4 ms·

> it's still unpleasant to see that people claiming to be egalitarian or people who say that want meritocracy What ever gave you the impression that the "Ameri

> it's still unpleasant to see that people claiming to be egalitarian or people who say that want meritocracy What ever gave you the impression that the "America #1" crowd was either of those things?

mrtksn 7y ago
The populists say all the time that they want meritocracy and complain that those women/minorities/immigrants are hired based on their gender/race/passport instead of their skills. They are populist probably because these opinions are popular.
- nl 7y ago
  I think you'll find that the "America First" crowd and the "Meritocracy" crowd are listening to different parts of the arguments from the same people, and just hearing what they want to hear. I think there is a strand in their argument that being American is a merit in itself, but this isn't usually stated explicitly except in forms like "Americans for American Jobs". I'm not arguing this makes any logical sense though - it doesn't.
  - mrtksn 7y ago
    I see your point. However, even if being an American(or any other nationality) was merit by itself, why would you demand government involvement in the hiring process? If being an American is a merit, then companies could choose to hire based on this merit. I'm just trying to understand that way of thinking. Maybe they think it's a merit but are insecure about it and demand recognition for because their experience shows that companies do not value this merit enough?
    - nl 7y ago
      There really isn't a lot of point trying to understand an emotional argument as a logical argument. It isn't.
    - pas 7y ago
      Maybe the best way to look at this is to recognize that people have concepts of how the world should look like, naturally that usually includes pleasantries for them. And when the world does not match their predictions, they want to correct for this error. Of course depending on cognitive patterns (which depend on exposure to others' cognition, eg. upbringing, peers, and all their previous experiences factor in to path dependence) one might try to look into themselves, look for their faulty base assumptions, look for causes external to their own sphere, and so on. Normally, people who are not familiar with the problems of borders, the arbitrariness of them, who grew up in a culture that never experienced a downsizing country, a war in their country, stories about how political persecution and/or absolutely bleak prospects drove hundreds of thousands (or millions) of their fellow countrymen away are not going to be very understanding of these problems. On the other hand they will understand that their life is not going as well as they would like it. And they are caught by the meme net cast by whatever lucky political group. (And "blaming the victim" fused with "the outside enemy" is a pretty proven strategy for populists.) And populists always advocate for more power to themselves to fix things. (Obviously, politics is about power, and populism is pretty much the shit tier direct marketing of politics.) Hence the thinking of "america first", "make america great first", before we deal with whatever is outside our borders. This also implies that listen to "americans first", and then listen to any external criticism. (This is again always a pretty great strategy to consolidate power - a form of divide and conquer.) And naturally, this has the effect of basically diverting the attention away from global issues. And since we're living in a global world for quite some time, without at least partially understanding global issues making sense of the local ones is a fool's errand. Because a thinking that tries to somehow understand everything locally inevitably runs into "outside powers caused this to us", and this feeds powerlessness. (It doesn't matter that the USA has and had a very significant factor in shaping that "outside world".)
  - burfog 7y ago
    It's just prioritization. From the available team members (American citizens of all types) the companies are expected to choose those with the most merit. It makes perfect sense if you want your team members to perform well and receive the benefits of that. The sports analogy: put the better players on the field, don't let spectators go on the field, don't score against yourself, and the resulting win should be great for the team.

> it's still unpleasant to see that people claiming to be egalitarian or people who say that want meritocracy What ever gave you the impression that the "America #1" crowd was either of those things?

mrtksn 7y ago

The populists say all the time that they want meritocracy and complain that those women/minorities/immigrants are hired based on their gender/race/passport instead of their skills. They are populist probably because these opinions are popular.

nl 7y ago
I think you'll find that the "America First" crowd and the "Meritocracy" crowd are listening to different parts of the arguments from the same people, and just hearing what they want to hear. I think there is a strand in their argument that being American is a merit in itself, but this isn't usually stated explicitly except in forms like "Americans for American Jobs". I'm not arguing this makes any logical sense though - it doesn't.
- mrtksn 7y ago
  I see your point. However, even if being an American(or any other nationality) was merit by itself, why would you demand government involvement in the hiring process? If being an American is a merit, then companies could choose to hire based on this merit. I'm just trying to understand that way of thinking. Maybe they think it's a merit but are insecure about it and demand recognition for because their experience shows that companies do not value this merit enough?
  - nl 7y ago
    There really isn't a lot of point trying to understand an emotional argument as a logical argument. It isn't.
  - pas 7y ago
    Maybe the best way to look at this is to recognize that people have concepts of how the world should look like, naturally that usually includes pleasantries for them. And when the world does not match their predictions, they want to correct for this error. Of course depending on cognitive patterns (which depend on exposure to others' cognition, eg. upbringing, peers, and all their previous experiences factor in to path dependence) one might try to look into themselves, look for their faulty base assumptions, look for causes external to their own sphere, and so on. Normally, people who are not familiar with the problems of borders, the arbitrariness of them, who grew up in a culture that never experienced a downsizing country, a war in their country, stories about how political persecution and/or absolutely bleak prospects drove hundreds of thousands (or millions) of their fellow countrymen away are not going to be very understanding of these problems. On the other hand they will understand that their life is not going as well as they would like it. And they are caught by the meme net cast by whatever lucky political group. (And "blaming the victim" fused with "the outside enemy" is a pretty proven strategy for populists.) And populists always advocate for more power to themselves to fix things. (Obviously, politics is about power, and populism is pretty much the shit tier direct marketing of politics.) Hence the thinking of "america first", "make america great first", before we deal with whatever is outside our borders. This also implies that listen to "americans first", and then listen to any external criticism. (This is again always a pretty great strategy to consolidate power - a form of divide and conquer.) And naturally, this has the effect of basically diverting the attention away from global issues. And since we're living in a global world for quite some time, without at least partially understanding global issues making sense of the local ones is a fool's errand. Because a thinking that tries to somehow understand everything locally inevitably runs into "outside powers caused this to us", and this feeds powerlessness. (It doesn't matter that the USA has and had a very significant factor in shaping that "outside world".)
- burfog 7y ago
  It's just prioritization. From the available team members (American citizens of all types) the companies are expected to choose those with the most merit. It makes perfect sense if you want your team members to perform well and receive the benefits of that. The sports analogy: put the better players on the field, don't let spectators go on the field, don't score against yourself, and the resulting win should be great for the team.