Affirmative Action Doesn't Work, It Never Did...

A very long piece from Slate, I'm not gonna paste the whole thing. In short, it don't work, it never did, and it was a Republican idea.

Again, extremely long, check the link for the full piece.

Oh, good.

From anyone else, a picture of Obama might have been all we got.

Looks interesting I don't have a lot of time right now, but will give it a read and return to the thread at some later time.

These bits are the meat of the article:

And:

There is a problem of equal opportunity, but affirmative action is a bandaid aimed more at social control than fixing the problem. Yeah, I can buy that. Of course, fixing the problem, really fixing it, is far more costly. It means really good public schools in every community, not just those that are already privileged. It means healthy nutrition programs and access to medical services. At base, it means a real effort to address poverty by leveling the playing field at a young age. But, you know, that's socialism, so fuck that.

It's only socialism to the extremes of the opposition.

The only way to really turn around schools today is to allow/make all schools part of a tech school program and make those programs bigger than college bound programs. Kids need to have somewhere else to put their gifts than college bound. Once we have the two places for kids to go we have to understand that there will still be a section hopefully small at this point who don't WANT to go the education route and we need to let go.

I truly believe fixing that problem will fix so many of our other problems. But unless it works in 10 years ( which it won't more like 15-20 to see true results) they would change out of it. Education annoyingly changes about every ten years.

Sounds like starting at the wrong end of the problem.

It means really good public schools in every community, not just those that are already privileged. - Gul
We've been through this before. There are many examples of schools that spend the least per student have the highest rates of graduation/success.
It all begins at home - if the families/parents are fucked up you can send the kids to the best schools on the planet. If the kid doesn't to learn (or even attend)
it's all for nothing.

That's why the rest of his post is even more important:

So we "level the playing field" by forcing families to stay together and/or act right? How would we go about doing that without violating their rights?

No government ever has "leveled the playing field" and had the result turn out a reduction in poverty. More often, the result has been more privation. But, y'know, we ignore those results because who needs grimy, mean ol' reality when it gets in the way of masturbatory theories?

What translation program did you use to derive that from "healthy nutrition programs and access to medical services"?

What if their parents spend their food money on Twinkies and soda? You could drop off a library of nutrition info at their doorstep, but will they give a shit?

So then we come back around to education. Not to mention prenatal care.

Execution.

And if the parents don't want to educated? If they refuse prenatal care?

BTW, Did you read the article, do you think affirmative action has been successful?

See post 14.

Education? Tell me with a straight face that there's not one human adult who hasn't heard the news that sugary snacks are more fattening and less nutricious than let's say an apple?
They fucking know, they just don't give a shit. It's like putting health warnings on cigarettes. Has anyone been shocked to find out they are bad for you?

You simply cannot make people equally healthy or successful. You can only equally leave them the hell alone.

You provide breakfast and lunch at school and a to-go bag to take home for dinner. You add a mandatory 'After School Activity' that goes from 3:30 - 4:30 (longer for sports). Kids that have Ds or below, their ASA is 'Study Hall' with tutors available. You make school year round with optional enrichment opportunities (and meals) during breaks.

There are ways you can overcome parental dipshittedness, if you care and are willing to spend the money to do it.

And yeah, as @Aenea says, you drop the 'go to college or suck at life' binary choice presented to kids. Washington has something called 'Running Start' where you can start taking classes at community colleges during High School. Buddy of mine had an associates when he graduated high school. Do something like that where high schools partner with tech schools.

Again, it's possible, if you care and are willing to spend the money to do it.

Good parents can easily compensate for bad schools.

Perfect schools can not compensate for bad parents.

Well, there's one way...

Yeah, that's the way it's usually done, too, or at least the way it usually ends up for the populations it's inflicted on. S'why I'm not a fan.

They can do a lot.

This:

Disappointed?

Affirmative action starts at the wrong end of the equation.

Time to post the food desert map again:

Affirmative action programs are often ham-fisted attempts to address a symptom without doing anything about the underlying cause.

The problem is that public debate usually isn't between people who want the ham-fisted approach and people who want something better. It usually ends up being a contest between people who want to address the symptom and people who don't even want to do THAT.

Thank you! When the ratio of not giving a shit parents/kids to good parents/kids gets too high, no amount of money will help much.
Build a youth center for example? Local thug kids trash it or scare away the good kids. Teacher dares to discipline a child to get them in line?
Parent comes to school to kick the teacher's ass! The vast majority of the "fixes" are band-aids developed to help the feel-goods sleep at night.

And fuck your "food deserts". We've been through this before. Here's a summary:
1. The same convenience stores that sell nasty crap food also sell fresh fruits. They are generally on the aisle "end caps" where you can't possibly miss them the second you enter the store.
2. Grocery stores AKA "Evil Nazi Bastards" run a crazy scheme to make a profit. Thus hanging their shingle in an area where people practice the "five finger discount" constantly (or just bum-rush the store and take what they want via intimidation) means they lose money.
3. It sucks to be poor and honest. It sucks worse when your neighbors scare away any attempts to better the neighborhood.

Disappointed? I'm struggling to what your point was.

As for your map, I know the flyover states are the great unknown to you, but there is food most everywhere. What if people choose not to eat better food?

And the map is very misleading at least when it comes to some of the "darkest" food desert counties in Texas.

Part of the reason there aren't many grocery stores in some of those counties is because hardly anyone lives there. You've driven through one of them on your way to South Padre. It's mostly occupied by the Kenedy and/or King ranches.

There's even a big sign on 77 in Sarita that warns that there's no gas or food for the next 70 miles.