Individual Assessed Activity: Critical Thinking: Argument Analysis

CIT 491 Individual Assessed Activity: Critical thinking – argument analysis Fall 2014

CIT491 Research Methods
Individual Assessed Activity: Critical thinking – argument analysis
Affirmative action or positive discrimination is a policy or a program promoting the representation of a group who have traditionally been discriminated against, (such as an ethnic minority or women) with the aim of creating a more equal society. This typically focuses on education and employment. There is much debate concerning claims that the practice is, in itself, racism; that it fails to achieve its desired goal; and that it has unintended and undesirable side-effects.
Study the following argument and answer the questions below.
(a) Provide a brief analysis of
Does the term ‘positive discrimination’ seem a self-contradiction? If so, it is particularly pertinent because that is what ‘affirmative action’ is called in some countries, including the UK. ‘Positive
Discrimination’ quickly gets us to the heart of present-day criticisms of affirmative action – namely that, even given the best of intentions, discrimination based on given characteristics, rather than personal achievement, is both unjust and ineffective.
Given characteristics are traits one is born with and has done nothing to earn.
Achieved characteristics are things earned through individual effort. That is why it is so terribly unfair to discriminate against someone because of their race, gender, age, ethnicity, and so forth. Being held responsible for something one does not control is the height of injustice.
Positive discrimination in effect uses racism to combat racism, sexism to contest sexism. After all, those given characteristics are still the basis for judgment. But what this approach overlooks is that the individuals who suffered the injustice are often not the individuals gaining the compensatory advantage. Nor are those who enjoyed the benefits of past discrimination necessarily the
One of these candidates is a Hispanic female, living in a state where Hispanics are in a minority, and have a history of being under-represented at university. Let's call her Juanita. Her father is a very wealthy cigar manufacturer, her mother a doctor. Juanita was raised in luxury, travelled the world with her parents, had private dance and music lessons, lived in a home filled with books and original art, and so forth. Juanita, however, was unmotivated in school and barely succeeded in gaining a highschool diploma.
The other candidate for the college's last available space is a white American male, let's call him Sam.
Sam's father, a laid-off coal miner, died of lung-disease when Sam was twelve. Sam's home is poor and is more filled with overdue bills than books. To help his family while in high school Sam worked
8 hours a day at minimum wages in a local diner. Despite this burden, Sam did the best he could and, with great effort, ended up, like Juanita, just graduating from high school and with only an average score on the college's admission test. Guess who gets into the college's last available space, and figure out how that sets to rights some past