A new Californian law threatens corporations with fines of up to $300,000 USD if they fail to meet state-sanctioned “racially and gender diverse” quotas.

The affirmative action assembly bill no. 979 was tabled in February 2020, approved in September, and amended in November of the same year.

The law demands that “every publicly held corporation in California must achieve diversity on its board of directors.”

Consequently, corporations must have “a minimum of directors from underrepresented communities on its board by January 2023.”

Its author, California State Senator Hannah-Beth Jackson, claims the law was aimed at ‘addressing discrimination by companies whose boards have long been dominated by men.’

Hence the 50/50 gender equality quota.

For corporations with 6 directors, 3 have to be female. For those with 5 directors, 2 have to be female. For those with 4 or less, 1 director has to be female.

Terms of definition are just as Woke. “Female”, as defined by the legislation ‘means an individual who self-identifies her gender as a woman, without regard to the individual’s designated sex at birth.’

Failure to comply with the new legislation begins with a $100,000 USD fine. With any further failures to ‘adopt the regulations’ attracting a fine of $300,000 USD.

Justification in the legislation appeals to statistics showing lower rates of ‘management, professional and related occupations’ amongst African, and Latino Americans, when compared to Whites (sic.) and Asians who ‘worked in the same occupation.’

Lawmakers also borrowed from the United States Equal Opportunity Commission (EEOC) data to allege a bias favouring “Whites” for executive positions.

The law sets out to put in place ‘affirmative action plans to increase the representation of women and minorities in historically unrepresented fields and occupations;’ and expand the ‘legislative goals of the Civil Rights act of 1964’

The implications of the legislation assume that there’s a pandemic of systemic injustice and discrimination-based racism and sexism.

With 39.1 million people in California, as of the 2019 census, 71.9% identified as white; 6.5% identified as Black or African-American; 39.4% identified as Hispanic or Latino, and 15.5% identified as Asian.

In addition, 50.3% identified as female. Nonfarm firms (2012) numbered 3.6 million. Men-owned were counted at 1.85 million, and women-owned firms 1.3 million. With minority-owned firms amounting to 1.61 million. Non-minority firms were 1.81 million.

There’s not a lot of disparity. So, where’s the systemic injustice?

It’s been argued before, and it’s worth restating. The easy explanation for the higher representation of Caucasians (assuming by ‘whites’ the legislation means Caucasians) in the workforce is that “whites” are the dominant demographic.

The legislation doesn’t appear to take a common-sense reading of the census data into account. 

While discrimination does no doubt exist, the higher representation of Caucasians doesn’t amount to proof of systemic injustice against minorities.

Likewise, a small disparity between men, women, minorities and non-minorities who own/run businesses do not indicate either an epidemic of racism or sexism.

Interpretations of the data appear to appeal to preconceived ideas (see the reference to expanding Civil Rights legislation 1964) based upon insinuations, and assumptions that have been used to manufacture justifications for the legislation.

The only systemic injustice manifesting itself here comes in the form of the Californian government.

These are tenured bureaucrats, clueless about how affirmative action legislation, which pursues quantity over quality, puts colour over character, and equates melanin with material wealth, oppresses the people equally.

This is supported by lawsuits against the Californian legislation, which object to quotas on the grounds they force shareholders to discriminate.

Contenders aim to show how the law overlooks the individual; in favour of the group that they were born into.

In the words of Ben Shapiro – who moved The Daily Wire from California to Tennessee because of arbitrary, poorly written legislation like Bill 979 – bureaucrats have put feelings before facts.

Acclaimed economist, Thomas Sowell, in the conclusion to his 2004 empirical study, ‘Affirmative Action Around the World’, writes:

“It’s remarkable how seldom these notions have been tested empirically, or even defined clearly, or examined logically, much less weighed against the large and often painful costs they entail.”

He adds:

“Despite sweeping claims made for affirmative action programs, and examination of their actual consequences makes it hard to support those claims, or even to say that these programs have been beneficial on net balance – unless one is prepared to say that any amount of social redress, however small, is worth any amount of costs and dangers, however large.”

(2004, p.198)

Woke legislation which demands preferential treatment built on “race” is essentially racist. Preferential policies are a breeding ground for discrimination.

The real oppressors are masquerading as the oppressed.