http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/2011/11/27/too-white-to-study-medicine Fantastic, if we did this during Apartheid it was bad, but now that its being done in reverse and to white people... its okay for the international community. Its not just white people. My wife is a Filipino doctor and she is struggling to practice medicine in South Africa as she is not black enough for the positions. So whenever you hear Africa needs more doctors, they mean only black doctors.
I would have thought the medical profession would be most strict on picking the highest ranked candidates first, after all other peoples lives will be in their hands. I'd rather my surgeon was selected on merit than skin colour, do they have a duty of care to inform people? I guess if we'd rather be 'PC' than sensible we get what we deserve.
From this, I am not sure what happened. Why was she accepted at first to begin with? If - - there were 550 people who ranked higher than her? Was the real reason that her selection was reversed the fact that she wasn't truthful in her first application? This situation seems very suspicious.
Because those 550 with higher scores that weren't getting in were also White. If they let her in based on her erroneously checked "color box", she would be getting in over other White people with even higher scores than she had. Arthur
Is it stated anywhere what the qualifications of the "Indian candidates, preferably from the Western and Northern Cape and African and coloured candidates from all provinces" were? Or was it 550/551 whites that ranked highest by merit, and then, below them, came the "Indian candidates, preferably from the Western and Northern Cape and African and coloured candidates from all provinces" and other white candidates? How many candidates applied altogether?
I wouldn't necessarily conclude that the 550 Whites ranked HIGHEST by merit, just higher than the woman who got in by erroneously checking "Black" on the form. Which is an indication of how far down the list they had to go, past White students, to fill their quota of Western and Northern Cape and African and coloured candidates. Still, that doesn't mean they were taking BAD students, after all she had achieved six distinctions in her Grade 11 exams, so presumably other black students around her position in the selection process had similar levels of achievement. It's likely that almost all who applied to this Medical School, White or Black, were well qualified. Arthur
Universities are allowed and sometimes even required to accept applicants by quotas. Which suggests that there was no injustice, and the candidate in the OP was not "too white to study medicine" - and the OP thus seems based on a false premise, stating a lie.
Because they are forced to do this doesn't make racial quotas right though Well maybe not to her, but to some of the other White applicants above her there was. Many of them had better scores and weren't accepted simply because of their skin color. The question is, is the injustice that is inherent in affirmative action justifiable and if so, for how long? (it's an example of using two wrongs to make a right) Arthur
Is it really injustice, or just a practical consideration? From the OP: What if the simple fact of the matter is that white doctors are not widely appreciated in South Africa, and it is therefore feasible not to train too many white doctors?
Yeah, I'm sure we could have used that same line here back in the 50s/60s the simple fact of the matter is that Black doctors are not widely appreciated in the US, and it is therefore feasible not to train too many Black doctors
Okay. How is social justice to be brought about in a multicultural, multiratial, multinational society in which each culture/race/nation wishes to be equally respected as all others?
Well a good start would be by being blind to race, nationality and gender when it comes to matters of who to hire, train and promote etc etc.
. If she'd made an error in reporting her GPA and her actual GPA was lower than she initially reported, we could rightly say that she was not admitted once the error was discovered because her GPA wasn't high enough. The error actually made, however, was in reporting her race. Once it was discovered that she was not black, she was refused admission. So how is it a lie to say that she wasn't admitted due to not being black enough?
How does that advance social justice in the context of a society where people of particular race or gender have been systematically repressed for many generations, to the point where they are left at a systemic disadvantage in competing for hiring, training and promotion? Color-blindness is great in the utopian case that you've already achieved perfect equality of opportunity. In places where the latter does not exist, it's not nearly so clear-cut. If color-blindness is the "start," then how exactly does that lead to equal opportunity? Moreover, it really does not matter at all what outsiders like yourself think of the justice of whatever affirmative action program South Africa decides to pursue. It's a matter of social justice to be worked out between the various elements of the society in question.
Because this 18 year old had nothing to do with the oppression of anyone. It really can't get any simpler than that. Arthur
it does not matter your opinion is irrelevant mods please close this thread i am sure we all have better, more productive, things to do
So, the only consideration in social justice, is whether any white people will suffer for it going forward. The question of how to fix the grevious damage to the black and other communities, inflicted systemicatically and intentionally by white people over many generations for the express purpose of privileging their descendents over the "coloreds," does not show up in the calculus. In which case, yeah, "social justice" is a pretty simple issue if you start by ignoring the 100% of the interests of the victims. And, yeah, again: as an American, what standing do you have to judge the policies that South Africans - in the context of a democracy - have decided are necessary and justified for repairing the damage of extensive racism and putting the country on the right course? You're going to stand here and tell us that they're evil because they allow a few white people to lose a few opportunities in order to advance social justice and overcome a fraught and problematic history?
I assume that at least some of the 550 higher-ranked white candidates were selected. It's not a lie. Obviously, this particular course/institution has quotas for black candidates and quotas for white candidates. Unfortunately for her, 550 of the white candidates ranked higher than she did.
