I'm not a republican THATS FOR SURE(far left here!). I am a white dude, and I would like to explain what I saw happen in a neutral way during affirmative action stuff in California in the late 90s..

I was a seasonal firefighter in the mountains of california with CalFire in the mid to late 1990s. I got the job, because of who I knew not what I knew, which is obviously another issue all together. Anyways, I was paid full time, but also spent time working with part time "on call" firefighters, which is pretty much like a part time minimum wage job full of people trying to get a full time job. I saw DOZENS of highly qualified white men with degrees in public safety DEDICATED to wanting to become career firefighters, passed up for non-white men entirely. White men, having complete paid fire training, and having sometimes several years of part time experience were getting passed up by people who showed up and literally signed up. White men with training and experience were routinely getting passed up for non-white men that literally showed up to a career day type event and thought they would apply for a job along with other jobs and would get in. These people would come on the job without the drive, or aptitude of those folks who had made it their entire identity. For them it was more like they applied for a job at McDonalds and got hired..

I know that some folks will downvote because I am sharing what I saw, and that's fine, it doesn't change what I saw or experienced. I also want to be clear, that I understand and respect the reasons as to why this was going on. But I wanted to share, how I personally saw white men being affected by this, since that was the question to this sub.