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Heroes Community > Other Side of the Monitor > Thread: Is Affirmative Action Another Word For Communism?
Thread: Is Affirmative Action Another Word For Communism? This thread is 3 pages long: 1 2 3 · NEXT»
Consis
Consis


Honorable
Legendary Hero
Of Ruby
posted January 17, 2004 11:42 PM

Poll Question:
Is Affirmative Action Another Word For Communism?

In light of the many squabbles in the united states and around the world I would like to pose a debatable question for the Heroes Community:

Is Affirmative action another word for communism?
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Responses:
Yes
No
"Silence you capitalist pig!"
"The Man Is Puttin Me Down!"
Who cares
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Shadowcaster
Shadowcaster


Honorable
Supreme Hero
Shaded Scribe
posted January 17, 2004 11:55 PM
Edited By: Shadowcaster on 17 Jan 2004

It isn't so much communism in my opinion as it is government doing what it believes is the best course of action, regardless of the people's opinion. That's essentially what most governments around the world, communist or not, do.

My Personal Opinion on Affirmative Action

I don't believe affirmative action is going about gaining equality in the right way. Instead, it now balances favor against the majority in favor of a minority group. Doing such isn't going to counterbalance the past. The past will always be there, and racism is a black mark on nations from all over the world's permanent record. How about providing equal opportunity for all instead of shifting the benefits of unequality to the other side of the the monority/majority gap.
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Wolfman
Wolfman


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Supreme Hero
Insomniac
posted January 17, 2004 11:56 PM

It is not communism it's racism...

Affirmative Action

Consis asked what my position was on Affirmative Action was, so here is the whole rant.

Affirmative Action has been done all wrong, and is now used in a time when it is no longer as necessary as it might have used to be.
Affirmative Action is racism pure and simple. It’s goal as I understand it, is to promote racial equality in colleges and other places. Well, it has been blown out of proportion and stomped on.
I see protestors supporting Affirmative Action, who don't look like the smartest bunch, saying you are racist if you don't support it. Well I guess that would make me a racist in their eyes. In reality, I am far from it. I don't care what race or gender you are as long as you get the job done right, or take college seriously.
I brought up Howard Dean in another thread, and how Al Sharpton has pointed out how he didn't employ a black person when he was governor of Vermont. Well, why does it really matter? I would rather someone gets the job because they have earned it, can do it properly, or has the training for it. Don't pull some bum off the street just to fill a statistic, that is ridiculous.
I have never been a fan of Rvd. Jessie Jackson. He brings up things that don't really matter, and blows them out of proportion. In Chicago, there was going to be an election for a new police chief. Gasp! There was no black on the ballot! There were two white guys and a Hispanic. Because of Jackson's bickering, one of the qualified guys got the boot off the ballot. I'm not saying the black person that was put in his place didn't know anything, just that the guy that was there in the first place was probably more qualified, hence he was picked initially.
At colleges around the country, students have been staging Affirmative Action bake sales. The students set up a table at their school, bake cookies, just like any other bake sale. But then the prices come out. $1 for White males, $.75 for White females, $.50 for Hispanics, and $.25 for Blacks. When I read about this I thought it was great! Then I read on to see the reaction from people, I had a good laugh. One black student said it was false and the protestors were saying it was based on race, he said it wasn't. Then I read about the riots that broke out at a peaceful bake sale. Far left students physically attacked the stand, call me crazy but that is just not proper bake sale etiquette.
Administrators closed down the bake sales saying they were offending other students. They were just trying to sell some cookies, and other students attacked them, not the other way around. They have been done all over the country. I may even do one when I go to college...unless it is shut down before I have the chance.

There it is, Consis, have at it.

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privatehudson
privatehudson


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The Ultimate Badass
posted January 18, 2004 01:05 AM

A couple of links towards what exactly "affirmitive action" is would be useful for those of us not in the know!


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Wolfman
Wolfman


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Supreme Hero
Insomniac
posted January 18, 2004 01:43 AM

*GASP!* Something in politics that PH doesn't know about?!

Anyway, most sites I would find on it would be extremely biased one way or another.  So no, I guess I can't give you a link.  
Basically it was developed to give minorities a better chance to get into college by giving them extra points on college entrance exams in some cases.  That's not fair.  And in other cases, colleges had to have a certain percentage of minorities.  So if you were white and had excellent scores, you could be turned down because you were white.  

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Aquaman333
Aquaman333


Famous Hero
of the seven seas
posted January 18, 2004 04:38 AM

I voted "Yes" simply because I am a victim of Affirmative Action. God Forsaken Virginia Tech and their low miority student population.
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Peacemaker
Peacemaker


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Peacemaker = double entendre
posted January 18, 2004 04:38 AM
Edited By: Peacemaker on 18 Jan 2004

Okay.  Hopefully my reputation for being somewhat measured on topics that I feel very strongly about (such as it is) will speak well for me here.  Let's hope that is the case.

PH, Affirmative Action is a major plank in the social reformation platform known as the Civil Rights Movement that arose during the 1950's and 1960's here in the United States.  

There are some major milestones that mark this development in American social reform.   The first was the event when Rosa Parks, a black janitor in the 1950's, refused to go to the back of the bus where all blacks were relegated to during that period, which was still the segregation era in this country.  

After the landmark case of Plessy v. Ferguson in the late 19th century the social theorem of "separate but equal" ruled in this country.  This case was decided after the abolition of slavery when there was a real big fight about whether blacks had a right to use the same bathrooms, drink from the same fountains, use the same swimming pools, go to the same schools and colleges, sit in the same part of the restaurant or bus etc.  The United States Supreme Court in Plessy said that it was acceptable.  As long as Africam Americans had access to facilities, even if the facilities were separate, then there was no constitutional violation.

When Rosa Parks got on the bus one day too tired to go to the back of the bus, she sat down in the front seat and refused to move back.  She ended up getting arrested and thus the Civil Rights movement as we know it was born.

The second major milestone in the Civil Rights Movement was the US Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education, which was the Supreme Court's decision in the 1950's finally overruling the "separate but equal" doctine set forth by the same Court nearly a hundred years earlier in Plessy v. Fergusun.  This case arose when members of the local NAACP chapter in Topeka, Kansas, volunteered to participate in an action designed to force the issue. They took their children to white-only schools in their neighborhoods and attempted to enroll them for the upcoming school year. All were refused admission. These parents filed suit against the Topeka Board of Education on behalf of their twenty children. Oliver Brown, a minister, was the first parent listed in the suit, so the case came to be named after him.

The case went to the Supreme Court, which finally recognized that separate isn't equal in a "segmentalized" society, where resources and representation are both dominated by a portion of the constiuency primarily or exclusively comprised of the dominant demographic entity (white people).

This integration did not come easily after the Supreme Court's decision.  Resistance was persistent and frequently violent. There is famous footage from this era of several African American students trying to walk into an Arkansas High School, where the Governor (Orval Faubus) and other local whites were resisting integration.  He dispatched the Arkansas National Guard to block the students from entering the school. President Eisenhower ended up sending federal troops to see the students into the school and protect them.  

The subsequent developments went from these milestone events, to trying to break down some of the existing endemic barriors to people of color breaking into the system. The theory here is that racism had become so built into every aspect of the social infrastructure that favoritism toward whites and/or racial bias against everybody else would continue to perpetuate themselves unless we took affirmative steps to level the playing field.  Generational poverty and segmentalised school systems had created an entrenched sub-society in which people of color were perpetually trapped in a chronic poverty underclass situation.  So they started manufacturing special ways to inject people of color into the dominant school and labor systems.  One of those methods was to establish percentage quotas for employee work forces and school enrollments.

Many people believe that continuing affirmative action mechanisms so long after the initial barriers have been broken down has become counterproductive.  They believe that there is nothing to prevent us from assuming the problem is solved and that individuals should be hired, enrolled and generally advanced entirely on the merit of their ability and performance.  

Many believe that while there have been tremendous inroads, simply eliminating the mechanisms may not be the most effective solution.  The percentages of minority representation in both the work force and college enrollment suggest that there is a ways to go.

This is my personal take on this.  Immanuel Wallerstein, an international specialist and Senior Research Scholar at Yale University, has observed a phenomenon  called "segmentalism" which occurs when societies of distinct cultural, economic and social elements become permanently pitched, creating a chronic state of poverty and a perpetual underclass situation in one of the distinct cultures.  

I have observed Wallerstein's theory born out around me in a generally ongoing manner in many ways.  I have seen enormous intellect, talent and potential get flushed down the toilet with the lives of people who never had the opportunity to step on in and advance because of a lack of money, accessibility, opportunity, and a plethora of other reasons too numerous and disturbing to recount here.  

While I tend to agree that everyone should be advance on their own merits, the reality is that people surrounded by a generational culture of poverty cannot just do that the way people who have never experienced those disadvantages think they ought to be able to.  I think that just eliminating the entire mechanism of affirmative action altogether does not take into account a continuing segmentalized aspect of our society.  

It is a theory I will grant you all.  But Wallerstein's observations about a segment of a society becoming perpetually underclassed needs to be taken into consideration before the entire theorem of affirmative action is just trashed altogether.  The numbers tend to suggest the problem is not solved.
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privatehudson
privatehudson


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The Ultimate Badass
posted January 18, 2004 11:06 AM

I voted no. Not because I believe affirmitive action is right, but because you don't seem to have an accurate idea of just what communism is about. Communism is not about racial predjudice or promoting one segment of society over another. Communism in it's original form was meant to be about equality, not bias. I'm not convinced that Afirmitve action is right yet since I have not heard more than one argument in favour of it and pleanty against, but I do not equate it to communism.
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bort
bort


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Discarded foreskin of morality
posted January 18, 2004 04:17 PM

The standard argument for affirmative action is that there are barriers to advancement for certain groups of people, whether they be racial minorities or the gender majority.  These barriers do exist, even today.  They aren't as bad as they used to, but they're there.  Wolfman's example of the prices of bake sale goods would have been more accurate if it represented the average salary received for doing the same job.

Affirmative action is one way to try to break down these barriers.  It's probably not the best way, but it is one way.  However, I support affirmative action not because of past or current inequality but because of how it improves university life and education in its own right.

College is not like high school.  Only a small portion of your learning is done directly in class.  You learn much, much more from direct interaction with your professors and classmates.  The good university campuses (the ones that people complain about affirmative action if they don't get in, that is) are truly vibrant places.  There's always a performance or an art exhibit or something like that going on.  There's so many student organizations that you almost go insane trying to figure out which ones not to join.  It truly is a community, or more accurately, a bunch of small communities that form a supercommunity together.

There's this belief that those online universities can replace real universities.  They can't.  They only provide the classes which, while very important, are only a tiny bit of what a college education is about.  A good college education comes from, quite simply, being surrounded by intelligent, talented and interesting people.

The college application process isn't about simply rewarding people for a high SAT score (especially now, with all of those SAT prep courses so that, if your parents can shell out the dough, you can raise your score).  The college application process is about assembling a group of people that you hope will make the University a true learning environment.  The college application is really asking, "If you come here, how are YOU going to make US a better university?"  Part of the answer can be "Look, I got a 1600 on my SAT and a 4.0 GPA, I'm really smart, I'll contribute to all the class discussions," but that's only part of the answer.  There has to be more, "I always had a summer job and an after school job.  I have a work ethic.  I'm not going to just sit in my dorm room all day and play computer games."  "I play the violin, I'll be the one playing in concerts on campus."  "I play the tuba, I'll be performing during halftime."  "I play football, I'll be performing before and after halftime."  "I was student body president, I'll be organizing campus activities."  "I was a volunteer tutor, I'll be helping the students who are struggling."  If the only criterion for admission was an SAT score, the college campus would be a truly dull place.

So where does affirmative action come in?  Because it's the diversity of the campus that makes it such a stimulating place.  Other answers to the "What are YOU going to do to make us a better university?" can be.  "I'm black.  I've faced discrimination all my life.  In government classes when they talk about the civil rights movement or about what minority voters look for, don't you think it might be useful to have somebody who is a minority voter in the discussion sections?"  "I grew up in the ghetto.  In anthropology and sociology classes, I'll be telling people first hand what it's like to grow up surrounded by crime and poverty.  I'll be telling people what it actually does to ones mindset."  "I came here on an inner tube from Cuba when I was 14.  I can actually tell you what living under a dictatorship is like."  Don't underestimate how educational the simple presence of another viewpoint, a different perspective, novel experiences can be.  Discussing Huckleberry Finn or Uncle Tom's Cabin is more enlightening when there are African Americans in the discussion group.

This isn't just theoretical, it really does work this way.  As an undergraduate, I learned quite a bit from people who were most likely there "because" of affirmative action.  (I also learned a lot from people for whom affirmative action would have applied, but they didn't need it because they were simply incredibly people, far more intelligent, talented and dedicated than I can ever hope to be.  Since the discussion is about affirmative action, I'll leave them out of the argument.)  As a teaching assistant, I got a pretty good handle on the academic abilities of my students.  One time there was an african american girl in one of the chemistry classes I taught.  She was towards the bottom of the class.  Not the bottom and it was a very difficult class, so it's definitely not an indication of academic unfitness that she was struggling, but if I had to guess, I'd say that her grades and SAT scores were probably in the bottom 25% of the people who were admitted to my college.  She was dedicated, though and she would always come to my office hours for help because she genuinely wanted to learn.  I hope she learned something from me.  It was my job, after all, but I can say for a fact that I learned A LOT from her, stuff that I wouldn't have learned from any class.  She was from a small rural town in the south.  A town that had originally been made up of sharecroppers but, what with the changing economy and all, now really didn't have any sort of industry or commerce.  She didn't have indoor plumbing growing up.  Think about that.  The richest nation in the world.  One of the most advanced technologically.  There are people growing up today here that DON'T HAVE A FREAKIN' TOILET!  Talking to her about her experiences growing up was an education in itself.  Her school didn't offer a single AP course.  Teachers would only be there for a year or two while they fulfilled their Teach For America obligations or whatever so there was no continuity.  Her school didn't have a drama program and they had a single art class that didn't have enough supplies.  School band?  Forget it.  She probably didn't have the numbers on her college application, but the school was a better place for having her.  Another student of mine, African American female again, was also about at the bottom of the class, and was most likely there because of affirmative action.  Extremely nice person, it was a joy having her in class. Well, she came close to failing (she didn't and she genuinely didn't fail.  I didn't cut anybody any breaks while grading.  I was actually tougher on people than my boss was.) but I think she had a pretty good excuse -- she was from the ghetto.  I mean real ghetto, not just a sketchy neighborhood, I wouldn't have set foot in her neighborhood for anything.  Her boyfriend was murdered in a drive-by shooting in the middle of her first semester.  Needless to say, she had some trouble concentrating on her schoolwork for awhile.  (What amazed me is she still completed all of her assignments.  Not spectacularly, but not atrotious either.).  I learned from her how real and how devastating crime ridden neighborhoods are.  It's not just part of living there and people don't just get used to it.  I was very sorry for what happened to her, but her mere presence there improved my education in ways that I am grateful for.

That's why I support affirmative action.  It's only partially because of barriers to advancement.  It's really because diversity, in and of itself improves the education you receive at a University.  I don't think I would have learned anything at a school that was simply 20,000 carbon copies of me.
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Peacemaker
Peacemaker


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Supreme Hero
Peacemaker = double entendre
posted January 18, 2004 04:34 PM

bort, your posts are always good.  But that one just blasted my doors off.

Excellent post.  Well done.  Thanks to you.  The world is a better place having teachers like you in it.
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terje_the_ma...
terje_the_mad_wizard


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Supreme Hero
Disciple of Herodotus
posted January 21, 2004 09:57 AM
Edited By: terje_the_mad_wizard on 21 Jan 2004

Doesn't these "Affirmative Actions" work against their purpose?

It would seem to me, that a decent guy or gal of a majority would be kinda bitter if he/she had relly good grades, and was refused a place at his/her college/university of choice, because he/she didn't have the right pigmentation of his/her skin?
Kinda like Aquaman?

And couldn't this bitterness turn into hate towards the race of the guy/gal that got your place at college/university?

Hope you understood what I meant at the top, I'm not too good at putting my toughts to paper...

I agree with PH, you seem to have misunderstood the concept of Communism. Go read some Marx!
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Khaelo
Khaelo


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Underwater
posted January 21, 2004 05:51 PM

If you've been rejected from a college, you can't just point to another student and say, "He's got my place!"  It's too hard to tell why exactly the college makes its decision about any particular applicant.   You can get rejected for things like geographical distribution, or they have enough people with your particular extra-curriculars, or your essay was boring, or you applied just a tad too late, or they didn't like your interview, and so on.  This is why people apply to multiple colleges.

It's not the top students who get rejected/accepted for the sake of diversity, it's the borderline students.  And, as bort so eloquently points out, the students chosen for diversity offer something to the school that the borderline majority students don't.  It's one more factor out of many.  

Some people may blame their rejection on affirmative action, but the college doesn't tell you the reason they don't want you.  Affirmative action makes an easy scapegoat because it lets you believe that your rejection had nothing to do with you.
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Aquaman333
Aquaman333


Famous Hero
of the seven seas
posted January 21, 2004 09:19 PM

I know what you're saying, but I originally had a scholarship until it came time to close registration, and my scholarship was revoked. Now why would they do that right around the time to close registration? Hmmm. Did they have too many people with music scholarships? I doubt it.
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Peacemaker
Peacemaker


Honorable
Supreme Hero
Peacemaker = double entendre
posted January 21, 2004 10:10 PM
Edited By: Peacemaker on 21 Jan 2004

Aquaman, it is eqully if not more likely that due to the nationwide budget crisis your scholarship was revoked due to mandatory fiscal reorganization and a resulting lack of funds.  This is a widespread occurrence right now, resulting primarily from federal cutbacks.  Have you sent them a letter asking them why they revoked it?  They may not tell you, but it might be worth a try....

So sorry that happened.  Sucks dude.
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Consis
Consis


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Of Ruby
posted January 23, 2004 09:06 PM
Edited By: Consis on 25 Jan 2004

Good Points: Another Direction Of Thought

Best to address you guys before I get started.

Shadowcaster says affirmative action now balances favor against the majority in favor of a minority group. Doing such isn't going to counterbalance the past.

Wolfman says He would rather someone get the job because they've earned it, can do it properly, or have the training for it.

Aquaman333 claims to be a victim of affirmative action principles so he looked for the response that disagrees however the disagreement is due to disposition.

Peacemaker agrees with Wallerstein's "segmentalism" theory in which a chronic state of poverty and a perpetual underclass situation lies in one of three distinct pieces of culture. They are: Cultural, economic, and social

PrivateHudson doesn't think I have an accurate idea of what communism is all about. Communism, he says, is not about racial prejudice or promoting one segment of society over another.

Bort, having had the experience of a teaching assisstant, describes his first hand account of how he thinks affirmative action has improved university life and education. He also says that barriers do exist today for certain groups of people looking for educational and economical advancement. He goes on to say that affirmative action is one way out of many that is being used to break down the barriers he describes.

Terje_the_mad_wizard agrees with Shadowcaster, Wolfman, and Aquaman333.

Khaelo points out that affirmative action can sometimes make an easy scapegoat for disgruntled students who, frankly, weren't told why they were denied admittance.
----------------------------------------------------------

Ok secondly, I want to provide some links:

To look for some information covering discrimination and affirmative action try: aad.english.ucsb

For Maxist theories on Communism try: www.maxists.org
----------------------------------------------------------
Ok now we have that out of the way. How about we talk about this subject through what I call principle sight. That is to say theoretically first, then let's consider tangible evidence such as Aquaman333's testimony and Bort's personal account.

The first thing that I did was ask whether affirmative action is another word communism. If you will notice, as PrivateHudson did, I did not specify which type of communism. As you may all know there are two types of communism. There is the communism by definition and there is the communism defined by Maxist-type authors and even Karl Marx himself. We all know that communism, by definition, describes any economic theory or system based on the ownership of all property by the community as a whole. This type of true communism has yet to ever exist in any society today. My 10th grade history teacher would tell you that the native american indians are the closest to any known society to achieve true communism. Everything was shared, nothing wasted, so on and so forth.

The second type of communism was an approach described by Karl Marx. He tried to approach communism with an economical twist. Mind you I said he tried. He describes a hypothetical stage of socialism, to be characterised by a classless and stateless society and the equal distribution of economic goods, and to be achieved by revolutionary and dictatorial, rather than gradualistic, means. As one marxist author, Frederick Engels, writes:

"Communism is the doctrine of the conditions of the liberation of the proletariat."

He goes on to describe the proletarians and bourgeois classes of people:

"The proletariat is that class in society which lives entirely from the sale of its labor and does not draw profit from any kind of capital; whose weal and woe, whose life and death, whose sole existance depends on the demand from labor; hence, on the changing state of business, and on the vagaries of unbridled competition. The proletariat, is in a word, the working class of the 19th century. The class of the wholly propertyless, who are obliged to sell their labor to the bourgeoisie in order to get, in exchange, the means of subsistence for their support."

Here he describes the bourgeois:

"The class of big capitalists, who, in all civilized countries, are already in almost exclusive possession of all the means of subsistence and of the instruments(machines, factories) and materials necessary for the production of the means of subsistence."

One final quote I'd like to show of his:

"Labor is a commodity, like any other, and its price is therefore determined by exactly the same laws that apply to other commodities."
-----------------------------------------------------------

The question, now, should be to which definition of communism do you base your answer on?

----------------------------------------------------------
1. As for "Affirmative Action", would it be correct to say that it is trying to level the playing field for all people in american society regardless of race, gender, religious preferrence, or nationality?

2. Would it be correct to say that under the principles of communism affirmative action may be working towards the same goal?

3. Does affirmative action(in principle) believe people to be equal without econimic class or social status?
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Aquaman333
Aquaman333


Famous Hero
of the seven seas
posted January 23, 2004 11:43 PM
Edited By: Aquaman333 on 23 Jan 2004

Quote:

Aquaman333 claims to be a victim of affirmative action principles so he looked for the response that disagrees however the disagreement is due to disposition.



You'll have to forgive me. English isn't my first language, I know, I know, I live in America, I should know it, but I don't. Anyway, what exactly does that mean?


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IYY
IYY


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REDACTED
posted January 24, 2004 12:28 AM

"Silence you capitalist pig!" - Sorry I just couldn't resist. But I'd say it's not really communism although this so called "affirmative action" might be used in a communist society. Overall, communism was never as much about races as about classes.
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Consis
Consis


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Legendary Hero
Of Ruby
posted January 24, 2004 01:52 AM

Aquaman333 Clarification

Sorry if it seemed cryptic Aquaman333. I meant no disrespect. I was trying to say that through your disagreement with affirmative action your choice was made based on your own experiences. There was no choice for "if you've been wronged in some way by affirmative action then vote here". So I was saying that you chose "yes" because perhaps you relate communism to that which has done you wrong, as opposed to the types of definitions that we know it by today. Once again I apologize for my poor translation.
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Peacemaker
Peacemaker


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Peacemaker = double entendre
posted January 24, 2004 05:50 PM
Edited By: Peacemaker on 24 Jan 2004

Communism seeks to eliminate social classes that are distinguished economically.  It is anti-free-market.  Affirmative action is not anti-free-market, in that is does not seek to do away with socio-economic classes except to the extent that minorities tend to comprise an inordinant percentage of the lower class.  Affirmative action seeks to inject larger numbers of racial minorities into the middle and upper classes.

Thus, while both theorems seek to "level the playing field," they seek to do so in different ways and assume distinct economic frameworks.

Also, it is not true that absolute communism has never existed anywhere in any society.  There have been thousands of tribal societies on virtually ever continent, some of the most enduring societies over time, that have operated in a stable, communistic subsistence mode for thousands of years.  If your intent was to exclude these societies from your definition of "civilization," then your statement was fairly accurate.  

However, I would suggest you might have been referring to Western societies in the modern sense.  To exclude some of the most enduring, successful societies in the history of mankind from the definition of "civilization" is probably a misconception.
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posted January 24, 2004 10:09 PM

I've never been a professor.  I was a teaching assistant when I was an undergrad.  
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