:

Lift X2 a week which is all I can get in due to my gym being closed until next week

But I have also gotten cardio done for 2 days already which is fantastic – my skin looks better? Maybe I am just tan

And Meditated for 2X for at least 10-15 mins and will need to get another day in

Meeting up with people I care about

So on to the podcast for today! How the white working class just got sacrifed at the altar of the rich.

First thing: What even is affirmative action?

Affirmative action policies are those in which an institution or organization actively engages in efforts to improve opportunities for historically excluded groups in American society. Affirmative action policies often focus on employment and education. In institutions of higher education, affirmative action refers to admission policies that provide equal access to education for those groups that have been historically excluded or underrepresented, such as women and minorities. Controversy surrounding the constitutionality of affirmative action programs has made the topic one of heated debate.

Background on Affirmative Action

Affirmative action is an outcome of the 1960’s Civil Rights Movement, intended to provide equal opportunities for members of minority groups and women in education and employment. In 1961, President Kennedy was the first to use the term “affirmative action” in an Executive Order that directed government contractors to take “affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin.” The Executive Order also established the President’s Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity, now known as the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).

Affirmative action policies initially focused on improving opportunities for African Americans in employment and education. The Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954 outlawing school segregation and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 improved life prospects for African Americans. In 1965, however, only five percent of undergraduate students, one percent of law students, and two percent of medical students in the country were African American. President Lyndon Johnson, an advocate for affirmative action, signed an Executive Order in 1965 that required government contractors to use affirmative action policies in their hiring to increase the number of minority employees.

In the following years, colleges and universities began adopting similar recruitment policies, and over time the enrollment rates for African American and Latino students increased steadily. Despite the efforts that have been made to establish equal opportunity, gaps in college enrollment between minority and white students remain. According to data from the National Center on Education Statistics (NCES), in 2007, 70 percent of white high school graduates immediately enrolled in college, compared to 56 percent of African American graduates and 61 percent of Hispanic graduates. More recent data from NCES reports some changes in this gap, most notably for African American students. The updated report finds that in 2011, 69 percent of white high school graduates immediately enrolled in college, compared to 65 percent of African American graduates and 63 percent of Hispanic graduates.

The Affirmative Action Debate

The use of race as a factor in the college admissions process has been, and continues to be, a hotly debated topic.

Supporters of affirmative action make the following arguments:

• Affirmative action is more of a process than just an admissions policy. Colleges and universities reach out to groups that are underrepresented and urge students to apply. Institutions often offer financial aid to underrepresented students and provide on-campus support programs to improve their academic success.
• Affirmative action programs have resulted in doubling or tripling the number of minority applications to colleges or universities, and have made colleges and universities more representative of their surrounding community. Statistics show that after California abolished its affirmative action programs in 1998, the minority student admissions at UC Berkeley fell 61 percent, and minority admissions at UCLA fell 36 percent. After Texas abolished its affirmative action program in 1996, Rice University’s freshman class had 46 percent fewer African-Americans and 22 percent fewer Hispanic students.
• Graduates who benefited from affirmative action programs say that they have received better jobs, earned more money, and ultimately are living better lives because of the opportunity they received.
• Diversity in higher education provides an educational advantage for all students, both personally and intellectually. We exist in a global, multicultural society, and in order to achieve success, employers and employees must be able to work effectively with the diverse society that surrounds them.
• Affirmative action policies are necessary in order to compensate for centuries of racial, social, and economic oppression. Generally, individuals with higher socioeconomic status have more opportunities than those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. Supporters believe that certain racial or ethnic groups are disadvantaged because they are frequently in lower income brackets and consequently are not exposed to the same resources as students from higher socioeconomic classes. Advocates support the notion of competition between students based on merit, but argue that affirmative action compensates for economic disparities.

http://www.ncsl.org/research/education/affirmative-action-overview.aspx

Second: Has there ever been Affrimative Action for white people?

White affirmative action examples

40 acres and a mule – promise made to spaces post civil war

Overturned and many given back to white people

Reverse racism biggest people is racism against white – people feel its worse than blacks and Latinos

Racism is seen as small acts of meanness and not institutional racism

List of white handouts

1614 tobacco land and labor intensive

50-100 acres of land to populate the Americas – for white Europeans – white affirmative action

1705 Virginia required white indentured servants 20 bushels of corn 10 shillings a musket and 50 acres and a mule

Not overturned – this was the same year that also made it illegal for whites to employ blacks

This act drove poor whites against poor blacks and created a wedge of separation because before this they would join forces to create change

This was the idea to give some to a chosen few rather than to everyone divide and conquer

Post revolution white benefits 1785 land ordinance act 640 acres of native land given to whites at a $1 an acre to whites only led by Thomas Jefferson

Since 1785 also These funds were set aside for public education – of white people only

Homestead act 1863 excluded blacks because it was for citizens only. 10% of all land when to white people men because you had to be a citizen. Even if blacks and brown people were citizens racist practices made the distribution unfair.

The few blacks that get get land had most of that removed by racist practices by the us agriculture dept

1929 stock market crash – new deal. Build massive middle class wealth. Red lining. Home ownership was for people that could raise 50% down and pay the rest off jn 2-4 years. New deal makes 15-30 year mortgages available for most middle class – except red linking limiting the wealth of the home. Homeownership went from 30% to 70% most homes built in suburbs- redlined. And they didn’t loan to predominately no white neighborhoods – blacks and brown folks left out no access. Also where new work was newer and better infrastructure was added furthering the value of suburban white homes and lowering the values of black and brown inner city homes – until now with gentrification

1933-1952 33 billion was made available in business loans. adjusted for inflation that would be $2 trillion 98% of those loans given to white people. Excluded agricultural workers who were primarily black and brown people

Social Security when first created in 1935 it excluded domestic and agricultural workers who were primarily black and brown people.

2/3rd of all black workers until the program was expanded in the 1950s.

Service man’s readjustment act GI bill of rights sent vets of WWII and Korean and Vietnam wars to college. On paper no racial distinctions. BUT the college climate in the 40’s 50’s and 60’s was segregated! Where did men of color go to school HBCU’s who got less money. Not many were available most were teachers or agricultural schools for blacks and brown people. White schools didn’t let POC in. White people had access to government sponsored education in ways POC didn’t have. Less options less access.

Many white people allowed people to become doctors, engineers, scientists or businessmen. Or it allowed folks to get into trade schools BUT here again men of color were at a disadvantage due to the militaries racist practices in the military when it came to assigning jobs. White men had the chance to learn building, mechanical skills, and construction skills where men of color became dish washers and cooks. This was a multi-generational problem as well.

When we talk about why are people poor we too often hear about “choices” and “mindsets”. While failing to look over time at people who have been systematically left out of the economy.

in 1944 until 1971 the GI bill spend 95 billion on Vets to buy homes get vocational training and start businesses. Ira Katz Nelson southern white law makers made sure that these benefits would be overseen and marshaled out locally instead of federally making these benefits subject to Jim Crow practices. Private mortgage lenders, trade schools, and bankers turned away black and brown applications. A few POC did benefit but the overall effect of the law was to widen the wealth and opportunity gaps between black and white Americans.

The transfer of wealth in white families goes in the form of a social safety net or as a down payment on a home or help with higher education. Or as buying a car or with a home you can live in. Or with social security you don’t have to take care of your parents. In POC money travels from Adult child up the the parent and doesn’t move forward it moves backward to care for the parent instead of making it so the child does better than the parent.

The median white household has 13X the wealth of the average black household. The average white family lead by someone who hasn’t completed high school still has more generational wealth than the average black household with someone with a college degree.

If affirmative action is race based access to colleges and universities when was it legislated? 1618 was the year it was instituted. When whites got 30 schillings 50 acres of land a mule a musket and 10 bushels of corn it was race based affirmative action for white people specifically. Or the Naturalization Act of 1790 when it stated if you are white you can become a citizen – this was about race. Not merit Not Hard work, not meeting the criteria – just being white the color of your skin gave you access to loans, to neighborhoods to live in, IF YOU ARE WHITE.

So this country was built on affirmative action for white people. Affirmative action is a white phenomena.

Lastly – Does Affirmative Actions even work? Honestly it is hard to say with any honesty. It is based on opinion. I do think it has helped with equity in colleges and universities.

But also I think white people – not all white people but many – poke and prod at it and are actively trying to kill it.

I have heard it said when you have been on top for so long that equity can feel like oppression.

“When you’re accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression.”

And things started making a little more sense to me. All this anger we see from people screaming “All Lives Matter” in response to black protesters at rallies. All this anger we see from people insisting that their “religious freedom” is being infringed because a gay couple wants to get married. All these people angry about immigrants, angry about Muslims, angry about “Happy Holidays,” angry about not being able to say bigoted things without being called a bigot…

They all basically boil down to people who have grown accustomed to walking straight at other folks, and expecting them to move. So when “those people” in their path don’t move — when those people start wondering, “Why am I always moving out of this guy’s way?”; when those people start asking themselves, “What if I didn’t move? What if I just kept walking too?”; when those people start believing that they have every bit as much right to that aisle as anyone else — it can seem like their rights are being taken away.

Equality can feel like oppression. But it’s not. What you’re feeling is just the discomfort of losing a little bit of your privilege — the same discomfort that an only child feels when she goes to preschool and discovers that there are other kids who want to play with the same toys as she does.

It’s like an old man being used to having a community pool all to himself, having that pool actually opened up to everyone in the community, and then that old man yelling, “But what about MY right to swim in a pool all by myself?!”

And what we’re seeing politically right now is a bit of anger from both sides. On one side, we see people who are angry about “those people” being let into “our” pool. They’re angry about sharing their toys with the other kids in the classroom.

They’re angry about being labeled a “racist,” just because they say racist things and have racist beliefs. They’re angry about having to consider others who might be walking toward them, strangely exerting their right to exist.

On the other side, we see people who believe that pool is for everyone. We see people who realize that when our kids throw a fit in preschool, we teach them about how sharing is the right thing to do. We see people who understand being careful with their language as a way of being respectful to others. We see people who are attempting to stand in solidarity with the ones who are claiming their right to exist — the ones who are rightfully angry about having to always move out of the way, people who are asking themselves the question, “What if I just keep walking?”

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/chris-boeskool/when-youre-accustomed-to-privilege_b_9460662.html

So in review major points of this podcast were:

1. What was the nature and history of Affirmative Action
2. Examples of White Affirmative Action
3. When you have been privileged for so long Equity can Feel like Oppression.

SO if this made you think something, if you have a question or even more shocking a critique let me know. You can call me at 860-576-9393

This space is a place to talk back ask me questions, hit me with scenarios of how to react to situations real time. Depending on how good your stuff is I will give it my “first take response” or if it’s good it might be a future podcast!

Also as always if you’re interested in booking me to bring the power of inclusive activism to your organization you can always do so at [e-mail] or you can learn more about this organization at www.inclusiveactivism.com