For our friends on the left, attitudes toward race have apparently come full circle. It wasn’t that long ago, less than a decade perhaps, that the mere suggestion of a major corporation openly discriminating against prospective candidates for scholarships and fellowships based on their race would have been denounced from every angle of the political spectrum.
If those being excluded from consideration were to have been limited to only white folks, there would have certainly been sympathizers with the idea from various leftists, but they wouldn’t have been brazen enough to put forth the notion publicly. And if it wasn’t only white folks whose candidacies were being barred, if non-white scholars were also being eliminated from the pool of candidates, then we would have expected to hear screams of objection from all sides.
But times have changed, and it now appears to be perfectly acceptable for not only corporations but for academic institutions as well, to exclude any race they feel like, provided such exclusions align with their hierarchy of victimhood and electoral strategies. Now Google and many of the top colleges and universities in the country may have a serious problem on their hands as a result.
According to the Washington Free Beacon:
“That criterion, which an archived webpage shows has been in place since at least April 2020, is almost certainly illegal, civil rights lawyers told the Washington Free Beacon—both for Google and the universities.
‘It is illegal for Google to enter into contracts based on race under the Civil Rights Act of 1866,’ said Adam Mortara, the lead trial lawyer for the plaintiffs in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, who are pressing the Supreme Court to outlaw affirmative action. ‘And it is illegal for universities receiving federal funds to nominate students based on race under Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.’
That means nearly every top school in the United States could be at risk of losing its federal funding. Since Google’s discriminatory rule went into effect, a long list of universities has nominated students for the fellowship: Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Princeton, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Columbia, Cornell, Duke, Johns Hopkins, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Michigan, the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, the University of California Berkeley, and New York University.”
What does it all mean for Google and the universities? It means trouble, and perhaps big trouble.
Where the criterion from Google becomes particularly problematic is with its targeting of not only white candidates but of Asian-American scholars as well. Since its advent, Affirmative Action has been the government-mandated discrimination against white people, and its application has not only persisted, it has been upheld by the Supreme Court, with late Justice Sandra Day O’Connor being the catalyst for its continuation.
But this latest approach to race-based cherry-picking is taking the mindset to a new level and is thereby dismantling two major narratives in the process. First, by adding Asian-Americans to the list of non-qualified fellowship candidates simply because of their race, the leftists in academia and at Google are – perhaps unknowingly, or maybe just uncaringly – thoroughly blowing up the idea of so-called ‘white privilege.’ Are they now going to assert that ‘Asian privilege’ is also an issue? Good luck with that one.
Second, and perhaps most importantly, Google and their race-baiting accomplices are lifting their skirts on their true intentions and are subsequently revealing the utter unsustainability of their arguments. The lesson we were supposed to have learned after the Civil War and the dismantling of Jim Crow and other instances of institutional racism is this: Discriminating against people based on the color of their skin is wrong. Period. End of story. And just because your discrimination may align with your objectives of attracting voters and righting perceived historical wrongs doesn’t make it OK. Discrimination is still discrimination.
Ironically, considering the make-up of our current judicial branch of government, Google and the academic do-gooders at Harvard and elsewhere may have significantly overplayed their racist hands and may have accelerated the process of getting the playing fields back to level again. For all who despise racism in every form, let’s hope so.
By Jess Lawson
Jess Lawson is a regular contributor to The Blue State Conservative and a passionate, conservative millennial who loves America.
Enjoy HUGE savings at My Pillow with promo code BSC.
Follow The Blue State Conservative on Facebook and be sure to sign up to our Email List.
The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Blue State Conservative. The BSC is not responsible for, and does not verify the accuracy of, any information presented.
Notice: This article may contain commentary that reflects the author’s opinion.
Photo by Kai Wenzel on Unsplash
This story syndicated with permission from The Blue State Conservative