OK, so what is the difference between race and ethnic group?
Because the definitions seem to have a lot of overlap.
As has already been said, there are groups within “Black” that are more closely related in terms of genetic ancestry to groups in the “White” and/or “Asian” categories than to various other far-flung “Black” groups. If Black Somalis, for example, are on average more closely related to non-Black Yemenis than to Black Namibians, by what basis does it make sense to group Somalis and Namibians together, but Somalis separate from Yemenis?
It would go a long way in explaining disparities in academic outcomes and the argument for trying to achieve equality of results would be greatly diminished.
I feel exactly the opposite. If we as a society are missing out on all that potential, we ought to change the conditions that made all that potential wither on the vine. Improve public education, have better safety net programs, focus on improving the “environment” in which these kids are raised.
Affirmative action on the other hand does very little to help actualize their potential it tries to equalize results without actually equalizing the results. What good does it do to have businesses hire underqualified black employees. Much better to create an environment where they can achieve their potential.
Of course, that too - thanks for pointing the so-obvious-even-I-missed-it :o
It’s hard for me to imagine a scenario where you wouldn’t call someone who isn’t singing, running, or chasing a ball an underqualified black employee.
Well, you phrased the other half of the answer better than I was going to.
I responded to that point already. What I was basically talking about was that finding such evidence would not be scientifically very interesting in itself (finding generic correlates of intelligence would be, trying to group human populations that mostly overlap far, far less so).
But yes, in the hypothetical where we could definitely say group A is smarter on average than group B then yes that would definitely be a good argument against policies that tried to have proportional representation of A and B.
But we’re not in that hypothetical situation, and many (perhaps most) attempts at affirmative action worldwide are just aimed at improving opportunities for certain groups that seem to be disadvantaged, not necessarily equalizing numbers.
You may lack imagination.
Are you under the impression that all black employees have been hired with the benefit of affirmative action?
You’re the one that came up with the hypothetical, not me.
And affirmative action is in fact frequently about equality of results. Or if you prefer to call it improving opportunities, then the desire is to improve opportunities until you get equality of results (or something close to it). Maybe this is not what YOU think affirmative action should be but it is in fact how some proponents of affirmative action see the goals to be.
Generally, ethnic group corresponds to country of origin, and race corresponds to continent of origin.
Good enough for government work, but what’s odd is the refusal to recognize the arbitrary nature of your system, that it is reflective of subjective historical and cultural traditions. You also use this system as a tool to generalize across 7 billion humans a biological/genetic interpretation that is either unfounded, misleading, or flatly false.
We do know the genetic relationship between groups of people and are learning more each day. The patterns seen simply does not fit old racial models of centuries ago. To use this racial model in the way you do maybe be satisfying to your personal comfort but it is unethical and false.