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Originally posted by legalbeagle
At the risk of offending my Asian friends, I will say there is a difference. Perception is the key here. It's not what may actually happen, its about what these hiring partners believe to be the result of hiring more A-A associates. How many stories have you heard about an Asian American attorney claiming racial discrimination? Or that they tend to be less qualified as a group?(Clearly, this does not mean that other forms of discrimination do not effect Asians in a horrible way (see below))
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I agree, and I think all sides are guilty of creating that perception of African Americans.
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As you duly noted, I am guilty of painting with broad strokes but such is required to have a meaningful discussion with this issue. I used Creed/50 Cent example more for effect than substance, but even without scientific data, do you think A-A listen to Creed nearly as much as R/B hip-hop. The funny part is that its really OK and healthy to have these differences, its just not OK to limit people based on them and later claim you are really working hard to reach out.
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Well I'll agree that you can't limit people based on their differences and then claim you're trying to reach out, too much hypocrisy there. However, firms are in a tough position, if they don't proclaim their allegience to the god (goddess?) of diversity, their savaged on campus, so they all do. I don't think if a firm just said "we don't discriminate in hiring," that would be good enough, though maybe more truthful (or not). It's hard to "celebrate" differences and then not act based at least in part on those same differences, postively or negatively.
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To say I have "direct" evidence would be a bit of a stretch. As with common forms of prejudice, it doesn't lend itself to be readily identifiable. For example, how do you prove that a hiring partner rejected X number of A-A associate candidates once the majic number was reached? There are no two people with the exact same transcript, resume or cover letter so there will always be an excuse.
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I don't have any "direct" evidence that they're not discriminating, but which is harder to prove? As I understand civil rights law right now (at least as a statutory matter, not a constitutional one), you could basically cut and paste you original post into a brief and the onus would be on the firms to show that they aren't discriminating, essentially proving a negative (though that's not as hard as it's been made out to be). I think that's hardly fair either.
But, given everything I've said and everything you've said, and assuming that's all the evidence we have, would you feel comfortable voting for a verdict that said all (or even one) of these firms have violated civil rights statutes?
