Names, picture and other “personal stuff” should be taken off resumes by an intern or something before they are give to the HR department or what ever.

Is there a magic number, a percentage, that we are shooting for? Coming from a field that has a very high percentage of white males, I am at a loss. I do not know the actual percentages but in Mechanical Engineering there are very few minorities that decide to get this degree (lets say 5%). Should a company be required to fill half the vacancies with, lets say, women just to serve the greater good.

Talk about discrimination and resentment, I have seen the people actually fired, or laid-off just to preserve some perverse balance. And yes as you might be able to guess I was one of them. :) In my situation, the company was downsizing and needed X amount of engineers. I had just finished a project saving the company I worked for 17 times my salary, while a white female with similar experience in my department had a string of project failures from the first day she arrived in the plant. She was kept and I was let go. My then immediate supervisor told me a few years later he had received pressure from management to take the opportunity to increase the minority percentage. The company gave me a very good severance package which included a mandatory signing away any future lawsuit that might arise.

I am sure my situation is not uncommon and thankfully losing that job was one of the best things that ever happened to me.

Signed,
Life is unfair but let’s not add to the problem.

Kristen

I applaud your passion about the situation. But, your are forgetting the reason for affirmative action in the first place, which was white men got the jobs, business opportunities, loans, women and blacks were marginalized simply for who and what they were.

That was then, this is now. . Now, as you mentioned, more women and blacks have had opportunities open to them. Still there’s still a disporportionate number of inequalities out there. Affirmative action is only there to hurry things along, although it doesn’t say hire the less qualified candidate. It only says give all candidate equal consideration, don’t refuse to consider one because of sex or race. Of course, without the inequalities of the previous centuries and if this company that man interviewed at had been hiring qualified women before Affirmative action to begin, the guy probably would’ve gotten the position because there would be an equal proportion of men and women.

A sign of the times. There’s a clause in the constitution that says congress can change laws as it applies to the times. Once inequality has been banished in this country and everyone can get jobs on their merits alone, Affirmative action is a gonner, then natural diversity can take reign. However, there’s nothing in life that doesn’t have its own advantages and disadvantages. Qualified candiates being shown the door happens to be the disadvantage of Affirmative Action. No one can dispute it’s done a lot more good.

I’m all for diversity in the workplace, but it needs to be natural diversity…

I’ll admit, that paragraph outlines an effective way of building a diverse workforce. :)

Thanks for the vote of support!

kk

Bingo! I read these at Franchisepick;

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

“Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

All from Martin Luther King Jr.

It doesn’t matter what “label” you put on it – discrimination is discrimination and it is as wrong today as it ever was and ever will be…

WTG Kristen