THE DEFINITION OF RACIAL DISCRIMINATION

How do you define racial discrimination?

Would it be to favor one person or group over another based on their race? That seems pretty self-evident to me.

But it doesn’t appear to be as self-evident to others.  It appears there are people who see racial discrimination as favoring one person or group over another based on one or more specific races, but not on other races.

Isn’t that, in and of itself, racial discrimination? Isn’t that what is happening in colleges and universities around the country?  Shouldn’t there be an investigation to determine whether it is so,what affect it has on students in general and what, if anything, should be done about it?

Here are excerpts from Charlie Savage’s article for the New York Times, in which he reports on a new initiative from the Trump administration regarding racial discrimination by colleges and universities.  Take a look and see what you think:

The Trump administration is preparing to redirect resources of the Justice Department’s civil rights division toward investigating and suing universities over affirmative action admissions policies deemed to discriminate against white applicants, according to a document obtained by The New York Times.

The document, an internal announcement to the civil rights division, seeks current lawyers interested in working for a new project on “investigations and possible litigation related to intentional race-based discrimination in college and university admissions.”

The document does not explicitly identify whom the Justice Department considers at risk of discrimination because of affirmative action admissions policies. But the phrasing it uses, “intentional race-based discrimination,” cuts to the heart of programs designed to bring more minorities to university campuses.

Supporters and critics of the project said it was clearly targeting admissions programs that can give members of generally disadvantaged groups, like black and Latino students, an edge over other applicants with comparable or higher test scores.

The project is another sign that the civil rights division is taking on a conservative tilt under President Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions. It follows other changes in Justice Department policy on voting rights, gay rights and police reforms.

Interesting, wouldn’t you say?

OK, let’s start with the premise itself:  are colleges and universities intentionally admitting certain (not all – we’ll get to that in a moment) minority students with lesser qualifications – with the result that other students, who meet or exceed those qualifications, are rejected?

The answer is yes.  A great many colleges and universities specifically – and proudly – acknowledge they do exactly that.

Now:  is it the right thing to do?  An acceptable thing to do?

That’s a great question.  Because in order to answer that we have to answer why Black and Latino students are statistically so likely to have lower academic qualifications.

And that means we have to talk about public education.

And that means we have to talk about education in cities that, for the most part, have been run by one political party for decades:  the Democrat Party.

Whoops, we’re not supposed to do that, are we?  Sorry, let’s move on.

Next, let’s talk about the effect this has on students of Asian and Indian ancestry – who are also minorities but, statistically, are more likely to have above-average academic qualifications.

See, to over-represent Black and Latino students does not just negatively affect qualified White students.  It also affects other minority students, such as, for example, qualified Chinese, Japanese and Indian students.

Therefore, to discriminate in favor of Black and Latino students based on their race, is not only to discriminate against White students, it is to discriminate against non-Black and Latino minority students as well.

Every one of the issues raised above is important.  And  if there is an investigation of the kind mentioned in Mr. Savage’s article, they all should be explored.

Y’know, suddenly that investigation doesn’t look like such a bad idea after all.