Letters to the Editor
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@ TRenee: Congratulations on your successes. However, you told me a bit more than I needed to know.
A simple "yes" or "no" would have sufficed.
Just because some people wrongly misinterpret affirmative action as some kind of quota system to be filled doesn't make me eschew it. Affirmative action is supposed to even the playing field for QUALIFIED applicants and acknowledge the fact that people are discriminated against on the basis of gender or race (really, class should be included in this as well).
Yes. I already knew that. Did you think I didn't?
I've heard that line that says we should get rid of affirmative action because "Blacks will think that they only got ahead because of it," and I realiize that it's a lightening rod topic.
Yes. Isn't that what Clarence Thomas tends to think?
But, AKA, I make no bones about it. I grew up poverty-stricken and black--I know affirmative action helped me along, and I have no problem acknowleding that. But I also know that I am smart and talented aside of that--that the program helped level the playing field for me.
You are only saying that it may have given you an edge over an equally smart and talented white person????
What I object to is when people equate that with me (or Barack Obama) having gotten a handout because of affirmative action. That it's the ONLY reason (as Ferraro was implying) I've accomplished what I have.
Well, I don't think the ill-spoken words of Ferraro addressed you by name. Yet you seem to take them awfully personally. Can you tell me where exactly in the quote Koppelman has provided us that you see Ferraro saying that about Obama?
Yeah, maybe I got into my special competitive grammar school because I was black, but I had the test scores to get in; had to work twice as hard to overcome people's perception of me because of my blackness; and was able to graduate with better grades and more honors than all the little white privileged kids surrounding me.
Yes. I understand perfectly. Those priviledged white kids did not work so hard.