It has now become an accepted principle that the way to cure racism is through the promulgation of racial and ethnic diversity within corporations, universities, government agencies and other institutions including political parties. There are many facets for these diversity movements such as NS training, diversity hiring and admissions, diversity promotions, diversity politics and diversity accommodations etc. (e.g., Indian/Chinese/Malay student organizations and facilities at universities.MIC, MCA, UMNO in politics).
The common feature in all these facets is racial preference.
Why this diversity has brought racial division and conflict instead of promoting racial harmony, if diversity was the cure?
The answer is that you cannot cure racism with racism. Accepting this logic of diversity is same as thinking in racial terms rather than in terms of individual character or merit. Taking jobs away from one group in order to compensate a second group to correct injustices/imbalance caused by a third group who mistreated/sidelined a fourth group at an earlier point in history is absurd on the face of it and does not promote justice. It rather does the opposite. Singling out one group for special favors (e.g., through affirmative action/NEP) breeds justified resentment and fuels the prejudices of real racists.
“People are individuals”
Let’s take a fictional example in the field of job as a case study. A corporation named ALIBABA since its creation since 1953 refused to hire an Indian due to a quirky bias on the part of its founder. The founder then dies in 1969 and an enlightened Board of Directors decides that something "positive" needs to be done to compensate for past injustices and announces that, henceforth, Indians will be hired on a preferential basis.
Observe that:
This does not help the real victims - the previously excluded Indians.
The newly favoured Indians have not been victims of discrimination in hiring, yet unfairly benefit from it.
The non-Indians are now excluded from jobs due to the Indians preference.
These non-Indians did not cause the previous discrimination and are now unfairly made victims of it.
In the job sphere there are only three essential things an employer needs to know about an individual applicant:
> Does the person have the relevant ability and knowledge (or the capacity to learn readily)?
> Is the person willing to exert the needed effort?
> Does the person have good character? e.g., honesty, integrity
Similar concept is applicable in other sectors including education (which is in greater mess) & politics (which is a mockery now).
The proper solution, of course, is simply to stop discriminating based on irrelevant factors. Although Indian bias ( in the above fictional example) is not a social problem, the principle does not change when you replace hair color with skin color or religion.
Color-blindness & religion-blindness is the traditional and essentially correct solution to the problem of racism & religiosity. But this well-intentioned principle comes at the issue negatively.
The correct principle is individuality awareness…………
People often are making judgments of other people based on non-essential attributes such as skin color, gender, religion, nationality, etc. of course, does happen. At the same time, Individuality Awareness might be too "idealistic" too, But the solution is not to abandon the ideal but to implement it consistently. Thus, government and organizational policies should focus not on diversity-worship but to find way on how to objectively assess or measure the ability, motivation and character in other people.
The proper alternative is to focus on the individual and to treat each individual according to his or her own merits. Malaysians have always encouraged the concept of diversity. ONE of which could easily be reflected in your news papers. (just go through politics till vacancies, could see it everywhere)
When one condemns racism, they should practice what they preach. Malaysians should abhor racism, in any form, for the same reason. (Our parliament itself fails in that)
The belief - that you can cure racism with racial quotas - is a hopeless quest with nothing but increased conflict and injustice at the end. Time has reached where political leaders, educationalists and corporate leaders should find the courage to assert and defend the only true antidote to the problem of racism, which is INDIVIDUALISM. Diversity-worship won’t cure racism but individualism will.
- Vineeth Menon
