Opinion: Proposition 16 establishes necessary first step in combatting racial inequality
October 29, 2020
Affirmative Action is once again on the ballot in California in the form of Prop 16. A vote yes on Prop 16 would legalize Affirmative Action once more in California, making it legal for race, gender or ethnicity to be considered in matters of public education, contracts and employment. A vote no on the proposition would continue California’s “anti-discrimination” policy stated in Prop 209 and it will continue to be illegal to consider those factors when making decisions. As of now, California is just one of nine states to not have Affirmative Action policies.
This measure has raised much controversy in the state so far, with 26% of voters still undecided, according to a poll by the University of California Berkeley’s Institute of Governmental Studies.
Those for the proposition argue that Prop 16 will increase opportunities for women and racial minorities, helping to close the wage gap and diversify schools and businesses.
On the other hand, a primary argument against Prop 16 is that it will create more division and will essentially legalize discrimation.
For me, therein lies the problem. The idea that Prop 16 is discriminatory or that it will create discrimination is contradictory to the purpose of the proposition.
Prop 16 is a necessary and effective step for helping to combat racial injustice and inequality in our state. For this reason, the proposition deserves a vote yes.
The United States has a long history of racism, from slavery to segregation to the continued police brutality of today (to name only a few examples). Now, more than ever, there is a pressing need for change to end the inequality and discrimination facing racial minorities in California.
While Prop 16 may not be the perfect solution to this problem, it certainly is a start. Prop 16 is the only race-related piece of legislation on the California ballot this year, and in this critical state of our country, there is a need for immediate action to help minority groups, which Prop 16 provides.
Take, for example, the racial demographic of the University of California schools. According to their demographic data, in 1999, three years after the passing of Prop 209 in 1996, 3% of the students who enrolled were African American, while in 2019 that number had only risen to 4%. For Hispanic or Latino students, their percentage has doubled in the past 10 years from 11% to 22%, and for Asians and Pacific Islanders, the percentage has remained fairly consistent at around 30%.
While I can appreciate that the University of California has enrolled more Hispanic or Latino students, it troubles me that there has been little change with regards to the enrollment of African American students. There is a discrepancy between the whole of California and those numbers. According to the 2019 U.S. Census Bureau Black or African Americans make up 6.5% of California’s population, Hispanic or Latinos are 39.4%, and Asians are 15.5% of the population.
If colleges were once again permitted to consider race in their acceptance process as permitted by Prop 16, more Black and African American students would be accepted and be able to reap the benefits of a higher education. This does not mean that quotas will be added to ensure diversity, as quotas have been ruled unconstitutional, but the door will be opened for underrepresented groups to be more likely to be considered for acceptance.
A higher education is often considered to be essential for higher paying jobs and greater work opportunities, with a four year degree increasing the median income earned by 30%, according to the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC).
The PPIC also stated that Black and Latino people are much more likely to have a lower income than white or Asian people, creating a wealth gap. Increased access to higher education provided by Prop 16 could help to close this wealth gap and increase the quality of living for racial minorities.
Westview student opinion on Prop 16
Additionally, in the same poll from the University of California, Berkeley, 40% of Latino voters and 51% of Black voters said they support Prop 16. As the people that will most benefit from Prop 16, their voice on this decision matters most. As a white person, I will never experience racial discrimination, so I want to trust their judgement on what they think will help them as it impacts them directly.
While Prop 16 won’t end racism or solve all problems of racial inequality, it is a start. I want to see an end to the racial inequality that is plaguing the nonwhite people of our country, and I believe that Prop 16 will be the first step for that in California.
Race has been, and will continue to be, a factor in the hiring and decision-making process, and voting yes on Prop 16 would guarantee that racial minorities would be given equal opportunity to education and employment.
V0x • Oct 29, 2020 at 1:19 pm
Indeed, Proposition 16 will increase opportunities for women and minorities. However, this comes at the cost of other people who are not given these similar advantages. It’s essentially an unfair advantage you get if your skin is a particular color. The idea that Proposition 16 is discriminatory is contradictory to the problem that it is trying to solve, but simply saying that Proposition 16 isn’t discriminatory isn’t addressing that concern at all. By definition, Proposition 16 is discriminatory, simply because it gives head starts to particular groups of people at the cost of other groups. By giving these head starts or small boosts to women and minorities, you are thus holding back other, possibly more qualified people academically, insofar as the number of people getting into these colleges remains the same. What this means is that discrimination in favor of a particular group equates to discrimination against another. Fundamentally, the argument of Proposition 16 is treating people unequally for the sake of equal opportunity, which taken by face value, is nonsensical. It seems extremely hypocritical, no? I do agree that the United States has had a long and painful history of racism, but providing certain people with unfair advantages in the present will only serve to divide people even more than before. After all, it’s understandable that people would feel a sense of injustice if a person arguably less qualified than them were to get into a great college or job simply because of the color of their skin. In addition, what this does is perpetuate the harmful stereotype that minorities are unable to accomplish anything without the help of the government. Again, this increases feelings of hatred and overall division between us. Of course, it’s not as if racism will suddenly shift in the direction of the people who are put at a disadvantage as a result of Proposition 16, but the point of greater division in this state remains. Combating racial inequality should not involve state-sponsored inequality. Furthermore, there are already forms of “affirmative action” in California that involve other factors, such as economic status, which are arguably a bigger reason(as in, you can’t afford tutors or the tuition for a good college) for the racial disparities mentioned in the article, rather than racism or sexism. In addition, in the specific example of school admissions, it can be argued that affirmative action in fact does more harm than good. An article published by The Atlantic(https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/10/the-painful-truth-about-affirmative-action/263122/) explains that various studies have shown that students who benefit from affirmative action often have trouble learning and competing effectively, whereas those same students would have thrived had they gone to schools that better reflected their abilities. By allowing students to enter schools which might go at a faster pace than they are accustomed to/able to follow, affirmative action only goes to leave minority students in the dust, as well as reinforce their own and others’ that minorities can only succeed when given special privileges. At least with the current models of affirmative action that have been implemented, it’s hard to find much justification for allowing similar programs in California, if past performance is any indication of the future. Specific statistics that arise as a result of this effect include the findings that black college freshmen aspire to science and engineering careers more often than whites, yet the mismatch effect that comes from affirmative action leads them to abandon those same fields at twice the rate of their white counterparts, among other examples. For the most part, affirmative action only strengthens stereotypes and sometimes even leaves the people that it’s supposed to help worse off than if they had just gone to a school that matched their abilities. A higher education may ultimately be beneficial, but when said higher education fails to meet the needs of the students that are part of its system, those students are unable to reap the benefits of higher education. Lastly, multiple polls are cited in which people who stand to benefit from affirmative action state that they support Proposition 16. A group of people will obviously believe in something that they are benefited by. It’s why people vote for a particular presidential candidate over another. People vote for the people and things that represent their best interest, and that’s just self-evident. I don’t see how polls of Latinos and Blacks have any real bearing on this conversation. Overall, I don’t buy the supposed benefits that affirmative action brings to minorities, and I still find that a yes vote on Proposition 16 will only further exacerbate discrimination and division in California. Anyway, that’s just my 2 cents that no one asked for, and I’ve probably spent far too much time writing a comment that no one will read anyway. This is quite a nuanced and interesting topic to discuss, and it’s pretty cool to see all the various viewpoints that people have around here. That being said, I’ve got homework to do. pce