Reminds me of "Connections" TV show.
Obama's Secret Weapon In The South is 129 Million Years Old
121–130 of 318 posts
Re: Obama's Secret Weapon In The South is 129 Million Years Old
#122Earlier quoted context omitted.
The justification and rationale for race-based affirmative action is somewhat different from anything favoring people of low socioeconomic class generally. It has to do with correcting specific and massive historical wrongs in which our government was complicit, not lifting up disadvantaged people generally. Conflating the two is a little silly. If I destroy your house, you're not going to be happy if I make amends t…
Let's accept that rational; but that does leave one question: when does this end? If we have no way to measure the damage then how do we measure the resolution of the damage? Do we continue this for 5, 10, 50, 100, 500 years? Or do we simply never end it? Do we try to "correct" it so there are literally no poor people of a particular ethnicity? How realistic is that?
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Re: Obama's Secret Weapon In The South is 129 Million Years Old
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's effectively the same as what I stated. It's also still not a valid conclusion. For example, you haven't addressed whether it's worth trying to undo bad things that happened long ago with other injustices, as opposed to simply being just from here on out. For another example, you haven't addressed whether it actually works or not. (Those two examples actually are related, because theory and practice actually ar…
> undo bad things that happened long ago with other injustices First, you are implying that affirmative action is unjust, which it is not . Affirmative action does not mean that an unqualified worker replaces a qualified worker because of race. Affirmative action means that equally qualified workers are then selected to be as representative of the population as possible. This has the added benefit of making sure civi…
> First, you are implying that affirmative action is unjust, which it is not. Affirmative action does not mean that an unqualified worker replaces a qualified worker because of race. Affirmative action means that equally qualified workers are then selected to be as representative of the population as possible.
I've never heard of that idea (which means it's interesting, not wrong). But, I also think it's wrong. For example, at my university, where a pretty small proportion of applicants actually get in (it's highly competitive), you can't get a sizeable proportion of blacks using the method you suggest. You have to use the method that you don't suggest, which is what they do.
I appreciate your referencing actual reasearch. I think there are tangible but non-quantifiable effects that are not measured by that kind of thing, though.
For example, people know that affirmative action (as I have seen it practiced) is ubiquitous and unfair, and that in itself makes it harder for prejudices to be dissolved.
This even applies to the people who are supposed to directly benefit from affirmative action.
Re: Obama's Secret Weapon In The South is 129 Million Years Old
#124Earlier quoted context omitted.
You do realize that race and class are heavily intersectional, right? That rates of poverty are higher for non-whites, right? Also, helping people who are affected by institutional racism is not racist, it is an attempt to correct for existing racism.
You are not helping people because of their race, so why use that to select who gets help? There are rich black people as well as there are poor white people.
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Re: Obama's Secret Weapon In The South is 129 Million Years Old
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would be putting words in someone's mouth if I wrote, "You said X..." when they did not say X, but rather something that I think (rightly or wrongly) implies X. What I did is something different, but I agree that it's not obvious how this is conducive to productive and useful conversation. I know, it looks like I'm just trying to "score points." So, let me explain myself. This kind of dialogue actually is productiv…
You could have conveyed the non-snark by just omitting your parenthetical. Everything before that is totally valid, but the parenthetical invites the kind of reply that doesn't actually move the conversation in the way I think you intended. (Edit, adding): Also, when you use "", it's much better if you are actually quoting. If not, you are putting words in their mouth.
Thanks. This is useful. It got me thinking.
If I had just not put the parenthetical, it would make it look like I was "really asking" the question. That would treat the derivation in question as potentially legitimate (it's really not), and also invite serious but non-useful responses.
So that leads me to conclude that I just shouldn't have phrased my point as a question in the first place. I could have just stated my point as a statement, not a question.
Re: Obama's Secret Weapon In The South is 129 Million Years Old
#126Earlier quoted context omitted.
It sounds like you simply don't understand what affirmative action is. It's not welfare. You're seriously saying we should give out slots on boards of directors to people on food stamps ? AA doesn't correct for immediate need, it corrects for the fact that people growing up in unpriviledged environments lack advantages. So they have to work a job instead of going to a test prep class. They go to schools with high tea…
> AA doesn't correct for immediate need, it corrects for the fact that people growing up in unpriviledged environments lack advantages. So poor white folks never grow up in unpriviledged environments? You're providing no justification for why AA is race based instead of socio-economic based.
It came about when the disparity was more substantial. That it's less obvious now is a sign that it's working. Institutional underrepresentation of poor white people is already dealt with separately by the lack of historical institutional discrimination against them.
Re: Obama's Secret Weapon In The South is 129 Million Years Old
#127I think this is a great answer to people who ask why we still need things like affirmative action. Here you have a continuing demographic phenomenon that can be traced directly back to slave ownership patterns hundreds of years ago. It should be noted also that the black belt is also a terribly poor stretch of the country. Unfortunately, it appears that socioeconomic patterns are imprinted more deeply than anyone wou…
The problem with affirmative action is that it is based on race. It is racist. In fact it isn't just based on race, it is based on skin colour - since some mixed black-white people with white skin can be discriminated against. America needs to put race on the sidelines and start thinking in terms of class. You should help the disadvantaged or poor regardless of their great great grandparent's struggles. Affirmative a…
While I'm just a layperson on the subject, to me, there is far more to the question of affirmative action than giving opportunities to the "poor or disadvantaged." It's a way for our system to actively acknowledge and combat any (possibly subliminal) biases towards the previously privileged group of white males. As they say, old habits die hard, and it's naive to think that hiring and admissions processes are now completely blind to everything but parental income. Surely, strict quotas are an overreaction to this, but there is some middle ground between quotas and complete deregulation.
Re: Obama's Secret Weapon In The South is 129 Million Years Old
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
The historic chinatowns of San Francisco, New York, and LA are still predominantly populated with ethnic Chinese. At a bigger scale: China is still predominantly populated with ethnic Chinese. I'm not sure what conclusions you can reasonably draw from this, especially WRT affirmative action.
Ethnic Chinese in China were not subject to systematic oppression like blacks in the USA not even a century ago. That is a pattern, and it has far reaching effects.
Odd that you didn't mention the systematic oppression of Chinese in the USA. However, that's beside the point.
My point is that whatever the far-reaching effects of slavery, it's not clear that this specific geographic distribution is one of them - many cultures tend to clump together naturally even without systematic oppression (see: american expat communities around the world). Slavery may have chosen the original location, but isn't necessarily what's keeping people there.
Re: Obama's Secret Weapon In The South is 129 Million Years Old
#129Earlier quoted context omitted.
> undo bad things that happened long ago with other injustices First, you are implying that affirmative action is unjust, which it is not . Affirmative action does not mean that an unqualified worker replaces a qualified worker because of race. Affirmative action means that equally qualified workers are then selected to be as representative of the population as possible. This has the added benefit of making sure civi…
>The idea of "reverse racism" is baloney, and I can explain that opinion further if necessary. I'd be interested in that explanation. Combatting discrimination by allowing discrimination by or for minorities seems like pushing the pendulum too far back in the other direction. Isn't the idea equality? Having everyone playing by the same rules regardless of race? Example (in my own home state, no less) For jobs offered…
> Isn't the idea equality?
You weren't asking me, but the idea should be equality under the law, not equality.
Re: Obama's Secret Weapon In The South is 129 Million Years Old
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why can't we just try to remedy those ills directly? Why does there need to be an association with race? Because targeting based on race is a simple and effective way to target these ills. Race is often strongly correlated with these problems.
Yes but not all African American's are disadvantaged. But all disadvantaged people are disadvantaged. Why not make laws to simply help the disadvantaged? Why does race have to be the indicator, even if its a pretty good one? Why cant income be the indicator? It seems like it would be at least as accurate, if not more so... and no need to bring race into it.
How do you define & measure disadvantage?
You suggest income, but then that ignores:
(a) debt
(b) medical costs (Joe & Jim have the same income, but Joe has cancer and has to pay $LOTS per month, has less energy etc. Who's more disadvantaged?)
(c) where one lives (Joe & Jim have same income, but Joe lives near where possible jobs are, Jim needs a 2 hour bus journey)
(d) existing assets (Jim has a new car and partner has a second hand car, Joe has a crappy car that could break, who is more advantaged)
(e) family support/obligations, both financial & emotional (Joe has to care for his mother, Jim's mother can pay for her own nursing home. Joe knows he can rely on his parents to bail him out, Joe can't). etc.
All systems have flaws. This stuff is hard and complicated, and you'll have mistakes, false positives and false negatives with all methods (yes including race/ethnicity). There'll also be costs to each method: Cost for the applicant to have to find & submit paperwork, cost for staff to process and review it, opportunities for fraud (e.g. asset-based-measurement means you can fake it by moving assets to a family member/close friend for a year).
Race/ethnicity has several advantages as a "disadvantage metric":
(a) easy to apply (hard to fake), yes there are problems with people of many ethnicities
(b) cheap and quick to decide, no calculations or hours of staff time checking that the payslip from 2007 is legit, or try to figure out if the person really is a single parent or is the partner still living there, etc.
(c) applicants don't have to find old information & forms & letters
(d) strongly statistically correlated with disadvantage
However some people just react negatively about race being mentioned at all, thinking that "racism = any reference to race" and "racism = bad" ergo "any reference to race = bad". Sometimes conversations about this can be like talking about evolution to a creationist, ask yourself if there is any evidence you'd accept that would convince you that it's OK to have affirmative action, if not, you might be being dogmatic.