The New York Civil Liberties Union is condemning an employer for taking extra efforts to specifically recruit "people of color." Oh, wait, the employer is the military -- that explains it; I guess they should be scrupulously color-blind in their recruiting (though the NYCLU's allies in supporting affirmative action have long pointed to the military's use of race as an affirmative action success story), even though other employers should indeed specifically recruit non-whites.
The story also reports:
Eleni Angelos Healey, a senior at Trinity School in Manhattan and one of the plaintiffs in the suit, said she had been harassed by letters and e-mail from military recruiters. Her repeated efforts to stop them had failed, she said.
“I’m really glad,” Ms. Healey said, “that there’s going to be a much easier way for kids to get their names off these lists as soon as possible.”
Well, I certainly don't support spam, and if someone asks to be off a mailing list -- including the military's mailing list -- their request should be honored. But it doesn't strike me as a terribly serious civil liberties violation.
(The NYCLU has also apparently been complaining about the military's use of its recruiting database, and the story reports that the Defense Department settled the NYCLU's lawsuit by "agree[ing] to use the database only for recruiting, giving up the possibility of sharing it with law enforcement and intelligence agencies." I assume that the basis of the lawsuit was some statutory objection to the use of the database -- there are no constitutional that I know of -- objections to the use of such a database -- but I don't know the statutory scheme governing the question and thus have no opinion on the subject.)
I seriously cannot believe a human being exists on this planet who does not understand the distinction between the U.S. Army making extra efforts to recruit in minority neighborhoods, and IBM making extra efforts to recruit in minority neighborhoods.
I do understand that ROIs would be very different...
I wonder if this group would file a similar complaint against Michigan's universities for tracking race and ethnicity?
And yes, I realize that there are many fine jobs in the military that don't involve getting killed. I've had relatives who've had both kinds.
Presumably, anyone willing to join the military feels it is the most "decent" place of work that is available to them. So you advocate that those in "minority neighborhoods" should not be informed of such opportunities that may be most beneficial to them?
There! I corrected your generalization for you.
Military service provides a great number of benefits to those who enlist. Such as the best training to discipline your self and motivate your self to succeed. The discipline and maturity attained by those who enlist in the military helps to make many of them ready for a life of success through work, self-discipline, and self-motivation that they would never obtain otherwise. The post service benefits are also pretty good for many who serve and wish to continue their educations.
The people who falsely claim that the military is over-represented with minorities and the poor spout these "facts" without any real knowledge of the facts or the benefits to young people of voluntary military service.
Says the "Dog"
Please read my post again and note that I don't advocate anything at all. I was merely explaining the point Steve made that SeaLawyer seemed to find mysterious. I DO think that there's a difference between the military and IBM recruiting in minority neighborhoods, etc., but I very much think that the military should be perfectly free to do so. And yes, people in "minority neighborhoods" should be as informed of their choices as possible and be free to make whatever choices they feel are best for them. In many cases, enlisting in the military may well be a fine choice.
Maybe (probably) I'm just dense, but I don't get your joke (which I assume is at my expense).
...and yet, Kerry volunteered, which I guess goes to show you that even he knew he was a loser. (?)
After which, he came to realize that his former employer operated in the manner of Ghengis Khan.
Returning to your original post, that is a distinction that IBM lacks.
O.K., I am dense tonight. I get the jibe.
But I do think that the military is a much less appealing job for enlisted people at present than it was, say, 10 years ago. Let's face it, the increased chance of dying in Iraq does matter.
We could easily expand the ranks of the military in this country if we reduced our standards. The problem is that the military prefers the better recruits.
Believe it - one such human being exists right here.
There's probably a very strong link between wealth and unwillingness to serve.
I will stipulate to this point. But perhaps there is something more than a merely economic imperative to service as well. Put differently, one might ponder whether, controlling for wealth and cost-of-living differences, working-class whites (or minorities) from, say, Boston or New York or Philadelphia or Los Angeles, are as likely to enlist as their cohorts in, say, Atlanta, Houston, Cincinnati, or Richmond (or smaller cities and towns in "red" areas)? Political commentary sometimes devolves into simplified economic determinism, but can we hypothesize that the drive to enlist may have a cultural dimension too? Anecdotally, among my colleagues I have often encountered greater respect for service among southerners than among New Englanders.
That is incorrect. I knew far more "rich white kids" as DG put it, in the military than in civilian life.
The only reason any joins the military is they have no other options.
That is such a load of crap! The real difference between IMB and the military, is the military is a much better option.
That is why I asked the question Steve.
I don't question the courage of anyone who visualizes getting shot or blown up over there and volunteers anyway, but many of that age take the risk with eyes wide-open.
If they've graduated high school but are not college bound and don't have a job with a future, the military has a lot to offer.
It is presumptuous for anyone born with better opportunities to sneer at this option for the less well-off to better themselves.
(I'm not pro-military, but facts is facts.)
Of course, this also means that while Harvard should be allowed to discriminate on the basis of sex and race in its admissions, the University of Michigan should not. I can't imagine why the ACLU takes a different view of that case.
I'll assume you haven't spent your civilian life working for IBM. Am I right?
Military recruits on average come from households with slightly higher than average incomes (with most having median household incomes of 25-50K). But only a tiny percentage (as in less than 2%) come from households making 90K+. And a 90K household income hardly counts as rich. So I guess you were very selective in your friends when you were in the service. But the point, as I recall, was the distinction between IBM and the military. Not the average American and the military.
I've been a Private, SGT (actually Staff SGT) and Officer. Military enlisted recruit demographic is:
1. slightly more educated than the total cohort
2. slight better household incomes
3. less trouble with drugs, and crime
4. more rural, more red state, more southern
all in all, far from the conventional Democratic PC wisdom. The ACLU is just basicly and reflexively anti-military. we all know that.
Not if you are a Democrat member of congress thinking about tax rates and tax increases and payroll tax increases. 90k is definitely rich. Basically anyone with a job is rich as far as they can determine.
Says the "Dog"
Well I referred to Marines I served with not my friends. Of course those are one and the same, however I didn't have much choice in who was assigned to my units.
Yeah, and if you don't study hard, you might get sent to Iraq. Take that!
Why? If the government can draft them, they can send them spam.
According to this, 74% of casualities in the Iraq war are white, but 59% of casualities from NYC are black.
Army Demographics Powerpoint
This tells me that 24% of enlisted persons are black, and only 60% are white. Hispanics make up 10%. The trend is Hispanics replacing both blacks and whites in the military. As would be expected with demographic changes.
It seems that whites are the ones with a disproportionate casualty rate. But some possible reasons are:
- A larger percentage of minorities are women.
- A larger percentage of whites join the high casualty jobs.
It seems to me the military is disproportionately southern, and therefore disproportionately black. Compounding this is that non-rural, non-southern whites do not enlist at high rates. My feeling is that southerners and the rural population is simply more comfortable with weapons than the general population. This may be why rural whites join the high casualty jobs. The military is obviously not exploiting blacks.
Interestingly, the private sector jobs with the highest fatality rates strike me as "white" jobs: fisherman and loggers.
CNN Dangerous Jobs Story
NYCLU is pursuing the aim of the ACLU: destroy the military, destroy America, by any means necessary. Their paymasters in the Kremlin are gone, but they're staying bought.
And the bastards hate Christmas too!!! And apple pie.
Add in the "leave the small town to seek your future" factor. NA for inner city youth. Also of course, there is the self reinforcing feedback loop when the military is considered an honorable decision by your peers, parents and veteran relatives. Lastly, much social life in small town red states used to revolve around the local NG Armory. all positive to recruiting.
We always used to joke in peacetime about complaints from the ACLU and people like Rangel about the slur that Vietnam minority casualty rates were much higher than for whites. They were NOT. and of course, the enlisted black population has always been higher than the general population, due to the unique equity of military life and its place as the most equal opportunity career for blacks.
Imagine the complaints in peacetime if the Army had enforced recruiting quotas to lower the number of blacks in the Army to match the general cohort. LOL all those good jobs being denied to blacks :)
HAHAHAHA!!! Great stuff. Can I have another?
In fact, casualties among blacks in Viet Nam did spike. When the first line units went in, paratroopers and Marines, something like 50% of the rifle strength--manuver battalions--was black. Both of those groups took only volunteers.
The reason the casualty rates then regressed to being proportionate to within a tenth of a percent of population representation is that the rates among whites was higher in the beginning-advisers and so forth--and later when the draft brought large numbers of whites into Infantry units which were not volunteer.
The typical enlistee today is characterized as being white, all-thyroid (euphemism alert) who believes in God, Country, and Kicking Ass. Even during the very short period where the Army but not the Marines were behind in recruiting, they were not behind in guys enlisting FOR combat arms. He's better educated than his age peers, healthier, probably not an introvert, a quick thinker, and if he gets out and moves in next door, you're lucky.
Why are you jumping to the conlusion that the law suit had anything to do with race, minorities or affirmative action?
It appears your reaction says more about the assumption you make then about the Civil Liberties Union.
But I don't know what the fuss is about. I remember receiving tons of military recruiting information when I was a senior in high school. I also got brochures from all sorts of colleges I didn't want to attend. It isn't hard to throw this stuff out.
The Navy recently did just that.
See www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2006611190377
Excerpt: