Affirmative action is defined as an action or policy favoring those who tend to suffer from discrimination especially in relation to employment or education; positive discrimination. Affirmative action happens everywhere, at colleges, universities, and companies looking to hire new employees. The main trouble in my mind, however, is the colleges, universities, and other graduate schools. At Michigan State University and many other colleges and universities, they use affirmative action to help decide who is eligible to join their campus class. Unfortunately they use a point system of which GPA, SAT, and ACT scores are taken into the thought process. However, race or minority, gender, family alumni, and location are big contributions to defining the eligibility of a student. Affirmative action is not fair to men and people who are not part of minorities because someone who is not as eligible might get in to a university over someone who truly deserves it just because if an unimportant factor that is taken into consideration. If Britney, an African American girl in a college preparatory school gets into Yale, but has a 3.5 GPA and Sean, a Caucasian from a school in East St. Louis, a bad area in St. Louis, does not get in, but has a 4.5 GPA, then you know that Yale uses affirmative action. Sean was not given the proper points because he is not in a minority. Sean definitely deserves the opportunity to attend Yale because he is more eligible in the academics area since Britney was only accepted because she is part of a minority and is a woman. Affirmative action is completely wrong no matter where it is done because it gives others a better chance at something because they are in a minority or are females.

The main problem with affirmative action is that it makes racism and prejudice worse by accepting more of a certain type of person just because they are women or because they are African American or Hispanic. The authors, David Sacks and Peter Thiel, of the article, The Case Against Affirmative Action, say, “Race-conscious programs betray Martin Luther King’s dream of a color-blind community.” Basically, that says that racism is getting in the way of life. So you cannot fix racist minds with putting them in racist situations. When forcing a variety of races in a dormitory in college to be together, it could be really bad because then you are forcing for two or more people to be together of two different ethnicities that might not get along because of racism or something like that. I think that one of the peoples might think that the other person only got in because on race if that person was not smart enough or did not show the potential to be smart. I, as a Hispanic girl, do not want to be in my senior year waiting for my acceptance letter from colleges knowing that a portion of the reason why I was accepted was just because I am a female and of Hispanic ethnicity. I think that I should get in just because of my academic eligibility, which consists of GPA and SAT and ACT scores.

People are always talking about how we need to be more diverse, but the people should at least be eligible because of the needed qualities rather than their race or religion or sex. Not all minorities are disadvantaged. At the school of which I attend, Houston Christian High School, there are many races such as African Americans, Hispanics, Asians, etc. however, there are more Caucasians. “But if ‘diversity’ were really the goal, then preferences would be given on the basis of unusual characteristics, not on the basis of race” as said by David Sacks and Peter Theil. None of us got in because of our race and gender, and if we did, that should be changed. All of us got in because of our grades and scores, as it should be. Since every student attending HCHS got accepted because of their grades, and we have that diversity that is apparently needed, then we obviously do not need affirmative action. If we are plenty diverse as high school students, then we really do not need affirmative action in colleges and universities.

Not only is affirmative action not needed, but also it is racist and sexist against females and people of any race other than Caucasians. That is basically saying that females and people of different ethnicity are not good enough to get into colleges and universities unless they are given those extra twenty points. Administrative workers in those colleges and schools basically believe that we cannot get in without those extra points because we are not smart enough.

Affirmative action should never be done no matter who does it, whether it is people at colleges and universities or people hiring people for jobs. Affirmative action is simply not fair to anyone no matter who is involved. People are treated unfairly and it really just should not be that way. If everyone understood why this simply should not be allowed, then we would be a better world who is not as prejudice.