James Meeks: White Women Shouldn't Get Affirmative Action From City

State Senator James Meeks, a reverend at a South Side church and a candidate for mayor of Chicago, was trying to talk about his education policy yesterday.

Instead, during a forum on WVON radio, he wound up making another round of controversial comments about race. (Scroll down to watch.)

Meeks was talking about the city's programs designed to benefit minority- and women-owned enterprises, which mandate that a certain share of city contracts go to such businesses.

"I think that the word 'minority,' from our standpoint, should mean African-American," Meeks said, as reported by FOX Chicago. "I don't think women, Asians and Hispanics should be able to use that title. That's why our numbers cannot improve, because we use women, Asians and Hispanics, who are not people of color, who are not people who have been discriminated against."

Later, when asked to clarify, he said that the City Hall programs should only stop their set-asides for "white women."

This is not the first time Meeks has raised a stir with some racially motivated remarks. A fiery sermon he gave at his Salem Baptist Church several years ago likened Mayor Daley to a "slave master" and called some black elected officials "house n*****s" who "are gonna fight you to protect that white man."

Meeks has also struggled with remarks he made about homosexuality, describing it as "an evil sickness" in 2006. During the campaign season, he's sought at leaset publicly to make amends with the gay community, though he continued to vote against a civil unions bill in the state legislature.

Watch Meeks on affirmative action:

Comments

[jilrita]

05:07 PM on 01/06/2011

Na na na na...hey hey hey...goodbye!

[rich-james]

02:10 AM on 12/29/2010

"Affirmative action" should be abandoned. As a nation, we can't afford to not hire and promote people on the basis of merit. To continue on our present course is national suicide.

[hulagirrrl]

12:43 AM on 12/29/2010

He is wrong, wrong and wrong. Hope he won't win.

[moionfire]

03:33 PM on 12/28/2010

He is wrong about asians and hispanics. But he is correct that white women aren't a minority... There are more white women then there are white men....Time to cut them off affirmative action rolls...

[paradigm88]

08:57 PM on 12/28/2010

You almost got it right. Just remove the word "them" from your final sentence and everything will fall into place.

[rich-james]

02:17 AM on 12/29/2010

Precisely.

[Evan O]

04:34 PM on 12/21/2010

Here's a fact I bet James Meeks is completely unaware of. One of the first members of the Black Panther party was Japanese American Richard Aoki. It's sad to see that the solidarity we had during the civil rights movement, not only as minorities but as a nation, is not only completely lost today but is continually shat on by people like Meeks.

[hulagirrrl]

12:46 AM on 12/29/2010

Yep, and how many white people marched along with Dr. King, or enrolled their kids in black neighborhood schools to ensure that these schools get new books instead of the old discarded ones from white schools. Not so long ago, but seems some in the black community have selective memory. Glad to know that he is a minority with his views.

[ewright637]

12:54 PM on 12/20/2010

While I won't argue that Latinos haven't experienced some form of marginalization, no group of people have experienced the degree of legalized discrimination as African Americans have. So to have a set aside originally designed to off-set this discrimination for African Americans become another groups primary benefit is a problem. No one wants’ to discuss how white women became categorically identified as minority. It was a white supremacist congress men name Howard Smith who influenced the drafting of the legislation to include white women so that allocations could still come back to whites. This is a fact, and as a result, white women are the "number one beneficiary" of these programs. This is also a fact. Furthermore, white companies use daughters, wives, and nieces as a front to obtain these set asides. This is also a fact. So why hasn't the non-factual media mentioned any of these counter arguments. It is for the same reason that the Affirmative Action debate is kept fixated on African Americans when a whole array of individuals are benefitting. And the sad part about it is, very seldom do you see white women, or other minorities defending Affirmative Action. Until now, suddenly white women advocates are starting to surface, where were they during the debates about the University of Michigan. It should also be noted that these set asides, even if allocated as originally intended, are grossly inadequate and can’t even be confused as a mechanism to repair the ills of white supremacy.

[mjb5406]

12:52 PM on 12/19/2010

Meeks is a minority x 2... African-American AND mentally imbalanced. Add to that the group of people who walk around with their heads up their behinds and you have a triple-play.

[SteveDenver]

02:21 AM on 12/19/2010

Hey Meeks: "minority" means "a group of people who differ racially or politically from the larger group." Women, Asians and Hispanics [and other minorities] need protection from your type of ignorance.

[Ice woman]

04:30 PM on 12/18/2010

*facepalm* *headdesk*

[Tim Walkoe]

02:22 PM on 12/18/2010

I'm Dutch, I am a minority damn it!!!

[Rebecca Sive]

02:13 PM on 12/18/2010

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/12/16/james-meeks-white-women-s_n_797710.html#comments: Here is a take on the Rev. Meeks' brouhaha.

[BookmanIIII]

12:02 AM on 12/18/2010

Chicago, Chicago...my kind of town. If it's strange or crazy, Chicago's the town to be in.

[Hammm]

05:37 PM on 12/17/2010

this guys is definitely not a minority...there are way too many stupid political candidates for them to use that label.

[mamapower]

06:37 PM on 12/17/2010

Amen to that!!

[UKNOWHOW ICM]

07:36 PM on 12/17/2010

Touché.

[mamapower]

02:31 PM on 12/17/2010

See, the !gnorant come in all groups and ethnicity.

He even looks stoooopid.

[SteveDenver]

02:21 AM on 12/19/2010

You can't always tell a book by its cover, but sometimes you can.

[PDXPLT]

02:19 PM on 12/17/2010

At my workplace, Asians aren't considered a minority; i.e., you don't get any credit for meeting "diversity goals" if you hire one.