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I think this suffers from a causation direction bias. Maybe people with the choice mindset wind up in positions of wealth and power because of this mindset. I

I think this suffers from a causation direction bias. Maybe people with the choice mindset wind up in positions of wealth and power because of this mindset. I can only speak anecdotally, but the hand full of millionaires I know all grew up lower middle class, and they all have choice mindset. I think the worst kinds of people create a false dichotomy here where either everything is choice or everything is a product of externalities. It does seem to me that choice mindset leads to better outcomes within whatever context the person is in. It’s extremely unlikely to result in a poor person from a third world country running a Fortune 500. But within their context they are likely to have better outcomes than people who externalize credit/blame.

tclancy 5y ago
Isn’t this exactly what we are talking about? You’re assuming the same “choices” exist for everyone.
- Consultant32452 5y ago
  I explicitly stated the opposite when I talked about people living in different contexts.
temptemptemp111 5y ago
People from Caucasia?
jheriko 5y ago
there is going to be some of that for sure. i expect people reading this comment will not understand your point to mean "some" and will probably read it as "all". despite the length of your comment to the contrary, they won't parse and extract the meaning but, probably without even noticing it, rely on biases and shortcuts to interpret the meaning more rapidly (and wrongly). i'm pretty confident you are not suggesting it is responsible for 100% of the signal here, just some <100% of it. as a counterpoint i'd offer up those people who have been traumatised by their living conditions. they often adopt a choice mindset and it is harmful to them. so no, actually a choice mindset and taking responsibility in a horrible environment doesn't actually help. i say this with some bias as someone who has adopted that kind of mindset and watched those not taking responsibility for themselves perform better in many areas precisely because they excessively (from my perspective) seek help from others and ignore responsiblities. i have a number of experiences where i've ended up supporting someone extensively, because they come to me "in a difficult situation" only to realise i'm less capable of supporting them then they are of me in terms of resources and opportunities. its quite mind blowing at the time, but i try to understand how it happens - my suspicion is that their bar for 'failure' is so damned high that they will actually not use their piles of resources for psychological reasons alone.
- Consultant32452 5y ago
  The Marxist mindset has been drilled into them since kindergarten. They can only see the world in terms of class and identity. That’s why you see them propagating the false dichotomy in responses. They trivialize choice as having only nominal impact on outcomes. There’s no point in encouraging self determination, only focus on the externalities, no one can ever be responsible for their outcomes in any more than a trivial sense. The reality is that choice and context are symbiotic in outcomes and while it’s obviously true that not all options are available to everyone, individual choice has massive influence on individual and group outcomes.
licebmi__at__ 5y ago
I think this is a weasily way to put an argument. Yes, we can agree that just sitting around doing nothing is unlikely to help someone’s outcome. But when you have a growing population throwing their backs on 2 jobs and still struggling to make ends meet, you might want to consider that this people do have the choice mindset, and the choice mindset is failing spectacularly. So with this in mind, and with agreement on the point that you need to try, could we focus on the externalities instead of congratulating ourselves about our choice mindset?
sidlls 5y ago
> think the worst kinds of people create a false dichotomy here where either everything is choice or everything is a product of externalities. > But within their context they are likely to have better outcomes than people who externalize credit/blame. I think you're interpreting "choice mindset" in the context of this article differently from how it's meant. Poor people understand very well what it means to have to make choices. They know quite well that their choices impact their lives, and how. That's part of the psychological violence the poor experience, in fact: their choices are often of the form "which harm do I visit on my family this week?" Your comment about the false dichotomy captures it, partially: the wealthy imposing/projecting their view that every condition is the result of a choice made by the individual. Poor people generally don't believe their entire lives are a product of externalities, but the rich certainly do believe it's all about choices.
nshepperd 5y ago
Yes, that's a pretty obvious confounding possibility. It's foolish to draw any causal conclusions from a correlation between 'wealth' and 'choice mindset' when the causality could clearly go either way.

tclancy 5y ago

Isn’t this exactly what we are talking about? You’re assuming the same “choices” exist for everyone.

Consultant32452 5y ago
I explicitly stated the opposite when I talked about people living in different contexts.

temptemptemp111 5y ago

People from Caucasia?

jheriko 5y ago

there is going to be some of that for sure. i expect people reading this comment will not understand your point to mean "some" and will probably read it as "all". despite the length of your comment to the contrary, they won't parse and extract the meaning but, probably without even noticing it, rely on biases and shortcuts to interpret the meaning more rapidly (and wrongly). i'm pretty confident you are not suggesting it is responsible for 100% of the signal here, just some <100% of it. as a counterpoint i'd offer up those people who have been traumatised by their living conditions. they often adopt a choice mindset and it is harmful to them. so no, actually a choice mindset and taking responsibility in a horrible environment doesn't actually help. i say this with some bias as someone who has adopted that kind of mindset and watched those not taking responsibility for themselves perform better in many areas precisely because they excessively (from my perspective) seek help from others and ignore responsiblities. i have a number of experiences where i've ended up supporting someone extensively, because they come to me "in a difficult situation" only to realise i'm less capable of supporting them then they are of me in terms of resources and opportunities. its quite mind blowing at the time, but i try to understand how it happens - my suspicion is that their bar for 'failure' is so damned high that they will actually not use their piles of resources for psychological reasons alone.

Consultant32452 5y ago
The Marxist mindset has been drilled into them since kindergarten. They can only see the world in terms of class and identity. That’s why you see them propagating the false dichotomy in responses. They trivialize choice as having only nominal impact on outcomes. There’s no point in encouraging self determination, only focus on the externalities, no one can ever be responsible for their outcomes in any more than a trivial sense. The reality is that choice and context are symbiotic in outcomes and while it’s obviously true that not all options are available to everyone, individual choice has massive influence on individual and group outcomes.

licebmi__at__ 5y ago

I think this is a weasily way to put an argument. Yes, we can agree that just sitting around doing nothing is unlikely to help someone’s outcome. But when you have a growing population throwing their backs on 2 jobs and still struggling to make ends meet, you might want to consider that this people do have the choice mindset, and the choice mindset is failing spectacularly. So with this in mind, and with agreement on the point that you need to try, could we focus on the externalities instead of congratulating ourselves about our choice mindset?

sidlls 5y ago

> think the worst kinds of people create a false dichotomy here where either everything is choice or everything is a product of externalities. > But within their context they are likely to have better outcomes than people who externalize credit/blame. I think you're interpreting "choice mindset" in the context of this article differently from how it's meant. Poor people understand very well what it means to have to make choices. They know quite well that their choices impact their lives, and how. That's part of the psychological violence the poor experience, in fact: their choices are often of the form "which harm do I visit on my family this week?" Your comment about the false dichotomy captures it, partially: the wealthy imposing/projecting their view that every condition is the result of a choice made by the individual. Poor people generally don't believe their entire lives are a product of externalities, but the rich certainly do believe it's all about choices.

nshepperd 5y ago

Yes, that's a pretty obvious confounding possibility. It's foolish to draw any causal conclusions from a correlation between 'wealth' and 'choice mindset' when the causality could clearly go either way.