Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, February 24, 1995 TAG: 9502240027
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: PETRA BARRERA
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
As a woman, I've operated a minority-owned business for more than 15 years, and I take exception to his statements.
Yates, welcome to the world. He and the angry white males are experiencing what women and minorities have lived with for years. It's difficult to walk a mile in another's shoes, isn't it? He fails to remember that the economic pie is shrinking due to world economies, that the baby-boom generation's large numbers have flooded the work place, and that 12 years of Republican administrations led us from being the largest lender nation in the world in 1980 to the largest debtor nation in 1992. Could that possibly have anything to do with the problems all of us, not just white males, face today? No, he searches for a scapegoat, and finds the ones always chosen: women and minorities. Affirmative action is the great Satan.
I sell electronic components to large government contractors such as McDonnell Douglas and Lockheed. Affirmative action only guarantees me the right to bid, not to receive contracts. In my industry, the lowest bidder gets the contract, and in a minimum of instances is a 5 percent-to-10 percent leeway given to a woman- or minority-owned business. Large corporations receiving federal, state or local funding are only required to give 5 percent to 10 percent of their total business to women and minorities - a far cry from dominating the industry. Many large contractors satisfy the requirement by hiring minority janitorial contractors, and never deal with us at all.
Now, if those shoes make Yates' feet sore, let's compromise. Affirmative action came into existence to promote equality in a social and business world operated by the Old White Boy League. As a Hispanic female, I hereby relinquish my right to deal, as Yates puts it, as a preferential-treated business for 5 percent to 10 percent of contracts. I'll ask only to be given a fair chance to compete. No old boys, golf courses or power lunches. Equal competition, not lip service.
Yates stated that white males with families to support are having careers damaged due to preferential treatment. Women head 30 percent of households today. Combined with minorities, we might be a larger group than his, and we, too, have families to support. Even with affirmative action, we fight every day not to be second-class citizens due to racism, sexism, etc., in a nation whose work places and social settings are still rampant with discrimination. He says white males never did anything to deserve what has happened to them. Neither have we.
So, tenure-track positions in universities that have traditionally been staffed by males are now being given to females. Why? In the past, were women too stupid to achieve advanced degrees and teach in college? Or did the institutions' sexist hiring practices never allow them the chance to prove their worth? Of course, in Yates' mind, that never happened. Blacks never rode on the back of the bus, Hispanics never had as a primary lifestyle the job of migratory vegetable-pickers, and Asians never worked as laborers, cooks and laundry boys because of a failure in equal opportunity.
With his blistered feet, Yates sees affirmative action as a myth promoted by Democrats. I see him as not much different from his forefathers who caused the need for it in the first place. He needs to open his narrow mind and change his attitude. We have many ways to eliminate the need for affirmative action. Equality and understanding will allow us to solve this nation's problems together. We ask only for a fair chance. We've always been willing to work with Yates.
Petra Barrera, of Roanoke, is president of Mexitronics Corp.
by CNB