Jon Snow,
First, I agree that blanket AA does ignore many underpriveleged White people, especially the White rural poor. I contend that AA should be weighted in the direction of SES and not race (at least for college admission). Some colleges already give special consideration to 1st generation college students regardless of race. However, one of the other benefits to AA is that it increases diversity on college campuses and eventually in the workforce. Exposure to people of different backgrounds generally leads to greater acceptance and greater intergroup collaboration which is necessary to change racial attitudes and promote inclusion of minorities into society and increase chances of equality. SO, I think policies that include race or minority status for admission criteria are still necessary and usually beneficial.
Second, the person you described had a very difficult life, but he/she does benefit from White Privilege. This person probably still probably would be able to check off most of, if not all of, these items:
1. I can if I wish arrange to be in the company of people of my race most of the time.
2. If I should need to move, I can be pretty sure renting or purchasing housing in an area
which I can afford and in which I would want to live.
3. I can be pretty sure that my neighbors in such a location will be neutral or pleasant to
me.
4. I can go shopping alone most of the time, pretty well assured that I will not be
'followed or harassed.
5. I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of
my race widely represented.
6. When I am told about our national heritage or about "civilization," I am shown that
people of my color made it what it is.
7. I can be sure that my children will be given curricular materials that testify to the
existence of their race.
8. If I want to, I can be pretty sure of finding a publisher for this piece on white privilege.
9. I can go into a music shop and count on finding the music of my race represented,
into a supermarket and find the staple foods which fit with my cultural traditions, into a
hairdresser's shop and find someone who can cut my hair.
10. Whether I use checks, credit cards, or cash, I can count on my skin color not to work
against the appearance of financial reliability.
11. I can arrange to protect my children most of the time from people who might not like
them.
12. I can swear, or dress in second hand clothes, or not answer letters, without having
people attribute these choices to the bad morals, the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race.
13. I can speak in public to a powerful male group without putting my race on trial.
14. I can do well in a challenging situation without being called a credit to my race.
15. I am never asked to speak for all the people of my racial group. 16. I can remain oblivious of the language and customs of persons of color who
constitute the world's majority without feeling in my culture any penalty for such oblivion.
17. I can criticize our government and talk about how much I fear its policies and
behavior without being seen as a cultural outsider.
18. I can be pretty sure that if I ask to talk to "the person in charge," I will be facing a
person of my race.
19. If a traffic cop pulls me over, I can be sure I haven't been singled out because of my
race.
20. I can easily buy posters, postcards, picture books, greeting cards, dolls, toys, and
children's magazines featuring people of my race.
21. I can go home from most meetings of organizations I belong to feeling somewhat
tied in, rather than isolated, out-of-place, out numbered, unheard, held at a distance, or
feared.
22. I can take a job with an affirmative action employer without having coworkers on the
job suspect that I got it because of race.
23. I can choose public accommodation without fearing that people of my race cannot
get in or will be mistreated in the places I have chosen.
24. I can be sure that if I need legal or medical help, my race will not work against me.
25. If my day, week, or year is going badly, I need not ask of each negative episode or
situation whether it has racial overtones.
26. I can choose blemish cover or bandages in flesh color and have them more or less
match my skin.
Third, your notion that change can't forced is mind-boggling to me. Would you say that the social and legal policies put in place during the civil rights era and since have had no impact on improving racial equality in this country? The Civil Rights Movement and these policies did not just appear, they were part of an effort to FORCE change because change needed to happen THEN, because it was not happening all by itself! Certainly it is possible that eventually attitudes would have shifted, but to wait until that happened would be devastating to a large portion of the population and the ramifications would be felt for generations.
The US government has its issues and may be involved in areas that are better left to the private sector (I'm guessing we would disagree about the areas), but I think civil rights and promotion of equality is one area where the government has a duty to intervene.
