Affirmative action programs that let people move up the ladder for no other reason than their gender and skin color are lazy and insulting.

Through all the tears of joy or sorrow this morning, many of you might have missed the news that voters in Michigan scrapped affirmative action in their state. The state voted yes to referendum two which bans public institutions from “using affirmative action programs that give preferential treatment to groups or individuals based on their race, gender, color, ethnicity, or national origin for public employment, education, or contracting purposes.” At the same time, it added gender as a protected class to the provision of the constitution already in place prohibiting discrimination on basis of race, color, or national origin. It was a long and often bitter fight, but in the end, the voters of Michigan did the right thing. Affirmative action programs that let people move up the ladder for no other reason than the color of their skin or gender are perhaps among the laziest and insulting solutions to diversity problems in America that anyone has ever come up with. Moreover, they are quite possibly blatantly discriminatory themselves.

None of this is to say that there are not groups that have been traditionally oppressed or traditionally disadvantaged.

The logic supporting affirmative action programs that currently exist has become ridiculously circular. “Because America is racist/sexist we need affirmative action.” Yet, “America’s racism/sexist is evidenced by the fact that we still need affirmative action.” Does that make any sense to anyone? It certainly does not to me. None of this is to say that there are not groups that have been traditionally oppressed or traditionally disadvantaged. That logic, however, negates the fact that others who may not fall into one of these traditionally oppressed groups might be similarly, if not more, disadvantaged. Under some existing systems, the black daughter of a physician, educated in private schools, and in no need of financial assistance would automatically be given a few more “points” than a white male who has grown up in public housing. In this example, it is painfully obvious who the victim of racism is.

The programs thus not only reinforce the idea that minorities are inherently inferior, they actually increase racial animus.

Many people have gotten even more idiotic and claimed that the end of affirmative action programs means the end of minorities in college or in positions of power. Anyone that is a minority should be extremely offended by these sentiments. They rather imply that successful minorities have only achieved their level of success because of affirmative action. Not only does that completely diminish the accomplishments of the Mexican kid that worked as hard as he could to get extremely high SAT scores and a 4.0 GPA and therefore earn his right to admission on his own merits, it allows the white kid who bombed the SAT and had a 3.5 GPA to think that somehow the Mexican kid stole his spot. The programs thus not only reinforce the idea that minorities are inherently inferior, they actually increase racial animus.

None of this is to say that America does not need to do more to achieve diversity in college campuses or in the public sphere at large, but rather that we are doing it the completely wrong way. There are several other ways one could measure diversity. If the goal of affirmative action programs is to give people more of a chance that might not otherwise have one, perhaps we should consider whether or not their parents went to college. Level of parental education is often crucial to the success students have in school. How about the zip code of the child’s high school? Inner city youth clearly have many more things to deal with than those who attend high school in wealthy suburbs. Perhaps even parental income would be a good factor to consider. If you parents could not afford to get you a tutor, or to send you to a better school, perhaps you do deserve more of a shot. These are barriers faced by people of all varieties and taken into consideration would achieve the real aims of affirmative action; giving the person a chance who never had one to start with.