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Segregation is using threats of violence to force people to live separately. "Separate but equal" was enforced at the point of a gun. The OP explicitly disavowe

Segregation is using threats of violence to force people to live separately. "Separate but equal" was enforced at the point of a gun. The OP explicitly disavowed that. He's describing voluntary movement. For example, the tendency of Mexicans to live near each other, or for Indian immigrants to the US to live in Jersey City or Edison. Enlightenedfool's point is that most people, including very pleasant people, harbor tribalist feelings. And these tribalist feelings inform consumption choices. For example, the bad romantic comedies my girlfriend watches have a disproportionate number of black people in them - eventually google informed me that "African American Comedy" is a genre. A steelman of enlightenedfool's point might note the condemnation of white people making consumption choices based on tribalism, and ask if a black woman preferring to watch movies with Meagan Good and Taraji P. Henson rather than Kate Hudson and Jennifer Aniston deserves similar condemnation.

kingkawn 12y ago
If people voluntarily ghettoize it does not mean the ghetto is not real, it means that it's so real that it doesn't need to be enforced anymore.
dalke 12y ago
It looks like you are making a definitional statement that 'segregation' is only possible due to 'threats of violence'. If so, this is overly narrow. There are others ways to get segregation. Quoting from Wikipedia: > Housing segregation traditionally has been the practice of denying African American or other minority groups equal access to housing through the process of misinformation, denial of realty and financing services, and racial steering. Misinformation can take the form of realtors or landlords not giving a certain ethnic group, or race, an accurate portrayal of available units. Racial steering typically occurs when realtors or landlords steer European Americans to available units in white communities, and African Americans to black or racially mixed communities. Generally, racial steering involves misinformation on the part of the realtor or landlord as well, because they will not tell the African Americans or other minorities about the available units in the European American communities. That used information asymmetry, not threats of violence, to steer 'voluntary movement' and end up with a higher amount of segregation than would have occurred if all parties were equally informed. While illegal, these forms of housing segregation still exist: see http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-obtains-120000-settlement-discrimination-lawsuit-against-chicago-area http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-obtains-120... as an example. The quote "Unlawful steering by real estate agents frustrates the rights of people to make fully informed housing choices and perpetuates segregated housing patterns" shows that these non-violent policies are directly tied to segregation.
- yummyfajitas 12y ago
  Disputing definitions is pointless. Obviously voluntary housing choices are segregation_dalke but not segregation_fajitas. Now lets get back to discussing objective reality, and remember that words are merely convenient shorthands for that reality. http://lesswrong.com/lw/np/disputing_definitions/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/np/disputing_definitions/ The point I was making: Yzzxy was arguing against a straw man, acting as if enlightenedfool advocated in favor of using violence to confine certain groups to certain regions ("separate but equal"). Enlightenedfool argued no such thing. Now if you really want to argue against consumption choices based on tribalist preferences, make that argument. Also be wary of the fallacy of expanding a definition and then expecting all conclusions drawn from the narrow definition to also hold for the wide one - I've noticed when people dispute definitions on topics like this, that fallacy often follows.
  - dalke 12y ago
    You created a non-standard definition and used that to make your argument. Then you refuse to allow anyone to object to your basis of argument, and imply that any further corrections likely stem from a fallacy on my side. How bloody convenient for you. Nobody except you said there was a threat of violence. The original article even compared the violence of the Jim Crow South with "the Californian way [which] worked tacitly through housing, jobs and education policies. On top of racially restrictive covenants, realtors around the San Francisco Bay Area were engaged in a practice called blockbusting." This isn't violence. Restricted covenants have been unenforceable by the government since Shelley v. Kraemer in 1948, so it's not like there's even any threat of government force to back up a covenant through the civil courts. The comment by enlightenedfool are personal, but don't reflect the law. It is illegal to discriminate based on national origin just like it's illegal to discriminate based on race. Both have been illegal since the Civil Rights Act of 1968/Fair Housing Act. Currently the only legally accepted threat of violence, for those who hold that government force is backed by a threat of violence, is against those who use discriminatory practices. In any case, enlightenedfool was not talking about violence either. ("And that's not because of violence.") Neither was yzzxy, who referred to the housing discrimination in Chicago, which were very similar to the non-violent way of California. For your statement to make sense means (I believe) that you inferred that yzzxy's reference to "separate but equal" was a statement that equated enlightenedfool's beliefs on "own kind" as identical to the specific government practices ruled illegal in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, and that you believe laws are only possible via the threat of violence by the government, and therefore yzzxy must mean that enlightenedfool also want coercive violence. This is a stretch. It's much easier to believe that yzzxy uses it as a short-hand for the thinking behind the separate but equal doctrine rather than specific implementation points. For one, Brown v. Board of Education was not about private discrimination in the housing market but about government discrimination. For another, the theory of "laws backed by threat of violence" is extremely tenuous here. Redlining occurred through mortgage discrimination, via the National Housing Act of 1934, where banks ended up denying mortgage capital to high-risk/strongly minority areas. Where is the violence in "we will not give federal mortgage insurance to houses in this neighborhood"? For a third, if anything, it is yzzxy who supports government-backed violence as a way to prevent further segregation. The only way I could understand your conclusion required an implicit acceptance of an incorrect definition - that 'housing segregation uses threats of force to live separately.' It seemed easier to first start with that wrong statement, as it would otherwise be impossible to address your other substantive points. Instead you ended by asserting that any definition arguments are pointless - quite odd from someone who asked "What does "systemic" mean?" on this very thread? If you really believe that definition arguments are meaningless, why do you get into them? You say you are "trying to understand", and yet reject as meaningless anything which might lead to a change in your understanding. How disingenuous. And yes, I'm using my own private definition that you can't respond to because I haven't told you what it means.
GabrielF00 12y ago
Would you consider redlining or housing covenants that restricted particular groups to be policies that were "enforced at the point of a gun"? Both were contributing factors to segregation.
- yummyfajitas 12y ago
  As I understand it, the government required banks to redline. So yes. Housing covenants were probably not, but I don't know the details. Similarly, much as I dislike them, the "No Students, Foreigners or Bachelors" restrictions imposed by most housing societies near me are voluntary.

kingkawn 12y ago

If people voluntarily ghettoize it does not mean the ghetto is not real, it means that it's so real that it doesn't need to be enforced anymore.

dalke 12y ago

It looks like you are making a definitional statement that 'segregation' is only possible due to 'threats of violence'. If so, this is overly narrow. There are others ways to get segregation. Quoting from Wikipedia: > Housing segregation traditionally has been the practice of denying African American or other minority groups equal access to housing through the process of misinformation, denial of realty and financing services, and racial steering. Misinformation can take the form of realtors or landlords not giving a certain ethnic group, or race, an accurate portrayal of available units. Racial steering typically occurs when realtors or landlords steer European Americans to available units in white communities, and African Americans to black or racially mixed communities. Generally, racial steering involves misinformation on the part of the realtor or landlord as well, because they will not tell the African Americans or other minorities about the available units in the European American communities. That used information asymmetry, not threats of violence, to steer 'voluntary movement' and end up with a higher amount of segregation than would have occurred if all parties were equally informed. While illegal, these forms of housing segregation still exist: see http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-obtains-120000-settlement-discrimination-lawsuit-against-chicago-area http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-obtains-120... as an example. The quote "Unlawful steering by real estate agents frustrates the rights of people to make fully informed housing choices and perpetuates segregated housing patterns" shows that these non-violent policies are directly tied to segregation.

yummyfajitas 12y ago
Disputing definitions is pointless. Obviously voluntary housing choices are segregation_dalke but not segregation_fajitas. Now lets get back to discussing objective reality, and remember that words are merely convenient shorthands for that reality. http://lesswrong.com/lw/np/disputing_definitions/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/np/disputing_definitions/ The point I was making: Yzzxy was arguing against a straw man, acting as if enlightenedfool advocated in favor of using violence to confine certain groups to certain regions ("separate but equal"). Enlightenedfool argued no such thing. Now if you really want to argue against consumption choices based on tribalist preferences, make that argument. Also be wary of the fallacy of expanding a definition and then expecting all conclusions drawn from the narrow definition to also hold for the wide one - I've noticed when people dispute definitions on topics like this, that fallacy often follows.
- dalke 12y ago
  You created a non-standard definition and used that to make your argument. Then you refuse to allow anyone to object to your basis of argument, and imply that any further corrections likely stem from a fallacy on my side. How bloody convenient for you. Nobody except you said there was a threat of violence. The original article even compared the violence of the Jim Crow South with "the Californian way [which] worked tacitly through housing, jobs and education policies. On top of racially restrictive covenants, realtors around the San Francisco Bay Area were engaged in a practice called blockbusting." This isn't violence. Restricted covenants have been unenforceable by the government since Shelley v. Kraemer in 1948, so it's not like there's even any threat of government force to back up a covenant through the civil courts. The comment by enlightenedfool are personal, but don't reflect the law. It is illegal to discriminate based on national origin just like it's illegal to discriminate based on race. Both have been illegal since the Civil Rights Act of 1968/Fair Housing Act. Currently the only legally accepted threat of violence, for those who hold that government force is backed by a threat of violence, is against those who use discriminatory practices. In any case, enlightenedfool was not talking about violence either. ("And that's not because of violence.") Neither was yzzxy, who referred to the housing discrimination in Chicago, which were very similar to the non-violent way of California. For your statement to make sense means (I believe) that you inferred that yzzxy's reference to "separate but equal" was a statement that equated enlightenedfool's beliefs on "own kind" as identical to the specific government practices ruled illegal in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, and that you believe laws are only possible via the threat of violence by the government, and therefore yzzxy must mean that enlightenedfool also want coercive violence. This is a stretch. It's much easier to believe that yzzxy uses it as a short-hand for the thinking behind the separate but equal doctrine rather than specific implementation points. For one, Brown v. Board of Education was not about private discrimination in the housing market but about government discrimination. For another, the theory of "laws backed by threat of violence" is extremely tenuous here. Redlining occurred through mortgage discrimination, via the National Housing Act of 1934, where banks ended up denying mortgage capital to high-risk/strongly minority areas. Where is the violence in "we will not give federal mortgage insurance to houses in this neighborhood"? For a third, if anything, it is yzzxy who supports government-backed violence as a way to prevent further segregation. The only way I could understand your conclusion required an implicit acceptance of an incorrect definition - that 'housing segregation uses threats of force to live separately.' It seemed easier to first start with that wrong statement, as it would otherwise be impossible to address your other substantive points. Instead you ended by asserting that any definition arguments are pointless - quite odd from someone who asked "What does "systemic" mean?" on this very thread? If you really believe that definition arguments are meaningless, why do you get into them? You say you are "trying to understand", and yet reject as meaningless anything which might lead to a change in your understanding. How disingenuous. And yes, I'm using my own private definition that you can't respond to because I haven't told you what it means.

GabrielF00 12y ago

Would you consider redlining or housing covenants that restricted particular groups to be policies that were "enforced at the point of a gun"? Both were contributing factors to segregation.

yummyfajitas 12y ago
As I understand it, the government required banks to redline. So yes. Housing covenants were probably not, but I don't know the details. Similarly, much as I dislike them, the "No Students, Foreigners or Bachelors" restrictions imposed by most housing societies near me are voluntary.