[dahart]

Yes this is true, that can and has happened. I don’t think it’s true as rule, but it’s a valid point. Still, the most important question is what is the alternative?

We are closer to ending sexism and racism than we were 70 years ago before any affirmative action existed, right? Who’s to say that all the backfiring and unintended consequences that have happened aren’t better than the parallel universe in which maybe slavery still exists? Would it have happened faster with no quotas or boosts for groups that were historically discriminated against? Maybe yes, that’s possible, but we can’t know. What we do know is that we’ve made forward progress, even if imperfectly.

The thing that tends to be forgotten when people talk about affirmative action being preferential treatment is that the previous ‘in’ group was already getting preferential treatment, and maybe still is. We did not start from a level playing field. The core idea is to try to balance the pre-existing preferential treatment out. Unless you can resolve the cause of that, an easier way to attempt to handle it is to try to artificially make the preferences equal. The idea is not to give preferential treatment as an outcome, it’s to remove preferential treatment. This is related to how discrimination is not racism, and why positive discrimination is different from negative discrimination.

[armchairhacker]

> We are closer to ending sexism and racism than we were 70 years ago before any affirmative action existed, right?

Correlation does not imply causation

> Who’s to say that all the backfiring and unintended consequences that have happened aren’t better than the parallel universe in which maybe slavery still exists?

They are better, but it's a low bar and an even lower one

> Would it have happened faster with no quotas or boosts for groups that were historically discriminated against?

Maybe, but even if "no", keeping the quota may cause a backslide.

Artificially balancing preferential treatment by applying it badly in the wrong direction is a duct-tape solution. Sure, it may have been justified after the Civil Rights Act. But it's not ideal and doesn't seem justified anymore, when we can easily positively discriminate for traits that are more obviously and universally negatively discriminated against, like income.

[dahart]

> Correlation does not imply causation

This is not relevant to what I said. We are closer to ending sexism and racism due to legislation, which is causal. We took specific actions to try to end sexism and racism and we know they had a positive effect.

> Artificially balancing preferential treatment by applying it badly in the wrong direction is a duct tape solution

I agree! It was meant to be a duct tape solution, from the start. It was meant to be temporary and end preferential treatment and go away.

> it may have been justified after the Civil Rights Act

I agree with this too, the justification was probably much stronger 60 or 70 years ago. It is weaker now… and that might be an indicator of its success.

Applying it badly has happened, and it’s lame and sucks, but that’s not an inherent feature or outcome of the core idea. Some might rightly say it was predictable.

The big open question is whether turning off all affirmative action will close that remaining gap, or leave us with a little bit of persistent systemic bias, or worse, a backslide. If that does, the next question is what to do.