I have black friends
Jan 29th, 2011 by Unamused
I have black friends. This post is not about them.
Anyone who has ever heard or participated in a candid discussion of race issues is probably familiar with exchanges like this (Igor is not based on any real person):
UNAMUSED: Blacks are, on average, less intelligent than whites. This is a well established scientific fact.
IGOR: How dare you suggest blacks are inferior to whites? You’re just a racist!
UNAMUSED: First, that’s not what I said. Second, in case you haven’t noticed, I’m friends with Carl [who is black], Peng [who is East Asian], and Manuel [who is Hispanic]. Would a racist be friends with them?
IGOR: So what? That doesn’t mean anything. Hey guys, Unamused is trying that same old bullshit line racists always try: “Oh, but I have black friends! That means I can be as racist as I want!”
That’s enough out of those two. My question is this: what’s wrong with the “I have black friends” argument? A racist — against blacks, in this example — is unlikely to be friends with black people. So how do you explain my black friends? Any explanation that manages to cram “hates blacks” and “has black friends” into one logically consistent universe is going to be a complicated, convoluted, cockamamie scheme. Occam’s Razor suggests we take the simpler route, and conclude that I’m not actually a racist — that I have good reasons to believe what I believe about race differences in intelligence.
Somehow I doubt Igor would buy that. So what’s really going on here? So far, I’ve been taking it for granted that “racist” means something like the following:
racist (1): someone who hates people because of the color of their skin, or shape of their eyes, or width of their nose, etc.
Let’s call those people racists (1). When Igor scoffs at the notion that my liking some black people could somehow preclude my being a racist, he’s not talking about racists (1). He’s operating from a definition very much like this, as famously put by Peter Brimelow:
racist (2): anyone who is winning an argument with a liberal
It matters not a whit to Igor that I don’t feel hatred toward any races, or that I treat people as individuals because it would be irrational to do otherwise. These points are inessential — irrelevant, even — to definition 2. Let’s call the people who fit that definition racists (2).
Now, if I were a racist (1) — if I really did hate/resent/mistreat people based on their race — Igor would certainly call me a racist, and he would be right to do so. Actually, he would skip the name-calling and go straight to the press, the courts, the police, and if possible the lynch mob. The problem for Igor is that if he stuck to persecuting racists (1), he would have no one to lynch!
There are virtually no real white racists (1) in America today. They are largely an urban legend. Unfortunately for Igor, if people understood that white racism (1) is extinct in the United States, they would quickly lose patience for forced diversity (including affirmative action, racial quotas, the four-fifths rule, disparate impact, and forced busing), discriminatory lending practices, and of course race-baiting demagogues like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson.
And Igor will not let that happen. So he has expanded the meaning of “racist” until it actually starts to look quite like definition 2. Now he can profitably persecute whites (and blacks, the so-called Uncle Toms) for all of these new, exciting kinds of racism (2):
- Believing true statements that favor whites or reflect poorly on blacks. For example, noting blacks’ higher average criminality and lower average IQ is racist (2), because committing crime and being unintelligent are bad. For the same reason, observing that blacks are more disruptive in classrooms is racist (2). See: thoughtcrime.
- Believing that blacks can be held accountable for their own behavior. For example, you are very racist (2) if you don’t believe that black students are only disruptive in class because black churches are so much more lively and enthusiastic than those boring white churches. You are completely, utterly racist (2) if you don’t accept that blacks score poorly on IQ tests because evil whites have told them, all their lives, that they are inferior; because white school teachers refuse to teach black students; and because the tests are culturally biased against blacks, whose “black mathematics,” for instance, are to be celebrated as a valid (indeed, preferable) alternative to the markedly inferior “white mathematics” of Archimedes, Gauss, and Einstein.
Finally, you are incredibly, unbelievably racist (2) if you fail to acknowledge that blacks only ever commit crimes in retaliation for much worse racial crimes committed against them by white conspirators; or out of desperation, in a society that will not allow them to feed their families by any other means. That’s why they feel the need to rape and murder white women. That’s why mainstream blacks consider beating a white boy unconscious, then stomping and kicking him, to be a cause their community can unite and rally around.
- Saying anything that some paranoid race-baiter can misinterpret as being connected with race. Yes, that’s the full description — “misinterpret as being connected with race.” To pick a particularly silly example, it is racist (2) to draw a cartoon where a crazed ape from recent headlines is implied to be responsible for writing a stimulus bill. This is because President Obama, who supports the bill, is black, and a long time ago racist (1) people would compare blacks to monkeys.
- Being a cop. This is to be considered super racist (2), and don’t you forget it.
- The absence of racism (1). This is very racist (2), because it proves that racism (1) has sunk so deeply into our minds that we no longer notice it. This leads us to believe it does not exist, when in fact it permeates our society to the very core. This so-called institutional racism explains every black failing that can’t be explained by regular ol’ (mythical) racism (1).
So that is what racism means to Igor. That is why it doesn’t matter if everything I believe about race happens to be true. I am still a racist (2). Poor me.
One interesting, unintended consequence of this re-defining of “racist” is that whenever someone accuses me of being racist (2), I feel an almost irresistible urge to show them what real racism (1) looks like.
IGOR: How dare you suggest blacks are inferior to whites? You’re just a racist!
UNAMUSED: Oh, give me a break. If I were a racist, I wouldn’t stand here debating with you. I’d just call you a “nigger-lover” and get on with my day.
IGOR: [head explodes, showering bystanders with blood and gray matter, to my great relief]
Of course, I resist. Well, most of the time…
Update
In the comments, I discuss race relations with Obsidian and Hail. My own comments are summarized in a follow-up post, “I still have black friends.”
Hi Unamused,
Got wind of your blog through the grapevine, and am more than game for discussing things with you in an calm and dispassionate manner. Let’s begin with your first point, that Black folk are on average, less intelligent than Whites or for that matter, Asians.
OK.
So what?
Your response?
O.
Great, that’s perfect. Let’s start with the short version of my response: So nothing!
The long version: What I’m looking for is this, right here. A calm, dispassionate discussion of race issues—and that’s all.
Usually—I’m not implying this is the case for you—usually the question “so what?” in this context has a fairly obvious subtext: “Oh Unamused, I bet you’re trying to formulate an argument that supports slavery/Jim Crow laws/racist hiring practices/whatever.” But I’m not. I’m not heading in that direction. This conversation doesn’t end with me saying “and so you see, that’s why Hitler was so cool.” I don’t get my statistics from a little-known appendix of “The Turner Diaries.”
I’m tired of seeing race realism portrayed as the same old racism repackaged for the Facebook generation—”this ain’t your grandfather’s racism,” to pick an example completely at random.
What I want is to discuss these issues like they were any other scientific issue. I think differences between races are interesting. I also think sharks, Roman history, and volleyball are interesting. The difference is, I can talk about those three things without being called names.
Why do I care, though? Why is it important to have a real conversation about race? Because race relations in America are an unmitigated disaster.
One example: black students perform less well in school than white students. So today, millions of dollars are being wasted in education-theory-approved schemes to fix this problem: They need black teachers as role models! Wait, they need to be forcibly integrated with white students! No, they need to have their own all-black schools! I bet they need to study “black mathematics”! And so on.
All of this is ridiculous if you happen to believe the overwhelming data that says blacks have a lower average IQ than whites. That explains it. That’s why there’s a gap. There’s no “institutional racism” keeping anyone down, because nobody is being kept down. If the phenomenon disappears, we don’t need a theory to explain it.
If a white person comes to believe this, they can no longer feel guilty for keeping another race down; if a black person comes to believe this, they can no longer feel angry for the discrimination they’ve been taught is all around them, every day. Then sane policies on inner city schools, forced busing, and so on, will follow.
Blacks will still underperform, on average. So what? Who cares about averages? Whites underperform in school relative to Asians, but I don’t get angry about it, because I don’t believe there’s an Asian conspiracy to keep me down. I acknowledge my own limitations, and I don’t give a sh*t how well whites do on average—what kind of lunatic is loyal to an entire race?—except when statistical differences between groups of people are used to justify so-called reverse racism (i.e., supposedly compensatory discrimination).
Basically, what I’m saying is that racial conspiracy theories, which dominate American race relations today, cannot survive in the light of an open, honest discussion.
Affirmative action. Racial quotas. Forced busing. The 4/5ths Rule and disparate impact rulings. None of these are helping blacks in America. They teach blacks that they cannot help themselves—that they are nothing more than victims of an all-powerful white foe. I give them more credit than that. And the same policies breed resentment of blacks by whites.
They are the product of dishonesty and closed-mindedness. They’re poisoning blacks against themselves (“we’re all helpless against white racism”), blacks against whites (“we’re kept down by society”), whites against blacks (“I wonder if he really deserved that promotion?”), and whites against themselves (“Wait, so I’m the jerk responsible for blacks’ continued failings?!”).
That’s where I want to go. And it starts with: “So, blacks have an average IQ about 15 points less than whites. What does that explain about the world today?”
Update: By the way, welcome to my blog! And thanks for your comment.
Unamused,
Well, you certainly have put a heck of a lot out there on the table, that’s for sure! So, please allow me to begin our conversation with the following question:
On the one hand, you say that Blacks are less intelligent than Whites; but on the other hand, you make the case that things such as Affirmative Action and the like, are impediments to Black success. How can both these statements be true, because by your argument Blacks are limited no matter is Affrimative Action is in place or not. Right?
Please explain?
Thanks!
O.
Sure thing—glad I stopped by to post something new about race relations.
These statements are both true because blacks can be limited in more than one way. To be precise:
In a fair system (i.e. one that doesn’t discriminate against or in favor of anyone the basis of race), blacks are going to underperform relative to whites in some respects (in school, for instance; obviously not in professional sports). Every race will perform differently because of race differences in IQ, athleticism, and so on, which are genetic in origin. We should probably restrict our discussion to IQ and scholastic success, for simplicity’s sake.
Now, affirmative action obviously helps blacks in the short term: it gives them an unfair advantage over equally- or better-qualified whites and Asians. So that helps overcome a meritocracy, at least. Of course, it’s racist, so whites and Asians should oppose it—it’s in their best interest to do so.
But blacks should oppose it too, because in the long run (even over a decade), it hinders them: First, it teaches them that they always need a helping hand from the government, whether that’s a college scholarship or a welfare check. Learned helplessness on a societal scale.
Second, as I pointed out, it’s “poisoning blacks against themselves (‘we’re all helpless against white racism’), blacks against whites (‘we’re kept down by society’), whites against blacks (‘I wonder if he really deserved that promotion?’), and whites against themselves (‘Wait, so I’m the jerk responsible for blacks’ continued failings?!’).”
Either way limits blacks, but one way is fair and one way isn’t.
Unamused,
Assuming all you’re saying is indeed true here, ending Affirmative Action would be beneficial to Whites and Asians, but not so much for Blacks, for the simple reason that they would underperform with no means to get out of it. How is that a good “sell” to them? Again, per your argument, Blacks cannot improve their aggregate state; its genetic. Please explain?
O.
Sure, ending affirmative action would be beneficial to whites and Asians, since they would no longer experience that form of racial discrimination. And it would be bad for blacks who don’t deserve to get scholarships, because they wouldn’t; who don’t deserve to get promotions, because they wouldn’t; and so on. It’s a return to normalcy—sanity, even!
Yes, blacks would underperform scholastically with no means to get out of it… except, of course, the means available to people of all races: you know, studying hard? Whites will continue to underperform scholastically relative to Asians, with no other means to get out of it; Asians will continue to underperform athletically relative to whites and blacks in most sports, with no other means to get out of it, and so on. It’s called a meritocracy, and frankly, I don’t see any problem with it. The only blacks who will be hurt will be the ones who would have received undeserved promotions, scholarships, raises, jobs, etc., instead of the whites and Asians who deserved them.
Also, once again, ending affirmative action would benefit blacks in the long term, for the two reasons I gave in my previous comment. (I intend to expand on the long-term benefits, to people of all races, of race-realist domestic policies in a post later this week.)
Per my argument, yes, blacks cannot (in the short term) improve their average IQ, to pick one relevant example. It (or rather, its variability) is about 80% genetic—or something like that! My response will be to reiterate and expand on part of my very first comment:
“So what? Who cares about averages?” Seriously. Now, I’m white, if you hadn’t guessed, and “whites underperform in school relative to Asians, but I don’t get angry about it, because I don’t believe there’s an Asian conspiracy to keep me down.” Blacks are taller than me, on average; how upset can I possibly be about this fact, which is about as immutable as genetic IQ differences? Look, if blacks believed what I believed about inheritance and IQ and so on, statistics and averages wouldn’t upset them—couldn’t upset them! They sure don’t upset me: “I acknowledge my own limitations, and I don’t give a sh*t how well whites do on average—what kind of lunatic is loyal to an entire race?”
As for this being a “good sell,” I’ll note two things: One, I think the state of blacks (and whites, and everybody else) in America today proves that the system isn’t working, and I really don’t see how we could hurt blacks more by chopping out all the irrational left-wing policies, like affirmative action, which are based on misunderstandings, myths, and misinformation about human nature, than we have already hurt them by implementing those policies.
And two, I hope that someday there will be enough race-realist people in this country—white, black, Asian, Hispanic, and every other race—to end these programs without 100% non-white support. Note that I’m talking about ending them democratically, i.e. Congress votes ‘em out. And I think many blacks will be on board, because they’ll realize that “racism to help blacks” is a really, really, really bad idea. In the long run.
Obsidian’s “So what?” is an excellent point.
HBDism, i.e. the so-called Race-Realism movement, doesn’t seem to propose much. It prefers to talk.
Actually, and ironically, the only real policy argument I read from Unamused above is this: “What we need, in-practice, is more color-blindness” (while all the same talking more openly about race).
A common white belief today has it that “if only we push harder for ‘Post-Racialism’, utopia is around the corner!” I am not sure why they believe, or claim to believe, this. — B.H. Obama was elected by this belief and utopia is…no closer.
Well Hail, in fairness to BHO, he’s only been in office for two years; I don’t think a utopia can be built that quickly, assuming such a thing was or is possible.
But at any rate, I’m still trying to get my head around the notion that Black folk would find it in their interest to reject Affirmative Action. By all historical accounts, the exact opposite is true, because Black folks have greatly benefitted from it, it played a very strong role in the formation of the Black middle class. And when you factor in Unamused’s HBD-informed argument, it just doesn’t make sense as to why Black Americans would voluntarily reject AA. I just don’t see it.
Moreover, and speaking of Obama, according to him he directly benefitted from AA, as did his wife as I recall. One may disagree with his policies, but one would be hardpressed to say that he doesn’t have the cognitive chops to get the job done academically. What does Unamused say in such a case, given that it could be argued that AA was put into place to assist well deserving Blacks the chance to shine but were kept out due to decades of discrimination?
O.
I addressed it in my first three replies.
First of all, you have to talk in order to propose anything.
Second, race realism is such a controversial position, its proponents are still trying to get it accepted as a legitimate point of view by the mainstream. We’re still seeking permission to say these things we believe—these true things about race that are considered unacceptable. Only when we solve the problem I described in “I have black friends”—the radical redefinition of “racist” in order to suppress race realism—will it be possible for race realists to make policy proposals and have them taken seriously. That’s the real proposal of the race realism movement. Given that it pertains to the state of racial discourse, guess what, it requires us to talk a lot.
When you say that’s the only argument you “read” from me, and put it in quotation marks, it looks like you’re attributing the words to me, which is deceptive. Anyway, in my first reply to Obsidian (continuing in the next two), I put forward an argument for ending the following: “Affirmative action. Racial quotas. Forced busing. The 4/5ths Rule and disparate impact rulings.” If you choose to collect all that—that whole massive policy shift toward racial sanity—into “more color-blindness,” then yes, that is essentially my “only real policy argument.” I feel like you’re moving the goalposts on me, though.
More to the point, your idea that “talking more openly about race” somehow precludes or works against “more color-blindness,” contradicts the evidence. (I assume that by “more color-blindness” you mean “less racial discrimination,” as opposed to “more ignorance about race,” though it’s hard to tell.) At this point, given the existence of the HBD movement, the black-on-white hate crime statistics, and the state of race relations in America generally, it is clear that color-blindness—that is, fair treatment of all races—is not possible if racial truths are suppressed. (Forcing everyone to lie about race doesn’t make the races get along better—who could have guessed?)
It may be a common belief among whites, but I did not say it. If we’re still talking about my post, let’s skip the racial stereotypes, and stick to what I actually wrote about.
Whatever white beliefs may have led to his election, President Obama is not a product of an open discussion of race. This is clear from his books, his treatment of the Henry Gates debacle, and the way his party still frames opponents as racially-motivated (2).
Let me sum up everything that, I believe, is wrong about your attitude—and it is an attitude, not an argument: Open, honest discussions of race will not make people hate each other more than they already do—and probably less (see: my other three [edit: four] replies). They will end the useless and damaging policies that are making a healthy multi-racial America (or, for that matter, “post-racialism”—whatever that means) impossible. My policy idea, therefore, is that we should be free to speak truths about race without a vicious backlash.
It was overcompensation for historical discrimination. Having served its purpose, it’s now just (“reverse”) racism.
Have you read my second and third comments? Also, I’m not really talking about convincing black Americans to voluntarily reject affirmative action. I’m more interested in whether or not we should get rid of it.
We have no evidence, nor can we have, that Obama would have been “kept out” if not for affirmative action. Furthermore, potential discrimination against intelligent blacks at that time has little to say about possible discrimination today, after decades of affirmative action.
Finally, everything you’ve said misses the point: the solution to the problem is to treat blacks equally, not treat them better than whites and Asians. Current affirmative action policy is predicated on the mistaken assumption that blacks are exactly as intelligent as whites on average. That is why it tries so hard to rectify imaginary discrimination—the so-called “disparate impact” that comes from racial differences in intelligence. When you realize that blacks are going to underperform as a group in a fair system, then you can implement a fair system.
Unamused,
Lest you think I’m a typical Negro along these lines, I’d just like to disabuse you of any such notions; here is a recent post I put up over at my blog on related matters and questions:
VSB’s “Mirror” Discussion: Uncomfortable Questions Black Folk Need To Ask Themselves
Looking forward to stopping by and reading your comments either there or here!
O.
Unamused,
Replies below:
I’ll review it.
[Unamused: Yes, please do read the things I have written in response to you.]
I don’t disagree.
Alright, let’s get right into the public policy part of the argument – exactly what public policy proposals do you have in mind, Unamused? Here’s my take on the matter:
HBD As Public Policy: Questions For The True Believers
[Are you serious? You still haven't spotted the public policy proposals? Hint: they're in the very next paragraph of mine that you quote:]
Maybe I’m wrong on this point, but I don’t think “force busing” exists much anymore, and if it did it would be in accordance with the Brown v Board of Education decision of 1954. One could argue whether it was a good policy or not, as you seem to be doing here, and as Thomas Sowell argues in his book Black Rednecks and White Liberals, but my point still stands – is “forced busing” even around anymore? And if so, where? Most Black kids attend all or nearly all Black schools in our time anyway, and the opposite is true for White kids, ie, they’re attending all White schools or very close to it. So I fail to see what your gnashing of teeth is all about on this score.
[Busing is still going on, and it still needs to end—all of it. Talking about Brown v Board of education is a red herring.]
We’re currently discussing the merits or lack thereof of Affirmative Action, and am enjoying the debate; wrt “disparate impact” and so forth, I’m looking forward to discussion on that matter as well. What’s very interesting to me in this whole debate, is that current Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas played a role in such things, as he was an important figure in the EEOC prior to his being installed on the court. I am curious as to what your thoughts are about him in this regard?
[That is even further from the topic under discussion, which is quite far from the topic of my original post.]
“Forcing everyone to lie about race”? That’s a rather provocative comment. Care to explain, please?
[In America today, you can be forced out of your job for saying things which are obviously true about race. Have you seen any video with Jared Taylor and at least one other person?]
I think the supposed “hate crimes” of Blacks against Whites deserves a bit more examination, so looking forward to have that discussion and debate with you. [When you posted this, you also commented on my 5-day-old post "Hate crimes: I hate 'em". How much more examination did you really need?] As for the rest of your comment, it comes accross more like a rant than anyting else – not that there’s anything wrong with that…
[This, for the record, is the entirety of the rest of my "rant": "It may be a common belief among whites, but I did not say it. If we’re still talking about my post, let’s skip the racial stereotypes, and stick to what I actually wrote about. ... Whatever white beliefs may have led to his election, President Obama is not a product of an open discussion of race. This is clear from his books, his treatment of the Henry Gates debacle, and the way his party still frames opponents as racially-motivated (2). ... Let me sum up everything that, I believe, is wrong about your attitude—and it is an attitude, not an argument: Open, honest discussions of race will not make people hate each other more than they already do—and probably less (see: my other three [edit: four] replies). They will end the useless and damaging policies that are making a healthy multi-racial America (or, for that matter, “post-racialism”—whatever that means) impossible. My policy idea, therefore, is that we should be free to speak truths about race without a vicious backlash.”]
“A common white belief today has it that ‘if only we push harder for “Post-Racialism”, utopia is around the corner!’”
Agreed.
The voting results of 2008 begs to differ.
[Once again: whatever white beliefs may have led to his election, President Obama—the man, the politician—is not a product of an open discussion of race, for the three reasons I cited.
Obama received only 45% of the white vote. That means overwhelming minority support was crucial to his election. Therefore the voting results do not disprove or even address my point.]
“Vicious backlash”? Please explain by what you mean when you say this? How are those who hold views like yours “viciously” treated? As for the “useless and damaging policies” you mention above, that is still very much a matter of debate at this point…
[See above, under "Forcing everyone to lie about race." The "useless and damaging policies" are exactly what we currently are debating, or did you think I had forgotten?
Holla back
O.
Hi Unamused,
Replies below:
Great! So, what’s the problem, again?
[The rest of my comment explains it.]
Then you need to get out more. There are plenty of people who have no problem discussing these and related topics with you; some of them are even Black!
[In my experience, and in the experience of many other race realists, it is very difficult to find something willing to discuss race issues calmly and dispassionately. Especially black people.]
While that indeed may be, it is nevertheless understandable, given that those who think as you do, either openly advocated or weren’t particularly bothered by, things like Jim Crow.
[Fascinating. You've just said: it's understandable that most people would misinterpret what I say as racist, because people like me support racist laws.]
When its major funders include outfits like the Pioneer Fund, that is to be expected.
[I'm sorry to report that most race realists don't have "funders," let alone "major" ones.]
But that is part of being an adult in the realworld – when you’re an iconoclast, people can and will judge you, mock you and call you names. At that point you have to decide which is more important – you’re position on things and speaking to them, or not being vilified? *shrugs*
[What can I even say to this? You're either missing the point completely, or ignoring it. Let me spell it out for you: it is practically impossible to have an open, honest discussion of race in America. I used name-calling as a lighthearted euphemism for the extremist tactics used to suppress race realism.]
So, race relations in the nation is WORSE, today in 2011, than it was in 1961? And if so, what actual examples can you present to back up your story? I’d like to see this one…
[Straw man argument. "Race relations are an unmitigated disaster" does not imply or require that race relations are worse than they were in 1961.]
Well, let’s look at all that:
1. Actually, there is a dearth of Black teachers if anything. Check in with any major urban area, and you will see this.
[So you're one of those misguided people who believes black students need black teachers to succeed? Sort of reinforces my point: if you don't understand race differences in intelligence, you're going to say things like that.]
2. Millions of dollars are indeed wasted in terms of education; however, it must also be said that said monies aren’t wasted in a misbegotten effort to educate the genetically inferior; rather it is spent on administrative costs and the like.
[The billions (!) of dollars are indeed, being wasted in "a misbegotten effort to educate [blacks].” Some of that also qualifies as “administrative costs.”]
3. “Forced intergration with White students” is a red herring, since the majority of Black students attend schools in which they are the majority. This has been documented and is easily found online.
[The majority of black students attending majority-black schools does not imply that there is no forced integration, also known as busing. This is elementary logic and is easily confirmed online.]
I await your clear examples of “race relations” in American circa 2011 being an “unmitigated disaster”…
[My example was the millions (actually, billions) being wasted on education schemes. We're in the middle of it now.]
OK, so let’s go back to what we just discussed above:
1. Does having Black teachers negatively impact Black students, even if said Black students don’t score as high as Whites and Asians due directly to genetic reasons? In other words, is it possible for Black teachers to have a positive impact on Black students, in spite of their lowered on average test performace relative to White and Asian students?
[Black teachers help black students cheat, but otherwise don't do much good. See here, too.]
2. If the majority of the monies spent in education is going to administrative costs and so forth, how does that impact the testing issue? Especially when roughly half of all Black boys dropout of school to begin with?
[I can't figure out what that is supposed to mean.]
3. Most Black kids in our time attend largely or wholly Black schools. So again, red herring.
[Yes, this is a red herring. Or did you mean what I said?]
For one thing, why would a White person walk around with so much “guilt”? Are you saying that this applied to you, Unamused, either now or at some point in your life? Moreover, I don’t personally know many Blacks who feel as to suggest above, and I think it’s fair to say that I probably know more Black folks than you. Third, what “sane policies” in terms of education, would you suggest?
[A white person might feel guilty when the party line on black failure is that it's caused by white bigots discriminating against them, and for the never-ending "legacy of slavery." My idea of sane policies on education would be to stop trying to close an achievement gap that exists for genetic reasons.]
Well see, there’s the rub – your fellow HBDers, and that includes your hero Jared Taylor, they care. They care about averages, and when those averages tend to favor Asians and Jews, that’s when Whites can and will make a fuss about it.
[Reading comprehension, Obsidian. I was explaining why we shouldn't care about how well different groups do on average. Then I pointed out that I, like Jared Taylor, care "when statistical differences between groups of people are used to justify so-called reverse racism." Finally, talk about a straw man! I have never complained about Asians or Jews, or anyone, succeeding on their own merits. Since I'm half-Jewish, that would be more than a little strange.]
Please give me an example of “racial conspiracy theories” – especially in light of Obama’s election as president of the United States?
[President Obama, huh? Racial conspiracy theories, huh?]
Please give me examples of beneficiaries of Affirmative Action bearing clear and present resentment of Whites? Moreover, there is all manner of evidence that Affirmative Action – which came into existence under a Republican president in Nixon – has been the spark that created the present day Black middle class. That in itself, is proof that such things are indeed “helping Blacks in America”.
[Nixon is a red herring—did you really think I wouldn't notice? I mentioned that whites resent blacks for receiving AA; you make the same claim on your own blog: "It burns them up to see people like Barack Obama get in the place," etc. Finally, as I mentioned before, civil rights, and possibly AA, helped blacks decades ago. That is no reason for reverse racism to continue today. (Obviously...)]
O: You need to get out more. I’m Black and cannot recall the last time someone Black actually said such things to my face with a straightface. Can’t speak that much to what you Whites think or feel, so I’ll take your word for it. And Affirmative Action was put into place to correct “dishonesty and closed-mindedness”.
[Um, those were not meant to be direct quotations. They were an attempt to paint racial tensions in a humorous light. And no, civil rights were put into place to correct dishonesty and closed-mindedness. Pro-black discrimination (AA) is the problem.]
I agree the discussion is worth having; so long as we keep it all in perspective.
[Strange that you would speak of "perspective," since you're focusing with laser intensity on one tiny part of my overall argument.]
Thanks; always a pleasure to hash these things out…
O.
Hi Unamused,
Replies below:
But that’s just it – Affirmative Action addresses the fact that often, deserving Blacks don’t get in, not because they lacked the competence or credentials, but BECAUSE they were Black, and we have all manner of evdence in our time that AA is still very much a needed force to level the social playing field. For example, I am sure you’re aware of the University of Chicago’s famed “Black name/White name on Resume” study: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Names_and_Racism_in_the_Hiring_Process
[The resumes in this experiment were designed to make the blacks and whites look equally qualified. Given that affirmative action exists in schools, colleges, and jobs, why would an unbiased manager, reading two comparable resumes, believe that the potential beneficiary of AA was equal to the potential sufferer of AA? Also, given my experiences with people with very "black" names, frankly I wouldn't want to work with them either, if I had the choice of an equally qualified white applicant.]
LOL. By your own words above, no matter of study would a difference, right?
[Again, what I'm saying is that group differences shouldn't concern us. It's up to each individual to succeed or fail. It just seems like many black individuals want to blame their failure on white individuals.]
O: Which, in the case of say, a Barack Obama, would be virtually nonexistent. He was a beneficiary of AA, by his own admission during his time at Harvard, where he was its first Black president of its prestigious Law Review. Are you arguing that he did not deserve such a position, and if so, on what grounds?
[Barack Obama is certainly smart enough for college, so today he wouldn't need affirmative action—even if, decades ago, it might have helped him overcome discrimination.]
Then I’ll wait for your expanded post on the matter, because you have yet to make the case thus far…
OK…
Seriously? Your fellow White Nationalists, that’s who.
[As I have explained twice now, White Nationalists care when group averages are used to justify anti-white and anti-Asian discrimination. My "so what, who cares" remark was used to introduce an argument as to why that is the only circumstance in which we should care.]
In truth, and I think I know here because I probably know more Blacks than you do, most Blacks don’t even know what we’re talking about here, to say nothing of being all hot and bothered about it. Most Blacks are just trying to live their lives, Man.
[You don't have to be black to hear what high-profile blacks, like Michelle Obama, are saying about supposed discrimination. My argument does not require a majority of blacks to feel that way.]
You couldn’t be more wrong. See Eugene Robinson’s book “Disintergration” for more on these points. Here’s the Amazon review:
Amazon
And here he is discussing the book: Book TV
[Thank you for your recommendations. Personally, I recommend Jared Taylor's "Paved With Good Intentions."]
Affirmative Action, Brown v Board of Education and the like, weren’t put into place by acts of Congress, so Congress couldn’t play a role in their ending, I don’t think. Which raises another very interesting question, to my mind – as to whether we should have gone the more democratic route on all of this. Especially given the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” debate in our time today…
[Do you seriously think that Congress not being able to vote out AA has any bearing on this debate? Good grief. I stand corrected, Obsidian: "Congress votes 'em out" is not a completely accurate description of an eventual democratic termination to affirmative action policies. Can we return to the other thousands of more important matters?]
Holla back
O.
As I said, I’ve moved on from the topic of short-term benefits to blacks of ending affirmative action. Your responses above are another good illustration why: most of them have no relevance to the arguments of mine you’re quoting, or pose questions I’ve already answered.
I don’t know if you’re doing this on purpose or just not paying enough attention to what I write, but I do not believe there is any point to continuing this particular discussion. I’m not learning anything, and you show no signs of changing your mind, which is neither surprising nor worrisome to me—you are, after all, my opponent. I’ll let our audience, whoever they might be, decide for themselves on the basis of what I’ve already written.
Hi Unamused,
Replies below:
LOL. That’s nice, U-blame your interlocutor as to your failure for thinking your arguments out in a logical and rational fashion. Affirmative Action is a matter of public policy and by extension, politics; you may be a logical thinker, but you have shown that you don’t know a heck of a lot about public policy, or politics. Black people aren’t going to give up on Affirmative Action and not for the reasons that you think; but even if they those reasons you proffer were indeed true, they still wouldn’t do so, because no one is interested in turning the clocks back on their own progress. Making pie in the sky appeals to abstract concepts such as “fairness” and “merit” have about as much relevance as you taking a Swiss army knife to a gunfight. The only people interested in the supposed well-being of Black self esteem and the like along these lines, are Whites like you and the handful of Black Conservatives that you all hoist up.
Oh, that’s rich, Unamused – trot out a bunch of boilerplate positions, actually ask for debate, and then when you get it, attack your interlocutor. Much to learn about a great many things, you still have, young one. :)
Holla back
O.
This will be my final comment on the subject. First, it is not conducive to constructive debate to avoid addressing your opponent’s answers to your questions and counter-arguments, then suddenly drop three giant blocks of text in a row when he calls you on it.
Moving on:
I have never been, nor will I ever be, interested in (much less committed to) convincing low-IQ blacks to give up affirmative action. Your arguments are therefore irrelevant. It is enough to me that I understand why it is good for blacks, as well as whites, to end AA. I think many readers will understand it too, which was my goal.
The fact that you consider fairness and merit “pie in the sky appeals to abstract concepts” speaks for itself, as do the scare quotes.
Attack? You are being oversensitive. I merely pointed out that your replies are not counter-arguments to my quoted remarks. You are simply not following my argument. You insist on hopping from one unrelated subject to another; for instance, from “AA created the black middle class” (a claim which I already addressed), to an irrelevant question about President Obama in college, to saying white nationalists care about averages (a logical fallacy, conflating two different uses of the word “care”), and then to declaring—as if it somehow helped your case—that Congress couldn’t repeal affirmative action. There is no coherent argument here, or in any of your other remarks.
I’m sure you disagree. Again: I am not debating to convince you. I know you will not change your mind. I am debating to convince the readers, and I’m satisfied to end this particular discussion here.
Hi Unamused,
Repies below:
??? LOL, you’re funny. I responded in point for point fashion to your comments and responses. Now to be sure, you are free not to like it, to not respond, to dismiss it, heck, to even do a OneSTDV and delete them; but, given that your posts aren’t exactly known for their brevity, one would think that you would be the last person to knock the length of my comments. :)
[Reading comprehension, Obsidian: I was explicitly referring to the fact that you simultaneously replied to three different comments by me, each of which was made at a different point in time during our debate. That is hardly fair to me. The only reason you did so is that I called you out.]
Coolbeans – but here’s the problem. You HAVE said that it would be good for African Americans to give up Affirmative Action, quite a number of times throughout this debate. I merely asked you as to why this would be, and how this could actually be sold to Black folk; to date, you have yet to make this clear, and that’s after declaring that you would devote a post to the topic. Do I take your comments here to mean that no such post will be forthcoming from you on the matter?
[Again, reading comprehension: convincing all blacks is not my goal. It is irrelevant whether or not blacks are "sold" on it (an unfortunate choice of words).]
As for “convincing low-IQ blacks” – it’s not them you would have to convince. It’s the uppity Negroes like President Obama, who in one of the few papers he wrote as president of the Harvard Law Review, that not was Affirmative Action needed but that he personally benefitted from it. You need to convince Gen. and former Sec’y of State Colin Powell, who not only serve two tours of duty in Vietnam and rose through the ranks to become a general in the US Army – one of the last of enlisted Men to do so – but went on to become a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. According to him, Affirmative Action made his ascension in life possible. You would have to convince Condoleeza Rice, former Provost at Stanford, member of GWB’s cabinet and the second Woman and second African American to be Sec’y of State – she too had favorable things to say about Affirmative Action. I’m sure I don’t have to point out to you that the latter two Blacks are well known and virtually life long Republicans, either – right? No one would accuse these Black people as being “low-IQ”, Unamused. And it is people like them you need to make the case to, that is, if you’re serious.
Straw man: I did not say any of those people had a low IQ.
Indeed: Amazon
Please note that the author of this book, also had a big role in the publication of The Bell Curve. Hmm.
[Are you suggesting I need to read a book about nepotism to understand why fairness and merit are "pie in the sky appeals to abstract concepts"? I'll pass.]
False. I have countered your tropes with actual questions, questions that you simply cannot answer, which is funny to me, given the fact that if you had done your homework, you would have been able to proffer something a bit more substantive. Here, let me help you:
Amazon
Sowell is actually making the argument [insults].
No, you haven’t; your argument was that things like Affirmative Action have made race relations an, and I’m quoting you now, “unmitigated disaster”. I am asking you to prove it. To date, you haven’t. Moreover, you haven’t debunked my claim that Affirmative Action has been a major catalyst in the creation of the Black middle class, a group that by definition by the way, you couldn’t tar and feather as “low-IQ”. You were saying?
[See... all my other comments. And my comments on your comments.]
U: to an irrelevant question about President Obama in college, to saying white nationalists care about averages (a logical fallacy, conflating two different uses of the word “care”),
O: Wrong again – White Nationalists care very much about keeping the country majority White, even if that means giving those who can actually cut it academically the boot. Since you’re such a big fan of Jared Taylor I’m surprised you don’t see these kind of sentiments expressed over at his AmRen site – and even by his arguments, what I’m saying would be the case, because he’s against immigration.
[Already addressed the "caring" issue.]
Yes, there is: “And two, I hope that someday there will be enough race-realist people in this country—white, black, Asian, Hispanic, and every other race—to end these programs without 100% non-white support. Note that I’m talking about ending them democratically, i.e. Congress votes ‘em out. And I think many blacks will be on board, because they’ll realize that “racism to help blacks” is a really, really, really bad idea. In the long run.”
Those were YOUR words Unamused, not mine. I was merely responding to what YOU said. And what I said was in fact the case – Congress didn’t enact Affirmative Action, that was the result of a Presidential Executive Order, and has been subsequently supported in the courts. Similar to Roe v Wade, or Brown v Board of Education, etc. You were saying?
[Already addressed the Congress issue.]
Sure, I have no problem with that at all. The problem though is that by saying you’re not debating to convince me, you’re suggesting that I have a vested interest in Affirmative Action, when in fact you have no idea what my personal position is on the matter. Nor was I interested in seeking to win the crowd over to my point of view either. I am interested in debating the actual merits or the lack thereof, of the positions you have delcared on this blog; and given that you have made it quite clear that you encourage and welcome debate, I thought to take you up on it. A pity then, to discover, just as we’re getting started, that you now want to shut said debate down. But I do agree, that given your utter lack of preparedness to hash these things out, that it is probably best to end things here, and let those in the peanut gallery judge for themselves the left and the right of things.
O.
[Straw man: I have never suggested you have a vested interest in affirmative action.
If you're not even interested in winning the crowd over to your point of view, then this debate really is pointless. The only person left to convince is yourself, and you've definitely succeeded there. Therefore I'll close the debate here, and we'll let the peanut gallery judge.]
Why?
Why discuss race issues at all, unless you’re getting paid for it?
Your attitude is so… productive. Yes, why discuss anything at all, unless you’re getting paid for it? Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because it’s important? Or even just interesting.
My attitude is in fact “productive” because unless you can produce something from an activity, why engage in it?
Time would be better spent in activities that can produce results.
No, your attitude is the exact opposite of productive. You assume that talking about race could never ameliorate the MASSIVE OVERWHELMING problems with race (“unless you can produce something from an activity…”), so in an act of (some combination of) ignorance, cowardice, and/or laziness, you have given up without even trying (“…why engage in it?”), and not only that (which is merely sad), you seem to be on a mission to stop everyone else from thinking about things you’ve decided aren’t worth thinking about.
Unamused wrote:
Hmm. Would the following statement be more useful to blacks:
We’re all helpless against white intelligence. Our average level of intelligence is one standard…what do you call it…devi…devi….one really big gap below the level of average white intelligence. What can we do with that?
Again, to rephrase:
We’re kept down by our low levels of intelligence. We didn’t even ask to come here, but here we are and we are being forced to compete not only with whites, who significantly more intelligent than we are, but with Asians and Hispanics who are also more intelligent than we are.
How is the former fair? Did blacks ask to have lower average levels of intelligence? Obviously, life is unfair. By invoking IQ differentials, you are making the case FOR Affirmative Action, as has been noted elsewhere.
But what of the IQ gap? Studying hard in school is positively correlated with intelligence, so your remark is a non-starter.
But there was never an Asian conspiracy to keep you down. There WAS an actual conspiracy to keep blacks down in the US. You might feel differently if you lived in Asia and was relatively recently the object of such a conspiracy.
You are also overlooking human nature here. There was no conspiracy among Jews to keep gentile Germans down either. There was just an IQ gap between Jews and non-Jews in Europe. European whites, especially Germans, didn’t like that. We know how that ended. Why do you think blacks should be any less resentful than Germans over IQ differentials?
I do understand your argument against AA and I agree with it mostly, but there really is no way to put a pretty face on race differentials in IQ. I don’t have a good solution to this problem. I’m partial to Steve Sailer’s Citizenism, but fear Jared Tayor’s approach is more logically consistent. In any event, I do think blacks would be better off trading AA for A COMPLETE IMMIGRATION MORATORIUM, if this were at all possible, which it isn’t, unfortunately.
I don’t buy it. Nobody chooses their genes, yet it is fair to discriminate on an individual basis in favor of, say, competence, and against stupidity. That’s a meritocracy.
Just because some group of people (e.g., blacks) is statistically less competent than some other group doesn’t make this an unfair system. It certainly doesn’t mean we should discriminate against other groups (e.g, whites and Asians) just because they are more competent.
Complaining about how blacks as a whole are treated is ridiculous. It’s about how individuals are treated. A “people” cannot suffer; people suffer.
The conspiracy is over now, long over, and maybe blacks will realize that when we all stop acting like AA is necessary.
Unamused,
You are missing the point. Life is an inherently unfair system. We can try to make mitigate the unfairness of life by establishing uniform systems of assessment (meritocracy), but people have a tendency to favor their own, despite objective measures. The larger question is the following:
How should we best manage a multi-racial multi-ethnic society in which there are large differences in average intellectual ability between groups?
Intelligence differentials between groups in a given society are destabilizing, as Amy Chua has so ably documented. For you to expect blacks to learn their place, which is basically what you are advocating, is naive.
You wrote:
You don’t get it. It doesn’t matter to blacks that the conspiracy is long over. It is the effective status of blacks on the racial hierarchy, whether determined by “fair” means or not, that chafes. If I could wave my magic wand and get blacks to accept the reality of racial differences in intelligence and simultaneously disabuse them of the notion of systemic white racism, it would not matter one wit. In fact, it might intensify black resentment, given the seeming immutability of the IQ gap. The fact that German Jews achieved more, on average, than German gentiles due to their higher average level of intelligence in the “fair” German system did not prevent gentile Germans from resenting Jewish Germans. Why do you think the sentiment would be different for blacks in the US? One could assume that the resentment of a low achieving minority group in the US would be of little consequence if the majority was resolute in its application of a uniform system of assessment if it weren’t for the following:
1)We now have in the US, low achieving minority groups who constitute about 30% of the population. There would be no dismissing their racial resentment.
2)Whites currently are not resolute in applying a uniform system of assessment and will probably never be. This lack of resolution among whites is ironically caused by the IQ gaps among various groups of whites (especially that of Jews as compared to gentiles).
So, where does this leave us? Is there a way out? It is my firm belief that the biggest problem facing this country today is immigration. I think that a complete immigration moratorium should be implemented and enforced for the next 40 years. I would also advocate for the elimination of all racial preferences. Even assuming that we implement the aforementioned policies, the future looks pretty grim. State sponsored segregation seems more attractive every day.
[Warning: RR's entire line of discussion is a waste of time.]
Unamused wrote:
What does this mean, exactly? Clearly, a “people” CAN suffer. Jews suffered, as a “people” during the Holocaust. The Fur, as a “people”, suffered and continue to suffer at the hands of Muslims in Sudan. You seem to be arguing against group identification. Is that what you are doing?
It means exactly what it says. Populations don’t suffer; they are abstractions and incapable of feeling. The people who compose them suffer. The worst that can happen to a population is decline and extinction.
I am arguing against policies like AA which are supposed to help some group’s “performance.” If there were qualified (black) individuals unfairly losing out, that would be a problem. The fact that the black race is underqualified and therefore losing out, is not.
It was actually going pretty well until the collective white American guilt trip. In 1950, 9% of black families had only one parent; in 1965, 28%; in 1970, 33%; by 1992, half. Illegitimacy rates followed a similar trajectory. (Source: Paved With Good Intentions.) Black women were earning as much as white women long before AA (now they earn more). Blacks will “learn their place” when we stop telling them all their problems are caused by white people, and everyone secretly hates them, and that blacks can’t be racist, blah blah blah blah blah . . .
IQ is a funny thing. India has a low median IQ yet in my country they are all doctors, engineers, programmers, i-bankers and ambitious entrepreneurs.
Unamused,
Your statements are partly correct. Relatively speaking, things were going well for blacks in the 1950s, due mainly to a little thing called state sponsored segregation. Segregation prevented blacks from competing directly with whites and imposed strict discipline upon blacks. Whites felt guilty over segregation and eliminated it. Blacks will not learn their place unless they are forced (i.e. coerced, as they were during segregation) to. Are you advocating state sponsored segregation? If so, your position is logically consistent. If not, then you are advocating a policy that is completely contrary to human nature.
You wrote:
But this is precisely the problem. Your statement doesn’t mean anything. You are babbling now.
I’m going to try to disentangle this ball of confusion you have unbosomed here. Let’s see if I can concisely summarize your position:
Populations, which consist of people for our purposes, don’t suffer. Groups of people don’t actually suffer, by your line of reasoning, because averages are just numbers and don’t actually reflect an underlying reality. Individuals can suffer, but groups and populations (i.e. “people”) can’t suffer because the alleged suffering of specific peoples has been abstracted out through their population numbers.
This sounds like a very tortured argument. In fact, the tone of your argument is distressingly similar to the argument presented by anti-racist when they assail the existence of race. To take your argument to its conclusion, since “people” can’t suffer, “people” can’t have average IQs either (or average crime rates). Individuals can have average IQs, but “people” can’t. Yeah, that’s the ticket. I’m starting to see the light. White people don’t actually suffer due to AA or immigration. No. Individuals, who happen to be white, actually suffer. Now I get it. What you are saying is that we live in Bizzaro America, where groups don’t exist, or if they exist, can’t suffer as groups. I’m digging you now. I am feeling you (no homo). All blacks have to do is stop all that damn complaining and get on the Kumbaya love train and everything will be honky-dory. Oops. I didn’t mean “honky” as in…you know…the pejorative sense. [It's "hunky-dory."] I mean everyone will be judged by the content of their character, not the alleged suffering of their group or their average group IQ, which don’t exist anyway. Racial groups and group suffering only exist in our minds.
I would say this is a problem for blacks. And it is a problem beyond remediation, thus the resentment. Why do you think blacks would not resent their position in the meritorious racial hierarchy? Again, Europeans generally and Germans specifically, resented Jews precisely for this reason. How is racial resentment not a major problem?
It’s strange that you’re having difficulty with this, since what I said is not any more complicated or controversial than saying: “Groups of people do not fall in love with other groups of people, but people fall in love with other people.”
Not what I said.
Not what I said.
No, only groups can have average traits. Obviously.
Well now you’re just being silly.
Try to keep up now: talking about the “suffering” of blacks as a whole is ridiculous. Some inept blacks suffer because of their incompetence, just like some inept whites suffer; competent people of all races do just fine. Just because the average ineptness of blacks leads to higher “average suffering” among blacks than whites does not mean we need to intercede on behalf of their “people.” Blacks as a whole are not suffering.
Again, you’re talking about blacks and “their position.” There’s millions of blacks, existing at all points in the spectrum of merit.
India’s median IQ is hard to estimate (probably cuz of those 2000-some ethnic groups). Let’s say it’s 80–85. When you have over a billion people with that median IQ, you’re going to end up with a lot of smart people.
As for “all” of them being doctors, engineers, etc., that’s obviously a selection bias (and an exaggeration).
Yes, my government selects them on that bias. H1B visas, etc.
RR, many Blacks have argued that the worst thing to happen to Black American was integration.
However, the US government was afraid of separatism if all Blacks united and built a “nation within a nation”.
Unamused,
You are not grasping the import of your statement. You stated:
What we are debating currently is not whether blacks as a whole are suffering. We are debating whether it is possible for American blacks, or any other demographic to suffer as a group. You are under the impression that it is impossible for groups to suffer. You are wrong.
If you are making the point that blacks, as a group, are not currently suffering in the US, then I would agree with you, BUT THIS IS NOT WHAT YOU STATED. You came up with some drivel about how populations can’t suffer as if it was impossible for groups, like Jews in Nazi Germany, to suffer. Please, either write more carefully or read more carefully (preferably both).
Again, please bring some coherence to your statement:
Did Jews in Nazi Germany suffer as a “people”? Were the Jews deluded? Was the world deluded?
A more apt analogy to what you actually stated would be the following:
Groups of people cannot oppress other groups of people, but people can oppress other people.
Clearly, people can oppress other people. Groups of people can also oppress other groups of people. Consequently, people can suffer as a group. Are we clear?
I think I understand what you are driving at. You mean to say that people should be judged as individuals, not as members of a group. If you are saying that, then stick with that. If you are arguing against the usefulness of group identification, that’s fine also (although futile, given human nature). But don’t say groups CAN’T suffer.
Meme,
Integration clearly had its downsides for blacks. I don’t think it is reasonable to say it was the worst thing to happen to American blacks. At this point, segregation seems…..logical. I am not a supporter of segregation, but it sure would make things simpler.
RR, re-segregation won’t happen. Its too late.
Plus, many Black Americans are fully integrated and doing well for themselves within the white majority mainstream.
There’s no going back. Only forward.
Plus, isolationist groups like the Amish are not doing as well as the idealists and utopians among us thought they were.
The black population, as a whole, is a statistical abstraction. It does not experience happiness, sadness, or suffering. Your whole argument was that blacks as a whole are suffering disparate impact, which is supposedly bad. Well, it’s not. If an individual black person is discriminated against, that’s bad. If blacks as a whole turn out to be doing worse than whites, that’s not a problem. Black people do not experience love/hate/suffering collectively.
In Nazi Germany, virtually all Jews suffered. The Jewish people suffered exactly to the extent that individual Jews suffered, multiplied by the number of them. This trivial form of “group suffering” is not what I was referring to by “a ‘people’ suffering.”
Also, note that this was a case of explicit discrimination against a group of people. Disparate impact is not.
It would be apt, except we were talking about (the personal experience of) suffering due to disparate impact, not oppression, which is group-on-group. You had some hypothetical black person speaking for his entire race, saying:
Well, he may be kept down by his low level of intelligence, but collecting all American blacks into one group and saying they’re being kept down because you observe a disparate impact, in the absence of actual discrimination against that group, is what I have a problem with.
For the record, I will reproduce what you call “babbling” and a “ball of confusion,” which makes you wish I would “either write more carefully or read more carefully (preferably both)”:
Everything else is your imagination.
Update: I thought of a better explanation. It is wrong (i.e., irrational) to conclude that individuals belonging to some group are suffering (more than they ought to be), just because the group they belong to is statistically worse off than another group (“suffering”). Blacks have lower average income, for instance, but we cannot conclude that any individual blacks are suffering (more than they ought to be) because their income is low. (Low incomes make people suffer, but this has nothing to do with belonging to the group in question, i.e., being black).
Anyway, my remark was supposed to sum up my arguments; it wasn’t a new argument of its own. I think it is easy to read more into it than I intended, or to mistake it for something trivially false.
The main thing that holds black Americans back is a dysfunctional family system, and I see that amongst white Americans as well.
Part of the reason Asians, Indians and other South Asians, Carribbeans and Blacks from Africa do so well here is due to their functional and intact family backgrounds.
Unamused wrote:
Let me get this straight. The “group suffering” by experienced by Jews in Nazi Germany was trivial and is unrelated to “a ‘people’ suffering.” First off, I do NOT appreciate your anti-Semitism sir. The Holocaust was not trivial. I hate people who hate the Jews. I am intolerant of intolerance. If you are going to continue to spew vile hatred on this blog then I will….I will….dammit! I don’t have much leverage here. Ok. If you continue these vile tirades against the Jewish people I will give you the dressing down you so richly deserve. Secondly, group suffering and “a ‘people’ suffering is a distinction without a difference. I’m trying hard to understand you. Please help me out.
I’ll try to summarize the crux of your argument again:
Populations don’t suffer, because they are represented by numbers and numbers don’t have feelings. But people suffer, so long as they aren’t part of a “people” who can be characterized numerically.
[Still not what I said.]
What you assert here would be true if it weren’t for the fact that population quantification is abstracted from people. People exist without quantification, but the reverse is not true. You seem to be arguing that populations are not entities unless they are quantified. Six million Jews (an abstraction) killed in the Holocaust is not indicative of Jewish suffering? Did Jews suffer as a people during the Holocaust or not? I am arguing that the Jews did suffer during the Holocaust and that they suffered because of the disparate impact they had upon gentile Germans. The disparate impact led directly to explicit discrimination against Jews. I think we can both agree that this was a Bad Thing. The suffering was real and it occurred to a real “people”. A “people” CAN suffer. You are wrong to state that a “people” cannot suffer. If you wish to amend your statement, please feel free to do so. I think precision in writing is a good thing. Let me have a whack at what I think you are trying to say:
What I meant by “People cannot suffer” is that a group that experiences disparate impact isn’t oppressed because their “suffering” is not uniformly distributed. Every person in the group, in this case American blacks, doesn’t suffer because many qualified blacks achieve. This differs from the situation in the Jim Crow era where blacks, as a group, were explicitly discriminated against which was a Bad Thing.
So, if you are qualifying your statement to comport with the statement above, I accept your qualification without qualification, so long as we are in agreement that your original statement was wrong:)
You wrote:
Why is it bad? It might be bad for the black person discriminated against, but how would it be bad for whites or society as a whole? What difference does it make?
I think it would be bad because the black population as a whole would feel aggrieved and restive, leading to a less stable and cohesive society, eventually leading to state sponsored segregation.
Hmm. As I stated previously, gentile Germans experienced disparate impact with respect to Jewish Germans previously, and that turned out Really Badly. Even if it could be proven without a shadow of a doubt that every white person in America had a heart of gold and strictly adhered to objective measures of ability and those measures of ability were 100% correlated with performance, blacks (and others) would still feel aggrieved and restive. This would be bad for the country. One could argue that eliminating AA would leave the country no worse off. I would agree with this. What I would not agree with is your assertion that disparate impact, in itself, would not continue to have negative effects for the country at large. Perhaps there is no solution. Maybe White Nationalism will eventually become viable. I do know that eliminating immigration and AA would be well worth the effort.
Also, from a woman’s perspective, I wouldn’t want the country’s most sexually desirable men to be segregated from me. Would you?
Meme,
You mentioned that old bug-a-boo family structure. Yes, family structure is important, but family structures just don’t pop out of racial vacuums. The family structures of blacks were shaped by evolution. They are, generally speaking, somewhat different than the structures of whites. Absent segregation, black familial norms reasserted themselves.
You wrote:
But what of the family structures of the people they left in their home countries? Familial structures in black Africa and the Caribbean are very similar to black family structure here in the US.
Meme,
I don’t know. Your question assumes two things:
1) That the woman in question does not belong to the race of men deemed most desirable.
2) The woman in question actually had a shot at the country’s most desirable men.
If I, as a woman, wasn’t on the romantic radar of the most desirable men and the most desirable men did not belong to my racial group, then perhaps segregation might be a psychological blessing.
… Are you serious? What I said was that it is trivially true that groups suffer, if by “groups suffering” you mean the people in the group suffering. That’s still people suffering, just under a different name. If “a ‘people’ suffering” is just the people therein suffering, then this is true, but trivial (the truth, that is, not the suffering). I was getting at something more important. See my edited comment above.
I did not say that the Holocaust was trivial. You must be being sarcastic right? You can’t really be misinterpreting me that badly? (FWIW: I’m descended from Holocaust survivors.)
Everybody knows Jews suffered. What does it mean to say that, in addition, they suffered “as a people”? Nothing. It means nothing.
Then differentiate, precisely, between a group of suffering people and a group of people that suffers. What’s the difference? Depending on your answer, my statement (that people suffer, but “a people” doesn’t suffer) will either be right or trivially wrong.
Well, I agree with your statement. I think it closely matches what I said (all of it, not just the one sentence you picked out.) My original statement was not wrong, though.
Disparate impact is going to make whites treat blacks badly? Contradicts the evidence.
Well, since we’re so in agreement on immigration and AA, I can agree to disagree about the, er, impact of disparate impact.
The most desirable men do not belong to my racial group, however, the most desirable men do find me desirable. In a segregated circumstance we would have had no chance at romance.
I would have been stuck with men I don’t find desirable, which would not only be bad for me, but bad for the poor guys I had to “settle” for.
What man wants to be “settled for”?
Black Africans and Carribbeans come from the same types of families that most of Asia and Middle East come from – a 2 parent and multi-generational family (living under one roof).
“Rugged individualists” came up with the concept of the single parent household. The rest of the world thinks we’re nuts.
“Absent segregation, black familial norms reasserted themselves.”
Assimilation with “rugged individualists” caused the breakdown of the traditionally large and tight-knit Black family.
I’ve travelled all over the world and independent white people of Euro descent are held up everywhere as examples of what NOT to become familywise.
White Euros praise the “nuclear family” as some sort of model, appearantly not realizing that the nuclear family is already a breakdown of family.
Extended family > nuclear family > single parent household
When Grandma and Grandpa were kicked out and sent to the old age home, that began the destruction of the family.
Industrialization brought about the nuclear family. From there its just a hop, skip and a technological jump to single parent households.
As developing countries become more and more “developed” they will take on our social pathologies as well.
Or not.
Throughout Africa and South Asia I stayed with some very wealthy and technologically advanced families that remained large, intact and multigenerational.
Melanated people seem to have a “family gene” that’s missing in people of palor.
People of palor are all about “having my own space”.
Meme,
I have to disagree with you. Black American family structure is not some aberration among blacks. The following characteristics are shared among the family structures of black Africa and the black African Diaspora:
1) Low paternal investment.
2) Low paternal certainty.
3) Women doing the bulk of the work.
4) Fostering – Parents sending children to family members to raise for indefinite periods.
The rest of the world may think we are nuts, but the proof is in the pudding. Nuclear family focused societies have higher standards of living (lower levels of infant mortality, lower morbidity rates, lower mortality rates, greater rates of production etc.). Does this prove causality? No, but it does mean something.
Meme wrote:
Plenty, as it turns out, depending on the woman in question, of course. If I were a single fellow, I think I would take Halle Berry, even if I knew she was settling for me.
Most people do settle. It is simply a case of summing up the pros and cons of a particular situation and doing what one deems in his/her best interest. Lori Gottleib has been getting a lot of press over the past few months due to her book “Marry Him: The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough” (http://www.salon.com/life/feature/2010/02/07/lori_gottlieb)
Here she is being interviewed: YouTube
Men settle all the time. It is women who have a problem with settling. What gives with that? For instance, let’s say you are a college senior and you get wait-listed by your first choice college. If the college opts to accept you, do you turn them down because they settled for you?
With respect to being prevented from dating/marrying exogamously via segregation, sure, it would hurt on an individual level, but would probably help the underachieving group as a whole. Take American blacks, for instance. Segregation prevented many blacks from dating/marrying whites, which may have impacted the personal fitness of the blacks in question, but quite probably helped blacks as a group. Those blacks who had the wherewithal to pursue or be pursued by whites were probably high achievers as compared to other blacks. Segregation prevented these high achieving blacks from out-marrying, thus keeping their genes in the Negro American gene pool. Segregation shielded blacks from sexual competition from whites, just as it shielded blacks from economic competition from whites.
:)
[It's a little too subtle IMHO. And it's a dick move either way.]
You are wrong. You are effectively saying that race was irrelevant to Nazis persecution of the Jews. Jews suffered because they were Jewish people. That right. They suffered because they were a “people”. And their suffering stemmed from the fact that they were a “people”, not just people. They weren’t some randomly selected population of Earthlings who happened to have been slaughtered by the Nazis. They were targeted for slaughter because of their Jewish “peoplehood”.
[Not really sure how else to put this: NO, THAT IS NOT WHAT I AM SAYING, EFFECTIVELY OR OTHERWISE. Stop putting words in my mouth. Enough straw men.]
Sure. People and a “people” are not mutually exclusive categories. People can constitute a “people”. Persons do not exist as standalone entities. A group can suffer as individual human beings and can also be targeted for suffering because they belong to a particular group. While the net amount of suffering would be the same, the imposed suffering on a “people” has a specific tactical/strategic non-random purpose. This is the difference between people suffering and a “people” suffering.
[If you want to define "group suffering" as "being targeted for suffering because you belong to a particular group," well, that's fine (it's a way to make my statement trivially incorrect, as I've mentioned once or twice), but it really has nothing to do with what I said, since I was working from the premise that disparate impact (on American blacks) is NOT caused by disparate treatment (i.e., targeted suffering).]
Yes it was. It was very wrong, but let’s move on.
[I do not believe you understand the meaning of my original statement. Your every counterargument has been a straw man.]
You have misunderstood the example. Germans reacted negatively to the disparate impact Jews achievement had upon them. Similarly, blacks react negatively to the disparate impact white achievement has upon them. The difference between the former and the latter case is that the Jews were a very small minority in Germany and weren’t in a position to react assertively/aggressively to the restiveness of the German gentile population. Whites can react assertively/aggressively to the restiveness of blacks (and others, who collectively constitute 30% of the population of the US) over disparate impact. This is the danger.
I’m glad you are a good sport, but we will have to revisit the issue of disparate impact. It is vitally important and really needs to be addressed at length.
RR,
You disagree because you are inexperienced.
Northern and Western Europeans and their descendents in North American don’t do family.
We can’t wait to leave home and get away from our parents at 18.
Most of us couldn’t care less about aunts, uncles, cousins – forget grandparents, they are too old and an embarrasement.
Any man that says he “still” lives with his mother is considered a “loser” even if he is living with her to take care of her in illness. Shit, doncha know that biyatch is supposed to be a nursing home? That’s the general attitude.
We do divorce.
We do single parenthood.
We do shacking up.
Shit, nuclear family is on its way out.
In Netherlands, Sweden and other Western Euro countries its a relic of the past.
Contrast this with Asia and Africa where teenagers get EXCITED about a picnic with their elder aunts, uncles and grandparents!
Where not only are fathers loved and respected but so are grandfathers and great-grandfathers and a whole long lineage going back hundreds and sometimes THOUSANDS of years (in India this is common).
Elders are respected and even LIKED -what a concept!
I suggest you get out of your little orbit and travel the world a bit.
It does a body (and mind) good.
Failing that there is always “google”.
Here’s a little diddy about family structure in Ethiopia
http://www.tulane.edu/~rouxbee/kids98/ethiopia3.html
And that, my friend, is why most Africans and Asians think we are completely cultureless, coldhearted nuts (and sluts).
————————
Regarding “settling” – I don’t have to.
Luckily the men with the best muscle tone and the best genes/skin for aging slowly find me attractive. They also have rhythm – in more ways than one.
heh
Meme wrote:
But then how does one explain the eagerness with which Africans and Asians seek to immigrate to the West? Somebody is doing something right, and it ain’t them.
Unamused,
Dude, I’m not putting words in your mouth. I am trying to understand your argument, that is why I have repeated my understanding of your argument to you.
You wrote:
That’s not nice. You have hurt my feelings. Can’t we have a disagreement without resorting to personal invective and bad language?
No need to shout. Ok, can you better explain what you are saying? I have tried to summarize what I think you are saying because I don’t understand what you are saying.
If my counterarguments have been straw men, then my arguments should have been easy for you to refute. Could you do that?
Trivially incorrect? A statement is either correct or incorrect. We are not dealing with probabilities here. Being trivially incorrect is like being trivially pregnant. Correctness is a binary state.
Say, let’s just agree to disagree regarding the correctness of your statement. I like you and I would like to continue replying to your postings.
Easily explained my friend — $$$$$.
Cultured, family-oriented Asians and Africans DO NOT want their kids assimilating to the cultural norms of the United States.
They want their kids to study, work hard and succeed financially but retain their religious and cultural heritages.
They prefer iF their adult kids marry “their own” and some go as far as to arrange marriages – still very common amongst South Asians and Africans.
Cultured Africans DO NOT want their kids assimilating to African American cultural norms either.
African Americans are considered by many Continental Africans to be “lost” – completely cut off from their original histories, cultures and religions and still suffering from “slave mentality”.
You seem to not know anything about the world and people in it.
May I ask what your age and experience is?
1. “Trivially incorrect? A statement is either correct or incorrect. … Correctness is a binary state.”
Think about “the exception that proves the rule.” (Warning: that was an analogy.) It’s possible to define the words in a statement so that it becomes incorrect, but in a trivial way (i.e., obvious and silly). If “a group suffering” is defined to mean “the people who make up that group suffering,” then it is trivially true that groups suffer, given that people suffer (a premise which I grant). However, that is not the meaning I intended, as I have attempted to make clear in every subsequent comment.
I was implicitly assuming this: we all know people suffer (in this sense), and sometimes a lot of suffering people have something in common and can be considered a group. The group is then “suffering” in exactly the above sense. From that implicit starting point, which I thought too obvious by far to mention, I went on to claim that this is the only sense in which a group can be said to suffer. Therefore, to speak of “the black race” suffering because their average income is low, or whatever, is just silly. The black race suffers exactly to the extent that black individuals suffer, and black individuals do not (really) suffer because of statistics. (“Honey, I just read in the news that my race has a lower average income than another race, and now I feel sad! … So what’s for breakfast?”)
2. Regarding putting words in my mouth: you have consistently done exactly that. It’s just a fact. Look at your comments, e.g., “Let me have a whack at what I think you are trying to say: …” You went so far as to put your interpretation of my remark in the same format as direct quotes from me.
3. The only refutation to a straw man argument is to say “that’s not what I said.” Loudly, if necessary.
4. Finally, it’s a dick move to deliberately misinterpret an innocuous and true statement as Holocaust denial.
5. We can certainly move on from this point.
Yes, I am aware that immigrants come here for the money. But why do they seem so incapable of generating the same degree of wealth in their own countries? I mean, if their cultures and family structures are so much better, why are the living standards in African and Asian countries so much lower? Why are the childhood morbidity and mortality levels so high? It seems to me that the nuclear family focus of the West has some advantages compared to other systems.
Perhaps, but African Americans are, nonetheless, the most successful blacks on the planet. Explain that!
Of course, the arguments you have presented here are proof of WHY WE MUST IMPLEMENT AN IMMIGRATION MORATORIUM….NOW!!!! These people clearly do not want to become Americans. They need to leave.
Yes, RR, there are benefits to the nuclear family system. There are benefits to every system, as well as drawbacks. My point however is that the traditional nuclear family is a thing of the past. Divorce, single parenthood and shacking up are norms in Western European countries are the descendents thereof in the US.
As far as African Americans being the most successful Africans on the planet, I don’t know about that. The Continental Africans that I know are far more on point culturally, spiritually, financially and familialy (a word?) than many of the African Americans I know.
Now your statement, “Of course, the arguments you have presented here are proof of WHY WE MUST IMPLEMENT AN IMMIGRATION MORATORIUM….NOW!!!! These people clearly do not want to become Americans. They need to leave.”
Why so you say that?
Because they are cultured and family-oriented?
Granted, its not mainstream in America to be either right now, we are becoming pretty crass and underclass as a whole, however that doesn’t mean that someone with values and culture cannot be American at the same time.
If the “marrying their own” gets to you – would you prefer that they date and marry interracially?
They are free to mate with whomever they want in the United States – including their own.
As an Amerian I take umbrage at the assumption that people who are cultured, religious and family-oriented are not welcome here because they are not “American enough”.
You may come from an uncultured, broken home but not all Americans do. Not even in 2011.
Unamused,
Mama Mia! Please focus on what I actually write. You wrote:
Now, YOU have created a straw man. I never stated nor implied this. [Um, I wasn't saying you did. I thought I made it mind-numbingly clear that I was re-stating my original statement, from before you joined the discussion. The one that ended in the disputed phrase about group suffering.] What I did was attack the following statement:
This is what you wrote. It is not true. It is not probabilistic. It is not a general rule. [Oops, I guess I wasn't clear enough when I said I was making an analogy to "the exception that proves the rule."] It is a statement that you asserted to be true. You were wrong and continue to be wrong. The statement was poorly thought out. Why don’t you just admit it and be done with it.
[It's like you're not even reading my comments...]
Perhaps we need to define “Straw Man” because one of us doesn’t know what a straw man argument is:
A straw man is a component of an argument and is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent’s position.[1] To “attack a straw man” is to create the illusion of having refuted a proposition by substituting it with a superficially similar yet unequivalent proposition (the “straw man”), and refuting it, without ever having actually refuted the original position.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man
[Uhhh... I wasn't talking about straw man arguments. I was talking about putting words in my mouth, in the sense of "[telling] someone what you think they mean or want to say.” Similar to a straw man, I guess, but not intended to be the same thing. See, I even wrote it: “2. Regarding putting words in my mouth”]
If I was actually trying to create a straw man, I wouldn’t have led off by writing “Let me have a whack at what I think you are trying to say”. I didn’t put words in your mouth. I honestly didn’t understand your argument because your argument was so incoherent. I was looking for clarification, which you attempted to provide. I again summarized my understanding of your argument. You then agreed that I had summarized your view correctly. There was no straw man created by me. You, on the other hand, did create a straw man. You characterized my argument as somehow equating black underachievement with black suffering. I never stated any such thing and I DEFY YOU TO SHOW OTHERWISE! Please write and read more carefully.
[Perhaps you should read more carefully. Seriously. The comment you're replying to wasn't an attack on you in any way.]
It was a joke. You have a very underdeveloped sense of humor to be Jewish:) Besides, didn’t you just violate your own comment policy by referring to my comments in a vulgar insulting fashion? I know it’s your blog, but am I wrong to expect coherence? Let’s move on man, before you end up banning me. Now THAT would be an….unsophisticated move.
[Hard, very hard, to detect the sarcasm that made your accusation into a joke. Hence, it was an "unsophisticated" move, and I called you out on it. I regret that my use of the slang term "dick move" was so insulting to you; I didn't think it was that bad.]
Meme,
In terms of wealth, health, education, etc., I defy you to list a group of Africans LIVING IN AFRICA that exceed African Americans in any of the aforementioned areas. Now, if we were talking female genital mutilation, or polygamy or Animism, you would have a case.
Sure, the nuclear family has its drawbacks, but it has served the West well. It has served the West much better than the extended family system has served non-whites. That is why they come here in massive numbers and we don’t go there in massive numbers.
It’s not that they are not American enough. They don’t want to be American at all! Some African and Asian immigrants bring their slaves with them for goodness sake! Many black Africans are STILL PRACTICING SLAVERY!
As far as the nuclear family serving the West well, I don’t know. Are families doing well in “the West”? Statistics say they are not. Children, adults and old people are all on anti-depressants, something is wrong somewhere.
Asia and Africa is poorer than the US but I can tell you that even very poor people living 8 to a 2 room “hut” are far and above much more happy and pleasant people to be around than your average, secular American teenager who has his/her own room, TV, and computer downloaded with the latest porn.
Money and material progress is not everything.
I know many South Asians with the oppurtunity to come to the US who have turned it down because their family and culture is much more important to them. Those that DO come tend to bring famiy and culture with them – and its a good thing they do because mainstream secular American culture cannot offer them either.
On the otherhand, the type of work I do puts me in contact with many American and Aussie women who have married Indian husbands and ex-patted there. If you are familiar with the “manosphere” blogs then you must be aware of this meme: American women are fat and obnoxious feminazis so we’s men gonna expat to Asia and find us some submissive Asian wimminz.
Well, I don’t know about that but I DO KNOW several American and Aussie women who done went and got them a Desi (South Asian) man!
[On top of it the myth of the "submissive Asian wife" is just that - a myth. Any guy with that idea, you can't say I didn't warn you!]
The Continental Africans that come to the US are by and large professionals at a greater percentage than African Americans are.
I’ve never met an Asian or African, either here in the States or in Asia/Africa that owned a slave – have you?
So far your comments have betrayed your ignorance regarding the cultures and peoples of the world and you have not answered my question on your age, experience and travels, if any.
As far as Animism – freedom of religion! That’s American, ain’t it?
Legal immigration and naturalization, along with paying taxes and speaking English is enough assimilation to be an “American”.
We do not have a collective culture or religion to offer anyone.
Immigrants have to bring their own and hopefully some of their family values will rub off on us.
(now I sound like one of those MRAs, mens rights activists)
Dude,
It seems that you have veered off into the realm of Alice In Wonderland mode of argumentation, where words mean what you want them to mean. This is what you wrote:
But then you wrote:
[Note: RR is lying here. He has taken comments about different things and put them next to each other, so that it looks like I'm contradicting myself.]
You are not making sense right now. You are babbling, actually. Can we move on? Do you have anything else to say regarding disparate impact or immigration?
Now you’re just flat out lying.
Your nonsense about straw man arguments was a direct response, complete with quotes, to this comment by me. See, this is what you wrote: “If I was actually trying to create a straw man, I wouldn’t have led off by writing ‘Let me have a whack at what I think you are trying to say’.” Quoting from my comment #104.
So I defended that comment. (“I wasn’t talking about straw man arguments,” I said, referring to #104, which you were also referring to.) It was easy to do, since #104 talked about putting words in my mouth, not about making a straw man argument. See, this is what I wrote in #104:
But now you’re cherry-picking every reference to “straw man argument” from this different comment. Did you really think I wouldn’t notice?
Meme wrote:
I agree, but previously you stated that immigrants come here for the money. Well, which is it? If they are not here for material progress and money, why do they stay here?
Again, if their cultures are so great, why did they elect to immigrate from their home countries in the first place? I guess our cultural traditions of property rights, freedom of speech, freedom of association (what’s left of it) etc. embodied in the constitution just doesn’t impress them.
No, thank God, but unfortunately, immigrant slave owners are here:
http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2001/December/01_crt_661.htm
http://www.newsweek.com/2000/12/17/slavery-s-new-face.html
Unamused,
Were you accusing me of making straw man arguments or weren’t you? It seems to me that you were. It doesn’t really matter where you made the accusation. The fact of the matter is that I didn’t create a straw man and I defy you to show me where you THINK I did. You were the first to use the term “straw man” and you directed comments containing the term at me. Did you take the red pill or the blue pill?
Hahahaha, okay, I guess if you say misrepresenting your opponent (which you just did) doesn’t matter, then it doesn’t matter. Hurray! That was sarcasm, by the way. So anyway, am I Alice in Wonderland or Neo in the Matrix? It’s important, you know. I need to know if I should be taking pills or eating mushrooms!
Here, for the record, is your preferred definition of a straw man:
Alright, let’s see if we can find some. Me:
You, shortly thereafter, in response to the above (my emphasis):
Have a wonderful day.
Meme: Money and material progress is not everything.
RR: I agree, but previously you stated that immigrants come here for the money. Well, which is it? If they are not here for material progress and money, why do they stay here?
Meme: I told you, money. That money is not everything to them is proven by the fact that many of them will not adopt the negative aspects of American life yet retain their own cultures, religions and family values while making money here, even going so far as to bring other family members over or even seeking brides and grooms from the homeland.
As far as “staying” not all of them do. In fact, I don’t know how informed you are about South Asian economics but many Indians who have been here for years, are now moving back. Another thing that’s happening is that Indian immigrants who have lived here for decades and conceived families here are now seeing their young adult American kids MOVING TO INDIA. And these kids never LIVED in India to begin with.
Clearly the days of the United States being the #1 place to immigrate to are coming to an end.
This should be good news to you.
Again, if their cultures are so great, why did they elect to immigrate from their home countries in the first place? I guess our cultural traditions of property rights, freedom of speech, freedom of association (what’s left of it) etc. embodied in the constitution just doesn’t impress them.
I can speak for South Asia, property rights, freedom of speech and freedom of association are the same there, if not more so than here.
Again, what attracted people here from the very inception of this nation was the prospect for more financial abundance.
That’s why your ancestors came here, as well as mine.
Nobody came and nobody comes for “culture”.
The culture of the United States that is exported all over the world makes people sick and I’m embarrassed that satellite TV now beams American television into homes worldwide.
When they ask me, “are all Americans like that?” my honest answer is, “not all, but many”.
The only advice I can give you is to get out more and see the world.
You are very inexperienced.
The US is a good place for certain things. And a bad place for others. Just like any other place on the planet.
Everywhere has its strenghts and weakness. Our weakness is family and sex.
Its not a special snowflake and it’s days of glory are ending – largely due to the lack of family values and the emotional/mental issues that result from that.
While we slack off and jerk off to milf porn, others are going to outpace us, especially in the fields of science and technology.
Why? Because their mothers were not whoring it up on youtube but actually raising them right.
Hah, well said. I regret that I have not being paying enough attention to your comments here, since I’ve been involved in—well, you know. ^^
Alright you 2 guys, here’s something 4 u:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jaH_hmnrPU
It’s only funny if you don’t know the reason whites get paid more than blacks, on average: they’re more competent, on average. So that certainly doesn’t preclude the reverse racism we’re all supposed laugh at (what the video calls “reverse affirmative action”—which makes no sense): “Oh, as if whites could be discriminated against! LOL.”( Meanwhile, 90%+ of all blacks will vote for the black candidate, regardless of his incompetence or criminal record, in any given election…) Anyway it’s whites on the left end of the bell curve—lower than average income—that are getting hurt by AA.
See, the whole problem is: if you pay everyone what they deserve for the work they do, blacks will get paid less than whites, because they have a lower average IQ. Women will get paid less than men, because they do not work as many hours of the day, days of the year, or years of their lives.
Update: Paid less on average, in both cases, if that wasn’t clear.