While the recent election commanded most of the national headlines, a ballot measure passed in Michigan that warrants comment. It was Proposal 2, formerly called the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative. With little variation, it has been billed as a measure “to end affirmative,” and as such, has been adamantly opposed by certain groups who believe passing the measure would send our society back in time. Although I do not live in Michigan, I supported the spirit of this initiative, and applaud the people of Michigan for making a courageous, and long overdue, decision.
It was with some sadness and frustration to read a front page headline in the local Arizona Informant, a weekly newspaper with a predominantly African American reading audience, “Ward Connerly Kills Affirmative Action in Michigan”. A picture of Connerly sat just below the headline. It would lead you to believe that in essence, the citizens of Michigan didn’t vote for Proposal 2. Instead, Ward Connerly killed affirmative action, and consequently, is a murderer. A quick check online and I discovered that this was an NNPA syndicated story, an organization representing about 200 newspapers of the Black Press.
Only the headline was incindiary. Mr. Connerly receives only incidental mention in the body of the article itself. The sensationalistic treatment of the headline overshadows the truth, maintaining a particularly skewed “official” position with respect to black political perspectives.
The NAACP criticized the outcome, with Bruce S. Gordon, its President and CEO calling it “a setback.” He went on to say, “It is clear that we have work to do to convince our fellow citizens that affirmative action has made us stronger as a nation and still has a role to play.”
Mr. Gordon, with all due respect, you don’t speak for me. I agree that affirmative action has made ours a stronger nation, but my definition of affirmation action is not the same as yours. When you speak of “affirmative action,” you’re talking about an institutionalized policy of preference pedaling, based on racial and ethnic factors. You’re also speaking of pedaling said racial preferences in a particular context; that is, only when the “preferred” racial group is African American.
One hundred fifty years ago, this country operated under the same definition of “affirmative action.” The only difference was in the “preferred” the racial group. That way of doing things was deemed to be not in the spirit of the founding principles of the United States. It remains incongruent with the spirit of equality today.
When I speak of affirmative action, I refer to traits that each individual is free to embody. Affirmative action is the willingness to see positive possibilities for one’s self and constituency, and venture outside of one’s comfort (or discomfort) zone in order to achieve them.
It is an openness to new ideas, new ways of doing things, and new people, regardless of their color, political leanings, ethnicity, or even their sexual orientation. It is positive and cooperative, not polarized and confrontational. Affirmative actors have a positive vision of what’s possible that helps “their own,” and the whole of society. Furthermore, they possess the will and determination to bring their vision to fruition. They are willing to work with like minded and hearted people, even if they don’t “look” like them.
Affirmative action is only transformatory when it is internalized and expressed through individual and collective expression; not when it is institutionalized as a social policy to be “enforced”, with favors used as dangled carrots to be doled out by politicians and bureaucrats.
The problem with affirmative action-based politics is that, in the past 40 years, the institutional policies have been getting the credit. Politicians have been taking the credit for the positive changes that have indeed occurred.
Furthermore, students who entered academic institutions by virtue of academic waivers due to their racial classification, do not shake the perpetual question of whether they could make it on their own. These people are being robbed of invaluable self knowledge for the sake of political expedience.
It is unfortunate that the NAACP and Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D) took such a dim view of the election results. The governor even vowed to work against it, immediately putting herself at odds with 58% of the voting population. Both the governor and Mr. Gordon had an opportunity to project and affirm a confident future and positive direction for the state of Michigan from this point on. Instead, they pouted like petulant , insecure children.
Interestingly, the governor and NAACP head have a strong ally in the Socialist Party of Michigan, whose web site ran the following about Proposal 2:
On November 7th Michigan voters will be asked to decide on a state Constitutional amendment to eliminate much of the still grossly insufficient progress that has been achieved in recent decades in the ongoing struggle against the systems of institutional racism and sexism. The deceptively named Michigan Civil Rights Initiative will not only eliminate all public sector affirmative action programs in the state of Michigan, but will also likely eliminate gender specific services such as women’s healthcare. The MCRI is the Michigan version of the 1996 and 1998 California and Washington Civil Rights Initiatives, all three of which have been led by millionaire businessman Ward Connerly. The MCRI is supported and funded by a litany of corporations, millionaires and white supremacists from right-wing media mogul Rupert Murdoch to the Mystic Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.
The people of Michigan, like the people of California and Washington before them, voted for the principal of equal representation under the law. They elected to finally embrace an idea we have flirted with for 230 years, and re-articulated in the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It’s hard to fault black folk for wanting to have an “advantage” based on race after our sordid history where the reverse was true. But in the worst of times, the thrust of the abolitionist movement was to end slavery, and racial preference.
This did not mean that preferences wouldn’t occur. Preference is the essence of choice, and choice is one of the chief components of what makes human beings, human. It meant that our choices would be made on factors that are more fundamental and meaningful than exterior features; character, integrity, ability, skill, knowledge, creativity, determination. Every human being possesses all of these features, in varying degree. Yet, when we focus on race, then these important human traits take a back seat, and while there appears to be an “advantage” to some, the whole of society pays a high price.
The people of Michigan have chosen to level the playing field. Bully for you!
