When I was 30, I started applying for teaching jobs with Community Colleges, so that I could work while I completed my dissertation in Philosopy. I was an award winning teacher, who just happened to be a white male in good health. I lost out on two different jobs (after being informed that I was the employment committee's first choice) to foreign national candidates with poor english skills. (Yes, they were equally qualified in education.) It was explained to me that "Affirmative Action candidates have to be given priority." (Neither lasted more that two years on the job.) When I asked how in the world a citizen of another country, who was a "majority" in their homeland, could qualify as a "minority," I was told that they fulfilled a needed quota.

I finally gave up on my dream of becoming a philosophy instructor when I read the following in an ad for a position with Tacoma Community College:

"Affirmative action, equal opportunity employer. Women and minorities, disabled and/or Viet Nam veterans, persons with disabilities, and persons over 40 encouraged to apply."

Jeez, if you don't want White Guys, just say so!!!!!   (Sadly, now I'm a 45 year old with a permanent partial disability, but I'm no longer looking in that field.)

Don't ask me to have a lot of sympathy for the AA position. I keep thinking about the students who had to sit through classes taught by qualified people, whom they couldn't understand. (And please don't flame me, because I knew students at both schools, and that was the report. One of the foreign nationals was a guy I knew in grad school, and it was damn near impossible to understand him. Once he got his point across, he was brilliant. However, most students gave up long before the point was made. I'm sure they weren't happy paying for the experience.)