Author Topic: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?  (Read 204172 times)

steveo

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1050 on: March 27, 2019, 10:13:14 PM »
I'll try and break down something that is I think clearly obvious which makes me think that there is either a significant cognitive dissonance occurring, a lack of good faith in your arguments (which we can call emotional immaturity) or a lack of intelligence (emotional or plan intelligence). I don't think I have to do this because it's very clear but I'll do it anyway.

1. Racism is based upon assessing someone as inferior based upon their ethnic background. Racism is perpetuated by white people against non-white people.
2. If racism was a significant factor people of different ethnicity would not be able to succeed because racism is a significant factor in success.
3. We have accepted that people of all different ethnic backgrounds can be successful. We have examples of Chinese and Indian doctors now being more prevalent that white doctors and African immigrants also being highly successful.

These points clearly prove that racism is not a significant factor in success. That is it. The argument is over. You can state that racism has some impact but you can't state it is significant beacuse the facts prove this isn't the case.
« Last Edit: March 27, 2019, 10:16:22 PM by steveo »

arebelspy

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1051 on: March 27, 2019, 10:21:30 PM »
While I've never heard this "Joe Rogan" podcast, this article makes me think you'd violently agree with it, Anis & steveo.

https://slate.com/culture/2019/03/joe-rogans-podcast-is-an-essential-platform-for-freethinkers-who-hate-the-left.html

Enjoy
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arebelspy

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1052 on: March 27, 2019, 10:23:45 PM »


I'll try and break down something that is I think clearly obvious which makes me think that there is either a significant cognitive dissonance occurring, a lack of good faith in your arguments (which we can call emotional immaturity) or a lack of intelligence (emotional or plan intelligence). I don't think I have to do this because it's very clear but I'll do it anyway.

1. Racism is based upon assessing someone as inferior based upon their ethnic background. Racism is perpetuated by white people against non-white people.
2. If racism was a significant factor people of different ethnicity would not be able to succeed because racism is a significant factor in success.
3. We have accepted that people of all different ethnic backgrounds can be successful. We have examples of Chinese and Indian doctors now being more prevalent that white doctors and African immigrants also being highly successful.

These points clearly prove that racism is not a significant factor in success. That is it. The argument is over. You can state that racism has some impact but you can't state it is significant beacuse the facts prove this isn't the case.

I accept #3. I think both sentences of 1 are independently false, and 2 is false.

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steveo

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1053 on: March 28, 2019, 12:23:18 AM »


I'll try and break down something that is I think clearly obvious which makes me think that there is either a significant cognitive dissonance occurring, a lack of good faith in your arguments (which we can call emotional immaturity) or a lack of intelligence (emotional or plan intelligence). I don't think I have to do this because it's very clear but I'll do it anyway.

1. Racism is based upon assessing someone as inferior based upon their ethnic background. Racism is perpetuated by white people against non-white people.
2. If racism was a significant factor people of different ethnicity would not be able to succeed because racism is a significant factor in success.
3. We have accepted that people of all different ethnic backgrounds can be successful. We have examples of Chinese and Indian doctors now being more prevalent that white doctors and African immigrants also being highly successful.

These points clearly prove that racism is not a significant factor in success. That is it. The argument is over. You can state that racism has some impact but you can't state it is significant beacuse the facts prove this isn't the case.

I accept #3. I think both sentences of 1 are independently false, and 2 is false.

1 & 2 are clearly accurate. I'd give you 2 to a limited degree if I was speaking about the odd success but I'm not. Point 3 proves that point. I don't believe that therefore you are discussing this issue in good faith.

The main issue though and what makes this topic so difficult is because some of you have re-defined racism to make it meaningless. Please define racism to me. It has to be extremely different to my point above which is actually racism and therein lies the issue.

As a side topic I don't like, watch or listen to Joe Rogan's podcast because I think he suffers from fussy thinking and logic. I call it a bro science approach. There is a similarity though to the racism topic. Since some people on here have such a fussy and unclear definition of racism they can argue (extremely poorly) that racism is a significant factor. The problem is when you can't define the thing you are stating is significant the whole argument is meaningless. This is where we are currently at and there has been nothing stated that logically refutes this point.
« Last Edit: March 28, 2019, 01:18:35 AM by steveo »

anisotropy

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1054 on: March 28, 2019, 01:25:10 AM »

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Harder working, greater risk takers......so.... culture ?

Quote
So where does racism come in?

I'm not making an argument for the existence of racism. Let's put that aside for a moment. I'm refuting a specific argument you've made against the existence of racism.

Your position is that the average African immigrant is doing fine or at least much better than the average "homegrown American black". Therefore what's holding them back is not skin color but something about the culture of "homegrown American blacks". Is this correct?

My position is that immigrants are a self-selecting population. We have evidence that the average of this population is more successful than the average of the native population from which they came. Therefore, the fact that this population of black immigrants is more successful than the native black population in America doesn’t tell us anything at all. It’s entirely possible that racism exists and this population is more prepared to overcome it.

To put it more simply – you say culture is the only variable between these two populations and your conclusion is that it must be the culture. I say, here is another variable which confounds your conclusion. Do you dispute the variable of self-selection in the immigrant population?

I think we are not agreeing on what culture IS. To me, working hard, taking risk, is a manifestation of the underlying culture. When we look up specific culture, such as "Asian American Culture", we often see reports on how they emphasize greatly on education and well, tiger parenting, among other things. So no, I maintain these differences you brought up, ie, harder working, greater risk takers, those are cultural differences between the immigrants and the native population.

On the matter of being "more intelligent", while it is entirely possible immigrants are "smarter" in general than the native population, I would like to see studies before drawing any conclusion. I am sure you are aware, the native population usually gets a really bad rep for low scores, much lower than every other ethnic group and is often used as "proof" of how they are inherently inferior. I call BS on that.

You might be surprised but I for one do not believe, at all the low score is representative of their "intelligence". There are environment reasons to consider, for example, it is known the health of the mothers during natal period has a significant impact on the cognitive development through out children's lives.

It so happens that the babies of the native population are much more likely to be underweight (2x?) than the national average, suggesting mothers' relatively poor health during pregnancy. In addition, the native population also suffers from fetal alcohol syndrome at 4x the rate as the national average, indicating a substance abuse problems from the mothers during pregnancy. These two examples are but a few of a myriad of environmental issues that negatively impact the cognitive development of the native population. Therefore I don't think there is any definitive evidence to suggest the native population is less intelligent than the immigrants.


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Does anyone, anyone at all, believe any of these things?

Also interesting that every one of these claims contains an absolute: impossible, every, all, existence. I rarely trust any statement that contains such words.

LOL ok I will answer this on two levels.

Firstly within the CRT field. The answer is yes. Those are quotes from renowned CRT scholar, Robin DiAngelo. She's the one that popularized the idea of "white fragility".  Her work has probably been cited over 10000 times, not criticisms, but used as foundations for future CRT work.

I was not kidding when I said this is an extremely racist field of study, and it IS the ideology behind progressives' view on racial issues and social justice movements. Look it up. Which honestly, you should have done 3 pages ago, I would have.

You can understand the shock and horror I experienced when I encountered these absolute claims, and most CRT scholars believe them!

Secondly, I am sure you are aware there is a sizable group of people on this forum who loves to cast trump voters/supporters as white racists. They really do think that, in nearly every instance. And ya, we SHOULD be suspicious of such statements, but how many have done that?

oh btw bacchi, any response on the Marva Collins subject?
« Last Edit: March 28, 2019, 01:29:15 AM by anisotropy »

steveo

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1055 on: March 28, 2019, 01:32:02 AM »
Firstly within the CRT field. The answer is yes. Those are quotes from renowned CRT scholar, Robin DiAngelo. She's the one that popularized the idea of "white fragility".  Her work has probably been cited over 10000 times, not criticisms, but used as foundations for future CRT work.

I was not kidding when I said this is an extremely racist field of study, and it IS the ideology behind progressives' view on racial issues and social justice movements. Look it up. Which honestly, you should have done 3 pages ago, I would have.

You can understand the shock and horror I experienced when I encountered these absolute claims, and most CRT scholars believe them!

Secondly, I am sure you are aware there is a sizable group of people on this forum who loves to cast trump voters/supporters as white racists. They really do think that, in nearly every instance. And ya, we SHOULD be suspicious of such statements, but how many have done that?

There is a lot of truth here. I don't think that a lot of posters are aware of where their ideas have come from. I wasn't aware of this field until you mentioned it. I also think that this field is abhorrently racist. They should educate themselves on this topic because they are doing a terrible job at articulating their argument.

You are also correct on the name calling of Trump supporters racist. Personally I cannot understand why there aren't tighter gun controls in America. It amazes me. In stating that I don't think that all the people that are pro-gun rights are white racists. It's much better to look at issues in detail that to demonise someone based on who they vote for or their belief system within reason.

anisotropy

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1056 on: March 28, 2019, 01:46:24 AM »
Firstly within the CRT field. The answer is yes. Those are quotes from renowned CRT scholar, Robin DiAngelo. She's the one that popularized the idea of "white fragility".  Her work has probably been cited over 10000 times, not criticisms, but used as foundations for future CRT work.

I was not kidding when I said this is an extremely racist field of study, and it IS the ideology behind progressives' view on racial issues and social justice movements. Look it up. Which honestly, you should have done 3 pages ago, I would have.

You can understand the shock and horror I experienced when I encountered these absolute claims, and most CRT scholars believe them!

Secondly, I am sure you are aware there is a sizable group of people on this forum who loves to cast trump voters/supporters as white racists. They really do think that, in nearly every instance. And ya, we SHOULD be suspicious of such statements, but how many have done that?

There is a lot of truth here. I don't think that a lot of posters are aware of where their ideas have come from. I wasn't aware of this field until you mentioned it. I also think that this field is abhorrently racist. They should educate themselves on this topic because they are doing a terrible job at articulating their argument.

You are also correct on the name calling of Trump supporters racist. Personally I cannot understand why there aren't tighter gun controls in America. It amazes me. In stating that I don't think that all the people that are pro-gun rights are white racists. It's much better to look at issues in detail that to demonise someone based on who they vote for or their belief system within reason.

You know how Biden just said violence on women is due to white man's culture? That's yet another example of CRT's triumph. And you know what the sad part is? If somehow it was revealed to the people where their "social justice" ideas came from, majority of the supporters would still uphold them, despite its racist origin. They would be temporarily confused, and hesitate for a moment, but they would nonetheless not waver in their beliefs.

The scary part is the CRT is mandatory for teachers to take in their training, which are then grind up and put into the education system, much like how CDO brought down the financial system 10 years ago.

ps. @steveo  I believe their current definition of racism is it must be structural in nature against non-dominant groups (aka minority groups).

Now, you ready for their definition for minority groups? A group that has little or no access to social/econ/political/religious power. A minority does not have to be in the minority numerically. [in this garbage ideology, power is the prime directive]

LOL so this means, Jews, Asians are not part of the minority group. Neither are Mormons nor other smaller denomination of the christian faith, such as JHW, because Christian, as a whole (even though they dislike each other), holds power. You see how the game is played now? they make up all these bs arbitrary rules that change based on their own needs and demand everyone else to play by their rules.

Sometimes their own rules backfire and they end up eating their own. Case in point would be the current muslim protest against lgbt in the UK. Because this ideology (using intersecationality) ranks each groups oppression level based on its access to power, muslims (which has less power) than lgbt groups in the UK, is permitted to attack lgbt groups to "shame" and critique its existence and it's all "justified" ! LOL!

pps. I should add, they have another definition of racism, but it's not as popular. It is simply different treatment for different groups of people. Sounds benign and legit right? Nope, because it's essentially another way to state Equity for them.  Kendi asserts that, under this definition of racism, positions of power and wealth should be proportional to the population.  Namely, blacks should make up 13% of all ceos, legislators, judges, etc. In addition, this rule also applies to the negatives, ie, blacks should only make up 13% of all prison inmates (hence high incarceration rate is racist, pay no attention to the actual crime rate), people that are homeless, etc. Oh, this rule also applies to all awards and metals. Now do you see why they think meritocracy is racist?
« Last Edit: March 28, 2019, 03:12:14 AM by anisotropy »

Davnasty

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1057 on: March 28, 2019, 06:25:28 AM »
Does anyone, anyone at all, believe any of these things?

Also interesting that every one of these claims contains an absolute: impossible, every, all, existence. I rarely trust any statement that contains such words.

LOL ok I will answer this on two levels.

Sorry, I wasn't clear here. This was a question directed at other forum members participating in this conversation.

Davnasty

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1058 on: March 28, 2019, 07:28:43 AM »
Harder working, greater risk takers......so.... culture ?

This is what you said and I've already responded to it.

That's not culture. Culture is a collection of norms in a society. The top 10% of achievers and the bottom 10% have much of the same culture.

Quote
Quote
Quote
So where does racism come in?

I'm not making an argument for the existence of racism. Let's put that aside for a moment. I'm refuting a specific argument you've made against the existence of racism.

Your position is that the average African immigrant is doing fine or at least much better than the average "homegrown American black". Therefore what's holding them back is not skin color but something about the culture of "homegrown American blacks". Is this correct?

My position is that immigrants are a self-selecting population. We have evidence that the average of this population is more successful than the average of the native population from which they came. Therefore, the fact that this population of black immigrants is more successful than the native black population in America doesn’t tell us anything at all. It’s entirely possible that racism exists and this population is more prepared to overcome it.

To put it more simply – you say culture is the only variable between these two populations and your conclusion is that it must be the culture. I say, here is another variable which confounds your conclusion. Do you dispute the variable of self-selection in the immigrant population?

I think we are not agreeing on what culture IS. To me, working hard, taking risk, is a manifestation of the underlying culture. When we look up specific culture, such as "Asian American Culture", we often see reports on how they emphasize greatly on education and well, tiger parenting, among other things. So no, I maintain these differences you brought up, ie, harder working, greater risk takers, those are cultural differences between the immigrants and the native population.

While there is some truth that national or localized cultures may influence these traits, that's not what we're talking about with immigrants. Are you comparing immigrant culture to American black culture or African culture to American black culture. Because again, immigrants are a self selecting group. What you're trying to compare is an entire population with no selection bias (black people in America) against a self-selected population (immigrants from Africa).

If we were to take a random sampling of individuals from Ghana, do you think they would fare as well in America as the immigrants who actually come from Ghana?

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On the matter of being "more intelligent", while it is entirely possible immigrants are "smarter" in general than the native population, I would like to see studies before drawing any conclusion. I am sure you are aware, the native population usually gets a really bad rep for low scores, much lower than every other ethnic group and is often used as "proof" of how they are inherently inferior. I call BS on that.

You might be surprised but I for one do not believe, at all the low score is representative of their "intelligence". There are environment reasons to consider, for example, it is known the health of the mothers during natal period has a significant impact on the cognitive development through out children's lives.

It so happens that the babies of the native population are much more likely to be underweight (2x?) than the national average, suggesting mothers' relatively poor health during pregnancy. In addition, the native population also suffers from fetal alcohol syndrome at 4x the rate as the national average, indicating a substance abuse problems from the mothers during pregnancy. These two examples are but a few of a myriad of environmental issues that negatively impact the cognitive development of the native population. Therefore I don't think there is any definitive evidence to suggest the native population is less intelligent than the immigrants.

You just gave evidence of one thing and reached the opposite conclusion. impaired cognitive development = less intelligence.

If you wanted to see evidence you should have read the article I attached from the beginning. The flight of human capital is no secret.

https://www.latimes.com/world/africa/la-fg-global-african-immigrants-explainer-20180112-story.html

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Batalova’s research found that of the 1.4 million [immigrants from sub-Saharan Africa] who are 25 and older, 41% have a bachelor’s degree, compared with 30% of all immigrants and 32% of the U.S.-born population.

Aside from that, we don't need to prove that immigrants are different than natives. We know that immigrants are a self-selecting group. To compare them to a population that hasn't gone through the same selection bias is bad science, simple as that.
« Last Edit: March 28, 2019, 07:58:16 AM by Dabnasty »

arebelspy

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1059 on: March 28, 2019, 08:17:53 AM »
Does anyone, anyone at all, believe any of these things?

No. They're arguing against straw men.

I'm sure there are some radicals out there that believe what Anis is arguing against, but it certainly isn't the basis for most people's beliefs here about the issues related to racism.
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Watchmaker

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1060 on: March 28, 2019, 08:23:50 AM »
Okay, there's been too many new posts for me to reply to everything right now, but a few quick things:

Aside from that, we don't need to prove that immigrants are different than natives. We know that immigrants are a self-selecting group. To compare them to a population that hasn't gone through the same selection bias is bad science, simple as that.

Even more than that, there's an external selection process as well; US immigration rules are partially merit based. So not only are the people who wish to immigrate likely to be better educated and have more resources then their country in general, many of them have also been evaluated by the US to have exceptional skills or training (often in medicine, science or engineering).

Comparing immigrants to all native born black Americans is like taking a subgroup composed of scientists and comparing them to all Americans. The scientists will have, on average, significantly better outcomes, but we are not surprised by this.


2. If racism was a significant factor people of different ethnicity would not be able to succeed because racism is a significant factor in success.

This is clearly wrong to me, so I want to understand why it is clearly right to you. Perhaps part of the disagreement is that we're using the word "significantly" to mean different things.

To me, significant does not mean it's the dominant factor, a majority of the cause, or the largest single factor. It simply means it has a meaningful effect (not just in the noise). I'm hesitant to try to put a number of such a complex thing, but what the hey, it's what I do at work all day, so...

If I was asked to assign a magnitude to the effect of racism in America, I might say it is a -10% impact. What I mean by that is that a black person who ranks in the 90% percentile of some magical skill test would, on average, have an outcome similar to a white person at the 80% percentile.

So many caveats: I don't think these are testable or measurement numbers, I'm just trying to give an ideal of the scale I'm talking about. Don't get hung up on the 10%, I could have said some other number. The point I'm making is I'm not talking about 99%, 75% (or equally, 0.001%).

When you say "If racism was a significant factor people of different ethnicity would not be able to succeed" it makes me think you use significant to mean a dominating effect like 99%, 75%, etc and that's not what I'm saying.






 

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1061 on: March 28, 2019, 08:27:54 AM »
2. If racism was a significant factor people of different ethnicity would not be able to succeed because racism is a significant factor in success.

This is clearly wrong to me, so I want to understand why it is clearly right to you. Perhaps part of the disagreement is that we're using the word "significantly" to mean different things.

To me, significant does not mean it's the dominant factor, a majority of the cause, or the largest single factor. It simply means it has a meaningful effect (not just in the noise). I'm hesitant to try to put a number of such a complex thing, but what the hey, it's what I do at work all day, so...

If I was asked to assign a magnitude to the effect of racism in America, I might say it is a -10% impact. What I mean by that is that a black person who ranks in the 90% percentile of some magical skill test would, on average, have an outcome similar to a white person at the 80% percentile.

So many caveats: I don't think these are testable or measurement numbers, I'm just trying to give an ideal of the scale I'm talking about. Don't get hung up on the 10%, I could have said some other number. The point I'm making is I'm not talking about 99%, 75% (or equally, 0.001%).

When you say "If racism was a significant factor people of different ethnicity would not be able to succeed" it makes me think you use significant to mean a dominating effect like 99%, 75%, etc and that's not what I'm saying.

Yeah, this point has been mentioned multiple times.  Usually to deafening silence.

3) I stand by my statement that race does not matter as proven by every immigrants who learn to play the US game and become more successful than their white American counterparts.

The fact that some immigrants do as well or better than their white American counterparts does not prove that they are on an equal playing field.

That's like proving that drugs have no impact on athletic performance by comparing a stoned Michael Jordan playing basketball to a sober me.  Jordan will win because he's better.  That doesn't mean that we started on an equal playing field.

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1062 on: March 28, 2019, 09:20:05 AM »


1. Racism is based upon assessing someone as inferior based upon their ethnic background. Racism is perpetuated by white people against non-white people.
2. If racism was a significant factor people of different ethnicity would not be able to succeed because racism is a significant factor in success.
3. We have accepted that people of all different ethnic backgrounds can be successful. We have examples of Chinese and Indian doctors now being more prevalent that white doctors and African immigrants also being highly successful.

These points clearly prove that racism is not a significant factor in success. That is it. The argument is over. You can state that racism has some impact but you can't state it is significant beacuse the facts prove this isn't the case.

I accept #3. I think both sentences of 1 are independently false, and 2 is false.

1 & 2 are clearly accurate. I'd give you 2 to a limited degree if I was speaking about the odd success but I'm not. Point 3 proves that point.

1 & 2 are clearly not accurate. I'd give you 1a until I hear why ars thinks it's not true. Point 3 doesn't prove the point because 1 & 2 are inaccurate.

Look, dude, if someone doesn't agree with the assumptions of your claim, you can't use those assumptions anymore.


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I'll try and break down something that is I think clearly obvious which makes me think that there is either a significant cognitive dissonance occurring, a lack of good faith in your arguments (which we can call emotional immaturity) or a lack of intelligence (emotional or plan intelligence). I don't think I have to do this because it's very clear but I'll do it anyway.

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Since some people on here have such a fussy and unclear definition of racism they can argue (extremely poorly) that racism is a significant factor.

I'm curious. Does this negging strategy actually work? Do people actually back off and claim "You're right. I'm stupid and I argue poorly!" simply because you (repeatedly, over and over, again and again) state that it's true. Or maybe it's not deliberate and it's just how you argue?
« Last Edit: March 28, 2019, 09:57:17 AM by bacchi »

arebelspy

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1063 on: March 28, 2019, 03:34:15 PM »


1. Racism is based upon assessing someone as inferior based upon their ethnic background. Racism is perpetuated by white people against non-white people.
2. If racism was a significant factor people of different ethnicity would not be able to succeed because racism is a significant factor in success.
3. We have accepted that people of all different ethnic backgrounds can be successful. We have examples of Chinese and Indian doctors now being more prevalent that white doctors and African immigrants also being highly successful.

These points clearly prove that racism is not a significant factor in success. That is it. The argument is over. You can state that racism has some impact but you can't state it is significant beacuse the facts prove this isn't the case.

I accept #3. I think both sentences of 1 are independently false, and 2 is false.

1 & 2 are clearly accurate. I'd give you 2 to a limited degree if I was speaking about the odd success but I'm not. Point 3 proves that point.

1 & 2 are clearly not accurate. I'd give you 1a until I hear why ars thinks it's not true.

Not all racism is based on assessing someone as inferior. Can you think of an example of someone not necessarily thinking someone is inferior based on their ethnicity but still being racist? That counter example proves 1a false.
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runbikerun

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1064 on: March 29, 2019, 02:21:08 AM »
Point 2 is an absolute masterpiece of wrongness. It's the kind of argument I hoped I'd get from opponents when I debated in college.

10k races regularly have a woman finish inside the top 2-3% of finishers, and yet we have no difficulty understanding that gender has a major impact on running performance.

Still, though, I'm sure steveo will tell me I'm unable to grasp the core of his argument.
« Last Edit: March 29, 2019, 02:24:22 AM by runbikerun »

FrugalToque

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1065 on: March 29, 2019, 06:36:00 AM »
1. Racism is based upon assessing someone as inferior based upon their ethnic background. Racism is perpetuated by white people against non-white people.
In our society, sure.
Quote
2. If racism was a significant factor people of different ethnicity would not be able to succeed because racism is a significant factor in success.
No.
That's ridiculous.
Otherwise, every red-pilling, MGTOW jackass could shut the hell up because white men succeed sometimes.
What you're saying there is completely illogical.

What?  Because one dark-skinned person becomes president, we're supposed to pretend this society isn't full of red-lining, police beating and unfair administration of laws?  Even though just a couple of years ago, the Supreme Court got rid of a law that protects black voters in certain states from Jim Crow voting laws?

Oh, right.  Asians are disproportionately represented in the medical professions -> therefore racism is dead and gone.

No. No and No.  Racism can exist in spite of the fact that, occasionally, in certain areas, people of colour still manage to work out a living.

Toque.

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1066 on: March 30, 2019, 12:57:28 PM »
+1 to the comment above that just because a few POC succeed doesn't mean racism has been defeated.

Some white people are intentionally racist dicks and others are just thoughtlessly so. It's important for us all to continue working on calling out racist attitudes when we see/hear them and also challenging ourselves to be better, less racist humans.

But white people have zero claim to being the world's only racists. Given the opportunity, POC are just as fucking bad. Racism isn't as one sided as people like Robin Diangelo would have us believe. She literally claims that "people of color cannot be racist." Even if they exhibit the same. exact. behavior. as white racists, they are just "biased." wtf

In 2017, shortly after a story had come out about a racist Airbnb hostess in California who had refused to rent to an Asian American guest, I tried to book an apartment for my family in Beijing through Airbnb. After using Google Translate to read descriptions and reviews of a bunch of different places in the part of the city where we wanted to stay, I booked an apartment that looked good and had good reviews.

Shortly after I booked and paid for an ~3 week stay, the host messaged me in Mandarin through the Airbnb app and asked, "Are you a foreigner?" After using Google Translate to read the host's message, I wrote back in English and confirmed that, yes, I was a "foreigner," and that my family and I were looking forward to meeting the host and staying in his apartment in Beijing. Immediately, the host wrote back in Mandarin and said, "Sorry, but we don't rent to foreigners. It's just too much trouble for us to have to deal with foreigners staying at our apartment. Foreigners don't speak Chinese and they don't understand how to register themselves with the police, etc., so, sorry. Please cancel your reservation..." lol

After writing to Airbnb to ask what to do, within a day I heard back from some senior person who apologized profusely for "the ordeal" the Chinese host had put us through. I laughed out loud when Airbnb gave us a $200 credit to compensate for the "trauma" of being turned down because of our race. Whatever. According to a friend who has lived in China for most of the past 20 years, that type of experience is completely normal there. Our friend said he gave up trying to book places through Airbnb, because every time he booked a place, once the host found out he was a foreigner, the host would cancel on him, sometimes at the last minute.

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1067 on: March 30, 2019, 04:10:42 PM »
+1 to the comment above that just because a few POC succeed doesn't mean racism has been defeated.

Some white people are intentionally racist dicks and others are just thoughtlessly so. It's important for us all to continue working on calling out racist attitudes when we see/hear them and also challenging ourselves to be better, less racist humans.

But white people have zero claim to being the world's only racists. Given the opportunity, POC are just as fucking bad. Racism isn't as one sided as people like Robin Diangelo would have us believe. She literally claims that "people of color cannot be racist." Even if they exhibit the same. exact. behavior. as white racists, they are just "biased." wtf

In 2017, shortly after a story had come out about a racist Airbnb hostess in California who had refused to rent to an Asian American guest, I tried to book an apartment for my family in Beijing through Airbnb. After using Google Translate to read descriptions and reviews of a bunch of different places in the part of the city where we wanted to stay, I booked an apartment that looked good and had good reviews.

Shortly after I booked and paid for an ~3 week stay, the host messaged me in Mandarin through the Airbnb app and asked, "Are you a foreigner?" After using Google Translate to read the host's message, I wrote back in English and confirmed that, yes, I was a "foreigner," and that my family and I were looking forward to meeting the host and staying in his apartment in Beijing. Immediately, the host wrote back in Mandarin and said, "Sorry, but we don't rent to foreigners. It's just too much trouble for us to have to deal with foreigners staying at our apartment. Foreigners don't speak Chinese and they don't understand how to register themselves with the police, etc., so, sorry. Please cancel your reservation..." lol

After writing to Airbnb to ask what to do, within a day I heard back from some senior person who apologized profusely for "the ordeal" the Chinese host had put us through. I laughed out loud when Airbnb gave us a $200 credit to compensate for the "trauma" of being turned down because of our race. Whatever. According to a friend who has lived in China for most of the past 20 years, that type of experience is completely normal there. Our friend said he gave up trying to book places through Airbnb, because every time he booked a place, once the host found out he was a foreigner, the host would cancel on him, sometimes at the last minute.

That's pretty shitty they wouldn't rent to you but nationality /= race. They had issues with your dialect, not a physical trait like your skin color.

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1068 on: March 31, 2019, 07:49:52 AM »
+1 to the comment above that just because a few POC succeed doesn't mean racism has been defeated.

Some white people are intentionally racist dicks and others are just thoughtlessly so. It's important for us all to continue working on calling out racist attitudes when we see/hear them and also challenging ourselves to be better, less racist humans.

But white people have zero claim to being the world's only racists. Given the opportunity, POC are just as fucking bad. Racism isn't as one sided as people like Robin Diangelo would have us believe. She literally claims that "people of color cannot be racist." Even if they exhibit the same. exact. behavior. as white racists, they are just "biased." wtf

In 2017, shortly after a story had come out about a racist Airbnb hostess in California who had refused to rent to an Asian American guest, I tried to book an apartment for my family in Beijing through Airbnb. After using Google Translate to read descriptions and reviews of a bunch of different places in the part of the city where we wanted to stay, I booked an apartment that looked good and had good reviews.

Shortly after I booked and paid for an ~3 week stay, the host messaged me in Mandarin through the Airbnb app and asked, "Are you a foreigner?" After using Google Translate to read the host's message, I wrote back in English and confirmed that, yes, I was a "foreigner," and that my family and I were looking forward to meeting the host and staying in his apartment in Beijing. Immediately, the host wrote back in Mandarin and said, "Sorry, but we don't rent to foreigners. It's just too much trouble for us to have to deal with foreigners staying at our apartment. Foreigners don't speak Chinese and they don't understand how to register themselves with the police, etc., so, sorry. Please cancel your reservation..." lol

After writing to Airbnb to ask what to do, within a day I heard back from some senior person who apologized profusely for "the ordeal" the Chinese host had put us through. I laughed out loud when Airbnb gave us a $200 credit to compensate for the "trauma" of being turned down because of our race. Whatever. According to a friend who has lived in China for most of the past 20 years, that type of experience is completely normal there. Our friend said he gave up trying to book places through Airbnb, because every time he booked a place, once the host found out he was a foreigner, the host would cancel on him, sometimes at the last minute.

That's pretty shitty they wouldn't rent to you but nationality /= race. They had issues with your dialect, not a physical trait like your skin color.

There is lots of discrimination in the world  that is based on things other than skin colour.  Gender identification, language, ethnicity.  Some gets lumped under racism, some doesn't.  It's still discrimination based on some common but meaningless distinction.

MasterStache

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1069 on: March 31, 2019, 08:13:27 AM »
+1 to the comment above that just because a few POC succeed doesn't mean racism has been defeated.

Some white people are intentionally racist dicks and others are just thoughtlessly so. It's important for us all to continue working on calling out racist attitudes when we see/hear them and also challenging ourselves to be better, less racist humans.

But white people have zero claim to being the world's only racists. Given the opportunity, POC are just as fucking bad. Racism isn't as one sided as people like Robin Diangelo would have us believe. She literally claims that "people of color cannot be racist." Even if they exhibit the same. exact. behavior. as white racists, they are just "biased." wtf

In 2017, shortly after a story had come out about a racist Airbnb hostess in California who had refused to rent to an Asian American guest, I tried to book an apartment for my family in Beijing through Airbnb. After using Google Translate to read descriptions and reviews of a bunch of different places in the part of the city where we wanted to stay, I booked an apartment that looked good and had good reviews.

Shortly after I booked and paid for an ~3 week stay, the host messaged me in Mandarin through the Airbnb app and asked, "Are you a foreigner?" After using Google Translate to read the host's message, I wrote back in English and confirmed that, yes, I was a "foreigner," and that my family and I were looking forward to meeting the host and staying in his apartment in Beijing. Immediately, the host wrote back in Mandarin and said, "Sorry, but we don't rent to foreigners. It's just too much trouble for us to have to deal with foreigners staying at our apartment. Foreigners don't speak Chinese and they don't understand how to register themselves with the police, etc., so, sorry. Please cancel your reservation..." lol

After writing to Airbnb to ask what to do, within a day I heard back from some senior person who apologized profusely for "the ordeal" the Chinese host had put us through. I laughed out loud when Airbnb gave us a $200 credit to compensate for the "trauma" of being turned down because of our race. Whatever. According to a friend who has lived in China for most of the past 20 years, that type of experience is completely normal there. Our friend said he gave up trying to book places through Airbnb, because every time he booked a place, once the host found out he was a foreigner, the host would cancel on him, sometimes at the last minute.

That's pretty shitty they wouldn't rent to you but nationality /= race. They had issues with your dialect, not a physical trait like your skin color.

There is lots of discrimination in the world  that is based on things other than skin colour.  Gender identification, language, ethnicity.  Some gets lumped under racism, some doesn't.  It's still discrimination based on some common but meaningless distinction.

Sure. But again linguistic discrimination isn't racial discrimination. Seems like the owners would be better served simply asking if the renters are fluent in Chinese rather than asking what country they are from. No doubt there are many Americans fluent in Chinese.

arebelspy

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1070 on: March 31, 2019, 10:41:21 AM »
Sure. But again linguistic discrimination isn't racial discrimination. Seems like the owners would be better served simply asking if the renters are fluent in Chinese rather than asking what country they are from. No doubt there are many Americans fluent in Chinese.

They sure would. Linguistic discrimination would serve their purposes better, but instead they fall back to assumptions and racial discrimination.
I am a former teacher who accumulated a bunch of real estate, retired at 29, spent some time traveling the world full time and am now settled with three kids.
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MasterStache

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1071 on: April 01, 2019, 06:15:49 AM »
Sure. But again linguistic discrimination isn't racial discrimination. Seems like the owners would be better served simply asking if the renters are fluent in Chinese rather than asking what country they are from. No doubt there are many Americans fluent in Chinese.

They sure would. Linguistic discrimination would serve their purposes better, but instead they fall back to assumptions and racial discrimination.

https://www.legalmatch.com/law-library/article/race-and-nationality-discrimination-lawyers.html
« Last Edit: April 01, 2019, 06:20:28 AM by MasterStache »

arebelspy

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1072 on: April 01, 2019, 07:55:28 AM »
Yep. You want to bet they look at someone's name/pictures to ask about that? You think if someone's last name and photos are Chinese, they're okay with them?

Lots of times people use racist assumptions and default to using race as a proxy for what they're actually looking for.

E.g. in housing. They may want good tenants who pay their bills. One way to get this would be use credit scores (which correlate with people paying their debts). Instead, a lazy landlord might make assumptions about a person who pays their debts based on their skin color and use race as a proxy for what they're actually looking for, and end up being racist.
I am a former teacher who accumulated a bunch of real estate, retired at 29, spent some time traveling the world full time and am now settled with three kids.
If you want to know more about me, this Business Insider profile tells the story pretty well.
I (rarely) blog at AdventuringAlong.com. Check out the Now page to see what I'm up to currently.

GuitarStv

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1073 on: April 01, 2019, 08:04:18 AM »
Yep. You want to bet they look at someone's name/pictures to ask about that? You think if someone's last name and photos are Chinese, they're okay with them?

Lots of times people use racist assumptions and default to using race as a proxy for what they're actually looking for.

E.g. in housing. They may want good tenants who pay their bills. One way to get this would be use credit scores (which correlate with people paying their debts). Instead, a lazy landlord might make assumptions about a person who pays their debts based on their skin color and use race as a proxy for what they're actually looking for, and end up being racist.

And that landlord might later be elected president of the United States.  :P

jinga nation

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1074 on: April 01, 2019, 10:32:44 AM »
The end of religion is the only solution for this conflict.

This kills me. Okay - let's go out and exterminate all those religious people.

Don't get me wrong I have an aversion to lots of aspects of religion. Religion offers no consolation to me at all. People though have the right to believe what they want to believe and you can't eradicate it. That is wrong.
I didn't say to kill anyone religious. End of religion /= exterminating religious people.
If no religion, can't have faith-based conflicts and wars raging for millennia.
Or at least get rid of state-sponsored religious activities, domestic and foreign. Absolute separation of religion/church and state.

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1075 on: April 01, 2019, 10:34:28 AM »
The end of religion is the only solution for this conflict.

This kills me. Okay - let's go out and exterminate all those religious people.

Don't get me wrong I have an aversion to lots of aspects of religion. Religion offers no consolation to me at all. People though have the right to believe what they want to believe and you can't eradicate it. That is wrong.
I didn't say to kill anyone religious. End of religion /= exterminating religious people.
If no religion, can't have faith-based conflicts and wars raging for millennia.
Or at least get rid of state-sponsored religious activities, domestic and foreign. Absolute separation of religion/church and state.

I find it amazing that someone would draw that conclusion from your statement.

A perfect example of emotional and illogical thinking.

Shane

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1076 on: April 01, 2019, 10:57:47 AM »
+1 to the comment above that just because a few POC succeed doesn't mean racism has been defeated.

Some white people are intentionally racist dicks and others are just thoughtlessly so. It's important for us all to continue working on calling out racist attitudes when we see/hear them and also challenging ourselves to be better, less racist humans.

But white people have zero claim to being the world's only racists. Given the opportunity, POC are just as fucking bad. Racism isn't as one sided as people like Robin Diangelo would have us believe. She literally claims that "people of color cannot be racist." Even if they exhibit the same. exact. behavior. as white racists, they are just "biased." wtf

In 2017, shortly after a story had come out about a racist Airbnb hostess in California who had refused to rent to an Asian American guest, I tried to book an apartment for my family in Beijing through Airbnb. After using Google Translate to read descriptions and reviews of a bunch of different places in the part of the city where we wanted to stay, I booked an apartment that looked good and had good reviews.

Shortly after I booked and paid for an ~3 week stay, the host messaged me in Mandarin through the Airbnb app and asked, "Are you a foreigner?" After using Google Translate to read the host's message, I wrote back in English and confirmed that, yes, I was a "foreigner," and that my family and I were looking forward to meeting the host and staying in his apartment in Beijing. Immediately, the host wrote back in Mandarin and said, "Sorry, but we don't rent to foreigners. It's just too much trouble for us to have to deal with foreigners staying at our apartment. Foreigners don't speak Chinese and they don't understand how to register themselves with the police, etc., so, sorry. Please cancel your reservation..." lol

After writing to Airbnb to ask what to do, within a day I heard back from some senior person who apologized profusely for "the ordeal" the Chinese host had put us through. I laughed out loud when Airbnb gave us a $200 credit to compensate for the "trauma" of being turned down because of our race. Whatever. According to a friend who has lived in China for most of the past 20 years, that type of experience is completely normal there. Our friend said he gave up trying to book places through Airbnb, because every time he booked a place, once the host found out he was a foreigner, the host would cancel on him, sometimes at the last minute.

That's pretty shitty they wouldn't rent to you but nationality /= race. They had issues with your dialect, not a physical trait like your skin color.

There is lots of discrimination in the world  that is based on things other than skin colour.  Gender identification, language, ethnicity.  Some gets lumped under racism, some doesn't.  It's still discrimination based on some common but meaningless distinction.

Sure. But again linguistic discrimination isn't racial discrimination. Seems like the owners would be better served simply asking if the renters are fluent in Chinese rather than asking what country they are from. No doubt there are many Americans fluent in Chinese.

Since I don't know the Beijing Airbnb host personally, it's hard to say for sure exactly why he rejected us, but my guess is our lack of fluency in Mandarin was less important than the fact that we were not Chinese nationals. Some Chinese people don't speak Mandarin well, but everyone knows the procedure for registering with the police when they go to a new place, so the Airbnb host doesn't have to help them. At other Airbnb units where we stayed in China, the host sent someone who spoke a little English to meet us and accompany us to the local police station to register. Some Airbnb hosts just let us stay in their apartments without registering. The Beijing police appeared to be especially strict, and this guy just didn't want to deal with having to hold foreigners' hands to help us get registered. But if all the host cared about was whether or not we could register ourselves at the local police station without his help, he could've just asked if we knew how to do that. We would've been fine going to the police station on our own. Google Translate makes things like that relatively easy. The host could've called ahead to let the police know we would be coming in at a particular time to register, and then we could've just shown up at the police station with our passports.

Just imagine the uproar in the US if an Airbnb host or any landlord required that guests speak English fluently in order to stay in his apartment(s)...

jinga nation

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1077 on: April 01, 2019, 11:01:04 AM »
The end of religion is the only solution for this conflict.

This kills me. Okay - let's go out and exterminate all those religious people.

Don't get me wrong I have an aversion to lots of aspects of religion. Religion offers no consolation to me at all. People though have the right to believe what they want to believe and you can't eradicate it. That is wrong.
I didn't say to kill anyone religious. End of religion /= exterminating religious people.
If no religion, can't have faith-based conflicts and wars raging for millennia.
Or at least get rid of state-sponsored religious activities, domestic and foreign. Absolute separation of religion/church and state.

I find it amazing that someone would draw that conclusion from your statement.

A perfect example of emotional and illogical thinking.
And to make it clear, i'm a real financial conservative unlike those self-proclaimed conservatives in the US Congress and WH. Most of those asswipes are even socially conservative even though they like to boast, just check their closets.
I don't need to pander to Russia, Israel, <insert country name>, PACs, special interest groups or lobbyists to make a living. LBYM and deploy your little green army. 'Murica!

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1078 on: April 01, 2019, 11:08:42 AM »
+1 to the comment above that just because a few POC succeed doesn't mean racism has been defeated.

Some white people are intentionally racist dicks and others are just thoughtlessly so. It's important for us all to continue working on calling out racist attitudes when we see/hear them and also challenging ourselves to be better, less racist humans.

But white people have zero claim to being the world's only racists. Given the opportunity, POC are just as fucking bad. Racism isn't as one sided as people like Robin Diangelo would have us believe. She literally claims that "people of color cannot be racist." Even if they exhibit the same. exact. behavior. as white racists, they are just "biased." wtf

In 2017, shortly after a story had come out about a racist Airbnb hostess in California who had refused to rent to an Asian American guest, I tried to book an apartment for my family in Beijing through Airbnb. After using Google Translate to read descriptions and reviews of a bunch of different places in the part of the city where we wanted to stay, I booked an apartment that looked good and had good reviews.

Shortly after I booked and paid for an ~3 week stay, the host messaged me in Mandarin through the Airbnb app and asked, "Are you a foreigner?" After using Google Translate to read the host's message, I wrote back in English and confirmed that, yes, I was a "foreigner," and that my family and I were looking forward to meeting the host and staying in his apartment in Beijing. Immediately, the host wrote back in Mandarin and said, "Sorry, but we don't rent to foreigners. It's just too much trouble for us to have to deal with foreigners staying at our apartment. Foreigners don't speak Chinese and they don't understand how to register themselves with the police, etc., so, sorry. Please cancel your reservation..." lol

After writing to Airbnb to ask what to do, within a day I heard back from some senior person who apologized profusely for "the ordeal" the Chinese host had put us through. I laughed out loud when Airbnb gave us a $200 credit to compensate for the "trauma" of being turned down because of our race. Whatever. According to a friend who has lived in China for most of the past 20 years, that type of experience is completely normal there. Our friend said he gave up trying to book places through Airbnb, because every time he booked a place, once the host found out he was a foreigner, the host would cancel on him, sometimes at the last minute.

That's pretty shitty they wouldn't rent to you but nationality /= race. They had issues with your dialect, not a physical trait like your skin color.

There is lots of discrimination in the world  that is based on things other than skin colour.  Gender identification, language, ethnicity.  Some gets lumped under racism, some doesn't.  It's still discrimination based on some common but meaningless distinction.

Sure. But again linguistic discrimination isn't racial discrimination. Seems like the owners would be better served simply asking if the renters are fluent in Chinese rather than asking what country they are from. No doubt there are many Americans fluent in Chinese.

Since I don't know the Beijing Airbnb host personally, it's hard to say for sure exactly why he rejected us, but my guess is our lack of fluency in Mandarin was less important than the fact that we were not Chinese nationals. Some Chinese people don't speak Mandarin well, but everyone knows the procedure for registering with the police when they go to a new place, so the Airbnb host doesn't have to help them. At other Airbnb units where we stayed in China, the host sent someone who spoke a little English to meet us and accompany us to the local police station to register. Some Airbnb hosts just let us stay in their apartments without registering. The Beijing police appeared to be especially strict, and this guy just didn't want to deal with having to hold foreigners' hands to help us get registered. But if all the host cared about was whether or not we could register ourselves at the local police station without his help, he could've just asked if we knew how to do that. We would've been fine going to the police station on our own. Google Translate makes things like that relatively easy. The host could've called ahead to let the police know we would be coming in at a particular time to register, and then we could've just shown up at the police station with our passports.

Just imagine the uproar in the US if an Airbnb host or any landlord required that guests speak English fluently in order to stay in his apartment(s)...

Right.

That uproar you mention is a good thing . . . because as evidenced, given the chance to many people tend prefer racism.  We have tribal instincts that are hard to ignore sometimes.  The US is a great place when compared to China in that regard.  It's important not to see that difference and say 'meh, good enough' when faced with the discrimination and racism that does occur daily though.

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1079 on: April 01, 2019, 02:30:22 PM »
Yep. You want to bet they look at someone's name/pictures to ask about that? You think if someone's last name and photos are Chinese, they're okay with them?

Lots of times people use racist assumptions and default to using race as a proxy for what they're actually looking for.

E.g. in housing. They may want good tenants who pay their bills. One way to get this would be use credit scores (which correlate with people paying their debts). Instead, a lazy landlord might make assumptions about a person who pays their debts based on their skin color and use race as a proxy for what they're actually looking for, and end up being racist.

Sure, I was just going by what information the OP provided. Asking about weather someone is a foreigner certainly could preclude actual American-born Chinese persons. If the renter asked to see a picture and then they were denied, racism would certainly come into play.

MasterStache

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1080 on: April 01, 2019, 02:34:39 PM »
+1 to the comment above that just because a few POC succeed doesn't mean racism has been defeated.

Some white people are intentionally racist dicks and others are just thoughtlessly so. It's important for us all to continue working on calling out racist attitudes when we see/hear them and also challenging ourselves to be better, less racist humans.

But white people have zero claim to being the world's only racists. Given the opportunity, POC are just as fucking bad. Racism isn't as one sided as people like Robin Diangelo would have us believe. She literally claims that "people of color cannot be racist." Even if they exhibit the same. exact. behavior. as white racists, they are just "biased." wtf

In 2017, shortly after a story had come out about a racist Airbnb hostess in California who had refused to rent to an Asian American guest, I tried to book an apartment for my family in Beijing through Airbnb. After using Google Translate to read descriptions and reviews of a bunch of different places in the part of the city where we wanted to stay, I booked an apartment that looked good and had good reviews.

Shortly after I booked and paid for an ~3 week stay, the host messaged me in Mandarin through the Airbnb app and asked, "Are you a foreigner?" After using Google Translate to read the host's message, I wrote back in English and confirmed that, yes, I was a "foreigner," and that my family and I were looking forward to meeting the host and staying in his apartment in Beijing. Immediately, the host wrote back in Mandarin and said, "Sorry, but we don't rent to foreigners. It's just too much trouble for us to have to deal with foreigners staying at our apartment. Foreigners don't speak Chinese and they don't understand how to register themselves with the police, etc., so, sorry. Please cancel your reservation..." lol

After writing to Airbnb to ask what to do, within a day I heard back from some senior person who apologized profusely for "the ordeal" the Chinese host had put us through. I laughed out loud when Airbnb gave us a $200 credit to compensate for the "trauma" of being turned down because of our race. Whatever. According to a friend who has lived in China for most of the past 20 years, that type of experience is completely normal there. Our friend said he gave up trying to book places through Airbnb, because every time he booked a place, once the host found out he was a foreigner, the host would cancel on him, sometimes at the last minute.

That's pretty shitty they wouldn't rent to you but nationality /= race. They had issues with your dialect, not a physical trait like your skin color.

There is lots of discrimination in the world  that is based on things other than skin colour.  Gender identification, language, ethnicity.  Some gets lumped under racism, some doesn't.  It's still discrimination based on some common but meaningless distinction.

Sure. But again linguistic discrimination isn't racial discrimination. Seems like the owners would be better served simply asking if the renters are fluent in Chinese rather than asking what country they are from. No doubt there are many Americans fluent in Chinese.

Since I don't know the Beijing Airbnb host personally, it's hard to say for sure exactly why he rejected us, but my guess is our lack of fluency in Mandarin was less important than the fact that we were not Chinese nationals. Some Chinese people don't speak Mandarin well, but everyone knows the procedure for registering with the police when they go to a new place, so the Airbnb host doesn't have to help them. At other Airbnb units where we stayed in China, the host sent someone who spoke a little English to meet us and accompany us to the local police station to register. Some Airbnb hosts just let us stay in their apartments without registering. The Beijing police appeared to be especially strict, and this guy just didn't want to deal with having to hold foreigners' hands to help us get registered. But if all the host cared about was whether or not we could register ourselves at the local police station without his help, he could've just asked if we knew how to do that. We would've been fine going to the police station on our own. Google Translate makes things like that relatively easy. The host could've called ahead to let the police know we would be coming in at a particular time to register, and then we could've just shown up at the police station with our passports.

Just imagine the uproar in the US if an Airbnb host or any landlord required that guests speak English fluently in order to stay in his apartment(s)...

Yeah whole thing is a little awkward. I mean they ruled you out assuming you didn't speak mandarin because you were a foreigner. I am sure not being a Chinese national had more to do with it. There are a handful of countries outside of China where mandarin is the main language. I would be surprised if they refused to rent to those folks. Seems like some shady business practices. I wouldn't feel bad about not giving them my money.

Bloop Bloop

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1081 on: April 01, 2019, 10:25:49 PM »
On a related note, I wish that we had more immigration. Immigrants are so freakin' hard working and successful - both at the top (the doctors and lawyers) and the bottom (the janitors and 7/11 workers) of the totem pole. The more migrants we import, the more productive we come, the higher our profits and the more meritocratic society becomes. And also, more integration = hopefully more multiculturalism and less entrenched racial stereotypes.

GuitarStv

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1082 on: April 02, 2019, 07:02:12 AM »
I'm not sure that your plan of depending on a racial stereotype as an immigration pro will result in less entrenched racial stereotyping.  :P

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1083 on: April 02, 2019, 08:58:28 AM »
+1 to the comment above that just because a few POC succeed doesn't mean racism has been defeated.

Some white people are intentionally racist dicks and others are just thoughtlessly so. It's important for us all to continue working on calling out racist attitudes when we see/hear them and also challenging ourselves to be better, less racist humans.

But white people have zero claim to being the world's only racists. Given the opportunity, POC are just as fucking bad. Racism isn't as one sided as people like Robin Diangelo would have us believe. She literally claims that "people of color cannot be racist." Even if they exhibit the same. exact. behavior. as white racists, they are just "biased." wtf

In 2017, shortly after a story had come out about a racist Airbnb hostess in California who had refused to rent to an Asian American guest, I tried to book an apartment for my family in Beijing through Airbnb. After using Google Translate to read descriptions and reviews of a bunch of different places in the part of the city where we wanted to stay, I booked an apartment that looked good and had good reviews.

Shortly after I booked and paid for an ~3 week stay, the host messaged me in Mandarin through the Airbnb app and asked, "Are you a foreigner?" After using Google Translate to read the host's message, I wrote back in English and confirmed that, yes, I was a "foreigner," and that my family and I were looking forward to meeting the host and staying in his apartment in Beijing. Immediately, the host wrote back in Mandarin and said, "Sorry, but we don't rent to foreigners. It's just too much trouble for us to have to deal with foreigners staying at our apartment. Foreigners don't speak Chinese and they don't understand how to register themselves with the police, etc., so, sorry. Please cancel your reservation..." lol

After writing to Airbnb to ask what to do, within a day I heard back from some senior person who apologized profusely for "the ordeal" the Chinese host had put us through. I laughed out loud when Airbnb gave us a $200 credit to compensate for the "trauma" of being turned down because of our race. Whatever. According to a friend who has lived in China for most of the past 20 years, that type of experience is completely normal there. Our friend said he gave up trying to book places through Airbnb, because every time he booked a place, once the host found out he was a foreigner, the host would cancel on him, sometimes at the last minute.

That's pretty shitty they wouldn't rent to you but nationality /= race. They had issues with your dialect, not a physical trait like your skin color.

There is lots of discrimination in the world  that is based on things other than skin colour.  Gender identification, language, ethnicity.  Some gets lumped under racism, some doesn't.  It's still discrimination based on some common but meaningless distinction.

Sure. But again linguistic discrimination isn't racial discrimination. Seems like the owners would be better served simply asking if the renters are fluent in Chinese rather than asking what country they are from. No doubt there are many Americans fluent in Chinese.

Since I don't know the Beijing Airbnb host personally, it's hard to say for sure exactly why he rejected us, but my guess is our lack of fluency in Mandarin was less important than the fact that we were not Chinese nationals. Some Chinese people don't speak Mandarin well, but everyone knows the procedure for registering with the police when they go to a new place, so the Airbnb host doesn't have to help them. At other Airbnb units where we stayed in China, the host sent someone who spoke a little English to meet us and accompany us to the local police station to register. Some Airbnb hosts just let us stay in their apartments without registering. The Beijing police appeared to be especially strict, and this guy just didn't want to deal with having to hold foreigners' hands to help us get registered. But if all the host cared about was whether or not we could register ourselves at the local police station without his help, he could've just asked if we knew how to do that. We would've been fine going to the police station on our own. Google Translate makes things like that relatively easy. The host could've called ahead to let the police know we would be coming in at a particular time to register, and then we could've just shown up at the police station with our passports.

Just imagine the uproar in the US if an Airbnb host or any landlord required that guests speak English fluently in order to stay in his apartment(s)...

Right.

That uproar you mention is a good thing . . . because as evidenced, given the chance to many people tend prefer racism.  We have tribal instincts that are hard to ignore sometimes.  The US is a great place when compared to China in that regard.  It's important not to see that difference and say 'meh, good enough' when faced with the discrimination and racism that does occur daily though.
Agreed, Steve. Compared to people in many other parts of the world, most educated Americans are much less (blatantly) racist. I also agree with your last comment about tribal instincts. You realize, though, that what you're saying is hugely controversial to some people? Currently, I'm reading an interesting book by Harvard professor, Steven Pinker, called Blank Slate. It's about Pinker's claim that some of human nature is hard wired into us. You wouldn't think that would be a controversial stance, but apparently it is...

Bloop Bloop

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1084 on: April 02, 2019, 09:04:17 AM »
I'm not sure that your plan of depending on a racial stereotype as an immigration pro will result in less entrenched racial stereotyping.  :P

Saying that migrants are hard working is not a racial stereotype. It is a fact. When you have to be the cream of the crop from your home country to make it over here, you are statistically likely to be more talented and productive. I'd love to have more cream of the crop migrants here so that we can be a more efficient and productive society.

Shane

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1085 on: April 02, 2019, 09:54:51 AM »
I'm not sure that your plan of depending on a racial stereotype as an immigration pro will result in less entrenched racial stereotyping.  :P

Saying that migrants are hard working is not a racial stereotype. It is a fact. When you have to be the cream of the crop from your home country to make it over here, you are statistically likely to be more talented and productive. I'd love to have more cream of the crop migrants here so that we can be a more efficient and productive society.
Agreed, immigrants are not a racial group. Immigrants are self-selected group. They are superior, in many ways, to their counterparts back home, wherever they came from, who lack the ambition and/or skills to emigrate. This fact, more than anything else, is what has made the US great. Allowing continuing, gradual, steady, predictable immigration is what will really make America great (again).

Watchmaker

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1086 on: April 02, 2019, 10:11:42 AM »
Agreed, Steve. Compared to people in many other parts of the world, most educated Americans are much less (blatantly) racist. I also agree with your last comment about tribal instincts. You realize, though, that what you're saying is hugely controversial to some people? Currently, I'm reading an interesting book by Harvard professor, Steven Pinker, called Blank Slate. It's about Pinker's claim that some of human nature is hard wired into us. You wouldn't think that would be a controversial stance, but apparently it is...

I've read all of Pinker's popular science books since he published How the Mind Works when I was in high school. I'm amazed at how controversial a character he has apparently become since then. When I first heard someone making an argument against "Pinkersonism" (an amalgamation Pinker with Jordan Peterson) I was flabbergasted, because I'd never thought of the two being anything alike.

I do think it's important to realize how much we've already improved human life, and to build on our successes rather than tear things down. In that respect I am like Pinker, and maybe that sounds like Peterson to someone?

Shane

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1087 on: April 02, 2019, 10:08:36 PM »
Agreed, Steve. Compared to people in many other parts of the world, most educated Americans are much less (blatantly) racist. I also agree with your last comment about tribal instincts. You realize, though, that what you're saying is hugely controversial to some people? Currently, I'm reading an interesting book by Harvard professor, Steven Pinker, called Blank Slate. It's about Pinker's claim that some of human nature is hard wired into us. You wouldn't think that would be a controversial stance, but apparently it is...

I've read all of Pinker's popular science books since he published How the Mind Works when I was in high school. I'm amazed at how controversial a character he has apparently become since then. When I first heard someone making an argument against "Pinkersonism" (an amalgamation Pinker with Jordan Peterson) I was flabbergasted, because I'd never thought of the two being anything alike.

I do think it's important to realize how much we've already improved human life, and to build on our successes rather than tear things down. In that respect I am like Pinker, and maybe that sounds like Peterson to someone?
Yeah, it's pretty crazy how, in 2019, Pinker and Peterson have become so controversial. Although I disagree with some things I've heard both of them say, I'm grateful for their viewpoints. People who disagree with Peterson and Pinker are always free to conduct their own research, write their own papers/books, or make their own YouTube channels to counter any messages they don't like. In theory, almost everyone claims to agree that human nature is influenced by both nature and nurture. In practice, though, whenever scientists try to present results of their studies that seem to indicate that, maybe, some particular aspects of human nature are hard-wired into us, people start accusing them of being nazis, showing up at their lectures with noisemakers trying to deplatform them. The stuff James Damore wrote in his, now, infamous memo to the Google diversity committee was pretty tame, IMHO, but it got him fired from his job. wtf

Watchmaker

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1088 on: April 03, 2019, 08:30:13 AM »
Agreed, Steve. Compared to people in many other parts of the world, most educated Americans are much less (blatantly) racist. I also agree with your last comment about tribal instincts. You realize, though, that what you're saying is hugely controversial to some people? Currently, I'm reading an interesting book by Harvard professor, Steven Pinker, called Blank Slate. It's about Pinker's claim that some of human nature is hard wired into us. You wouldn't think that would be a controversial stance, but apparently it is...

I've read all of Pinker's popular science books since he published How the Mind Works when I was in high school. I'm amazed at how controversial a character he has apparently become since then. When I first heard someone making an argument against "Pinkersonism" (an amalgamation Pinker with Jordan Peterson) I was flabbergasted, because I'd never thought of the two being anything alike.

I do think it's important to realize how much we've already improved human life, and to build on our successes rather than tear things down. In that respect I am like Pinker, and maybe that sounds like Peterson to someone?
Yeah, it's pretty crazy how, in 2019, Pinker and Peterson have become so controversial. Although I disagree with some things I've heard both of them say, I'm grateful for their viewpoints. People who disagree with Peterson and Pinker are always free to conduct their own research, write their own papers/books, or make their own YouTube channels to counter any messages they don't like. In theory, almost everyone claims to agree that human nature is influenced by both nature and nurture. In practice, though, whenever scientists try to present results of their studies that seem to indicate that, maybe, some particular aspects of human nature are hard-wired into us, people start accusing them of being nazis, showing up at their lectures with noisemakers trying to deplatform them. The stuff James Damore wrote in his, now, infamous memo to the Google diversity committee was pretty tame, IMHO, but it got him fired from his job. wtf

Hmm, this is exactly what I mean. I've always thought of Steven Pinker as a rational, humanist writer interested in the truth. Not that I think he's always right, but I felt he was an honest and fair communicator.

To me, Jordan Peterson is something completely different, and infinitely worse. I find Peterson to be a dissembling, opportunistic, intellectual lightweight. And hugely unkind. Some of what I've seen him do verges on evil to me, because of the way he skirts around the edges of saying horrible things, while carefully maintaining deniability. Yes, I think he makes a reasonable point here and there, but a broken clock is right twice a day.

I thought the Damore memo was fairly idiotic, and certainly a fire-able offense. It's a great example of the importance of approach and attitude in a discussion like this. He came off like a whiny, entitled sexist to me (another white guy), and apparently to many other people as well. It's absolutely possible to discuss the science behind biological differences in a respectful and productive way, why didn't he do that?

None of that is to say I think Peterson or Damore should be censored, by the way.

What I'm saying is I completely understand why Peterson is controversial, but do not understand why Pinker is, or why he is grouped with Peterson. Maybe he's said things in interviews/articles/etc that explain this (I've only read his books). Should I be re-evaluating Pinker?
« Last Edit: September 26, 2022, 12:28:44 PM by Watchmaker »

runbikerun

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1089 on: April 04, 2019, 01:58:41 AM »
There was a spectacular dismantling of the Damore memo on Quora or Medium by a former Google hiring manager, which went along the lines of:

1. You have the science badly wrong.
2. You don't seem to understand what the relevant skills are for your role.
3. If Google put you on a team with a woman, they're basically inviting a lawsuit for creating a hostile work environment, so the only real option you've left them with is firing you.

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1090 on: April 04, 2019, 06:46:29 AM »
Here's Damore's actual memo. Not surprisingly, many people who like to disparage it on the Internet have never actually read it. Damore wrote his memo in response to a request from Google management for feedback. Damore's firing basically proved his point, that Google is an echo chamber.

Watchmaker

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1091 on: April 04, 2019, 09:27:40 AM »
Here's Damore's actual memo. Not surprisingly, many people who like to disparage it on the Internet have never actually read it. Damore wrote his memo in response to a request from Google management for feedback. Damore's firing basically proved his point, that Google is an echo chamber.

I read it right when it came out. I'm guessing runbikerun has read it too. So why does it matter if "many people" haven't?

I think I know what essay runbikerun is talking about, and I believe it's this one:
https://medium.com/@yonatanzunger/so-about-this-googlers-manifesto-1e3773ed1788
(the author wasn't a hiring manager, he was a Distinguished Engineer (quite senior position).

He doesn't do much to address the science in Damore's memo, but many other people have done that. I think his points 2 and 3 are the valuable part that explain why (even if Damore had got all the science right) Damore was wrong, and why his memo was "incredibly stupid and harmful".

Incidentally, some of Damore's behavior post-memo has validated my initial impression of him.

Shane

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1092 on: April 04, 2019, 06:37:10 PM »
Here's Damore's actual memo. Not surprisingly, many people who like to disparage it on the Internet have never actually read it. Damore wrote his memo in response to a request from Google management for feedback. Damore's firing basically proved his point, that Google is an echo chamber.

I read it right when it came out. I'm guessing runbikerun has read it too. So why does it matter if "many people" haven't?

I think I know what essay runbikerun is talking about, and I believe it's this one:
https://medium.com/@yonatanzunger/so-about-this-googlers-manifesto-1e3773ed1788
(the author wasn't a hiring manager, he was a Distinguished Engineer (quite senior position).

He doesn't do much to address the science in Damore's memo, but many other people have done that. I think his points 2 and 3 are the valuable part that explain why (even if Damore had got all the science right) Damore was wrong, and why his memo was "incredibly stupid and harmful".

Incidentally, some of Damore's behavior post-memo has validated my initial impression of him.

Yeah, pretty sure Yonatan Zunger is right that it was stupid for Damore to send off his memo, not only because it cost him his job, but also because some of the things he said in it were probably pretty hurtful to some of his former colleagues at Google. In one interview of Damore, he talks about the fact that he has been diagnosed with ASD, and that this may partially explain why, at the time, he didn't fully understand the implications of what sending out his memo meant.

Nowhere in his memo does Damore claim that women are "unqualified" to be engineers. Damore only argues that *part* of what may be holding Google back from getting to 50% men/50% women engineers is that there are biological differences between the sexes. Duh!

Quote
Note, I’m not saying that all men differ from women in the following ways or that these differences are “just.” I’m simply stating that the distribution of preferences and abilities of men and women differ in part due to biological causes and that these differences may explain why we don’t see equal representation of women in tech and leadership. Many of these differences are small and there’s significant overlap between men and women, so you can’t say anything about an individual given these population level distributions.

Quote
I hope it’s clear that I’m not saying that diversity is bad, that Google or society is 100% fair, that we shouldn’t try to correct for existing biases, or that minorities have the same experience of those in the majority. My larger point is that we have an intolerance for ideas and evidence that don’t fit a certain ideology. I’m also not saying that we should restrict people to certain gender roles; I’m advocating for quite the opposite: treat people as individuals, not as just another member of their group (tribalism).

Damore seems super smart, but he's young, inexperienced, and maybe his autism played a role in his decision to send out his somewhat tone deaf memo. I still don't think he should've been fired, though. Google asked for input from Googlers and Damore gave them his input. Just because Damore's opinions aren't in the mainstream at Google doesn't mean he deserved to lose his job. My understanding is that Damore sent off his memo only to the diversity committee, or whatever Google calls it, in response to the committee's request for input. Someone in that group, apparently, leaked Damore's memo and, from there, it spread throughout the company.

The reason I asked if you'd read Damore's actual memo, @Watchmaker , is because it seems kind of pointless to me to try to discuss a document with someone who has only read biased reports *about* said document, and not the document itself.

Watchmaker

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1093 on: April 04, 2019, 09:43:03 PM »

The reason I asked if you'd read Damore's actual memo, @Watchmaker , is because it seems kind of pointless to me to try to discuss a document with someone who has only read biased reports *about* said document, and not the document itself.

I was bristling at what I took to be the implication that I hadn't read it and was arguing from ignorance. Probably over-sensitivity on my part and not a helpful addition to the conversation. I apologize.
 
Yeah, pretty sure Yonatan Zunger is right that it was stupid for Damore to send off his memo, not only because it cost him his job, but also because some of the things he said in it were probably pretty hurtful to some of his former colleagues at Google. In one interview of Damore, he talks about the fact that he has been diagnosed with ASD, and that this may partially explain why, at the time, he didn't fully understand the implications of what sending out his memo meant.

Damore seems super smart, but he's young, inexperienced, and maybe his autism played a role in his decision to send out his somewhat tone deaf memo. I still don't think he should've been fired, though.

I agree about Damore being young and inexperienced, but I just don't accept that as an excuse. He's an adult, if he hadn't learned how to act like one before this, it was a wake-up call that he needed.

Just because Damore's opinions aren't in the mainstream at Google doesn't mean he deserved to lose his job.

I don't think he was fired because his opinions aren't in the mainstream-- he was fired because his approach to airing them was incredibly stupid and harmful. He could have presented his unpopular/rare/controversial opinions in a more respectful and thoughtful manner and he'd still have a job. That's part of being an adult too. 

Shane

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1094 on: April 05, 2019, 11:08:47 AM »
I don't think he was fired because his opinions aren't in the mainstream-- he was fired because his approach to airing them was incredibly stupid and harmful. He could have presented his unpopular/rare/controversial opinions in a more respectful and thoughtful manner and he'd still have a job. That's part of being an adult too.
Agreed, that Google had every right to fire Damore and that he got fired not for having out of the mainstream views but for expressing them publicly in a way that was probably hurtful to some of his colleagues. By just firing Damore and not having an open, honest discussion about the points that he raised, though, I think Google missed an opportunity to address thousands(?) of its employees who probably agree 100% with what he said in his memo. The only message they got was that it's not okay to speak up and express views that run counter to what management wants. Period. I think a reasonable argument can be made that even if everything Damore wrote in his memo about innate biological differences between men and women were true, affirmative action type programs still benefit Google and society as a whole. It's impossible to know, for sure, exactly how much of the observable differences between men and women are hard wired and how much are due to environmental influences. Since we can't do anything about the hard wired stuff, all we can do is try our best to give boys and girls equal opportunities in life, and then sit back and watch what happens. Just as much as it's important to change our expectations for what women can and should do with their lives, it's just as important that we work towards making society more tolerant of men's choices to do stereotypically female jobs like elementary school teacher, nurse, stay at home dad, etc.

runbikerun

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Re: Liberals vs Conservatives - why does it have to be this way?
« Reply #1095 on: April 05, 2019, 12:04:47 PM »
I don't think Google had a choice - if they tried to make just about any woman in the company work on a team with him, they'd have been wide open for a neverending series of constructive dismissal claims. Once the memo was out and his name was attached to it, firing him was the only option realistically available to them.