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This is a very weird submission in which to be posting a comment like that. Those foundational institutions should be held to high standards, and it's good tha

This is a very weird submission in which to be posting a comment like that. Those foundational institutions should be held to high standards, and it's good that there are people who will call them to account when they fail to "product the common people," especially when the failure is systematic.

meri_dian 9y ago
I agree with you. The institutions should be held to a high standard, and there should be people to hold them accountable. However there are many people, many people on HN who, if asked, would say that our institutions are fundamentally broken or, as a comment elsewhere on this post says, a "discriminatory clusterfuck". My point is that this is a skewed and biased understanding of reality produced by constantly being fed negative news. Are our institutions perfect? Obviously not. Is there room for improvement? Of course! But do most people who interact with our institutions get treated fairly and according to the letter of the law, a law that itself is for the most part fair and just? I believe so.
- jadedhacker 9y ago
  That's true, but that's mainly true of political majorities. Political minorities (often racial, national, or other kinds) are systemically impacted. Increasingly, it is the wealthy minority that is treated exceptionally fairly with incredible deference while any poor person, if they make a small mistake, is thrown to the wolves and blamed for not understanding a complex system or thinking too little of it.
- dogles 9y ago
  You believe so...with what evidence? You’re pointing at a system that has well-documented, overwhelming evidence of systematic corruption, lawlessness, and oppression, both in recent history and modern day. A “few bad apples” sort of defense is infuriating at this point, because it seems so willfully ignorant. We have the highest incarceration rate in the world - doesn’t that give you pause?
rayiner 9y ago
What is a "high standard?" 99.9% There's hundreds of thousands of civil cases filed every year. If even 0.1% of them are botched that's hundreds of cases a year to highlight in a report. That's especially true when you define "botched" to include sad but unavoidable events. The woman who had a warrant issued because she was terminally ill--how the heck is the court supposed to know that the reason the woman did not show up to court was because she was sick?

meri_dian 9y ago

I agree with you. The institutions should be held to a high standard, and there should be people to hold them accountable. However there are many people, many people on HN who, if asked, would say that our institutions are fundamentally broken or, as a comment elsewhere on this post says, a "discriminatory clusterfuck". My point is that this is a skewed and biased understanding of reality produced by constantly being fed negative news. Are our institutions perfect? Obviously not. Is there room for improvement? Of course! But do most people who interact with our institutions get treated fairly and according to the letter of the law, a law that itself is for the most part fair and just? I believe so.

jadedhacker 9y ago
That's true, but that's mainly true of political majorities. Political minorities (often racial, national, or other kinds) are systemically impacted. Increasingly, it is the wealthy minority that is treated exceptionally fairly with incredible deference while any poor person, if they make a small mistake, is thrown to the wolves and blamed for not understanding a complex system or thinking too little of it.
dogles 9y ago
You believe so...with what evidence? You’re pointing at a system that has well-documented, overwhelming evidence of systematic corruption, lawlessness, and oppression, both in recent history and modern day. A “few bad apples” sort of defense is infuriating at this point, because it seems so willfully ignorant. We have the highest incarceration rate in the world - doesn’t that give you pause?

rayiner 9y ago

What is a "high standard?" 99.9% There's hundreds of thousands of civil cases filed every year. If even 0.1% of them are botched that's hundreds of cases a year to highlight in a report. That's especially true when you define "botched" to include sad but unavoidable events. The woman who had a warrant issued because she was terminally ill--how the heck is the court supposed to know that the reason the woman did not show up to court was because she was sick?