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2	UPFRONT Ruben Navarrette, Jr. An Affirmative Action success story. read more...
3	UPFRONT Dr. Eduardo Padrón Sparks of understanding can be radicalizing. read more...
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UpFront

Going the Distance

Wouldn’t you assume that white MALES, who control so much wealth and power in this country, would be more secure than to think the world is out to get them?

Talk about paranoid delusions. With changing demographics, white males feel picked on and marginalized. That’s understandable. But they need to understand this: They are not being systematically discriminated against in a manner in any way reminiscent of the treatment endured by African Americans, Latinos and other minorities throughout U.S. history. While I could make an argument that racial preferences hurt those they intend to help—and that’s a discussion that minorities need to have at some point—it’s harder to argue that white males are being punished because of their race and gender. The numbers just aren’t there.?
Yet, we’re going to hear a lot about white male victims now that Americans have rebooted the debate over affirmative action, thanks to the arrival on the national scene of a certain, self-described “perfect affirmative action baby...(a) Puerto Rican, born and raised in the South Bronx, and from what is traditionally described as a socio-economically poor background.” That’s how newly appointed U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor described herself during a panel discussion in the 1990s to explain how she managed to go places. And, coincidentally, it’s how her critics have described her recently in an attempt to put her in her place.?
The Ivy League graduate said that, while her high school and college grades were good, her test scores “were not comparable to my colleagues at Princeton and Yale,” although they were “not so far off so that I wasn’t able to succeed at those institutions.” Still, Sotomayor said, had those universities relied solely on test scores, “It would have been highly questionable [that] I would have been accepted.”
I know what Sotomayor was trying to say. I don’t go around calling myself an affirmative action baby, but I understand those who do. Sotomayor was using her own success story to call into question the ability of test scores to predict college performance and extol the virtues of race-conscious and class-conscious admissions policies. She was speaking with a mixture of both arrogance and humility—acknowledging that she had help getting started on her path, but speaking with the confidence that comes with knowing that her own talent and hard work carried her the rest of the way.
In Sotomayor’s case, going “the rest of the way” included graduating summa cum laude from Princeton, being chosen as an editor of the Yale Law Journal, and serving 17 years on the federal bench. Sotomayor didn’t just learn to play the game. She played it to win.?
Nevertheless, conservatives who opposed Sotomayor’s nomination from the moment it was announced jumped on the comments about affirmative action, seeing them as a confession that she is not qualified to sit on the Supreme Court and probably didn’t deserve half the opportunities she had in life.?
Sotomayor also did a lot to provoke the ire of white male conservatives when she said, in a 2001 speech: “I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.”?
Critics called that statement racist. It’s not. It’s realistic. As Americans, we all have different perspectives on what we see of the world. That includes those who serve as judges. At one point, a chorus of naysayers, including radio talk show host Bill Bennett and Weekly Standard editor Fred Barnes, snidely charged that Sotomayor wouldn’t have gotten into Princeton or Yale Law School if not for affirmative action.?
Is that so? Well, given Sonia Sotomayor’s credentials and accomplishments, that comment would seem to be a pretty good testimonial for a program that has long been under fire by those who are desperate to hold on to what they have—even while others strive for their share.???

Ruben Navarrette ,Jr. is a regular columnist for Hispanic magazine, an editorial board member of the San Diego Union-Tribune, a nationally syndicated columnist with the Washington Post Writers Group, and a weekly commentator at CNN.COM. Contact him at
www.rubennavarrette.com