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I'm not sure I understand this line of thinking. It seems to suggest that there is some semblance of equality of opportunity (or, put another way, that we shoul

I'm not sure I understand this line of thinking. It seems to suggest that there is some semblance of equality of opportunity (or, put another way, that we should ignore the multitude of ways in which we can observe that opportunities are grossly unequal). It also seems to seems to suggest that if marginalized groups have drastically worse outcomes, it's because of some characteristic within those people. It seems a roundabout way of saying that all outcome disparities can be explained with, "Well, they're just lesser people in regards to intelligence/work ethic/whatever."

emerged 4y ago
- CoastalCoder 4y ago
  I share your frustration, but I doubt this problem can be resolved by actual physical warfare.
  - overboard2 4y ago
    I'd assume the physical warfare would be a last resort.
- turtledove 4y ago
  The system you describe isn't perfect, but almost certainly is a net increase in fairness. Is there a reason we can't solve the equality issue for historically marginalized groups, then fix the systems again to address the smaller set of folks who were disadvantaged by the changes? Basically, can we Zeno's paradox our way most of the way there, solving and disadvantaging smaller and smaller sets of people?
  - ghufran_syed 4y ago
    Why use historically marginalized groups - which almost always means racial groups as your target? If you want to put more money into educational support for children where neither parent went to college or makes more then $x - I'm all in favor. But when you can easily measure those things, why then conflate it with race? If certain racial groups fall into those disdavtaged categories, they will automatically benefit. But maybe poor hard working white, or indian, or Chinese parents are dubious about giving additional benefit to the middle class or rich people who happen to be of a certain race? To take a specific example, why should a university prefer to accept one of president Obama's kids ahead of the child of a Chinese butcher or shopworker, all other things being equal?
    - turtledove 4y ago
      I didn't say race very deliberately. There are plenty of marginalized groups of particular races, of course, but there are marginalized groups based on plenty of other criteria. LGBTQ+ folks, the elderly, women, immigrants, etc etc etc.
      - CryptoPunk 4y ago
        All of these are crude generalizations. If marginalization can be definitively stated to exist in someone, then it can be measured, and if it can be measured, then it can be directly compensated for without resorting to generalizations. I would prefer that the state treats every one equally, instead of trying to equalize something as elusive, hard to measure and outside of any sensible government mandate, as good fortune (or lack of bad fortune) in one's life.
        stale2002 4y ago
        > I would prefer that the state treats every one equally, instead of trying to equalize something as elusive I don't think you quite understand here. There are ways of helping out marginalized groups, with their specific problems, and still treating everyone equally. For example, when there are laws that are passed, that make sexual harassment in the workplace illegal, this disproportionally helps out women, with this problem that they mostly face. But, even though, yes, this helps this marginalized group, it is still equal. Sexual harassment is still illegal, whether it happens to either men or women, but passing such a law does help this marginalized group more.
        turtledove 4y ago
        You are correct, of course, but equality can be deployed the opposite way as well. The law that says "no sleeping under bridges" impacts different groups unequally.
        turtledove 4y ago
        I'm trying to imagine how you would quantify how marginalized someone is. Black Americans have challenges, women in America have challenges, Black Women in America have challenges that are unique from either Black Americans or women. (When people talk about intersectionality, this is what they mean.) How does being queer interact with being from West Virginia, or being poor and and having celiac. There's just too many factors, you cannot just calculate them all, because they are not independent variables.
  - sokoloff 4y ago
    I think the reason we can’t is that even “just” defining the target state and path to get there is insanely difficult to get agreement even among people who staunchly and genuinely support some version of “solve the equality issue”. When will we know we’ve solved it? When outcomes are equal? When 100.00% of unequal outcomes can be explained as the outcome of individual and family choices? When 99% can be explained? How should we treat inter-generational wealth and property ownership? If I’ve worked all my life, lived prudently, carefully spent less than I earned, should I be able to pass along only my old baseball mitt to my kid? Maybe $100? Maybe $100K? Maybe $2M and the paid-off house under the condition he takes care of his mother? If one kid gets a musty baseball mitt and another a house and $2M, is that OK or not? One kid gets a house and another a house and a live-in elderly mother; equal? Different people feel differently, even if they’re both “all for solving the equality issue”.
    - turtledove 4y ago
      We won't ever know, but we'll know when we haven't solved it. Let's fix the injustices we are aware of today. (E.g., the effects of racist housing policies that depressed wealth for generations of Black Americans.) As soon as we're no longer able to point to obviously and deeply unequal opportunities, then we can stay figuring out how to know when we're done.
      - sokoloff 4y ago
        “Why can’t we all just agree to do this specific one thing first?” Because not everyone agrees that’s the best first step. To build a coalition, you have to get the coalition to agree on a goal and a path or at least the right first step(s). Maybe some of them believe that nationalizing public education is a shorter path; others believe that early childhood nutrition is their preferred way to make fastest progress; still others believe that race must be explicitly excluded because it’s an imperfect proxy; others want race to be front and center in the discussion because they think it’s more than just a proxy. If you think X is more important than Y, you may not want to sign up for “Y first; then after we do Y then maybe we’ll consider X.” This goes triple when X and Y both require some common resource. If it was possible to fix all of the apparent inequalities at once, it’s fair to ask why hasn’t it already been done? I think the answer is usually that you don’t have enough “oomph” to do everything at once, especially when there’s a risk and low appetite for over-correcting to create new inequalities from the program designed to eliminate them. Coalition building is hard, even among people who 70+% agree on how things ought to be.
- doliveira 4y ago
  - IfOnlyYouKnew 4y ago
    - snovv_crash 4y ago
      No, what's happened is that a lot of progressive politics became actively divisive and toxic, which gave opponents actually relevant, insightful commentary about its shortcomings. At some point the progressive movement will weed out it's toxic members and divisive politics and at that point we can make real progress with making the world a fairer place again.
  - emerged 4y ago
    - doliveira 4y ago
    - kbelder 4y ago
      Honestly, I think you're being unproductively passionate. I understand, but sometimes when you feel that swell of righteous anger it might behoove you to pause for a minute before you continue typing. And that applies even if you are absolutely, 100%, correct. But this: >Whatever it is we are pushing back against, it is not liberalism. I agree. Much of the modern far left is the antithesis of liberal, they're strongly authoritarian... but they don't think they are. They've gotten spun around, so they think they are banning, censoring, and restricting in the name of freedom and liberty. It's nonsense, but it's something they can't see when they're in the middle of it... and worked up with their own righteous anger. Or defending against the attacks of others. Nobody thinks straight when they're being attacked. That's a good reason to actively work on keeping HN discussion civil. It keeps the reactive reptile brains of all involved under control.
- teucris 4y ago
  > only minorities of some sort suffer from worse opportunities.. that is utterly ridiculous. > You throw under the bus anyone who’s in “not marginalized” group but had a shitty lack of opportunity, and vice versa. The entire definition of “marginalized” is “pushed out to the margins”. In the case of equity, it’s that marginalization that means a lack of opportunity. So throwing people under the bus who had a lack of opportunity means a bad definition of the marginalized. Which has happened. A lot. So many mistakes have been made in trying to provide equitable outcomes. Shameful ones. But that doesn’t mean the whole concept is bad. > I am literally willing to fight in a war to stop it at this point if it comes to it. If you’re willing to die for something, you better be damn sure you’re fighting the right enemy. Given what you’ve said here, I don’t think you’ve found them yet.
- dang 4y ago
  We've banned this account for repeatedly breaking the site guidelines and for using HN for ideological battle. Regardless of what you're battling for or against, it's not what this site is for, and it destroys what it is for. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. They're here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
koheripbal 4y ago
Can unequal outcomes be an indicator of unequal opportunity? Yes. Can unequal outcomes exist despite equal opportunity? Yes. There are many non-intrinsic reasons for groups of individuals to not be equally represented. The most obvious is human ethnic group migrations, and the most consistently studied is career-choice differences between men and women. Equal opportunity does not guarantee equal outcomes - especially in only one or two generations after a migration. ...and in the case of gender differences in career interest, forcing equal outcomes is counter-productive. Humans are different. Different outcomes are evidence of diversity, not malice.
- Volundr 4y ago
  > especially in only one or two generations after a migration. Thats a perfect example of unequal opportunity. As much as we try to make excuses around it, the single biggest predictor of someone's lifetime income is their parents income. The fact of the matter is being rich provides opportunities and advantages being middle class doesn't and definitely not being poor, and there is little evidence to suggest that this corrects itself after a few generations. The fact is historically poor populations tend to stay that way, with those who escape being outliers.
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    People also absorb their parents' attitudes about things like work, diligence, handling money, honor, investing, value of education, etc. These have a large effect on their future lives. > there is little evidence to suggest that this corrects itself after a few generations On the contrary. The vast bulk of modern American citizens emigrated to America as poor, even destitute, people. Look what happened to their descendants.
  - rayiner 4y ago
    > The fact of the matter is being rich provides opportunities and advantages being middle class doesn't and definitely not being poor, and there is little evidence to suggest that this corrects itself after a few generations. The fact is historically poor populations tend to stay that way, with those who escape being outliers. This is, in fact, the opposite of true. As noted below, pretty much every wave of American immigrants until recently (Irish, Germans, Italians, Southeast Asians) came here desperately poor and eventually attained economic parity with the groups that were already here. Indeed, that process continues with Hispanic immigrants: https://academic.oup.com/qje/article/135/2/711/5687353 https://academic.oup.com/qje/article/135/2/711/5687353 ("Hispanic Americans have rates of intergenerational mobility more similar to whites than blacks, leading the Hispanic-white income gap to shrink across generations.") In the U.S., structural poverty affecting a discrete minority affects Black and Indigenous people, and certain white sub-groups such as Appalachians and Cajuns. It's not a good default model for thinking about income mobility in general.
roody15 4y ago
Not necessarily let me give you an example. Welding is overwhelming a male profession. At least 85 percent of professional welders are male. Is it a goal to make 50 percent of welders male and female? Why? How about equal representation between asian and white welders ? again why? In todays world women welders are encouraged and hired with little difficulty. You could argue that they have close to an equal opportunity as anyone to become a welder (perhaps more so). Just because this metric group does not work out proportionally to the population base does not necessarily indicate oppression. It is possible that many women for some unknown reason just don’t want to be welders… maybe that’s okay.
- TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
  There are many professions like this. My sons school has 35 teachers, none of which are men. Nursing seems to be another profession with many more women than men. Same with spa workers. Truck drivers are mostly men. Movers. NFL football players. Are we supposed to equalize all of these?
  - kwhitefoot 4y ago
    > Are we supposed to equalize all of these? No, but we are supposed to remove the barriers that prevent men becoming nurses and teachers, women becoming truck drivers, etc., etc.
    - kbelder 4y ago
      So, all legal barriers have been removed for decades. There may be cultural barriers, or cultural incentives. How can you know when other barriers are gone, and you have a job that is just naturally more appealing to men or women? Is there a point when you can say it's done?
      - TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
        > you have a job that is just naturally more appealing to men or women? Unfortunately, I think this no longer appropriate to suggest. I think certain circles would cancel you for suggesting this.
gwright 4y ago
I don't see the parent comment communicating those ideas. There is no statement in the comment that there is currently "some semblance of equality of opportunity" only that "most humans would agree striving for equal opportunity is a universal goal". This is a directional statement, not a statements about current progress in that direction. Nor do I see any statement that group outcomes are explained entirely "because of some characteristic within those people."
kwatsonafter 4y ago
I sometimes see this in academics; I like to call this phenomena, "trying so hard to be anti-racist that it comes out as racism."
- kbelder 4y ago
  A while ago, Biden announced that he hasn't selected a Supreme Court nominee yet, but that it was going to be a black woman. I felt that was more vile racism than anything I have ever heard come out of Trump's mouth. I was appalled by the blatant racism that would have to thoroughly permeate your world view to allow you to proudly say something like that. But, at the same time, Biden doesn't think he's racist. I believe that he truly despises racism. He's just got himself tied up into conceptual knots and self-contradictory values and beliefs, and rationalizations that he doesn't want to examine too closely. I don't think that's uncommon among academics and intelligent people in general.
dontcare007 4y ago
History is a vector. If you think of it that way, it makes sense that some groups end up with relatively more negative outcomes than others. Our moral obligation is to provide everyone with the tools to overcome whatever disadvantages their ancestral vector has placed on them.
thegrimmest 4y ago
> it's because of some characteristic within those people But why can't this be true? Numerous studies have shown that genetic and particularly cultural traits produce vast differences in cognitive ability. Most recently for instance in a story about Korean twins separated at birth[1]. Research also shows that these differences can account for an overwhelming majority of the disparity in outcomes. This has been an active area of research for decades, and academia isn't at all in agreement that "marginalization" is the culprit here[2]. > marginalized groups have drastically worse outcomes Not all "marginalized groups" do though, do they? Unless you only include groups with poor outcomes in your definition of "marginalized", in which case it's a bit circular isn't it? 1. https://www.psypost.org/2022/05/psychologists-found-a-striking-difference-in-intelligence-after-examining-twins-raised-apart-in-south-korea-and-the-united-states-63091 https://www.psypost.org/2022/05/psychologists-found-a-striki... 2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5csE8q9mho https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5csE8q9mho
- cmdli 4y ago
  > But why can't this be true? Numerous studies have shown that genetic and particularly cultural traits produce vast differences in cognitive ability. Most recently for instance in a story about Korean twins separated at birth[1]. Let's be honest, the reason so many people are opposed to this view is because it has been wrongfully used in the past to justify very real oppression and inequality of opportunity. At the very least, it is a very dangerous mindset historically, and even now it's not very well understood. For example, in the study you mentioned around Korean twins, one was raised in a fairly standard Korean household while the other was tossed around the foster care system and had multitudes of setbacks given to them. And yet people will still use it as evidence that these differences are inherent and unchangeable. Do you not see how this reasoning can lead us to ignore our own blindspots and biases?
  - thegrimmest 4y ago
    > wrongfully used in the past to justify very real oppression and inequality of opportunity That doesn't mean that the view is factually inaccurate though does it? I think the best way to avoid oppression is to define and prohibit the practice of it, rather than measure the outcomes. This is what civil rights seems to be all about. > differences are inherent and unchangeable I never said that, I said that different childhood circumstances, cultural practices, and domestic environments clearly produce vastly different outcomes. I also think that using authority to standardize how children are raised would be tyrannical. Most fundamentally, if you want to raise your children without, for instance, an emphasis on educational attainment, you should have the right to do so. Also, no one should be surprised that children raised in such circumstances don't go on to have equality of economic outcome. And no one should get bent out of shape about these facts in combination, as they are not a product of "marginalization".
thfuran 4y ago
>It also seems to seems to suggest that if marginalized groups have drastically worse outcomes If they have equal opportunity, how can they be marginalized? Why can't remaining differences in outcome be explained by cultural or character differences? Given the opportunity to do what they want, people who don't value the same things probably aren't going to do the same thing.
inglor_cz 4y ago
"It also seems to seems to suggest that if marginalized groups have drastically worse outcomes, it's because of some characteristic within those people." What about minority groups that have drastically better outcomes? For a non-US-controversial example, Chinese people in Malaysia, probably the only country that has affirmative action ("Bumiputera") for the majority ethnic group. The historical experience says that disproportionally successful minority groups tend to live under a persistent shadow of violent retribution / ethnic cleansing / genocide at the hands of the majority, so their "privilege" is often very two-edged. But this situation, actually fairly common across the world, is rarely discussed in modern racial narrative.
visarga 4y ago
You forgot to mention people having different values and ways to go about achieving them - could explain the difference in outcomes without making them lesser in any way.
Spooky23 4y ago
The difficult part about these discussions is that there’s a principled philosophical aspect and a pragmatic aspect. We’re all born equal, but take different paths. It’s a lazy answer to say “<“They”> are just a bunch of lazy rabble”, but it’s equally lazy to declare that we’re all prepared to do anything, given the opportunity. Coming to a middle ground that respects human dignity and improves society as a whole is truly difficult.

emerged 4y ago

CoastalCoder 4y ago
I share your frustration, but I doubt this problem can be resolved by actual physical warfare.
- overboard2 4y ago
  I'd assume the physical warfare would be a last resort.
turtledove 4y ago
The system you describe isn't perfect, but almost certainly is a net increase in fairness. Is there a reason we can't solve the equality issue for historically marginalized groups, then fix the systems again to address the smaller set of folks who were disadvantaged by the changes? Basically, can we Zeno's paradox our way most of the way there, solving and disadvantaging smaller and smaller sets of people?
- ghufran_syed 4y ago
  Why use historically marginalized groups - which almost always means racial groups as your target? If you want to put more money into educational support for children where neither parent went to college or makes more then $x - I'm all in favor. But when you can easily measure those things, why then conflate it with race? If certain racial groups fall into those disdavtaged categories, they will automatically benefit. But maybe poor hard working white, or indian, or Chinese parents are dubious about giving additional benefit to the middle class or rich people who happen to be of a certain race? To take a specific example, why should a university prefer to accept one of president Obama's kids ahead of the child of a Chinese butcher or shopworker, all other things being equal?
  - turtledove 4y ago
    I didn't say race very deliberately. There are plenty of marginalized groups of particular races, of course, but there are marginalized groups based on plenty of other criteria. LGBTQ+ folks, the elderly, women, immigrants, etc etc etc.
    - CryptoPunk 4y ago
      All of these are crude generalizations. If marginalization can be definitively stated to exist in someone, then it can be measured, and if it can be measured, then it can be directly compensated for without resorting to generalizations. I would prefer that the state treats every one equally, instead of trying to equalize something as elusive, hard to measure and outside of any sensible government mandate, as good fortune (or lack of bad fortune) in one's life.
      - stale2002 4y ago
        > I would prefer that the state treats every one equally, instead of trying to equalize something as elusive I don't think you quite understand here. There are ways of helping out marginalized groups, with their specific problems, and still treating everyone equally. For example, when there are laws that are passed, that make sexual harassment in the workplace illegal, this disproportionally helps out women, with this problem that they mostly face. But, even though, yes, this helps this marginalized group, it is still equal. Sexual harassment is still illegal, whether it happens to either men or women, but passing such a law does help this marginalized group more.
        turtledove 4y ago
        You are correct, of course, but equality can be deployed the opposite way as well. The law that says "no sleeping under bridges" impacts different groups unequally.
      - turtledove 4y ago
        I'm trying to imagine how you would quantify how marginalized someone is. Black Americans have challenges, women in America have challenges, Black Women in America have challenges that are unique from either Black Americans or women. (When people talk about intersectionality, this is what they mean.) How does being queer interact with being from West Virginia, or being poor and and having celiac. There's just too many factors, you cannot just calculate them all, because they are not independent variables.
- sokoloff 4y ago
  I think the reason we can’t is that even “just” defining the target state and path to get there is insanely difficult to get agreement even among people who staunchly and genuinely support some version of “solve the equality issue”. When will we know we’ve solved it? When outcomes are equal? When 100.00% of unequal outcomes can be explained as the outcome of individual and family choices? When 99% can be explained? How should we treat inter-generational wealth and property ownership? If I’ve worked all my life, lived prudently, carefully spent less than I earned, should I be able to pass along only my old baseball mitt to my kid? Maybe $100? Maybe $100K? Maybe $2M and the paid-off house under the condition he takes care of his mother? If one kid gets a musty baseball mitt and another a house and $2M, is that OK or not? One kid gets a house and another a house and a live-in elderly mother; equal? Different people feel differently, even if they’re both “all for solving the equality issue”.
  - turtledove 4y ago
    We won't ever know, but we'll know when we haven't solved it. Let's fix the injustices we are aware of today. (E.g., the effects of racist housing policies that depressed wealth for generations of Black Americans.) As soon as we're no longer able to point to obviously and deeply unequal opportunities, then we can stay figuring out how to know when we're done.
    - sokoloff 4y ago
      “Why can’t we all just agree to do this specific one thing first?” Because not everyone agrees that’s the best first step. To build a coalition, you have to get the coalition to agree on a goal and a path or at least the right first step(s). Maybe some of them believe that nationalizing public education is a shorter path; others believe that early childhood nutrition is their preferred way to make fastest progress; still others believe that race must be explicitly excluded because it’s an imperfect proxy; others want race to be front and center in the discussion because they think it’s more than just a proxy. If you think X is more important than Y, you may not want to sign up for “Y first; then after we do Y then maybe we’ll consider X.” This goes triple when X and Y both require some common resource. If it was possible to fix all of the apparent inequalities at once, it’s fair to ask why hasn’t it already been done? I think the answer is usually that you don’t have enough “oomph” to do everything at once, especially when there’s a risk and low appetite for over-correcting to create new inequalities from the program designed to eliminate them. Coalition building is hard, even among people who 70+% agree on how things ought to be.
doliveira 4y ago
- IfOnlyYouKnew 4y ago
  - snovv_crash 4y ago
    No, what's happened is that a lot of progressive politics became actively divisive and toxic, which gave opponents actually relevant, insightful commentary about its shortcomings. At some point the progressive movement will weed out it's toxic members and divisive politics and at that point we can make real progress with making the world a fairer place again.
- emerged 4y ago
  - doliveira 4y ago
  - kbelder 4y ago
    Honestly, I think you're being unproductively passionate. I understand, but sometimes when you feel that swell of righteous anger it might behoove you to pause for a minute before you continue typing. And that applies even if you are absolutely, 100%, correct. But this: >Whatever it is we are pushing back against, it is not liberalism. I agree. Much of the modern far left is the antithesis of liberal, they're strongly authoritarian... but they don't think they are. They've gotten spun around, so they think they are banning, censoring, and restricting in the name of freedom and liberty. It's nonsense, but it's something they can't see when they're in the middle of it... and worked up with their own righteous anger. Or defending against the attacks of others. Nobody thinks straight when they're being attacked. That's a good reason to actively work on keeping HN discussion civil. It keeps the reactive reptile brains of all involved under control.
teucris 4y ago
> only minorities of some sort suffer from worse opportunities.. that is utterly ridiculous. > You throw under the bus anyone who’s in “not marginalized” group but had a shitty lack of opportunity, and vice versa. The entire definition of “marginalized” is “pushed out to the margins”. In the case of equity, it’s that marginalization that means a lack of opportunity. So throwing people under the bus who had a lack of opportunity means a bad definition of the marginalized. Which has happened. A lot. So many mistakes have been made in trying to provide equitable outcomes. Shameful ones. But that doesn’t mean the whole concept is bad. > I am literally willing to fight in a war to stop it at this point if it comes to it. If you’re willing to die for something, you better be damn sure you’re fighting the right enemy. Given what you’ve said here, I don’t think you’ve found them yet.
dang 4y ago
We've banned this account for repeatedly breaking the site guidelines and for using HN for ideological battle. Regardless of what you're battling for or against, it's not what this site is for, and it destroys what it is for. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. They're here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

koheripbal 4y ago

Can unequal outcomes be an indicator of unequal opportunity? Yes. Can unequal outcomes exist despite equal opportunity? Yes. There are many non-intrinsic reasons for groups of individuals to not be equally represented. The most obvious is human ethnic group migrations, and the most consistently studied is career-choice differences between men and women. Equal opportunity does not guarantee equal outcomes - especially in only one or two generations after a migration. ...and in the case of gender differences in career interest, forcing equal outcomes is counter-productive. Humans are different. Different outcomes are evidence of diversity, not malice.

Volundr 4y ago
> especially in only one or two generations after a migration. Thats a perfect example of unequal opportunity. As much as we try to make excuses around it, the single biggest predictor of someone's lifetime income is their parents income. The fact of the matter is being rich provides opportunities and advantages being middle class doesn't and definitely not being poor, and there is little evidence to suggest that this corrects itself after a few generations. The fact is historically poor populations tend to stay that way, with those who escape being outliers.
- WalterBright 4y ago
  People also absorb their parents' attitudes about things like work, diligence, handling money, honor, investing, value of education, etc. These have a large effect on their future lives. > there is little evidence to suggest that this corrects itself after a few generations On the contrary. The vast bulk of modern American citizens emigrated to America as poor, even destitute, people. Look what happened to their descendants.
- rayiner 4y ago
  > The fact of the matter is being rich provides opportunities and advantages being middle class doesn't and definitely not being poor, and there is little evidence to suggest that this corrects itself after a few generations. The fact is historically poor populations tend to stay that way, with those who escape being outliers. This is, in fact, the opposite of true. As noted below, pretty much every wave of American immigrants until recently (Irish, Germans, Italians, Southeast Asians) came here desperately poor and eventually attained economic parity with the groups that were already here. Indeed, that process continues with Hispanic immigrants: https://academic.oup.com/qje/article/135/2/711/5687353 https://academic.oup.com/qje/article/135/2/711/5687353 ("Hispanic Americans have rates of intergenerational mobility more similar to whites than blacks, leading the Hispanic-white income gap to shrink across generations.") In the U.S., structural poverty affecting a discrete minority affects Black and Indigenous people, and certain white sub-groups such as Appalachians and Cajuns. It's not a good default model for thinking about income mobility in general.

roody15 4y ago

Not necessarily let me give you an example. Welding is overwhelming a male profession. At least 85 percent of professional welders are male. Is it a goal to make 50 percent of welders male and female? Why? How about equal representation between asian and white welders ? again why? In todays world women welders are encouraged and hired with little difficulty. You could argue that they have close to an equal opportunity as anyone to become a welder (perhaps more so). Just because this metric group does not work out proportionally to the population base does not necessarily indicate oppression. It is possible that many women for some unknown reason just don’t want to be welders… maybe that’s okay.

TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
There are many professions like this. My sons school has 35 teachers, none of which are men. Nursing seems to be another profession with many more women than men. Same with spa workers. Truck drivers are mostly men. Movers. NFL football players. Are we supposed to equalize all of these?
- kwhitefoot 4y ago
  > Are we supposed to equalize all of these? No, but we are supposed to remove the barriers that prevent men becoming nurses and teachers, women becoming truck drivers, etc., etc.
  - kbelder 4y ago
    So, all legal barriers have been removed for decades. There may be cultural barriers, or cultural incentives. How can you know when other barriers are gone, and you have a job that is just naturally more appealing to men or women? Is there a point when you can say it's done?
    - TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
      > you have a job that is just naturally more appealing to men or women? Unfortunately, I think this no longer appropriate to suggest. I think certain circles would cancel you for suggesting this.

gwright 4y ago

I don't see the parent comment communicating those ideas. There is no statement in the comment that there is currently "some semblance of equality of opportunity" only that "most humans would agree striving for equal opportunity is a universal goal". This is a directional statement, not a statements about current progress in that direction. Nor do I see any statement that group outcomes are explained entirely "because of some characteristic within those people."

kwatsonafter 4y ago

I sometimes see this in academics; I like to call this phenomena, "trying so hard to be anti-racist that it comes out as racism."

kbelder 4y ago
A while ago, Biden announced that he hasn't selected a Supreme Court nominee yet, but that it was going to be a black woman. I felt that was more vile racism than anything I have ever heard come out of Trump's mouth. I was appalled by the blatant racism that would have to thoroughly permeate your world view to allow you to proudly say something like that. But, at the same time, Biden doesn't think he's racist. I believe that he truly despises racism. He's just got himself tied up into conceptual knots and self-contradictory values and beliefs, and rationalizations that he doesn't want to examine too closely. I don't think that's uncommon among academics and intelligent people in general.

dontcare007 4y ago

History is a vector. If you think of it that way, it makes sense that some groups end up with relatively more negative outcomes than others. Our moral obligation is to provide everyone with the tools to overcome whatever disadvantages their ancestral vector has placed on them.

thegrimmest 4y ago

> it's because of some characteristic within those people But why can't this be true? Numerous studies have shown that genetic and particularly cultural traits produce vast differences in cognitive ability. Most recently for instance in a story about Korean twins separated at birth[1]. Research also shows that these differences can account for an overwhelming majority of the disparity in outcomes. This has been an active area of research for decades, and academia isn't at all in agreement that "marginalization" is the culprit here[2]. > marginalized groups have drastically worse outcomes Not all "marginalized groups" do though, do they? Unless you only include groups with poor outcomes in your definition of "marginalized", in which case it's a bit circular isn't it? 1. https://www.psypost.org/2022/05/psychologists-found-a-striking-difference-in-intelligence-after-examining-twins-raised-apart-in-south-korea-and-the-united-states-63091 https://www.psypost.org/2022/05/psychologists-found-a-striki... 2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5csE8q9mho https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5csE8q9mho

cmdli 4y ago
> But why can't this be true? Numerous studies have shown that genetic and particularly cultural traits produce vast differences in cognitive ability. Most recently for instance in a story about Korean twins separated at birth[1]. Let's be honest, the reason so many people are opposed to this view is because it has been wrongfully used in the past to justify very real oppression and inequality of opportunity. At the very least, it is a very dangerous mindset historically, and even now it's not very well understood. For example, in the study you mentioned around Korean twins, one was raised in a fairly standard Korean household while the other was tossed around the foster care system and had multitudes of setbacks given to them. And yet people will still use it as evidence that these differences are inherent and unchangeable. Do you not see how this reasoning can lead us to ignore our own blindspots and biases?
- thegrimmest 4y ago
  > wrongfully used in the past to justify very real oppression and inequality of opportunity That doesn't mean that the view is factually inaccurate though does it? I think the best way to avoid oppression is to define and prohibit the practice of it, rather than measure the outcomes. This is what civil rights seems to be all about. > differences are inherent and unchangeable I never said that, I said that different childhood circumstances, cultural practices, and domestic environments clearly produce vastly different outcomes. I also think that using authority to standardize how children are raised would be tyrannical. Most fundamentally, if you want to raise your children without, for instance, an emphasis on educational attainment, you should have the right to do so. Also, no one should be surprised that children raised in such circumstances don't go on to have equality of economic outcome. And no one should get bent out of shape about these facts in combination, as they are not a product of "marginalization".

thfuran 4y ago

>It also seems to seems to suggest that if marginalized groups have drastically worse outcomes If they have equal opportunity, how can they be marginalized? Why can't remaining differences in outcome be explained by cultural or character differences? Given the opportunity to do what they want, people who don't value the same things probably aren't going to do the same thing.

inglor_cz 4y ago

"It also seems to seems to suggest that if marginalized groups have drastically worse outcomes, it's because of some characteristic within those people." What about minority groups that have drastically better outcomes? For a non-US-controversial example, Chinese people in Malaysia, probably the only country that has affirmative action ("Bumiputera") for the majority ethnic group. The historical experience says that disproportionally successful minority groups tend to live under a persistent shadow of violent retribution / ethnic cleansing / genocide at the hands of the majority, so their "privilege" is often very two-edged. But this situation, actually fairly common across the world, is rarely discussed in modern racial narrative.

visarga 4y ago

You forgot to mention people having different values and ways to go about achieving them - could explain the difference in outcomes without making them lesser in any way.

Spooky23 4y ago

The difficult part about these discussions is that there’s a principled philosophical aspect and a pragmatic aspect. We’re all born equal, but take different paths. It’s a lazy answer to say “<“They”> are just a bunch of lazy rabble”, but it’s equally lazy to declare that we’re all prepared to do anything, given the opportunity. Coming to a middle ground that respects human dignity and improves society as a whole is truly difficult.