Regressive Action Argumentative Essay

Regressive Action “The only way to create a color-blind society is to adopt color-blind policies.” (unknown). Affirmative action began as a great idea, the United States government finally acknowledged the fact that ever since the nation was founded, racism and sexism have been prevalent. The government used this policy to help minorities, and other groups who have been treated unfairly throughout history to recover from decades of abuse. The flaw is that the consequences of this system had not been properly addressed. What started as a proactive plan to rehabilitate groups of people who have been mistreated in the past ended up becoming an unconstitutional act that created inequality, while actually magnifying the existing problem. Affirmative

However, if the opportunity is presented with little effort on the part of the applicant, they will squander it, as they will come to expect things to come effortlessly. This is evident from recent data from the US Department of Education, where it was found that of all bachelor degree recipients in the 2007-2008 academic year, 75% of white students graduated with a 3.0 GPA or higher, whereas only 55.3% of African American students graduated within this range. These graduation statistics clearly prove that there is a deficiency somewhere in the system. This shortfall can be largely attributed to the fact that affirmative action acts as a free lunch, where the recipients don’t have to work as hard to get there. Therefore, they tend to take the opportunity for granted more often than people who worked for the position. Complementary evidence can be seen on the bottom end of the spectrum, where African American students were almost three times as likely as white students to graduate with under a 2.5 GPA, with 14.5% of African Americans, and a mere 5.5% of white students. It is well known that human beings, if given something, are much more likely to disregard it, and take it for granted. For instance, if a mother gave her son $100 to buy clothes, there is a