Affirmative action is unfair. A simple statement made by those ignorant enough to avoid the true realm of the situation. What is unfair, lies in simple statistics, produced by the NAACP, “In 1970, white students made up 91% of college enrollment.” Yet, such obvious inequity was merely destructed as the system of affirmative action allowed for genuine modernized change, “In 2021, that number decreased to about 50%, with Black students accounting for 12.6% of college enrollees, Hispanic students 21.4%, and Asian students 7.1%.” Affirmative action does not, contrary to popular belief, oppress the majority. Rather, it uplifts marginalized communities in creating a level-playing field and promotes diversity in all senses of race, religion, and beliefs. Yet, on June 29, 2023, the United States Supreme Court banned affirmative action in universities; colleges were now not allowed to view race as a plausible component of applications. This begs the question, how much longer will it take for us as a nation, to revert back to what once was, that alarming statistic of college enrollment, serving 91% White populations. Through means of awareness, affirmative action allows minority groups to be recognized and represented, voids them of fear of discrimination, and tends to such communities in harsh socioeconomic conditions. 

As the 2024-2025 school year commences, statistics varying from state to elite colleges are releasing their recent admissions data - and they reflect the exact product of the weakened legislature. From data received from The New York Times, Prestigious schools such as Brown University, “had a fairly sharp decline in Hispanic first year students, to 10 from 14 percent,” and “the share of Black students dropped to 9 percent from 15 percent”. That same data is mirrored in schools ranging across America such as Harvard to Penn State.

Affirmative action has been the prime factor of diversifying representation and enrollment to once isolated communities. Though some refute that diversity is a reflection of population, it is rather true that diversification is a product of policies which expand accessibility. Such is undeniably seen in data reflected in higher education, data found from “Affirmative Action” sourced from Gale, “In Michigan, racial and ethnic minorities made up around 13 percent of undergraduates statewide before the affirmative action ban;” yet following bans in local and national universities such as Michigan, even prior to SCOTUS’ decision, “this number had declined to 11 percent” Two percent may be immiscible in the whole scheme of people applying to multitudes of colleges, yet when grouping such a number in terms of hundreds and thousands of those who are applying to universities as prestigious as Michigan, no number is too small. In fact, that 2% mirrors the mere thousands of marginalized applicants that were accosted due to unfair representation by college boards across the nation. Not only were communities accosted, Michigan as a constitution lost a portion of its representation in terms of incorporation of colored communities. Such change directly contributes to lack of representation and furthers the agenda for possible regress in societal expectations in incorporating people from vast backgrounds in virtue of true progress. Those real life implications and lack of representation are seen from “Counterpoint : Affirmative Action Promotes Equality” by Bourassa Rich, as “at the end of the 20th century, only 16% of Black people held professional or managerial positions, compared with 31% for White people.” Likewise women, even after gaining education, own merely and contract less than, respectively, three and ten percent of firms.Systems are majority-ruled. And the fervent lack of policies such as affirmative action are already reverting our world as we know it back to the country that idealized majority gain through the minority loss.

It is with true bearing that affirmative action stands by creating equity, without discrimination, fear, and displacement. We cannot be  a society, community, and a country, without helping those who need it most. How can we so freely call America, ‘the land of the free,’ and the ‘United’ States, without living with due guilt that those in power are implementing bans to take away the fundamental pillars that affirmative action stands on? To regress is not an option, as that leads to cycles of history that have been backed by years of racism, sexism, and so many more ideals that have spread like plagues. We cannot mirror the country that once was. Implementation of affirmative action is a necessity in progressing away from America's treacherous and embarrassing history. 

Sources Cited :

Hartocollis, A., & Saul, S. (2024, September 13). Affirmative action was banned. What happened next was confusing. The New York Times. Retrieved September 19, 2024, from https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/13/us/affirmative-action-ban-campus-diversity.html.  

"Affirmative Action." Gale Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2023. Gale In Context: Opposing Viewpoints, link.gale.com/apps/doc/PC3010999135/OVIC?u=nysl_we_clms&sid=bookmark-OVIC&xid=a687d3a6. Accessed 7 Mar. 2024.

Rich, Alex K.Bourassa, Cheryl. “Counterpoint: Affirmative Action Promotes Equality.” Points of View: Affirmative Action, Oct. 2023, pp. 3–6. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=pwh&AN=26607993&site=pov-live.