Journal Bill Dog's Journal: Inequities 15
Act I
A FA on the front page laments that more potholes have gotten fixed in wealthier neighborhoods in some city because their residents were more likely to own smartphones and download the report-a-hole app.
My thinking of course was, yeah, the squeakiest wheel tends to get the grease. That's just how it is, if there's not the gumption or resources to proactively/preventatively frequently attend to every wheel. Such as in city services.
I would think there'd still be a phone number to call to report them, since smartphones haven't always existed, and most everyone has at least a land line. So those who are bothered by them the most get them fixed first.
Doesn't sound terrible, but it's only a meant to serve (and does so very poorly) as just one example of a greater, overall concern: Data analytics could end up reinforcing inequities in housing, credit, employment, health and education.
Act II
I'm reminded of a popular, smarmy retort of the past to the accusation of Left-wing bias in the media: Life [itself] has a Liberal bias! The implication intended for conveyance, but not really believed by the utterer, of course, was that Left-wing slant in the content of reports about things in life was not actually injected, but innate. I.e. it's not a problem, it's what's normal.
Well, then: Life reinforces inequities.
Act III
But if all these naturally-occurring inequities are bad, shouldn't all naturally-occurring inequities be bad?
How about some we never hear about:
1) The number of news sources
The Left occupies 90-some percent of the news dissemination sources in the country, from news networks (like CNN) to non-news networks (like Comedy Central). Given that probably about 1/3 of the country is solid Left, that should be their quota on programming that distributes news. Or at most 2/3rds of all news-distributing media outlets, since you can also argue that the political middle has been lost to the Left.
2) Positions in (public) education
Leftism is grossly over-represented in academia. Why is diversity in the student body so important but not in the faculty?
3) Voter registration
At least in this state, even in so-called Republican areas the # of registered D's easily outnumbers the # of registered R's. And around here I've heard something to the effect that we've gotten rid of runoff elections being between the highest vote getting D and the highest vote getting R, to just the top two highest vote getters. Which will probably take that disparity and tend to make it even worse.
Maybe Democrat registration should be effectively capped at the current level of Republican registration in a district. For example lets say a city has 4 million residents with 45% registered D and 30% registered R. That's 1,800,000 expected D voters and 1,200,000 expected R voters. To make things more fair, shouldn't the number of D votes counted be stopped at 1,200,000? This still wouldn't guarantee equitable outcomes but it could be a start. Then it would be a matter of absolute turnout, on a level playing field.
4) Intelligence (that is, you never hear about this except from "racists")
Inherited wealth must be confiscated, for redistribution by the state, because it's too much of an advantage those of future generations. Well intelligence is passed down as well, and that's an even bigger factor. Maybe mandatory IQ testing should be performed at an early age, with forced dope ingestion in formative years to "equalize" the IQ of those more gifted.
5) Work Ethic
Cultural and home-life attitudes towards achievement also greatly factor in to outcomes in people in life. Jewish and especially Asian households are guilty of placing expectations and pushing their children to successes in life. Public school alone is insufficient in completely counter-acting this parental-instilled drive.
Maybe Child Protective Services' mission should be expanded. Not only do children need protection from their bad parents, but they need protection from others' good parents, who in raising their own children puts others at a disadvantage.
Some type of mandatory foster care in addition to public schooling might do the trick. Say state-run boarding schools, where you have to send your kids to go live 2 years for every 1 year they live with you, or whatever ratio is needed to eradicate the unfairness.
In a word: (Score:1)
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Aw. But put yourself in their shoes. You don't believe in God, and instead believe in a manner of collective redemption, as Obama has referred to. You don't believe anyone goes to a better place, so this is the only existence. You need something meaningful to believe in, and just "you live your life and then you die" doesn't provide any such opportunity. You don't belief in an afterlife or universal truth outside of this reality, so the reality must become the religion. Imagine how great of importance it is
It's simpler than that (Score:1)
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That's dumbed-down happy thinking, explaining none of the complexity that we see.
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Then you think that things like "social justice" and all the other "justices" are ruses. That Lefties don't really care about (their brand of) fairness, they're just using that as an excuse to achieve power. And that they want power just for the sake of power, and not to implement a whole complex alternative (to God's) morality like they seem.
That's as stupid as Lefties saying Conservative opposition is not about policy disagreements because it all really boils down to just racism.
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Then you think that things like "social justice" and all the other "justices" are ruses.
Darn right I do. These are all hormonal arguments, intended to excite feelings of unfairness that can be exploited, not rational consideration of justice itself.
Lefties saying Conservative opposition is not about policy disagreements because it all really boils down to just racism.
First, I don't doubt that actual DNA-based discrimination occurs, although I think it's relatively less prevalent in the U.S. than elsewhere. Second, darn right it's about power. Racism is a potent accusation because "You are racist" is a lie that can be hurled indefinitely.
Which is not to say that some on the Left (at lower levels, especially) are
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I'm saying that, in the name of retaining power, you'd see Nancy Pelosi throw ObamaCare under the bus if necessary. I don't think, at that level, these people believe in much of anything other than power.
There was a poignant line, to me, in the movie "Legally Blonde". Sally Field's character was a politician on the side of "good", from Hollywood's perspective; such as on animal rights.
She was fighting the "good" fight, and they (she and Reese Witherspoon's character) were about to score a significant victory (according to and legislating the side of "good"'s values).
In the end it got watered down and Reese felt betrayed, started scolding Sally for cutting a deal, to which Sally replied, paraphasing, in a "
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Lefties in power don't act the way they do for some inexplicable thirst for power for the sake of power, they do it because they'll take what they can get. They wanted HillaryCare, but settled for ObamaCare. It was still a victory for Leftism, making everyone in the society more equal. It's incrementalism; the best way to boil a frog. And it was still landmark legislation, and a major change for this country, especially in direction from our foundation.
Certainly, there is a spectrum. I don't think the top dogs believe in anything but power. I don't mind admitting that there are rubes and minions who may hold sincere belief in the rhetoric.
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If the top dogs on the Left don't believe their "religion"'s values are superior, and they're only in it for the power, then to what end?
But these days a smartphone is cheaper (Score:2)
A landline is pretty expensive all by itself these days. Smartphones are given away for $50 with $25 worth of initial minutes prepaid.
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Here in California, there's a "Universal LifeLine" program that subsidizes landline service (and now I see that starting this year you have the option of having it on your cell service instead). When I was in college and found out about it, I think my phone service dropped to something like eight bucks a month. I'm assuming other poor-friendly states have similar programs.
Some classes of people (not races) have more tolerance for degradation of their neighborhoods than others. And so I think wealth is a sec
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IIRC, it's a nationwide thing that some had referred to as the "Obama Phone", but the program actually has it's roots as far back as Bush 41 or Reagan.
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I see. [obamaphone.com]
I guess now I fuzzily recall hearing about the program before, as one of the Fox News Channel's evening commentary shows had a lady on who claimed that she was able to get multiple free cell phones and service [freegovern...phones.net], despite not actually being poor.
A report. [youtube.com]