Pacific McGeorge embarasses me. I opened my "Pacific Review" alumni magazine to find a picture and article about a McGeorge "Alumna." (Why is she an alumna, aren't we all alumni? isn't that what it says on the title of the magazine?) The title reads "THE GOOD FIGHT: One Woman's Crusade to End Bias." So my ex-school endorses her "good fight?"
The picture was of a dowdy looking white woman, but I gave her the benefit of the doubt and went on to read “In 1996 California voters overwhelmingly approved an amendment to the state constitution that prohibits race and sex based preferences by state and local governments.”
“Is this article talking about what I think it’s talking about?” I asked. I’m sorry to say that I was right. This champion of the downtrodden is fighting “the good fight” in support of proposition 209.
Knowing that you’ve received the job you have because of your merits is a good thing, but the reality of knowing that you have to be twice as good as a white candidate to get the same job is another. That smug self satisfaction at the end of the day, or dare I say resentful feelings towards my less qualified colleagues who got their jobs because of the oh so prevalent “good old boys” network, is not worth the decrease in diversity that occurs when 209 is strictly enforced. The article goes on to say that civil rights groups immediately worked to get 209 repealed. Critical readers unite and question why civil rights groups wouldn’t like 209. So who’s fight is “the good fight?” Tell me Connerly?
During my first year of law school I had a job where there was one woman and two Hispanics and one asian in a firm of over 40. You do the math. A law was passed in 1996 to remove the shield which protected people from discrimination because it was no longer needed yet I can be all by my lonesome in 2003? No longer needed or no longer wanted? Just as a footnote I was the "minority hiring and retention committee fellow" that year and no one really questioned my ability because when I got there I shined like a new penny. If the initiative was passed in 1996, did the people's memories of 1992 just disappear? Los Angeles basically had a race riot because inequality exists.
I think the last nail in the coffin for me was that the woman’s work was funded by PLF the Pacific Legal Foundation and she was a public interest law fellow. I bet there were dozens of more left minded men and women waiting for that fellowship who would have done some real good.
Check out: http://www.equaljusticesociety.org/ for news and action by scholars, activists, politicians, and people in the know.
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3 comments:
i remember prop 209, it was one of those issues that could set me off instantly. just hearing the word (i don't consider it a name, since that would mean he was human) "connerly" makes me sick.
i would write this pacific review and tell them not all 'Alumna' appreciate these kind of "hey we support evil" stories. wow, this brings back a lot of bad memories... at least i know we have similar views =) way to go justice lai!
Fucking McGeorge! This is why I never read anything sent to me by that school (except for monthly loan repayment crap).
The fucked up thing is that soon Asian Americans are going to be specifically targeted by these same people. Why? Because as Connerly pointed out in a speech given at McGeorge two years ago the number of minorities in the UCs has increased since the passing of 209. Unfortunately, what Connerly does not clarify is that this increase was for Asian Americans and not underrepresented minorities (black, latino, native american, etc.)whom activists were concerned about. I fear that the backlash against Asians in academia that happened in the 80s will happen again once white people figure out that they are still not getting jobs or into schools of their choice.
I'm not surprised that McGeorge would honor a schmuck like this..you've seen some of the people that come out of that school...especially those little nazis that call themselves federalists!
I learned from that anti prop 54 rally at Stanford that Connerly was passing around a draft version of 54 at the NATIONAL FEDERALIST CONVENTION! Federalists are so evil!
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