We (NCFM) recently received a letter from a troubled man, who found that he couldn't make a living. Part of what he was up against was "affirmative action", the act of giving preferential treatment to women and minorities. I must admit to feeling very emotional about this issue. Nevertheless, either because of or in spite of, I was given the task of responding to this gentlemen. As a white male, I feel part of a group that has been singled out and victimized without cause. But I am also angry as a white "liberal". The policies of affirmative action became perverted. Originally, I supported what I thought was something that was suppose to help people. Instead, what I supported drove a knife through our social fabric. Here is the letter. Below that is my response. Below that are some suggestions for further reading that come from the NCFM recommended reading list.

AFFIRMATIVE ACTION - Current policy of establishing hiring quotas, quotas for business contracts, quotas for university admissions, providing some people, and not others, with more favorable loan arrangements, preferential treatment in awarding broadcast licenses and other favoritism based on race and gender. Favoritism is enforced through government agencies. Affirmative action first became wide spread during the Nixon administration (Republican).

DEAR NCFM:

I might not have any legal standing, but I need your help. I lost my job in the recession of the late seventies and have not been able to recover. In 1978, I was denied employment at the Highway Department because I wasn't "qualified enough." I later found out about Affirmative Action which favors women in employment. There is a much sought after place where I have been turned down many times, but whenever I see their ad in community publications, I spot the words, Affirmative Action Employer!

My question is, if government can pass a law to put men out of work, then why are they unable to pass a law to put men back into work? When that REVERSE DISCRIMINATION law was passed, it went through without provision for displaced men to get any suitable work history. I have only worked three of the twenty three years since High School. I believe that I do have a right to fair employment and not be bypassed so women can be hired! I also think I should have not been passed over for a promotion by a female who had less experience than I did or even denied a full-time position based solely on the reason that I am a male! Fact: Shannon Faulkner was allowed to attend the Citadel even though she had at least one barrier that would disqualify a male!

As I have said, I might not have a right for legal action, but everywhere I turn, I see a woman, as a personnel director or as one of the various counselors helping me find work. I had a lawyer friend talk with Legal Aid and the ACLU and he reported, "Although the actions are unfair, I do not have a case". Meanwhile, I am dependent on SSI and other aid. After I pay my bills, I have just $5 a day for food, clothes, etc. (with no money for repairs), making it difficult to lose weight, important because I am a diabetic. I am 39 years old with nothing to show for it. Each day the notion of suicide gets more realistic as I further dry out.

In conclusion of my letter to you, I am aware you may or may not be able to help me. If you can offer any assistance or refer any service(s), please write to me.

Marvin O.

With respect to white men, they were the most obvious group to target based on birth. All white men were deemed guilty of past injustices because of the group they belonged to without any consideration for their individual behavior. The penalty was to exclude them from jobs and promotions. Their only recourse was through the courts. Almost no body took it because this is a very costly process and one most people can not afford it.

There is precedent for our government penalizing a whole group against its will in the name of serving the greater good. It is called "eminent domain". Eminent domain permits the government to seize property for the greater good, such as for the construction of a highway. Under this policy, those being asked to give up something are compensated for their loss. If they disagree with the proposed compensation they can go to arbitration on a case-by-case basis at a much lower cost than seeking redress in the courts. But under affirmative action, the government did not apply the policies of eminent domain. Instead, white men were pronounced guilty as a group and then robbed as a penalty. Even if the government ends affirmative action formally, it will not be able to stop the inertia of this social policy.

The fact that some black men are able to take advantage of affirmative action obscures the real position of most black men. What has emerged for them is "class" differences. Some black men have profited from affirmative action and have gone on to create wealth. But this needs to be contrasted with all of the unemployed black men committing crimes in their community. One fourth of all black men in the US are caught up in the justice system. It has never been so bad. Instead of black men, as a group, being empowered economically to support their families, the prime beneficiaries of affirmative action have been women, especially well educated, well fed, white women. The gains made by otherwise well off white women at the expense of black men can not be overlooked because of the way it raises the specter of race privilege once again.

The men who suffered under Affirmative Action were the ones least able to defend themselves. You can see them in poor communities (in some cases rich communities) all over this land. The rise in crime, drug taking, fatherlessness and the decline in living standard corresponds to the rise of feminism and women in the work place. At this point things become very tricky and complicated, because there is always an interplay of various interests and forces. Moreover, it is not in the interests of most men to be opposed to women in the work force. Rather, it is in men's interests to help shape and control how women's entry into the work force takes place.

Let me digress for just one minute. A working wife provides an economic fall back position for the family, if the "primary breadwinner", who up to now has been the husband, gets fired or laid off. In the days when men were expected to work and women were not, the male worker was completely dependent on the whims of his boss. No injustice was to great to endure to put food on the table and to provide a roof. Women's liberation held out the promise of empowering these male workers as much as it held out the promise of empowering women. But feminism was anti male and as much as it was anti male it was anti family. "Feminism" which was the driving lobbying force for all kinds of legal reform encouraged women to dump men ("a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle") and created a climate of male bashing. Discrimination against men became justified and fashionable.

Affirmative action was originally articulated as a way to make up for past injustices to BLACKS because of their prior enslavement.

In-so-far as affirmative action was suppose to compensate blacks with a family history of enslavement, the numbers of such people and their overall impact on the work place and the economy would have been inconsequential. The real problem arises when a policy, such as affirmative action, affects huge numbers of diverse people.

For example, in 1980 the New York Times did an in depth piece about the effect of affirmative action policies on blacks, especially black men (August 12, 1980, page B1). Citing an article this old results from the fact that so little has been revealed about affirmative in the press. Until 1989 there were no books on the topic. There was national silence; What Sociologist, Frederick Lynch calls, "the new McCarthyism". Without mentioning white males, the 1980 NY Times article quotes such black leaders as Horace Morris (former Director of NY Urban League), Charles Johnson (former NY State Assemblyman) and Psychologist, Kenneth B. Clark concerning their misgivings about the impact of women, hispanics, asians, etc., who compete with blacks under affirmative action policies.

Lets review these misgivings. Lets look at the idea of "women" competing with "blacks". A concern such as this is misleading. Some blacks are women. So when people talk about women competing with blacks, what they really mean is women competing with black men. The disadvantage that black men have is that black women count twice when tallying statistics. This was/is a common policy of employers when reporting to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. It was/is so common, in fact, that black women (hispanic women, asian women, etc.) became known as "twofers"; As in, "two for one".

Not mentioned in the 1980 NY Times article is the fact that in order to attract a pool of qualified racial candidates for jobs, both private industry and government have drawn upon foreign nationals to meet affirmative action quotas. In the meantime, the social conditions of the black community have deteriorated steadily. Black males were penalized by affirmative action in ways that were not so obvious. At the same time they found it difficult to raise their voices, because affirmative action held out the promise of special treatment. Moreover, to be critical of affirmative action in the name of their own self interest would have been construed as an attack on every other group. Horace Morris summed it up, "most people feel you can not attack women as a group."<

Indeed !!! Almost all of the public discussion against affirmative action has centered on "blacks" and affirmative action. In a racist culture, like the United States, it is so much easier to criticize race than anything else. Get the blacks and you get women, without ever having to be critical of women.

In the same NY Times article, C. Douglas Ades, who was a Chemical Bank Vice President for eleven years said, "The women threw a monkey wrench into the affirmative action process - many were educated, well-to-do and militant, and when the barriers came down they jumped in head-to-head with blacks, and the women won."

Warren Farrell, Ph.D., wrote the definitive book on discrimination against men. It is called, The Myth of Male Power, (see the NCFM reading list in the Reading Room section). Farrell was interviewed for an article in Transitions by, then, Transitions editor, John Macchietto (Transitions, Sept./Oct., 1993 - published by the National Coalition of Free Men).

In that interview Farrell summed things up this way:

....FARRELL: "By understanding that what we did to blacks was immoral, we were willing to assuage our guilt via affirmative action programs and welfare. By thinking of men as the dominant oppressors who do what they do for power and greed, we feel little guilt when they die early in the process. By believing that women were an oppressed slave-like class, we extended privileges and advantages to women that had originally been designed to compensate for our immorality to blacks. For women--and only women--to take advantage of this slavery compensation was its own brand of immorality. For men to cooperate was its own brand of ignorance."

Another problem with affirmative action was that it was not a policy aimed at the poor and "have nots". The well educated and those with money were in the best position to know about and take advantage of set asides. Indeed people such as Hillery Clinton, Oprah Winfrey, Bill Cosby and Geraldo Rivera (a white male - but, then, he is hispanic) are entitled to affirmative action (business set asides are what is most important to rich people), while millions of the white poor, and still more poor minorities, didn't and don't have any means by which to profit from the program.

The gender card is the most important, because of the sheer numbers of women - more than 50% of the population. If you add in the males from the other minority groups you are left with about 30% of the population which is comprised of white males. Within the category of white males there is an unknown percent who are unaffected by affirmative action policies - many of them are rich and powerful.

That leaves an unknown percentage of white males who are not rich and powerful, but against who it is ok to discriminate. Like black males in the ghetto, these white males are isolated and despised - the least able in our society to defend themselves and the least able to organize and to articulate their problems.

Making matters worse is that it is society's expectation that men will be the primary breadwinner (and every man's expectation of himself). This is not a choice for men. Just as women had been relegated to the household, men had been relegated to the work place - often despite its life threatening dangers.

Affirmative action cruelly displaced a portion of men and prevented them from reaching their full potential at what everyone (including themselves) expected them to do if they were to retain any dignity or respect. At the same time there were no accolades for men who became house-husbands (a situation most often resulting from unemployment). In fact, to this day men find it nearly impossible to get custody of children in divorce. There is no move for affirmative action for men in child custody cases. Men were/are prevented from juxtaposing their position with women. There is no acceptable retreat into the household for men as women flood the work force (And God only knows what the effect on wages has been by almost doubling the supply of labor in a very short period of time. I could go on, but I am running out of space).

IN SUMMARY:

Affirmative action did not take into consideration a person's circumstances or need and it singled out one group, white males, for open hostility and deliberate punishment. At the same time it secretly excluded some of the most needy it was suppose to help, black males. It was/is a group entitlement program that often benefit(ed) only the well educated and well off.

FURTHER READING:

NCFM has a flyer available on what to do if you suspect you are a victim of affirmative action. To obtain it send $1 plus a self addressed stamped envelope to NCFM, PO Box 129, Manhasset, NY 11030

Lynch R., Frederick, INVISIBLE VICTIMS: WHITE MALES AND THE CRISIS OF AFFIRMATIVE ACTION, Praeger, New York, 1991.

Roberts, Paul Craig; Stratton, Lawrence M.; THE NEW COLOR LINE: HOW QUOTAS AND PRIVILEGE DESTROY DEMOCRACY, Regnery Publishing Company, Washington, D.C., 1995.

Also read, Forbes Magazine, February 15, 1993 "When Quotas Replace Merit, Everybody Suffers".

US News & World Report, February 13, 1995, "White Men Need Not Apply".

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National Coalition of Free Men
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