KEN-JENNINGS wrote:
It's not that percentages weren't high enough - it's that owners weren't hiring (or even interviewing) black candidates. The owners were discriminating based on race. It's a sad fact of life, but it's there nonetheless. The policy doesn't say that owners have to hire a certain amount of black coaches, just that they must interview at least one black candidate. I've never read any studies or seen any academic evidence that black people are less intelligent in coaching football, so in a sport where the overwhelming majority of those involved are black, why is there a deficit of black coaches?
Why not ask them personally? Considering that a few years ago the Super Bowl had 2 teams with black head coaches and this year's champs (The Steelers) have a black head coach as well, I don't see a lack of black coaches.
Careers have a beginning and an end just like a product on the market. People that offer a service have to have certain requirements. To be a player, you only have to be young and talented. To be a coach, you have to have experience. Considering that whites only leagues predate black leagues, there is naturally going to be more white coaches for a while. As time goes by, some of these black players of today will later become coaches. Since there are more black players right now than whites, it is safe to assume that eventually there will be more black coaches than white ones. Would you support quotas for interviewing white coaches in the future if this comes to pass?
KEN-JENNINGS wrote:
My example was to show that your (and perhaps Wilson's) argument that affirmative action should be class-based is not a great solution. There is discrimination at all levels of society, and it's not only based on poor vs. rich. Affirmative action is a shitty reality that came to fruitiion because there is still discrimination almost 50 years after the Civil Rights Act passed, 150 years after the Civil War. It's pathetic, but it's a reality.
Do you think an institution that lends itself to assuming minorities can't cut it without help is helping end discrimination?
Given what I mentioned earlier about the Super Bowl, do you really think most people will refuse to hire black coaches in football over their race? If 2 black coaches succeeded recently in taking teams all the way to league titles, I think it should be clear to any management with half a brain that race doesn't matter. And for the few managers that don't realize this yet, I'm not sure if a black coach would want to work for them.
For the jobs that matter, managers care about performance. Any business that plans on sticking around will hire who they perceive as best for the job. Now, admittedly, this may not apply as much to lower level jobs, but even so, I can say from personal experience that people in my city certainly don't have a problem with hiring black people, whether it's fast food or running a large company.
And I seriously doubt all of these people wouldn't have been hired without affirmative action. The few people who believe that probably are racist anyway.
Oh yeah, and here's another glaring inequality with affirmative action. If I were black and moved to any lily-white city of a decent size, I'd automatically have a leg up on my white competition for a job as long as my qualifications were on par with theirs (and sometimes not even on par).
As a white person, I can't go to Detroit, Oakland, Baltimore, or Atlanta and automatically have an advantage based on my race in getting hired.
KEN-JENNINGS wrote:
Lowing - middle and upper class blacks are passed up on raises and promotions. They get paid less than their white counterparts. Look at any economics statistic rating the average salaries of black people against white people in similar positions of employment with similar qualifications and education. Black people (on average) get paid less. So do women. That is discrimination. Spin it how you want, that's the facts.
That's because they accept lower pay oftentimes. If they didn't, it wouldn't happen as much.
Last edited by Turquoise (2009-08-04 19:57:57)
