Jared Cormier
Tim Wise
A Particularly Cheap White Whine
1.
“to award scholarships on the basis of so-called merit, when merit itself has been accumulated due to an unfair head start, is to perpetuate a profound justice.”
This passage states that African American scholarships are given not simply because the recipient experienced oppression first hand throughout their lives, but through generations to the point where they don’t have the same opportunities as others.
2.
“We (whites) are ‘losing out’ if you will, only on something to which we have no moral claim namely, the ability to keep banking our privileges, and receiving the benefits (be they scholarships, college slots or jobs) of a system that has been skewed in our favor.”
This somewhat sarcastically states that are privileged enough and affirmative action policies are not racially biased, but rather work to remedy these “opportunity gaps…to the greatest extent possible”
3. “once economic status gaps between whites and blacks are fully accounted for, there is no statistically significant difference between white and black graduation rates.”
This mathematically indicates that the affirmative action policies for scholarships work. Without these polices that statistic would be drastically skewed toward whites.
It first struck me as odd that an organization like the BU Republicans would back anyone who truly believed that race-based scholarships were “the worst form of bigotry confronting America today.” Weather you support race-based scholarships or not there are clearly more pressing forms of bigotry that involve all citizens, not just those involved in college or involved in preparation for college. While there are arguments that these scholarships denounce racial equality, they come from narrow minded people caught up in semantics who just want to win. The statistics shown through the passage contain more than enough evidence to show that the policies work to create a more level playing field.
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