Good afternoon!
After reading these pages, I think this type of post, connections with current events, would be best appropriate to publish. This section of the book focuses on affirmative action, white identity, and how racism "isn't just black and white. As Tatum first explores the idea of affirmative action, I thought to myself, there's only one type, of course: educational. However, Tatum demonstrated to the audience that there's more than meets the eye. Prior to expanding on her point of view of affirmative action, she provides substantial evidence of how institutional racism is still present economically. Here's one example of how minorities still face a disadvantage when searching for jobs.
"In another version of the same experiment, the White testers presented themselves as ex-felons (having served eighteen months for possessing cocaine with intent to sell) and were teamed up with Latinx and Black applicants with no criminal records. Whites with criminal records still had more callbacks or job offers (17.2 percent) than did Latinx testers (15.4 percent) and Black testers (13 percent) with no criminal records"
This quote, after the several pieces of evidence she gives, made me see institutional racism through a whole new lens. This really opened my eyes to the clear racial bias that's still present in society today.
After giving this evidence, Tatum starts to further explore the idea of affirmative action and why it's beneficial in some cases. She states that for companies, it's crucial to have focused goals to improve. And for some companies, the main goal is to have more diversity in the workplace. Tatum then states the misconception that when affirmative action is placed in jobs, people often think that people only get the job because of their race, even though there's a candidate that's much more qualified. She then tackles this common misconception by saying it's the bad companies that do this; good companies are the ones that evaluate candidates solely for their qualities. Plus, why would you want to work for a racist company anyways?
This topic of affirmative action is seen all over the media, especially in recent years. A couple of examples come from CNN research, which shows the recent decisions either approving or disapproving affirmative action in Colleges. For example, in February 2019, Texas Tech University came to an agreement with the Department of Education to stop seeing race and ethnicity as a driving factor when admitting students. This resulted in the ending of a 14-year-long investigation on the school's use of affirmative action (CNN Editorial Research).
After reading these pages, I think this type of post, connections with current events, would be best appropriate to publish. This section of the book focuses on affirmative action, white identity, and how racism "isn't just black and white. As Tatum first explores the idea of affirmative action, I thought to myself, there's only one type, of course: educational. However, Tatum demonstrated to the audience that there's more than meets the eye. Prior to expanding on her point of view of affirmative action, she provides substantial evidence of how institutional racism is still present economically. Here's one example of how minorities still face a disadvantage when searching for jobs.
"In another version of the same experiment, the White testers presented themselves as ex-felons (having served eighteen months for possessing cocaine with intent to sell) and were teamed up with Latinx and Black applicants with no criminal records. Whites with criminal records still had more callbacks or job offers (17.2 percent) than did Latinx testers (15.4 percent) and Black testers (13 percent) with no criminal records"
This quote, after the several pieces of evidence she gives, made me see institutional racism through a whole new lens. This really opened my eyes to the clear racial bias that's still present in society today.
After giving this evidence, Tatum starts to further explore the idea of affirmative action and why it's beneficial in some cases. She states that for companies, it's crucial to have focused goals to improve. And for some companies, the main goal is to have more diversity in the workplace. Tatum then states the misconception that when affirmative action is placed in jobs, people often think that people only get the job because of their race, even though there's a candidate that's much more qualified. She then tackles this common misconception by saying it's the bad companies that do this; good companies are the ones that evaluate candidates solely for their qualities. Plus, why would you want to work for a racist company anyways?
This topic of affirmative action is seen all over the media, especially in recent years. A couple of examples come from CNN research, which shows the recent decisions either approving or disapproving affirmative action in Colleges. For example, in February 2019, Texas Tech University came to an agreement with the Department of Education to stop seeing race and ethnicity as a driving factor when admitting students. This resulted in the ending of a 14-year-long investigation on the school's use of affirmative action (CNN Editorial Research).
Another decision regarding affirmative action, provided by a New York Times article, "A Timeline of Key Supreme Court Cases on Affirmative Action," states that on June 23, 2016, The University of Texas was granted the limited use of affirmative action, and after a supreme court ruling, affirmative action was voted 4-3 (Kramer). This decision, despite being executed in 2016, shows that affirmative action is still relevant and still a popular subject today.
Overall, this focused topic of affirmative action in this section of the book strongly connects to today's current events. I learned much more about this topic, especially from a different point of view. This passage definitely opened my eyes to new perspectives, and I'm looking forward to reading the next section.
Works Cited
CNN Editorial Research. "Affirmative Action Fast Facts." CNN, 13 Nov. 2019,
www.cnn.com/2013/11/12/us/affirmative-action-fast-facts/index.html.
Accessed 23 Mar. 2020.
www.cnn.com/2013/11/12/us/affirmative-action-fast-facts/index.html.
Accessed 23 Mar. 2020.
Kramer, Margaret. "A Timeline of Key Supreme Court Cases on Affirmative Action."
The New York Times, 30 Mar. 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/03/30/us/
affirmative-action-supreme-court.html. Accessed 23 Mar. 2020.
The New York Times, 30 Mar. 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/03/30/us/
affirmative-action-supreme-court.html. Accessed 23 Mar. 2020.
Gabe,
ReplyDeleteI found your post to be very interesting, your facts shocked me and kept me engaged while reading. Soon to be applying to schools, I thought your post was relevant due to the piece about college admissions and affirmative action. I liked that you went on to research what ended up happening with Texas Tech University to further your understanding for what was going on. Your book seems to be full of information and looks like it covers a wide variety of topics in connection to racism. It is interesting to see some parallels between my book and yours. I liked that you included that this book opened new perspectives for you and that you are excited to learn more. I think you did a really great job with your post and keeping it as relevant as possible.
You did a really good job of giving the reader context of what’s going on in the book, because I haven’t read this book and I fully understood the context of your blog and wasn’t just summary. I agree with you. I thought affirmative action was just in education and I never really thought about it in careers, so this was an interesting point of view. The only thing I would’ve liked a bit more connection to the current event, like commentary or a specific story just to really tie it together.
ReplyDeleteGabe,
ReplyDeleteI really thought you did a nice job with this post. You showed me how bad institutional racism is through the lens of those discriminated against. I also liked that you connected it to current events in our everyday lives. Have you heard or noticed any form of institutional in a certain place such as a job or maybe even school? I think that the stat you provided about white criminals getting more job call backs than any other person with a clean history but a different race was very interesting and gave me a sense of in a way how lucky I may be not having to experience this on the daily.
-Logan
Thank you! I can't think of a specific incident of institutional racism that I noticed, but sometimes the incidences can be so common that they're looked over. I'll definitely try to think of some examples.
DeleteI also found the job call backs stat very interesting, and I'm really glad you understood my shock when I first read it. Thanks!
Certainly discussion of affirmative action is relevant. I think there could have been a bit more discussion of the issues related to affirmative action today. Is it still controversial?
ReplyDeleteI also wonder about your points that Tatum states that the good companies handle affirmative action more carefully. Does she provide evidence of how this occurs?