Affirmative action is not measuring someone's achievements relatively to the external difficulties they faced. It's treating people differently because of their

Affirmative action is not measuring someone's achievements relatively to the external difficulties they faced. It's treating people differently because of their race. I.e. Racism. You could give an advantage to people who grew up in poor areas, had poor parents, graduated from poorly preforming schools (or failed to graduate at all), etc. If you wanted to help people who faced more adversity. Affirmative action discriminates in favour of the children of millionaires who had every opportunity to succeed but happen to be black, and against white and Asian kids who grew up in a trailer park and went to a school that couldn't afford books. It's what happens when you target statistics without caring about people. People are individuals, not statistical representatives of demographic groups. You can't fix discrimination by discriminating, but you can hide it and that's what affermtive action seeks to do.