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I disagree entirely. I see people being lifted up. In that story, people were torn down. I have noticed this trend though, of reacting to justice movements by

I disagree entirely. I see people being lifted up. In that story, people were torn down. I have noticed this trend though, of reacting to justice movements by claiming it'll tear down people. Why do you believe this?

andreilys 6y ago
There’s a lot of vitriol aimed at rich people right now, regardless of how they attained their wealth. I imagine it’ll soon be transferred to talented people as well. Soon we’ll be right where the story predicted, everyone wears handicaps to make themselves equal.
- ThrowawayR2 6y ago
  Perhaps it's here already? We see a lot of posts here on HN denigrating the value of higher education and saying that highly-educated people are gatekeeping.
  - logicchains 6y ago
    I don't think many people here object to education, they just disagree that the university system does a good job of educating people.
  - wishinghand 6y ago
    The objection is not to highly educated people gatekeeping (though they should know better), but that people with a status that helps unlock further wealth are gatekeeping.
- rmrfstar 6y ago
  > There’s a lot of vitriol aimed at rich people right now, regardless of how they attained their wealth. Part of the problem is that our current property regime does not distinguish between property acquired through accession [1] and property acquired through extraction. There is this weird philosophy that all "market transactions" are equally legitimate and that market price is the correct (and only reliable) indicator of economic value. This view ignores the fact that market prices are as much a product of market structure as they are a reflection of people's preferences. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accession_(property_law) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accession_(property_law)
  - pydry 6y ago
    Our current property regime evolved that way for precisely that reason. Distinguishing the two and highlighting it would be a subversive, rather revolutionary act, which would attract a lot of hate.
- pydry 6y ago
  >There’s a lot of vitriol aimed at rich people right now, regardless of how they attained their wealth. I imagine it’ll soon be transferred to talented people as well. As a rule, few wealthy people extract 100% of their wealth and few earn 100%. The wealthy that extract 98% sure try to downplay that part and try to pretend that they're among the miniscule number who earned 90+%. Most manage to self delude themselves that vitriol against the wealthy IS vitriol against talent. Their egos demand it.
- jaltekruse 6y ago
  I don't care how you made your money, hoarding it should be looked down on. Greed is bad, we don't need to make things illegal, but I sure as hell am going to think anyone with a privately owned Yacht is a little bit worse of a person than someone reinvesting their money in their community and trying to explore new ideas, or if you are tired and don't want to personally invent stuff or run another business, go find some enthusiastic entrepreneur to support. I am not against rich people having power, I think we should get them to pay their damn taxes and fair share, but beyond part of their money that ought to be allocated by a democratically elected government they can do what they want with their wealth to control the world. But anyone using their money to just show how wealthy they are is going to get serious judgement from me, and I think that is a healthy way to think about rich people. I think it should be likely obvious from my statement above, I want there to be talented people, and I really don't see a substantial movement to pull down successful people. What are examples of things people are doing that make you think we are going in this direction?
  - dleslie 6y ago
    Yacht builders are people too, y'know. Yachts don't simply materialize when a certain amount of money gathers near a port.
    - dariusj18 6y ago
      Hit-men are people too, people don't magically get defenestrated when they speak out against Putin. This absurdist remark is just to point out that just because people get paid to do a job, it doesn't mean it's a job we as a society want people to have.
      - dleslie 6y ago
        Yacht builders aren't committing a criminal act, or violating anyone's basic human rights, when engaging in their trade. The only absurdist remark here is your comparison of Yacht Builders to Murderers.
        6y ago
- dleslie 6y ago
  > I imagine it’ll soon be transferred to talented people as well. It is already, and the logic is something like: talent is largely a function of practice and access to education. Having the means and opportunity to practice and be properly educated is a privilege. You can find _plenty_ of words written regarding the inherent racism, sexism, ableism et al in various hobbies due to unequal access; from GitHub hobby repos to enjoying nature through hiking and camping.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
HPsquared 6y ago
Zero-sum methods (robbing Peter to pay Paul) work doubly to achieve equality: reducing the 'higher' person and boosting the 'lower' person in a single action. Very quick and efficient if equality of outcome is the first priority.
- polishdude20 6y ago
  They work very well to achieve resentment of Peter and apathy of Paul.
SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
Lifting people up suggests targeted interventions to help individuals. If they face powerful beauty standards, help them find ways to become more beautiful. If there's a hard standardized test, help them find ways to pass it. Justice movements will sometimes engage in these kinds of things, but it's more common in my experience to say that the standards are simply wrong and need to be replaced with more equitable ones.
blueterminal 6y ago
One example: fit people made fun of because they are fit. The message that everyone is beautiful the way they are and that there's no need for further improvement is detrimental to the society.
jaltekruse 6y ago
There definitely is a line to be careful with, but I do think this is the vast majority of what is happening with most social justice movements today. Black Lives Matter is not fighting for cops to shoot more white people to equalize the numbers, they are trying to show how it is possible in lots of similar situations to deescalate situations without killing anyone, even with violent offenders if training is good, and officers don't have a bias (explicit or subconscious) against the type of person. It is also very obvious to show that minorities are being over-policed and often harassed for just living their lives. I think similarly with this issue of the leg up that attractive people have in the world, the only way we can fight it is by acknowledging it exists and trying to actively re-evaluate every decision we make about who we choose to interact with, and how much it is informed by these types of bias. This is not the same as giving the attractive people a -10 on whatever evaluation they are a part of. It is always going to be true that correcting for these types of bias will be inexact, welcome to life, but saying we just shouldn't give a shit about less attractive people is a worse outcome for all of society, and its not like author is asking for infinite effort from everyone to correct this. Talented people exist everywhere, if we don't push those of disadvantaged groups up, only some of them will "pull their bootstraps" hard enough to overcome things on their own. People need to be introspective to correct for their biases, there really isn't a way around that, we are imperfect beings quick to pass judgement. I have a distinct memory of a part of the confirmation hearing of Sonia Sotomayor, she had written about her need to actively review her background when starting a case, to see if she might have prior experiences that would color her judgement. Republicans tried to spin this as, she acknowledged she is biased, obviously she can't be an objective judge. But she defended herself well and asserted it is effectively impossible, to just be objective without this kind of evaluation. Effectively the same argument that people correctly make about the virtual impossibility of just being "race-blind", we all have things we have experienced that color our perceptions of different people, ideas and places, we cannot ignore that fact and just go on asserting we are good objective decision makers with no special effort to account for these things.
- ls612 6y ago
  In the specific example of police brutality you are right, however BLM organizations are also generally anti magnet school/charter school, which in many poor primarily black neighborhoods is the only good school option for children. Since these schools get to choose (for the most part) who they enroll they tend to take all the more gifted kids/kids with good family environment out of the normal public school. This obviously leads to greater inequality of outcome, which activists try to "correct" by forcing everybody to be in the low quality public schools. Remember this when people go on and on about "equity". In the grave, all men are equal.
chasd00 6y ago
Leaders of "justice" movements want power. The best way to get power is to make an outside group the enemy and tell your followers their problems are only because of the enemy. Next, you position yourself as having the answer and if your followers will only continue doing what you say then they will be lifted, their problems will subside, and the enemy vanquished. As long as you can keep an enemy front and center and your followers problems never subside your power will continue to grow. it's the oldest playbook in humanity.
- pydry 6y ago
  It's a little hard to act like they're being disingenuous when the supposed enemy acts in ways that are completely consistent with being an actual enemy, though. Only when the supposed enemy is not.
- komali2 6y ago
  You write this in a way that implicitly dismisses the Cause of various social justice movements as indistinguishable from any group with leaders. Are you claiming that there's no difference between Black Lives Matters and Jim Jones' church?
spaceprison 6y ago
Sure, identifying these inequalities is a step in making things 'more equal' but how does society correct something that is arguably biological in nature (our preference for beauty)? Masks? A government backed hotornot.com that issues beauty bonus points to improve ugly hiring outcomes? People who are good with numbers approach financial situations from a position of privilege, surely that's an equality killer? Do we impose Financial acuity tarrifs in addition to standard taxation? Obviously these are absurd examples but there is a point of diminishing returns and even negative outcomes in the pursuit of TOTAL equality.

andreilys 6y ago

There’s a lot of vitriol aimed at rich people right now, regardless of how they attained their wealth. I imagine it’ll soon be transferred to talented people as well. Soon we’ll be right where the story predicted, everyone wears handicaps to make themselves equal.

ThrowawayR2 6y ago
Perhaps it's here already? We see a lot of posts here on HN denigrating the value of higher education and saying that highly-educated people are gatekeeping.
- logicchains 6y ago
  I don't think many people here object to education, they just disagree that the university system does a good job of educating people.
- wishinghand 6y ago
  The objection is not to highly educated people gatekeeping (though they should know better), but that people with a status that helps unlock further wealth are gatekeeping.
rmrfstar 6y ago
> There’s a lot of vitriol aimed at rich people right now, regardless of how they attained their wealth. Part of the problem is that our current property regime does not distinguish between property acquired through accession [1] and property acquired through extraction. There is this weird philosophy that all "market transactions" are equally legitimate and that market price is the correct (and only reliable) indicator of economic value. This view ignores the fact that market prices are as much a product of market structure as they are a reflection of people's preferences. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accession_(property_law) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accession_(property_law)
- pydry 6y ago
  Our current property regime evolved that way for precisely that reason. Distinguishing the two and highlighting it would be a subversive, rather revolutionary act, which would attract a lot of hate.
pydry 6y ago
>There’s a lot of vitriol aimed at rich people right now, regardless of how they attained their wealth. I imagine it’ll soon be transferred to talented people as well. As a rule, few wealthy people extract 100% of their wealth and few earn 100%. The wealthy that extract 98% sure try to downplay that part and try to pretend that they're among the miniscule number who earned 90+%. Most manage to self delude themselves that vitriol against the wealthy IS vitriol against talent. Their egos demand it.
jaltekruse 6y ago
I don't care how you made your money, hoarding it should be looked down on. Greed is bad, we don't need to make things illegal, but I sure as hell am going to think anyone with a privately owned Yacht is a little bit worse of a person than someone reinvesting their money in their community and trying to explore new ideas, or if you are tired and don't want to personally invent stuff or run another business, go find some enthusiastic entrepreneur to support. I am not against rich people having power, I think we should get them to pay their damn taxes and fair share, but beyond part of their money that ought to be allocated by a democratically elected government they can do what they want with their wealth to control the world. But anyone using their money to just show how wealthy they are is going to get serious judgement from me, and I think that is a healthy way to think about rich people. I think it should be likely obvious from my statement above, I want there to be talented people, and I really don't see a substantial movement to pull down successful people. What are examples of things people are doing that make you think we are going in this direction?
- dleslie 6y ago
  Yacht builders are people too, y'know. Yachts don't simply materialize when a certain amount of money gathers near a port.
  - dariusj18 6y ago
    Hit-men are people too, people don't magically get defenestrated when they speak out against Putin. This absurdist remark is just to point out that just because people get paid to do a job, it doesn't mean it's a job we as a society want people to have.
    - dleslie 6y ago
      Yacht builders aren't committing a criminal act, or violating anyone's basic human rights, when engaging in their trade. The only absurdist remark here is your comparison of Yacht Builders to Murderers.
      - 6y ago
dleslie 6y ago
> I imagine it’ll soon be transferred to talented people as well. It is already, and the logic is something like: talent is largely a function of practice and access to education. Having the means and opportunity to practice and be properly educated is a privilege. You can find _plenty_ of words written regarding the inherent racism, sexism, ableism et al in various hobbies due to unequal access; from GitHub hobby repos to enjoying nature through hiking and camping.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

HPsquared 6y ago

Zero-sum methods (robbing Peter to pay Paul) work doubly to achieve equality: reducing the 'higher' person and boosting the 'lower' person in a single action. Very quick and efficient if equality of outcome is the first priority.

polishdude20 6y ago
They work very well to achieve resentment of Peter and apathy of Paul.

SpicyLemonZest 6y ago

Lifting people up suggests targeted interventions to help individuals. If they face powerful beauty standards, help them find ways to become more beautiful. If there's a hard standardized test, help them find ways to pass it. Justice movements will sometimes engage in these kinds of things, but it's more common in my experience to say that the standards are simply wrong and need to be replaced with more equitable ones.

blueterminal 6y ago

One example: fit people made fun of because they are fit. The message that everyone is beautiful the way they are and that there's no need for further improvement is detrimental to the society.

jaltekruse 6y ago

There definitely is a line to be careful with, but I do think this is the vast majority of what is happening with most social justice movements today. Black Lives Matter is not fighting for cops to shoot more white people to equalize the numbers, they are trying to show how it is possible in lots of similar situations to deescalate situations without killing anyone, even with violent offenders if training is good, and officers don't have a bias (explicit or subconscious) against the type of person. It is also very obvious to show that minorities are being over-policed and often harassed for just living their lives. I think similarly with this issue of the leg up that attractive people have in the world, the only way we can fight it is by acknowledging it exists and trying to actively re-evaluate every decision we make about who we choose to interact with, and how much it is informed by these types of bias. This is not the same as giving the attractive people a -10 on whatever evaluation they are a part of. It is always going to be true that correcting for these types of bias will be inexact, welcome to life, but saying we just shouldn't give a shit about less attractive people is a worse outcome for all of society, and its not like author is asking for infinite effort from everyone to correct this. Talented people exist everywhere, if we don't push those of disadvantaged groups up, only some of them will "pull their bootstraps" hard enough to overcome things on their own. People need to be introspective to correct for their biases, there really isn't a way around that, we are imperfect beings quick to pass judgement. I have a distinct memory of a part of the confirmation hearing of Sonia Sotomayor, she had written about her need to actively review her background when starting a case, to see if she might have prior experiences that would color her judgement. Republicans tried to spin this as, she acknowledged she is biased, obviously she can't be an objective judge. But she defended herself well and asserted it is effectively impossible, to just be objective without this kind of evaluation. Effectively the same argument that people correctly make about the virtual impossibility of just being "race-blind", we all have things we have experienced that color our perceptions of different people, ideas and places, we cannot ignore that fact and just go on asserting we are good objective decision makers with no special effort to account for these things.

ls612 6y ago
In the specific example of police brutality you are right, however BLM organizations are also generally anti magnet school/charter school, which in many poor primarily black neighborhoods is the only good school option for children. Since these schools get to choose (for the most part) who they enroll they tend to take all the more gifted kids/kids with good family environment out of the normal public school. This obviously leads to greater inequality of outcome, which activists try to "correct" by forcing everybody to be in the low quality public schools. Remember this when people go on and on about "equity". In the grave, all men are equal.

chasd00 6y ago

Leaders of "justice" movements want power. The best way to get power is to make an outside group the enemy and tell your followers their problems are only because of the enemy. Next, you position yourself as having the answer and if your followers will only continue doing what you say then they will be lifted, their problems will subside, and the enemy vanquished. As long as you can keep an enemy front and center and your followers problems never subside your power will continue to grow. it's the oldest playbook in humanity.

pydry 6y ago
It's a little hard to act like they're being disingenuous when the supposed enemy acts in ways that are completely consistent with being an actual enemy, though. Only when the supposed enemy is not.
komali2 6y ago
You write this in a way that implicitly dismisses the Cause of various social justice movements as indistinguishable from any group with leaders. Are you claiming that there's no difference between Black Lives Matters and Jim Jones' church?

spaceprison 6y ago

Sure, identifying these inequalities is a step in making things 'more equal' but how does society correct something that is arguably biological in nature (our preference for beauty)? Masks? A government backed hotornot.com that issues beauty bonus points to improve ugly hiring outcomes? People who are good with numbers approach financial situations from a position of privilege, surely that's an equality killer? Do we impose Financial acuity tarrifs in addition to standard taxation? Obviously these are absurd examples but there is a point of diminishing returns and even negative outcomes in the pursuit of TOTAL equality.