Minority Groups "Special Rights"

[Hlafordlaes]

I think this is the core question about attempts to formalize and codify protection for segments of the population that are experiencing discrimination.

It's something I changed my mind about on a per-topic basis when I was in my 20s. For example, I had disagreed with a philosophy prof about the importance of the US proposal for an ERA (Equal Rights Amendment). It was an attempt to spell out in plainer words that 'equal rights for everybody' included women. I couldn't understand why additional legislation was necessary, 'everybody means everybody, it's already the law'.

But I observed that when my rival pays a black engineer 25% less than her equally qualified male counterparts, when I hire a black engineer at 100% in my firm, I'm not fixing the problem. Black engineers are still getting paid less. Multiply that by millions of transactions, and it's a demographic income suppression even if 90% of the hiring managers are like me and wouldn't even consider it.

The problem is: the number of active racists is above the critical mass or threshold required to accelerate racial differences in opportunities; there's too much inertia for there to be a satisfactory resolution in human lifetimes (an example being my dad's golf course above, but substitute with the 1500% gap in white vs black [family estates] and their connection to tuition affordability), and my modelling that shows that small differences will probably grow over time in an unregulated environment, despite a majority of fair citizens.

The critical mass thing is basic modelling. Sort of like how we don't need to worry about a few vaccination avoiders... but when it reaches a threshold, it becomes a public health hazard. Same with bigots. A few are a joke. Above a certain percentage, there's an inevitability that target demographics will have no equity, no standard of living in 10, 20 generations. That's because when you and I treat people fairly, they don't gain over the average; but when somebody treats them unfairly, they lose versus average. Over time, this accumulates, and it seems to be exponential (as they lose assets, they lose the capacity to preserve the remaining assets faster). Just being fair doesn't compensate.

It's one of those "this is why we can't have nice things" things. Protection applies to all. But there's people who disagree with that, we have to push back in order to achieve the fairness that is offered in the nation's vision.

Most excellent post. Love the keen awareness of systemic effects.

***

In other news, as I write, I am eagerly awaiting a promised DVD about the quote below from a UK business colleague and friend from whom I hadn't heard in ages. He has moved his leadership and consulting practice largely to China, as well as a few other locations. As he is a world-class expert, I found it fascinating when he declared in an email:

Shortly after the [XYZ Company] days I went on a mad trip to Kenya and met a group of Maasai who taught me more about leadership in one week than I had ever learnt before. That learning has helped me to have fun with a more quirky look at leadership and it is why tomorrow I am addressing 2 groups at the School of Economics in Ljubljana and also why this time last week I was in Kenya with a small Maasai community with whom I have been working on a range of sustainability projects for the last 8 years.

Can't wait. Knowledge is where you find it, if you have open eyes. I cannot for the life of me imagine, once having heard a symphony orchestra, for someone to then only want to hear bugle calls and snare drums, if you catch my drift.

 

[catsmate]

At any rate, the white echo chamber you link to is not a reliable source. Motto: Start with fave premise, cherry-pick data for premise, admit no data or argument countering premise, fantasize about premise, use premise to feel superior, end with the conclusion: premise! Riiight.

Indeed. His source, thealternativehypothesis.org, is the pseudo-intellectual darling of the alt-right, often cited by the scum that hang out at the Daily Stormer yet full of dubious claims, distorted stats and outright lies.

 

[jakesteele]

I think they may be refering to stuff like Affirmative Action which prioritise minorities and women. Stuff like that, I'd think.

That is part of it, but I think they are able to get away with a lot more than the majority of people. For instance, I've been called a cracker, honky, etc., and white people got a nervous laugh and discreetly avert their gaze. If I'd called him them *******, the white liberals would jump my **** with outrage because liberals have been loving minorities to death since the '60's.

As far as Black Lives Matter crap, I say to them start in Chicago by making Rom Emanuel(sp?) stand, with pockets of cash and a gun, at ground zero Chicago. I say to there whining, "Red Lives Matter" before all other minority groups matter.

 

[jakesteele]

I and sure that it's the right of a bunch of stars can refer to themselves as a bunch of stars if they want to.



How is it "scary" to be including more people into professions that have historically excluded them, are often still closed clubs except to the "right people", and for which there are few role models for minorities to look up to and say "I want to do that"?

I'd also ask how it is a "special right" to be given acceptance into these sorts of professions that have historically excluded them?

Because it let's too many unqualified minorities into positions they really aren't qualified for or don't want. I lost a job to minorities on the railroad and they man said they he had a great job but it had to be given to a black person. He went on further to say that every time he saw a black person walk by he would go out and offer them the job but they would call him a honky and tell him to get my mama to take the job.

I also met a white couple whose son got hired into a minority spot on the fire department intended for a black male. I asked how that could be and she said, with a wry grin, "Apparently they couldn't find any unqualified blacks to take the job." Also, at the time, black men/women were given 6 months to prepare for the written tests, which the white firefighters
weren't given.

So yeah, I think liberals have created this culture of PCism that floats the boat of minority rage.

 

[Klimax]

I don't understand your point.

Import of cheap skilled labor for position like programmers. hence no more minority in those areas.

No. Its just you have a strange sense of fairness and good reason.

No wonder considering your own meaning of "fairness" is just "unfair and discriminatorical" and "good reason" is equivalent to "it benefits those I want" and "its my hypocrisy".

 

[LSSBB]

Because it let's too many unqualified minorities into positions they really aren't qualified for or don't want. I lost a job to minorities on the railroad and they man said they he had a great job but it had to be given to a black person. He went on further to say that every time he saw a black person walk by he would go out and offer them the job but they would call him a honky and tell him to get my mama to take the job.

I also met a white couple whose son got hired into a minority spot on the fire department intended for a black male. I asked how that could be and she said, with a wry grin, "Apparently they couldn't find any unqualified blacks to take the job." Also, at the time, black men/women were given 6 months to prepare for the written tests, which the white firefighters
weren't given.

So yeah, I think liberals have created this culture of PCism that floats the boat of minority rage.

Anecdotal evidence.

 

[Hlafordlaes]

That is part of it, but I think they are able to get away with a lot more than the majority of people.

You mean, they have their grandmothers knitting as children play, all under the body of a lynched figure, while the brave but hooded men celebrate their mob-backed "prowess" at protecting racial purity against a lone, unarmed innocent man? Gosh, that would be grotesquely primitive and shameful, especially if for generations thereafter they couldn't man up to their many such crimes, or even woman up. Or even figure it to be a crime, just "manifest destiny" or, more evasively, "state's rights," meaning their twisted sense of good and evil indicates they worship a demon version of whatever their god is. That's some bad-ass nasty moral, intellectual and physical cowardice. Go get 'em, cowboy!

 

[Archie Gemmill Goal]

No wonder considering your own meaning of "fairness" is just "unfair and discriminatorical" and "good reason" is equivalent to "it benefits those I want" and "its my hypocrisy".

Evidence?

Which of my suggestions are unfair or discriminatory? Which are hypocritical?

 

[Mumbles]

So yeah, I think liberals have created this culture of PCism that floats the boat of minority rage.

Opinions like the ones you and others have posted here are more than enough to float that boat - no need for "liberals" who, all too often, are themselves hostile to minorities as well.

 

[Klimax]

Evidence?

Which of my suggestions are unfair or discriminatory? Which are hypocritical?

As I said, I don't know what solution I'd propose to both not discriminate based on gender or race, and also get rid of the other sort of discrimination, other than enforcing laws and trying to further social change.

Shouldn't it be a case of which is the lesser of two evils?

Discriminating positively in favour of minorities to try to balance things a bit, or doing nothing and letting the inherent discrimination in the system drive outcomes?

To use an analogy that I really should be able to think of a better one than, introducing toxic chemicals to the body is bad for your health and no doctor should ever do it, but chemotherapy is preferable to letting cancer run its course.

He's the problem with sacrificing the very principle we're trying to uphold: once you go down that road, you are saying that discrimination is OK in some cases and not in others. It opens up the question: which is OK, and which isn't? Now, proponents of AA would certainly say that discrimination against the majority is OK, and discrimination against the minority is not. However, some less savoury people on the other side might argue that discrimination against a smaller number is better than one against the larger one. It makes the judgment rather subjective.

Maybe it is the lesser of two evils, but I don't like the implications.

Me either. But I don't like the implications of not doing it either. The problem is real and has been identified. The choice is to do something which isn't perfect or do nothing and accept that minorities will just have to be disadvantaged in the meantime.

At least in the case of AA there are rules about it, it's in the open and a conscious decision and we can make a choice to stop it or change the rules if we no longer need it.

You can't have your cake and eat it too. Either the laws are enforced and the employers must hire minorities, or the laws are toothless and ineffective. You have to pick your poison here.

No its quite possible that the laws just require businesses to take appropriate steps to ensure theres no discrimination against minorities and that steps are taken to promote the hiring of minorities and when enforced have positive outcomes without forcing companies to hire minorities if they can't find suitable ones.

That should do it...

(Instead of fixing actual problems, energy is spent on BS, idiocy and covering up deep structural problems and symptoms while ignoring underlying trouble)