Racial Injustice and Other Inconsistencies

• It's a policy that distinguishes between races and selects for the minorities.

• It makes assumptions about a person's life, upbringing, and background based on physical appearances.

• It's rooted in stereotypes.

• According to this doctrine, certain attributes are inherent in being of a given ethnicity.

• Its proponents hold that it "helps American society as a whole" by solving problems, even though its foundations are unjust and based on racism.

• The policy exists in both the private and the public sectors.

• It is based on convenience: Because performing in-depth research is difficult and expensive, making decisions based on race becomes simple and cheap.

• It fits the definition of "prejudice" perfectly because the act judges other people based on first impressions.

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If you're a conservative, chances are you assumed I was talking about "affirmative action."
If you're a liberal, chances are you assumed I was talking about "racial profiling."

In many ways, both systems are unfair both to those they target and to those they neglect to target.

Under affirmative action, individual members of minority groups have an advantage because minorities as a whole are underrepresented at schools and in certain industries. Those minorities who actually have talents and skills are often viewed by their white peers as the beneficiaries of affirmative action policies, even though they may have been highly qualified without any extra bonus. Equally qualified whites are at a disadvantage. Although some feel that it rectifies an American historical trend that barred minorities from achieving real success, many feel that it is simply "reverse racism." In some instances, affirmative action appears to be on the rise in private school admissions; yet many public school admissions statistics reveal that the schools are actively recruiting minorities less than in years past.

And what about "racial profiling," with which Dennis Prager and Ann Coulter (among the most vehement opponents of affirmative action) have no problem? It targets certain minorities (people of Middle Eastern descent in airports, and African-Americans and Hispanic people in car searches and other police procedures), while assuming based on skin color that a person is more of a suspect for a given crime. Shouldn't security in airports be on the look-out for all terrorists, Mohammed Attas as well as Timothy McVeighs? In a world where the vast majority of our terrorist enemies seem to be of Arabic descent, causing us to target Arabs, terrorists with unconventional skin colors are bound to emerge. We must be vigilant in suspecting all equally, even if that means raising the security for all travelers.

Although I consider myself a "progressive," I do not consider myself a hypocrite on most issues. Therefore, I do not support affirmative action or racial profiling.





And a few other inconsistencies:

Conservatives believe in an "inalienable right to life" as God grants us (via our Judeo-Christian Founding Fathers' Declaration of Independence), yet when a person is found guilty, that murderer's right suddenly becomes alienable. I'm not saying the death penalty isn't justifiable under the "Old Testament," but it's not justifiable if somebody believes that the right is and should be "inalienable."

Conservatives cannot understand why Obama criticizes McCain's success (see the '7 homes' ad), but McCain is not wrong to criticize Obama's success (see the 'Paris & Britney' ad).

Conservatives believe abortion is murder. Does the fact that the mother became pregnant due to rape make an abortion any less a "murder" of an innocent human being? Giving the option of an abortion to a rape victim sounds an awful lot like two wrongs making a right, no? John McCain rejects abortion ("infanticide") except in the case of rape or incest, so go figure.


Again, I'm trying to attain a Prageresque notion of "moral clarity."
I welcome inconsistencies of liberal thought (like the pro-"affirmative action" stance but not pro-"racial profiling" stance I mentioned earlier) in the comment field.