A Quote by Orlando Patterson
Placing a time limit on affirmative action would in all likelihood blunt the orchestrated politics of controversy that now bedevils it. And thinking about phasing it into a class-based entitlement program may at long last bring Americans around to a consideration of the growing inequality that threatens the harmony of our democracy far more than the alarmist cry of 'racial division.'
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While many Americans agree that 'the system is rigged' economically, few are aware of the ways in which racial inequality has been structured and embedded in our society. This is why candid, fact-based discussions about racial inequality are so desperately needed.
If we could create the conditions that make racism difficult, or discourage it, then there would be less stress and less need for affirmative action programs. One of those conditions would be an economic policy that would create tight labor markets over long periods of time. Now does that mean that affirmative action is here only temporarily? I think the ultimate goal should be to remove it.
My decision was sparked by affirmative action. There was a point in my life when affirmative action would have meant something to me - when my family was working-class, and we were struggling.
It's a bad strategy to have an identity-based strategy on the left. De-emphasizing identity all-around would help our politics because we would have to pay more attention to the issues. We may have to pay more attention to class if we didn't have these self-defeating identity agendas.
Sometimes we deliberate - for example when we plan a long trip or - if we are not math wizards - when we solve long division problems. However, if we deliberated every time we acted we would never get through the day. Most of the time, we act for reasons without deliberation. I am not just talking about cases of simple, habitual action, like brushing your teeth, but also about more sophisticated action.
For a long time, the Court has moved toward outlawing all forms of racial preference, including affirmative action, and Obama seems accepting, even supportive, of the change.
Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.
Prisoners do matter when analyzing the severity of racial inequality in the U.S. Yet because they are out of sight and out of mind, it is easy to imagine that we are making far more racial progress than we actually are.
Remember, until the 1970s, the spread of democracy has always been accompanied by the decline of inequality. The more democratic our societies have been, the more equal they have been becoming. Now we have the reverse tendency. The spread of democracy now is very much accompanied by the increase in inequality.
Every part of our program of perestroika - and the program as a whole, for that matter - is fully based on the principle of more socialism and more democracy.
A Confucian or Jewish love of learning would gain minorities far more than any affirmative action laws we might pass.
Those who deplore our militants, who exhort patience in the name of a false peace, are in fact supporting segregation and exploitation. They would have social peace at the expense of social and racial justice. They are more concerned with easing racial tension than enforcing racial democracy.
We are seeing a working-class, a middle class, which over the last three decades has seen their wages and income stagnate, while the very rich have seen their tax burden lighten in ways not seen in three or four decades. It's a face of a country that we need to look at and understand that inequality is perhaps the greatest threat to our economic recovery and democracy, and in that context we must take action.
I'm not overly alarmist about it, but I do think there are some worrying signs, like the growing accumulation of wealth by a very small proportion of the population, plus elections in the US are much more dominated by money than anywhere else calling itself a democracy.
I wasn't thinking about history. I was thinking about how we were going to end segregation at lunch counters in Atlanta, Georgia.We would have never thought about making history, we just thought: Here is our chance to get out our sense of rejection at this kind of racial discrimination. I don't know that there was a time that anybody growing up in the South wasn't enraged about being segregated and being discriminated against.
Over the summer I thought that I would seek out non-Americans as friends, just for diversity's sake. Now I find that I want to be around Americans - people who I know are thinking about our country as much as I am.
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