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>>If you read my post, you know that I am not a fan of quota systems.
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>>>Sure there have been problems in the past, but those don't exist today. It is long since past the time for any organizations that use public funds that cater to only one sex or race.
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>>The past is still here, John. I am seriously surprised that you feel that North American society has truly reached a stage where, without any support groups fighting for it, a black will be treated the same as a white, or a woman the same as a man - ie - without any conscious or subconscious discrimination. I don't know what things are like in your particular neck of the woods, but it must be far advanced over most of the rest of North America if that is really the case.
>
>Or, it may be that 60% of the Memphis population is black, so they are in control of much of the government. We have a black city and county mayor and several of the councilmen and commissioners also. I'd say they feel good about where they are. Even so, there are still quotas in place here. Whites should now be considered a minority.

John,
I'd still vote for you for king, but this paragraph and your anger about a 'black mayors conference' are a tad over the top.
People all over the states and the rest of the world generally vote for "one of their own". According to Oprah phones would buzz throughout black neighbourhoods in the 50s and 60s when there was A BLACK MAN ON THE TV it was such a rare thing!
Is it OK for Tom 'the hammer' Delay to fix electoral boundaries to get more Republicans elected but wrong for blacks to vote in one of their own?

My guess is that in 50-100 years the black/white thing will have disappeared in favour of competence for voting, but then the next group in line (Hispanics?) will take their place and keep the "one of our own" ball rolling.

Of course there'd be an uproar if there was a "Miss White America" or a "White Mayors Conference". It was a given, until just 25 or so years ago, that whites held ALL positions of power. The groups/competitions that formed since emancipation were aiming at giving blacks some small means/measures of bettering themselves and feeling better about themselves. There was never a need for such things for whites in the U.S. (or Canada) except to keep those socially stationed under themselves from moving into their own areas of endeavour.