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I’d caution you to recognize that the slippery-slope argument you are making requires an engineer’s adherence to an extremely strong definition of “equality of

by zamfi 5y ago

I’d caution you to recognize that the slippery-slope argument you are making requires an engineer’s adherence to an extremely strong definition of “equality of outcome”. The ADA requires only “reasonable accommodation” which is why you can still have rock climbing walls. Not many people are suggesting that we break everyone’s legs for equity, either. But most insidious about the slippery slope argument is the implication that since this absurd outcome is the inevitable consequence of addressing equity issues, that we should not try. This is, respectfully, crap. Yes, we should not ban rock climbing walls. Yes, we should reduce thresholds to help those in wheelchairs. We don’t need a framework that survives being taken to an unreasonable extreme in order to make progress. We are reasonable people who can make judgment calls, not paperclip-making universe-destroying automatons.

lazide 5y ago
I take it you skipped the paragraph in the middle pointing out the nature of this and where I was pointing out the slippery slope? The reality is there are a LOT of real world examples of this going all the way to the far poles, so this isn't hypothetical - and it often gets very murderey. Authoritarians of all stripes tend to take the approach of 'if it isn't working, do it harder', and 'if they don't like it, it's because they're bad/the enemy'. And authoritarians get power when people get scared or unhappy, more often than not. The 'evening the playing field'/'equality of outcome' approach is literally what was used to justify taking out all the intelligensia and rich folks in Russia and China during the communist revolutions, the 'punish them harder because they keep failing' approach is what is being used to punish minorities in a number of states literally right now in the US - and I could go on. I don't know why you would assume I think the ADA is a problem. The ADA is a reasonable setup - but it also doesn't guarantee, or attempt to guarantee, equalities of outcomes. It attempts to guarantee a reasonable level of equality of ACCESS and/or accommodations. Which is fundamentally different, and inherently has a reasonability test that can help shut down the real outlier stuff (like wanting to shut down all non-wheelchair accessible climbing walls or whatever). It's the difference between everyone getting an interview (or an internship) vs everyone being promoted to VP - or it being illegal to have someone who is a VP (in the meaning we have today)
- zamfi 5y ago
  I read your entire post, which is absolutely pointing out the slippery slope. And sure, many others have slipped down this slope. What I am saying is that your proposed dystopia is not the inevitable result of considering equality of outcome, as you seem to be suggesting, and that one should be very careful when making slippery slope arguments for doing nothing. Let’s be super clear: dystopias involving murderous authoritarian leadership claiming to act in the name of equity are a problem with murderous authoritarian leadership, not a problem with equity or desiring equitable outcomes, right? The ADA is an outcomes-focused law, that’s why it comes up in this context. It doesn’t guarantee anything, but few people are arguing for guarantees, and that’s the straw man you’re arguing against.
  - lazide 5y ago
    The ADA is not an outcome (as in success) focused law though? It is a opportunity based law. There is nothing in the ADA saying that everyone with a disability needs to succeed to the same level as someone without that disability, rather that a reasonable accomodation must be made to give them the tools to TRY. And for the rest, you lost context a bit - I was replying to the comment in the parent post to mine, which asked 'What is your basis for equality of outcome being a bad thing? Can you give some examples of what you're talking about?' My point is that fundamentally, true equality of outcome (if taken to mean 'everyone gets the same rewards/has the same success') may naively sound nice, even very fair, but is not only impossible, but undesirable when you look at what it would take to try to get there (depending on the degree of course). And when people try to quantify what they mean by 'rewards' it also tends to be obvious that most people's concrete ideas (and scale) of rewards do not line up with each other. And then gave some examples. A rephrasing of the idea, is the saying "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" (Karl Marx), but there are a great many ways to put it. There are many non-murderey areas that tend to be eas(ier) to balance, like education. If I've always wanted to be a mathematician, but have no knack for it, does that mean I get infinite tutoring? Most people would say no, and I can't think of anyone that has tried in practice. Many will say 'well, you can get x years of normal education, but if you fail out that's it'. Most will say 'well, you can apply, and if you have good grades, the state can cover it', etc. Most of those fall on the spectrum of equality of opportunity (aka ability to try/take a swing). Equality of outcomes is when you say 'Everyone should be able to be a mathematician, so everyone (or x percent of everyone) must be a mathematician'. That... gets weirder. What if they don't WANT to be mathematicians? Do we make them? What if their background/interests don't line up, so they hate the studying, and keep failing the tests? Do we fake the numbers? Beat them until they comply? Fail a bunch of everyone else until the numbers match? This is in no way to downplay very real issues with culture, racism, sexism, etc. that do happen. It's to point out the dangers of taking naive and course metric driven approaches to the problem. When we're talking wealth, access to jobs and political leadership positions, etc. there is also a long history of it getting much, much uglier. The particularly murdery/authoritarian examples happen because since it is fundamentally impossible for everyone to actually get the same rewards/outcomes in almost all cases and people can't all agree on what it would concretely mean to even get the same rewards/outcomes, the people in power either give up without succeeding and then get replaced (or rarely, has a coherent enough and smart enough power base that they can give a nuanced and sane answer that is not merely propaganda - looks like Sweden might have pulled that off?), or try harder. In government, try harder often means overpower resistance, purge dissenters, neutralize political opponents who don't support you - to various degrees of brutality. You see it everywhere, in the US, England, Russia, etc. In a revolution, that also usually means lining people up against a wall. Especially if the power base/population is angry and unhappy, and particularly if it is large (since that typically means the spoils are large for the winners), and since the naive answers sound good, there is huge incentive for someone to also tell people what they want to hear while trying harder, even if they know it's bullshit, and use tools like propaganda, secret police, you name it. It also provides really effective cover to do nasty things in the name of doing the right thing. There are some really recent historical examples of people getting all the power to try the hardest. Which tends to attract/filter for authoritarian types - probably especially the murdery ones after awhile. See Lenin vs Stalin (or really Stalin vs everyone else who could conceivably challenge his power) Mao did multiple purges. The Khmer Rouge was.... particularly nasty. All of that was done in the name of helping the everyman and producing a just outcome for the everyday person.

by zamfi 5y ago

lazide 5y ago

I take it you skipped the paragraph in the middle pointing out the nature of this and where I was pointing out the slippery slope? The reality is there are a LOT of real world examples of this going all the way to the far poles, so this isn't hypothetical - and it often gets very murderey. Authoritarians of all stripes tend to take the approach of 'if it isn't working, do it harder', and 'if they don't like it, it's because they're bad/the enemy'. And authoritarians get power when people get scared or unhappy, more often than not. The 'evening the playing field'/'equality of outcome' approach is literally what was used to justify taking out all the intelligensia and rich folks in Russia and China during the communist revolutions, the 'punish them harder because they keep failing' approach is what is being used to punish minorities in a number of states literally right now in the US - and I could go on. I don't know why you would assume I think the ADA is a problem. The ADA is a reasonable setup - but it also doesn't guarantee, or attempt to guarantee, equalities of outcomes. It attempts to guarantee a reasonable level of equality of ACCESS and/or accommodations. Which is fundamentally different, and inherently has a reasonability test that can help shut down the real outlier stuff (like wanting to shut down all non-wheelchair accessible climbing walls or whatever). It's the difference between everyone getting an interview (or an internship) vs everyone being promoted to VP - or it being illegal to have someone who is a VP (in the meaning we have today)

zamfi 5y ago
I read your entire post, which is absolutely pointing out the slippery slope. And sure, many others have slipped down this slope. What I am saying is that your proposed dystopia is not the inevitable result of considering equality of outcome, as you seem to be suggesting, and that one should be very careful when making slippery slope arguments for doing nothing. Let’s be super clear: dystopias involving murderous authoritarian leadership claiming to act in the name of equity are a problem with murderous authoritarian leadership, not a problem with equity or desiring equitable outcomes, right? The ADA is an outcomes-focused law, that’s why it comes up in this context. It doesn’t guarantee anything, but few people are arguing for guarantees, and that’s the straw man you’re arguing against.
- lazide 5y ago
  The ADA is not an outcome (as in success) focused law though? It is a opportunity based law. There is nothing in the ADA saying that everyone with a disability needs to succeed to the same level as someone without that disability, rather that a reasonable accomodation must be made to give them the tools to TRY. And for the rest, you lost context a bit - I was replying to the comment in the parent post to mine, which asked 'What is your basis for equality of outcome being a bad thing? Can you give some examples of what you're talking about?' My point is that fundamentally, true equality of outcome (if taken to mean 'everyone gets the same rewards/has the same success') may naively sound nice, even very fair, but is not only impossible, but undesirable when you look at what it would take to try to get there (depending on the degree of course). And when people try to quantify what they mean by 'rewards' it also tends to be obvious that most people's concrete ideas (and scale) of rewards do not line up with each other. And then gave some examples. A rephrasing of the idea, is the saying "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" (Karl Marx), but there are a great many ways to put it. There are many non-murderey areas that tend to be eas(ier) to balance, like education. If I've always wanted to be a mathematician, but have no knack for it, does that mean I get infinite tutoring? Most people would say no, and I can't think of anyone that has tried in practice. Many will say 'well, you can get x years of normal education, but if you fail out that's it'. Most will say 'well, you can apply, and if you have good grades, the state can cover it', etc. Most of those fall on the spectrum of equality of opportunity (aka ability to try/take a swing). Equality of outcomes is when you say 'Everyone should be able to be a mathematician, so everyone (or x percent of everyone) must be a mathematician'. That... gets weirder. What if they don't WANT to be mathematicians? Do we make them? What if their background/interests don't line up, so they hate the studying, and keep failing the tests? Do we fake the numbers? Beat them until they comply? Fail a bunch of everyone else until the numbers match? This is in no way to downplay very real issues with culture, racism, sexism, etc. that do happen. It's to point out the dangers of taking naive and course metric driven approaches to the problem. When we're talking wealth, access to jobs and political leadership positions, etc. there is also a long history of it getting much, much uglier. The particularly murdery/authoritarian examples happen because since it is fundamentally impossible for everyone to actually get the same rewards/outcomes in almost all cases and people can't all agree on what it would concretely mean to even get the same rewards/outcomes, the people in power either give up without succeeding and then get replaced (or rarely, has a coherent enough and smart enough power base that they can give a nuanced and sane answer that is not merely propaganda - looks like Sweden might have pulled that off?), or try harder. In government, try harder often means overpower resistance, purge dissenters, neutralize political opponents who don't support you - to various degrees of brutality. You see it everywhere, in the US, England, Russia, etc. In a revolution, that also usually means lining people up against a wall. Especially if the power base/population is angry and unhappy, and particularly if it is large (since that typically means the spoils are large for the winners), and since the naive answers sound good, there is huge incentive for someone to also tell people what they want to hear while trying harder, even if they know it's bullshit, and use tools like propaganda, secret police, you name it. It also provides really effective cover to do nasty things in the name of doing the right thing. There are some really recent historical examples of people getting all the power to try the hardest. Which tends to attract/filter for authoritarian types - probably especially the murdery ones after awhile. See Lenin vs Stalin (or really Stalin vs everyone else who could conceivably challenge his power) Mao did multiple purges. The Khmer Rouge was.... particularly nasty. All of that was done in the name of helping the everyman and producing a just outcome for the everyday person.