Affirmative action gives Hispanics, blacks, women and other minorities special consideration for employment, education and contracting decisions. It was created to allow minorities to have an equal chance of advancing.

Affirmative action has always been in the center of a lot of controversy.

Many opponents, mainly white men and the white women that it still benefits, claim that affirmative action is discriminatory towards white people. You would think that white women would not disagree with affirmative action but embrace it. It seems as though once they got the fruits of affirmative action they want to abandon it for all other groups.

A majority of the white resistance do not mind when a white woman receives 20 points lower on the SAT than a man and gets into MIT to boost its female population. Many pay no mind to the fact that small liberal arts schools such as Vassar admit men with lower SAT scores than their female counterparts just to get a 50/50 male to female ratio. That seems like a quota. But when you try to get more blacks and Hispanics into colleges and universities there is major white resistance and that seems contradictory.

Some may argue that diversity in ideologies is more important than cultural diversity. Then why do schools try to get an equal male to female ratio?

It is said that college is not only a place of academia, but a place of edification. A diverse college community fosters this. Lee Bollinger, president of Columbia University, states, "This society has been committed to trying to create a successfully diverse and integrated society, and universities across the county have played an important role in trying to meet that goal."

It is beneficial to the white students to have affirmative action policies implemented at colleges and universities. The white students can get a better understanding of what black and Hispanic people are like. They can learn how to interact with other ethnicities. It also gives a better, not accurate, representation of the racial and cultural diversity that exist in the United States.

The opponents of affirmative action such as Washington Post journalist, Roger Clegg, argue that "It [affirmative action] sets a terrible legal, political and moral precedent to allow racial discrimination; creates resentment and stigmatizes the so-called beneficiaries in the eyes of their classmates, teachers and themselves; fosters a victim mind-set; removes the incentive for academic excellence and encourages separatism among racial and ethnic minorities; compromises the academic mission of the university and creates pressure to discriminate in grading and graduation; breeds hypocrisy within the school and encourages a scofflaw attitude among college officials; mismatches students and institutions, guaranteeing failure for many of the former."

There is no evidence that these downsides to affirmative action actually exist. A study done by William Bowen and Derek Bok debunked those myths and noted that, "Minority students admitted to selective schools had strong academic credentials, graduated in high numbers and did very well after leaving college ... This evidence dispels the notion that [affirmative action] has done a disservice to minority students by placing them in schools in which they are unable to compete ... There is also no evidence [again contrary to prevalent misperceptions] that the consideration of race stigmatizes minority students. Black graduates of the most selective schools are the most satisfied with their college experience."

Now I pose a question: Are white men threatened with more women, blacks, Hispanics and other minorities getting the skills they need to be real competitors for jobs usually held by white males? This is why they want to axe affirmative action, starting with the universities, where they will gain the skills they need to go up the economic ladder.

I am a proponent of affirmative action. I also believe that racism is not obsolete, so affirmative action is necessary. The only way black and Hispanic people can advance is if they are given the chance and skills they need to become successful in life. A diverse community nurtures a more enriching college experience. It benefits all parties, after all, why are you going to go to a college where everybody is going to be and look just like you?

This column first appeared in the Jan. 14 edition of The Heights, the daily newspaper of Boston College. It is reprinted here courtesy of U-WIRE.

The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.

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