When you are a different type of person entering a unusual situation, reactions are very different. In Harper Lee's novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, Jem and Scout go to the Negro church with their maid Calpurnia. They were treated very well from most of the Negroes, there were some that were slightly upset that they were there, but for the most part they were treated extremely well.
Most of the Negroes felt that they were inferior to the white children, or most ' did not want to protest fearing that they may be hunted down. The kids felt a little weird about coming into such a unusual situation, and would have left if not for Calpurnia. This is like affirmative action except in reverse. Instead of helping other colored people to gain jobs, it helped the white children in a Negro church.
Affirmative action was useful many years ago, when colored people could not get jobs because of racism. But in the times of the nineties people have learned about racism and how to prevent it, many colored people are in high jobs and are not discriminated against. But now, instead of colored people being discriminated against, white people are.
In a time of equality, people should be considered equal. People should be judged on their experience and skill, not the color of their skin. Now instead of jobs seeking the better applicant, they seek to make their quotas of colored people they hire. It is not right for the people who have to work with them, the employer, or the person being rejected. Now workers have to compensate for a persons ill experience and have to teach them. The employer could have had a better worker but has to make due with a mediocre one to make the quota. And the rejected worker still has to go find a job. Even though he or she had the necessary qualifications. Is it fair to discriminate against the white people? Shouldn't it be a level playing field void of skin color? Affirmative action is just racism placed in a more positive manner. Instead of people not hiring someone because they are black, they are not hiring someone because they are white. Affirmative action is just plain reverse discrimination. Affirmative action should be abandoned, and a level playing field should be established. People should be chosen for their skill, experience, and qualifications.
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