Lolife vs Lyle Rossiter, Thomas Sowell, and me

I often can’t properly remember how or why I arrive at any particular site on the web, but I also don’t often forget when I see something interesting, particularly if I feel strongly enough to comment on someone else’s blog.   Back in 2008, after Tropic Networks was acquired by Alcatel-Lucent, I found myself in a very foreign environment, and asking, which is crazy, this place or me?  I re-read Thomas Sowell’s A Conflict of Visions, amongst other works, to at least ensure that if crazy, I was in good company.  Some improbable series of events must have occurred to land me on “lolife’s” site, but once there, I decided to comment, as I had already written up an odd experience, one that demonstrated the conflict of visions in action, in the specific area of employment equity.  I was a blog-virgin up until that point, only ever before having posted comments to a few stock message boards on yahoo.

I clipped much of the discussion and place it below (sorry the format is a bit weird), but the original discussion can be found here. On our blog we will not resort to name calling, and expletives, but keep things civil.  The discussion below relates to Lyle Rossiter’s assertion that liberalism/leftism (whatever that might mean) is a form of insanity.  The bait looked just too tasty, so I bit.  Enjoy.

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1. Jerry Gossman
   17 February 2008 @ 3:50 pmRetard? Dipshit? Moron? It certainly doesn’t take you liberals long before you start with the name calling instead of articulating your defense of the “liberal agenda”…<clip>
2. <clip>
3. <clip>
4. <clip>
5. me mine [edBen: Ben’s first “political” post ever!!]
   21 February 2008 @ 5:58 pmI’ll not respond to some of the ridiculous ranting above, but there do exist very valid arguments that [edBen: just some, not all] liberals do suffer from a form of insanity, or at the very least an inability to think logically, and recognize truth.

   I believe the following, which I composed for another purpose, but post here, is relevant to the issue of whether the simultaneous support of affirmative action and individual rights constitute a form of insanity. Yes, [edBen: just some, not all] liberals do often deny, ignore, or dramatically misinterpret one or more of:
   – simple facts
   – human nature
   – basic laws of economics
   – the nature of complex systems, chaos, and non-linear dynamic behaviour.

   I am employed at a major multi-national corporation, in Canada. Similar policies apply in the ‘States.

   lolife appears to have aptly named him/her/itself.

   God Bless America. Thank DARPA we have the Internet. It might save us yet.

   Enjoy,
   b2b
   —————————————-
   Just this morning I sat through an “Employment Equity Focus Group” in which representatives from Human Resources solicited a bunch of us for input on how they could better achieve “diversity in the workplace”. There were in the meeting (a random sampling from the employee base, I believe):
   – an East Indian woman
   – a Black man
   – two Caucasian men
   – a Chinese woman
   – an eastern European woman
   – a Caucasian woman

   Everyone was asked, and no-one in the room felt there were any barriers or discriminatory practices being conducted in the workplace. No-one felt that they personally had been discriminated against at my company . Further, no one had observed discriminatory practices inflicted on others at my company. It was a very frank, open, and honest discussion, and there was no reason to believe these people were hiding anything.

   And yet the HR representatives claimed that there indeed existed “under-represented minority groups”, and claimed that it was backed up by statistics, but did not present them. I would be interested in seeing those statistics, and most particularly how they are broken out and segmented. I was delighted when both the Indian and Chinese ladies pointed out to these HR folk (both young Caucasian women) that perhaps there were cultural differences of choice (ie employee diversity) involved in the statistical bias they had observed. Both of them eloquently displayed their common sense and understanding of basic human nature, which seem so lacking in the Employment Equity Policy.

   The Indian lady had to point out that Indians encouraged their children to be doctors and lawyers, and so were probably over-represented in those areas, and under-represented in others. The Chinese lady had to point out that they emphasized maths and physics in Chinese education, and so the Chinese were probably over-represented in Engineering. They both had to point out that any under-representation of women, if it exists, was probably due to individual choice, ie that many women choose to place their families at a higher priority than their work, which will of course create a bias in the statistics of the resulting employee base. When later the question was raised “against what standard are these groups under-represented?” the answer was the general population, and not even the population of engineers, who dominate the employee base here, and would make a much better standard against which to measure, if such a measurement of result would be productive in any way.

   I find it amazing, baffling, and absolutely incomprehensible that an organization implementing a policy and process that is supposed to be encouraging diversity in our workplace seems not to understand the nature of diversity that already exists even when it is directly expressed to it (for example, by these sensible ladies). More importantly the implications of this diversity seemed not to be understood, namely that biases in the resulting statistics of the relative representations of various groups are to be expected, and are perfectly natural, and good, and in fact the result of diversity, by definition. I am baffled.

   I am asked (though I believe not *yet* compelled, though that is the very next step as we approach Orwell’s 1984) to fill out forms in which I am asked to disclose personal information like my race, gender, marital status, disability status, religious affiliation, etc. so that HR can know the statistics of these demographic groups within the employee base, so that you can create “greater equity and diversity in our workplace”, and to “eliminate barriers to full participation”. This process, I discover, seems in fact to be mandated under the “Employment Equity Act”, a piece of Canadian Federal legislation. I find all this quite repugnant, as we should never have to ask our employees any such thing, in fact we should be blind to all of this, unless an employee raises a complaint of inequitable treatment, in which case such information must be brought to the open so that the inequity can be investigated and if verified, addressed. This request for detailed personal information during the hiring process was the last straw for one former employee within my organization, who is no longer with us.

   Truly we have a conflict of visions in action here, and they cannot be reconciled, as the differences of opinion are axiomatic to the visions. In this case the conflict manifests itself as a battle between equality of *process* and equality of *result*. The Act, and the policies private companies are required to implement in accord with it, are attempting to implement equality of result. Most of the people in the room rather thought that equal treatment in the process was required, and that people should be hired and advanced on the basis of their abilities and merit, independent of the resulting demographics of the employee base that would be created through the application of such an equitable process. That is, the result is largely irrelevant, or at least highly likely to be biased by cultural preferences, and therefore unlikely to match any given demographic, if the process followed was equitable.

   The only way to directly alter the results, which is one stated goal of the legislation and the HR policies that arise from it – to create a specific outcome in terms of workforce diversity that aligns in some way with some notion of an ideal demographic distribution – given that an equitable process will naturally create “inequitable” results, is in fact to alter the process *away* from equitability, and to begin to discriminate in that process in favour of “under-represented” groups and against “over-represented” groups. The only possible active use of the statistics gathered by the employee demographic surveys is to implement just such inequitable processes. Equality of result is in direct conflict with equality of process, and the people who sit on different sides of this argument suffer from a conflict of vision in terms of what it is that should be optimized.

   Because I had read “A Conflict of Visions” by Thomas Sowell, which deals directly with this issue, I knew exactly what was going on in that room, and was able to express it, and to change the terms of the discussion somewhat. I suggested that instead of employee demographics, we might simply consult the historical statistics of employment equity complaints that had been raised in the past, and look for trends there. One person in the group complained that many people suffering injustice are afraid to complain, so those statistics would not be representative of “the true level of inequity”. I cannot imagine anyone other than a person who is actively being discriminated against being best qualified to determine if unjust treatment is in fact occurring, and to raise a red flag. There are many policies and legal facilities now in place to protect people who validly make such complaints, and this argument is therefore specious. If something is not important enough for an individual to complain about, given that complainants have all sorts of legal protection and recourse, then there simply is no wrong being done.

   Lyle Rossiter, an American forensic psychiatrist, has recently published a book in which he explores what he sees as a growing delusional psychosis that denies many basic aspects of human nature and diversity, and that many public policies have been and are currently being designed by people who suffer from it. The madness of what my company is attempting to implement through these policies is just one example that results from this. I think the delusion might simply be the application in public policy of the unconstrained vision, as defined by Thomas Sowell. Dr. Rossiter writes:

   “A social scientist who understands human nature will not dismiss the vital roles of free choice, voluntary cooperation and moral integrity…[yet they do] A political leader who understands human nature will not ignore individual differences in talent, drive, personal appeal and work ethic, and then try to impose economic and social equality on the population…[yet they do] And a legislator who understands human nature will not create an environment of rules which over-regulates and over-taxes the nation’s citizens, corrupts their character and reduces them to wards of the state…[yet they do]”

   All these things are occurring in Canada, and with increasing frequency and scope, and with ever lower standards and ever greater penalties for infraction, and the Employment Equity Act, and the resulting policies that private companies are asked to implement are just one example of many. I have watched it grow during my lifetime. This is very real, and it matters.

   When the group was asked what should be done to try and “foster diversity” and “eliminate barriers” I believe the consensus opinion, with allowance for my paraphrasing, was very close to: “Nothing need be done, as there are no barriers and no lack of diversity at our company, and what divergence from some ostensible norm in the resulting employee demographics that may exist is, in fact, due directly to our diversity of employees, and the diversity of opinion, and choice, and cultural influence that exist within the many different groups of society from which our employees are drawn.” In fact, everyone seemed to agree that there were MUCH MUCH greater problems that the Company was currently facing and that focusing on this type of (non-)issue showed a lack of concern by our executive management about the more important factors currently affecting employee retention.

   My request to my HR department is to stop asking employees questions about their race, sex, colour, religion, sexual orientation, whatever. It is demeaning and insulting and wrong, and these data can only be used for purposes that will result in inequitable treatment in hiring and advancement and compensation processes, as opposed to equitable processes that consider only ability and merit, and these questions scare away existing or potential employees who exhibit the qualities we desire.

   I requested that we cease reporting on the demographic statistics of “designated groups” to the Canadian Government. I realize that this may mean ineligibility for certain government contracts, and may in fact result in fines or other proceedings against the Company. In that event I ask that the Company use its resources to defend the rights of Canadians to be free of discriminatory practices in our workplace, by challenging the Employment Equity Act in the Supreme Court of Canada. I would be delighted to stand witness on the Company’s behalf if such a situation arose.
   —————–

   So who is insane and who rational? Go read “A Conflict of Visions”, an unbiased reflection on why liberals and conservatives argue and never agree, written by a Black Jewish male, if that matters to you, which, if you support affirmative action, it might. It didn’t to me, I simply recognized that he was correct in his thesis and analysis, and proof.

6. lolife
   21 February 2008 @ 9:06 pmThank you.

   First of all, you may well be correct that HR at your workplace was trying to fix something that wasn’t broken. That’s an anecdote and nothing more. Here is the meat:

   …biases in the resulting statistics of the relative representations of various groups are to be expected, and are perfectly natural, and good, and in fact the result of diversity, by definition. I am baffled.

   The median income for a black person in the US from 2000-2002 was $29,000. The median income for a white person was $47,000*. That’s “perfectly natural, and good, and in fact the result of diversity, by definition”, right? Are you really going to suggest this is a cultural choice and a result of the positive benefits of diversity?

   Of course not. It’s a direct result of discrimination against black people, starting with slavery and continuing to this day. The only people that deny it’s happening are the people who do it.

   The original point, by the way, is that the Right has gone so far over the edge in their hatred of all things liberal that they have made dialogue completely impossible. Now they want to lock us up and cure us until we are conservatives! That’s the worst kind of extreme partisanship and I’m waiting for one of you so-called sane people to admit it.

   * http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/income02/3yr_avg_race.html

7. WestSider
   24 February 2008 @ 8:47 am“The median income for a black person in the US from 2000-2002 was $29,000. The median income for a white person was $47,000*.”

   So logically there is only one true explanation for this? And it is that “conservatives” are inherently racist and are holding back people of color?

   Perhaps one group of individuals works harder than another group? I am not saying that it is absolute fact, but it would be an alternate explanation for the actual outcome that has been observed.

   It would seem that your dogmatic adherence to the discrimination argument to the exclusion of all other possible explanations is a hallmark of the political philosophy that you are trying to defend here.

   I think that is probably what Dr. Rossiter is trying to demonstrate.

8. lolife
   24 February 2008 @ 9:12 am

   So logically there is only one true explanation for this? And it is that “conservatives” are inherently racist and are holding back people of color?

   Perhaps one group of individuals works harder than another group?

   Of course! Black people are poorer, on average, not because of a legacy of racism and discrimination in this country which persists to this day, but because they are lazy!

   Of all explanations, yes, that is racist and retarded. Most poor people work their asses off, much more than the affluent.

   My “dogmatic adherence to the discrimination argument” is based on a whole bunch of facts that I laid out for you. You suggested one stupid explanation that is considered by most to be utterly without basis and then proceed to claim victory.

   So, to summarize, the left has a theory based on historical fact: slavery, racism and discrimination. (Or are you going to claim that these never occurred?) The right has a theory based on the superiority of white people over black people, you know, not being lazy and stupid and stuff.

   WTF

9. Robespiere
   25 February 2008 @ 11:58 amIt’s true. Racism has kept a black woman from attending Princeton and then Harvard University. It’s also kept here husband from running for the most powerful office in the world and being supported, in large part, by whites. (Oh wait…… nevermind).

   It also kept my very good friend from recieving an Ivy league education and going on to become an orthopedic surgeon. And it’s also kept the stunning black woman I had lunch with the other day from recieving a chemical engineering degree from MIT and and MBA from Harvard, the #1 business school in the nation.

   Perhaps you need there to be racist bogeymen so that you can feel righteous and pretend that you’re protecting blacks from those evil republicans?

   You clearly have no idea what you’re talking about. Racial discrimination is ILLEGAL. Hiring practices that favor minorities are LEGAL and PROMOTED. The greatest source of resistance to black achievement comes from within the black community where getting an education is seen as ‘selling out’ or ‘acting white’.

   I don’t blame you for your ignorance [Ben as Ed:Robespierre mistakes ignorance for stupidity.  Lolife is not ignorant, he has been educated into stupidity, as Bertrand Russel would say]. It’s all you’ve ever been taught by your liberal teachers and the liberal media and entertainment industry. My advice? Head on down to the hood and learn.

   Ps. While the proportions of poor blacks are higher than the proportions of poor whites (whatever ‘white’ means) there are millions more poor white people, or, as I’m sure you like to call them, ‘White Trash’.

10. lolife
    25 February 2008 @ 12:58 pmYou presented a bunch of anecdotes to counter a point I never made. Yes, of course, millions of people of color do quite well. We’re not arguing about that.

    I stated a fact above — a bona fide fact: on average, black people do worse economically than white people. This is the motivation for affirmative action.

    I’m waiting for one of you ‘tards to say “affirmative action doesn’t help the recipient and doesn’t create diversity in the institutions in question”. I don’t think that is true, but at least it is an argument against my point rather than this anecdotal, diversionary bullshit.

    Can at least one person argue the actual issue? If I had to twist your comment into an actual point I guess it would be that black people don’t value economic prosperity? Do you believe that?

11. Grodge
    25 February 2008 @ 3:06 pmI lost the link, but I was just reading an article entitled:

    [edBen: consonants changed, slight disapproval, but it slips through] “Top Proctologist concludes Conservatives are Tight-a$$ed”

    I look again and forward it if I find it.

12. KevinS
    27 February 2008 @ 12:10 pmTo quote mine:

    When later the question was raised “against what standard are these groups under-represented?” the answer was the general population, and not even the population of engineers, who dominate the employee base here, and would make a much better standard against which to measure, if such a measurement of result would be productive in any way.

    I’m sorry, but that has to be one of the most inane comments I’ve heard in quite a while. I’ll agree that attempting to make a company’s demographic profile exactly match that of the general population isn’t incredibly helpful, but I don’t think any real liberals are actually supporting this straw man of yours. We realize that in an individual company or field there will inevitably be deviations from the demographics of the population at large. But I think it’s the height of stupidity to offer up the demographics of a field of work as a target for comparison to examine discrimination in that field of work. As a hypothetical with only slightly made up numbers, in the 1940′s in the US, the mechanical engineering workforce was 5% female, 95% male. So if a company then was composed of 1 female mechie and 19 male mechies, then clearly they were the height of diversity and absolutely no discrimination was occurring. If we simply compare the demographics of a current population to the demographics of the current population, we get absolutely zero information out of the equation.

13. Robespierre
    27 February 2008 @ 2:49 pmNo, you didn’t just state the simple fact that blacks have lower income than whites. You went on to state that the cause of this discrepancy is racism and that they earn less because those individuals are being actively discriminated against by racist whites. It should be easy to find statistics showing that large numbers of minorities are being denied educational opportunities or jobs because of their color. I look forward to reading about those facts here on your blog.
14. b2b (aka me mine, here)
    27 February 2008 @ 8:28 pmI checked back here just for fun. Lolife, thanks for printing my note and continuing the discussion. But I don’t think you read my words carefully, or else you don’t understand my point, or refuse to understand, or something.

    More succinctly, the thrust of my argument above was:
    – different people have different visions of the nature of man
    – those with different visions interpret many things differently
    – one thing that is interpreted differently is “equality”
    – those of the constrained vision seek equality of process
    – those of the unconstrained vision seek equality of result
    – the difference is irreconcilable, as it derives from the vision itself, which is axiomatic to the individual doing the thinking

    and further, specific to employment equity:

    – diversity exists between groups
    – that diversity between groups affects results
    – if, in the presence of diversity, we seek to achieve equality of result, we must necessarily have inequality of process for individuals operating under it.

    The reason it was relevant to this thread is that, from my perspective, three of the people in the room that day, who I tagged as having the unconstrained vision, demonstrated (to me):
    – an inability to see and recognize obvious truths;
    – an inability to think logically;
    – persistent denial in the face of truth and logic.

    Which certainly comes very close to smacking of insanity.

    Lolife, to refute my “anecdote” you presented an argument of result, as opposed to one of process. That is a specious argument, in my vision, and further I assert that knowledge is largely represented by the collective memory of many anecdotes, as opposed to articulated rationality, so in my vision there is no diminution of the validity of my argument, simply because it is supported by an anecdote. The point I was making above is not “anecdotal, diversionary bullshit” but addresses in fact the core, root cause of the argument occuring on this thread, and the reason the two sides will never reconcile.

    Addressing a point you make later, and reiterating a point I made above, I believe you should not preclude the possibility that different groups may have different values, that when acted upon over time, produce different outcomes for those groups, but also should not assume that the answer to a difference in wealth distribution is due only to a single factor. You ask: “…black people don’t value economic prosperity? Do you believe that?”

    Clearly you seek a single, articulable “reason” for the disparity of results that you observe and quote. I don’t, any more than I seek a “reason” why certain biases occur in observed distributions of characteristics in species in nature. Many people dedicate their lives in search of such explanations, but they are doomed to continue to do so forever, if they seek “the reason”, as there is an infinite number of causal relationships of decreasing influence that produce the results, and the system is also not static.

    The system we are talking about here that generates affluence through employment (or not)is incredibly complex, and each individual in it unique in their behaviour and environmental conditions. Since you ask for at least one voice, you have mine: I think it likely that the difference between say, “blacks” and “whites” in their perceptions of the relative merit of pursuit of affluence through employment versus other pursuits is likely to account for some portion of the disparity in outcome you observe. I very much doubt it is the only reason, and I cannot say that it is even a dominant reason. But common sense says it likely plays a part in the disparity of outcome (ie income .

    But, just to keep the controversy and discussion going, I’ll state that I also think differences between the groups in the prominence and influence of role models who do or do not promote the types of behaviours that lead to affluence through employment is very likely to have a larger effect on that outcome. I also believe in my “law of unintended consequences” that asserts that attempts to influence behaviours in complex systems will often create results in direct opposition to the intent of a policy. My wife recently said succinctly to me: “Foreign aid subsidizes bad government.” She clearly understands what I mean. In this case, it would imply that the ultimate effect of affirmative action and other such policies will be to impoverish those it is designed to help.

    KevinS, your exact point is not clear to me, but it seems apparent that equity for you consists of equity of result, as opposed to equity of process, as you use a results-oriented set of metrics to argue.

    I was referring to legislation that was enacted to ensure that individual companies do not discriminate, and for that purpose, if one believed in a results-oriented approach, the “designated group” statistics from the subset of the population that *qualified* for the jobs (ie engineers) would in fact be the best metric, and is in fact how the legislation is written, enumerating hundreds and hundreds of job categories, presumably for the purpose of ensuring that the (biased) distributions of designated groups within each of these sub-segments are aligned between individual companies and the general population’s sub-segment stats.

    I think reasonable people of either the constrained or unconstrained vision would agree it is excessively punitive to hold an individual company accountable for, say, not enough women being engineers in the general population. That is not a problem for an individual company to attempt to solve – it has far too small an impact – that is a problem for parents, and teachers, and others, who should try to influence girls to study maths and sciences, if that is their objective. It is *almost* (but not quite, unless one is of the unconstrained vision reasonable to hold a company accountable for the fact that the proportion of female engineers in THEIR company is below the norm, and that is exactly how the Canadian legislation (with which I still object) is written, to force companies to step up and match the rest of the industry.

    I suggest you carefully re-read what I wrote, as it did not seem to sink in, but meanwhile I will pose to you some questions to consider:

    You desire specific outcomes in terms of employment equity.

    What is the process by which you propose the specific targets for specific job roles for specific designated groups be established? You offered an example of perfection, the 5%, 1 in 19 female mechies solution. Is that the answer, when generalized? What should be the allowance for statistical variation of random samplings of populations? Should we use the Student t-Test for a 95% confidence interval? Or is there a “better” way?

    How do we deal with smaller companies, where averaging effects and the laws of large numbers render statistical approaches invalid? Do we “round up to the nearest human” or round down? It gets quite binary in a small company situation, where ensuring “equity” might require that, say, the company only be able to legally hire a black Jewish man, or a middle-eastern Muslim woman, for the next opening. Should we enforce that, or provide exemptions for small size? If we are to provide small-company exemptions, what is the “right” size at which to do so? How do you know you are right about that? Do you think anyone might disagree with you? How will that be resolved?

    Please enumerate all the groups that should be considered in this process, and not those that shouldn’t, as either laws will apply, or they won’t. How do you know your list is “correct”? Do you think there might be anyone who might disagree with your list? How will you settle this argument about who should be “designated”, and who not?

    Is the proportion of all the various “designated groups” in the general population you might wish to consider constant and uniform across the United States?

    If the distribution is not homogeneous, how would you adjust your specific targets to consider geographical variation in the distribution? What should be the “radius of equality” in your vision of this process, and how do you know you have it right, as opposed to someone else’s view of how far to “cast the equality net”?

    Else you believe the proportional distributions of designated groups do not vary by geography, ie that the United States is totally homogeneous with respect to all possible groups that might suffer discrimination. Then I ask just: really, is that so? Alaska, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico, South, North, East/West and midwest all in?

    These are not just idle questions, but ones that must be considered and to which one must have answers if one seeks equality of result.

    The alternative, of having a law that addresses equality of process is much, much simpler to implement, and has a much lower cost for implementation. One needs laws that say discriminatory processes and practices are illegal, and one needs to have a mechanism to address complaints, and to enforce compliance to the law should they occur. Provided the legislation is well-crafted, it will allow the judiciary sufficient latitude to address injustices against individuals while not allowing them to hold individual companies accountable for the failings of society at large.

    I really, seriously, do not understand how, if we have a society in which any individual suffering an injustice through discriminatory practice or process has recourse and the force of law behind them, how any sane individual could claim that injustice was being done at some other scale, or that the results are somehow unjust. My inability to understand this, even though I am a well-informed, educated, intelligent, compassionate, generous, well-meaning and rational person is the crux of the conflict of visions. This conflict was vividly present in the room of my anecdote, and in the discussions here as well. Calling people names will not help.

    To return to the original subject of the thread, I will admit to not having read Rossiter’s book. I’ll have to get a copy and see what he says. Ignoring him, or calling him names will not refute his argument. Feel free to try to refute mine, but I fear unless you actually take the time to read something as I suggest below, it will be a fruitless discussion.

    Here is the web site of a very intelligent, wise, successful, and articulate man who I think understands this issue quite clearly. He has written several books and hundreds of articles on the topic. I have his collection of articles, entitled “Is Reality Optional?” in front of me, and he is also the author of “A Conflict of Visions”, amongst many other good books.

    His name is Thomas Sowell, and his website can be found at:

    http://www.tsowell.com/

    I seriously encourage anyone reading this to click through and read some of what this man has to say. Sowell preceded Rossiter by many years on this topic, if one believes that the reality-denial that can occur by those of the unconstrained vision, from both the “left” and the “right”, is a form of insanity.

    Reality is NOT optional, and reality includes causation, which, if one is truly interested in understanding why the reality of certain results occur, one should consider carefully, with an eye to just how complex even simple systems can be. Read “Chaos” by James Gleick, if you think things are simple. We now know better. There are few people as humble as the smartest people on earth, who have glimpsed this complexity.

    Lolife and KevinS, I assert that you are of the unconstrained vision, and those with whom you argue here are of the constrained vision, as defined by Sowell. If you wish to understand the reality of the plight of the black man in America, read what he says. He is a smart man, and sees truths that many others do not.

    Read his “Visions”, and you will also understand how better to argue productively with “conservatives” or “the right” or however you want to brand those with whom you disagree.

    Know your friends, lolife and KevinS, but know your enemies better. Read Sowell. I have gone through that process, and I feel I understand you better as a result.

    b2b

    PS: lolife I apologize for the jab about the aptness of your (presumably self-inflicted!) nom-de-plume. It was unnecessary. But so was the name-calling: “retard”; “dipshits” [sic]; “moron”; that preceded my post.

15. b2b (aka me mine, here)
    27 February 2008 @ 9:30 pmLolife, I chose to post again, but I have to say I found the ad-hominem arguments presented to others quite disturbing, and won’t be back if it continues. I have never posted to a politically-oriented blog before, don’t mind putting my thoughts down, as it helps in refining them, but I loathe insult, pejoratives, and ad-hominem argument, as it does not help to either settle differences or help achieve understanding of them.

    Am I “one of you ‘tards”, and is there a reason you stoop to name-calling instead of just discussion?

    With respect to some specifics above:
    Lolife wrote: “The median income for a black person in the US from 2000-2002 was $29,000. The median income for a white person was $47,000*. That’s “perfectly natural, and good, and in fact the result of diversity, by definition”, right? Are you really going to suggest this is a cultural choice and a result of the positive benefits of diversity?”

    I am unfamiliar with the statistics you quote, but do not argue with them, and yes, I think it is possible that diversity of opinion as to the merit of hard work may be at least partially at play. I never said that all effects of diversity are positive, I said specifically that the bias of Indians to becoming doctors and lawyers, Chinese becoming engineers, and women becoming mothers were natural and good. Please read Sowell, and do not misquote and twist the words of others.

    Robespierre wrote: “I don’t blame you for your ignorance. ” Robespierre, you confuse ignorance and stupidity. Maybe I’ll get it wrong, but from memory, Bertrand Russel said: “We are born ignorant. It is education that makes us stupid.” I think he was right.

    Lolife wrote: “The original point, by the way, is that the Right has gone so far over the edge in their hatred of all things liberal that they have made dialogue completely impossible. Now they want to lock us up and cure us until we are conservatives! That’s the worst kind of extreme partisanship and I’m waiting for one of you so-called sane people to admit it.”

    I would have to say, given only the evidence in this thread, that the “left” is exuding far more hatred than the “right”, if only by counting the nasty names that who is calling whom. Lolife you also seem to ascribe to individuals who post to this thread the opinions of others, and assign blame for injustices that were wrought by others as well. That makes dialog difficult indeed.

    I personally do not want to throw you in jail. I want you to read and understand some great thinking by some great people.
    b2b

16. lolife
    28 February 2008 @ 10:29 amFirst of all, I agree that we don’t have to have such negative tones and name-calling. Usually I am tilting in the wind on this blog, preaching to the choir. I am happy to discuss this stuff sans insults.

    Robespierre, like others here you seem to be implying that racism and discrimination are not a cause for the large gap in standards of living between white and blacks. I put forth a theory. What’s your theory? The undercurrent from the Right on this issue is that black people are lazy or stupid and that they made their own bed.

    Because if that is not true (which it obviously isn’t) then there is a context of some sort undermining those populations. We have a society made by whites for whites. The whole “back of the bus” thing is yesterday, historically. Do you really believe that these factors have no bearing on the earning gap?

    I’ve had black people tell me they have trouble getting a taxi. Of store owners that watch black patrons like a hawk, thinking they are all thieves. Of landlords who deny black people housing who are in better financial position than the white folks who get the apartment instead of them.

    And, yes, there are many, many cases of overt, illegal discrimination litigated every year. Here is one:

    The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission yesterday announced its largest-ever settlement for an individual racial discrimination case — $2.5 million — against Lockheed Martin of Bethesda.

    Lockheed agreed to pay Charles Daniels, a black aviation electrician who said he was subjected to racial epithets and threatened with bodily harm by white employees while repairing military aircraft.

    Daniels, 45, “was the target of persistent verbal abuse by coworkers and a supervisor whose racial slurs and offensive language included calling him the N-word, and saying, ‘We should do to blacks what Hitler did to the Jews,’ and if the South had won then this would be a better country,” the EEOC said in a statement. “Daniels was also subjected to multiple physical threats, such as lynching and other death threats after he reported the harassment.”

    This happened in 2001.

    Yes, there are tons of white racists in this country, unfortunately.

17. b2b (aka me mine)
    29 February 2008 @ 12:28 pmlolife:
    0) Thank you for not descending again to insult and ad-hominem.

    1) You just quoted some anecdotes. Yet you claimed to me above that anecdotes were insufficient to prove causal relationships. Can you explain the inconsistency of your position? Do anecdotes work for one side of an argument, but not the other? Are your anecdotes NOT “anecdotal, diversionary bullshit” as you said above, but something different, because they are your anecdotes as opposed to those of others?

    2) You say: “there are tons of white racists in this country, unfortunately”. I think that may be true. But I have a few questions for you on this. First, do you think we will ever have none, zero, nada? If so, what social cost would you be willing to pay to ensure that there were none, what price or sacrifice of, say, individual freedoms for all would you be willing to tolerate to achieve that result, or do you believe that this result can be achieved without social cost? If not, then what is the “correct” percentage of racists versus non-racists? And finally, do you believe that there are only white racists, or are there in your view also racists who are black, and Chinese, and Indian, etc?

    3) You stated “The original point, by the way, is that the Right has gone so far over the edge in their hatred of all things liberal that they have made dialogue completely impossible.” I think that one of the things that makes dialog difficult indeed is when one generalizes excessively: “The Right” “The Left” etc, which is why I am attempting to have a dialog between two individuals, ie you and me. I do not think I am having much success, by the way. In your own response just above you again address a tangent, racism, not the initial argument to which you sought to guide the discussion. I will ask an open question which is on-topic: “Is a refusal to respond to logical argument, by constantly changing topics, a form of denial, or insanity? If so, I think this discussion itself provides excellent evidence of Rossiter’s thesis! I acknowledge racism exists. The relevant debate was around what to do about it, and whether affirmative action and non-discrimination were mutually exclusive, when considered by a sane mind.

    4) You wrote; “Now they [b2b: who, “The Right”?] want to lock us up and cure us until we are conservatives! That’s the worst kind of extreme partisanship and I’m waiting for one of you so-called sane people to admit it.” Well, I think I am sane (and many others do as well) and you probably would classify me as one of “them”, but I do not want to lock you up. If all that is true then I am one anecdotal piece of evidence that refutes your assertion. I just want you to understand the inconsistency of your own position through reason and logic. If you deny reason and logic, then I think there is in fact a case to be made that you are experiencing a form of delusion.

    5)You wrote: “I sure hope this person isn’t employed by anyone. If so, they should be fired. I also certainly hope that this retard doesn’t work directly with patients. This kind of blatant political lie, marked up to pretend it is medicine, should completely undermine this dipshits credibility. Are you a doctor? Or a political hack?” Aside from finding the obvious ad-hominem nature of this line of thinking repugnant, I must ask: Do you know this individual, Rossiter, and are you in an informed position to offer such recommendations? Have you even read his book? I do not know whether he suggests remedying the “insanity of the left” through incarceration, or rehabilitation. IO think I have made it clear that I would prefer that those who deny reality simply begin to recognize it, and start to act in accordance with it, as opposed to just “locking up the lefties”.

    6) Will you take the time to actually read what I wrote, quote from it, and comment on what portions with which you disagree? I believe that is the nature of fruitful discussion, which I believe you claim to want to have, yet you don’t seem to act to achieve it. Is this a form of insanity manifesting itself, or do you just not have the time, in which case, I think you should remain silent, as, as I have said before, ranting at each other and calling each other names does not contribute to the resolution of disputes. I have asked multiple questions of you in all my writing above, but I don’t believe I yet have any answers, though I have tried to answer you, and KevinS, even where questions or assertions were generically addressed to “the right”.

    Frankly, the more of this “discussion” we have, the more I believe Dr Rossiter may have a very valid point!

    I look forward to a reply that addresses things I have actually said, and addresses questions I have actually asked, on the topic of whether certain sets of beliefs, all held to be simultaneously true, constitutes a form of insanity.

    One poster suggested the simultaneous support of affirmative action and opposition of discrimination constituted just such a potential pairing of mutually exclusive beliefs. I agree, and have provided logical argument in support of that position.

    Who is insane? I assert not me.

    Who refuses to have discourse? I assert not me.

    Is there no-one out there who will actually engage me on this?

    b2b

18. lolife
    29 February 2008 @ 1:07 pmSorry, b2b, if you take no offense at the suggestion that liberals are insane then you are not worth debating. We can’t just disagree anymore, we have to suggest that people are clinically incapable of reaching the conclusion that we have decided they should reach. That’s deeply offensive and contrary to a good-faith exchange of ideas. Every single Rightie that has posted here has no problem at all with Rossiter’s blatant partisan quakery. QED.

    I’d also suggest you try to be more concise. If it takes you thousands of words to make your point, you need to think a little harder.

19. b2b (aka me mine)
    29 February 2008 @ 5:37 pmlolife: Ignore my verbose arguments, if you find my not taking offense offensive, and therefore cause to ignore me.

    It was Jim’s post of Feb 17 that brought me here, after all.

    Just please argue either:

    1) that “the left” (or you, more specifically) does not simultaneously advocate the policies of affirmative action and non-discrimination;

    or

    2) affirmative action and non-discrimination are not mutually exclusive.

    It is a provable fact that either:
    a) at least one of statements 1) and 2) are true;
    or
    b) “the left” (or you, in particular) cannot think logically, or are deluded in some way.

    lolife: Will you defend “the left” (or yourself in particular) against Rossiter’s offensive suggestion by establishing the truth of one of statements 1) or 2)?

    g’night
    b2b

20. lolife
    29 February 2008 @ 6:05 pmMy answer is 2 as I’ve explained at length: affirmative action and non-discrimination are not mutually exclusive. In fact, affirmative action is specifically anti-discriminatory in that, it challenges the status quo to be more inclusive of populations who are the victims of discrimination.

    I acknowledge that you think that affirmative action is discrimination because it tips the scales in favor of one group over another. Yet because of racism that was so extreme that it was literally slavery, the scales have been tipped the other way for 200 years. I believe, as a society based on justice, we have a duty to address the on-going aftershocks of past, severe injustice which are clearly evident today.

    I think it is just ridiculous that you can’t read the above and acknowledge that it was written by a person who has thought about it a lot and reached a conclusion based on what he thinks are sound principles. You disagree with me? Fine. You think my argument is illogical? FIne. The feeling is mutual. I am not, however, calling your reasoning so profoundly flawed as to constitute medical insanity. To do so, in my opinion, would be incorrect, insincere and deeply partisan.

21. b2b
    2 March 2008 @ 12:11 amThank you lolife. We are now getting somewhere, I believe. I do not necessarily think your argument is illogical, I am just not yet clear what it is. The key to effective discussion is to define the terms we use, so we can communicate unambiguously, and it does take more of the right words to do so. I do not object to “tipping the scales”, as you say, but to the inequitable treatment of individuals during employment processes like hiring, advancement, and compensation review. I consider these processes “non-discriminatory” if ability, merit, and performance in the role are used as the metrics in determining the outcome, independent of race, creed, colour, etc.

    lolife wrote: “I believe, as a society based on justice, we have a duty to address the on-going aftershocks of past, severe injustice which are clearly evident today.”

    I agree. I also think that we are doing at least part of our duty to address those aftershocks if we ensure through law that those who have suffered injustice are at least ensured equitable treatment as defined above. It is, at least, a move in the right direction, I hope you agree. Please let me know, we might differ on this point.

    Next is answering whether we should be doing more, and if so, what, how, how much, and at how much cost to whom. That is where I see it getting complex. We must answer these to at least some extent, if we are actually going to do more, in law. If you’ve got the answers, great, lemme know, but otherwise, how do you think each of these questions should be answered, or do we not need to answer some?

    thanks,
    b2b

22. Susan
    9 March 2008 @ 10:18 amI would prefer that liberals stay out of my life and mind their own business. That seems to be the main objective of their lives is to
    remake the world to suit their ambitions and petty needs….you know…like whining and getting their way when they were children…and still are.
23. lolife
    9 March 2008 @ 10:33 amExactly, Susan. The only way you can make your point is to entirely misrepresent the liberal point of view.

    I would love it if conservatives would “stay out of my life” too. I think their anti-privacy agenda is completely daft and un-American. Their view that only heterosexuals have families worth supporting borders on criminal discrimination. The fact that they would give up civil liberties every time George Bush says there are bad men in the world is pathetic. The notion that “fiscal conservative” solely means people who cut taxes is retarded. That they want the police in the doctor’s office with pregnant women is more “nanny state” mentality than anything I can think of that liberals support. The Republican anti-science, theocratic agenda is appalling to the rest of the Westernized world. But then again reality has a well-known liberal bias.

    I would appreciate your comments if there was one tiny whiff of substance anywhere in them.

24. b2b (aka me mine)
    13 March 2008 @ 3:27 pmlolife I notice you respond not to my reasoned argument, and my many questions that might help you present your reasoned argument in response. Instead, you reply sarcastically to Susan’s statement of personal preference, and her generalizations of what she thinks “liberals” do, with your own generalizations of how you think “conservatives” and “Republican’s” think and act. It starts to look like a trend.

    These generalizations are all unprovable, and all most probably false as well, as proving falsehood would only require finding a single counter-example of a liberal, or a single conservative, who did not subscribe to all the generalizations you both are making.

    lolife you had earlier shared that “The original point, by the way, is that the Right has gone so far over the edge in their hatred of all things liberal that they have made dialogue completely impossible. Now they want to lock us up and cure us until we are conservatives!”

    You have here a living breathing individual who is trying to engage you in discussion, and you probably think I am “Right”. I asked several questions of you in the note above immediately preceding Susan’s. There are also many other unanswered questions preceding those (but let’s stay focussed for now, as I had thought we were making some progress, and focus and follow-up do not seem to be strong-points here).

    Would you please respond to those questions in the note immediately preceding Susan’s, or would you please let me know your rationale for not responding?

    I believe your considered responses might serve to advance our understanding of each other, if not the “Right” of the “Left” and vice versa.

    “The Right” cannot be insane. Neither can “The Left”. Only individuals can be insane. I suspect it is highly likely there are those that should be locked up on both sides. I believe what is at issue is the matter of degree, for both cases.

    thank you in advance,
    b2b

25. lolife
    14 March 2008 @ 1:12 pmI had written a response to your above post but I guess I forgot to hit submit prior to closing my browser. I run a business. We lack racial diversity. I won’t hire people solely because of their race but I would gladly give the tie to the people that help us broaden our diversity because I think it is good for my business and good for society as a whole. Affirmative action is not a pet issue for me, I was merely responding to the notion that the Left is insane because we see logic in fighting racial injustice.

    Susan is responding to a strawman argument which is not true. My counterexamples were to illustrate that if you want people to “leave you alone” you need to address both Left and Right. Her comment is complete nonsense.

    There are views generally held by the Left and views generally held by the Right and many people (such as myself) have no problem identifying themselves with one or the other. I often address these views in a general sense. That’s my prerogative, yes?

    I told you before: I don’t have time to debate every point everyone ever makes in the comments to my blog. I appreciate comments and I enjoy discussion but I’m only going to address what I choose to address because I have limited time. If I’ve missed something you think is important and you want to bring it up again, please do so.

26. b2b (aka me mine)
    17 March 2008 @ 4:22 pmI can’t force you to answer my questions, lolife, but I do think that whether you admit it to yourself or not (intelligent people are capable of the most effective self-deception!) you choose not to because you would “incriminate yourself” in front of your own internal judge, your reason.

    With respect to the issue of affirmative action and employment equity, someone claimed, and I agree, that they are mutually exclusive to a logical mind that lives in the real world. And this is just one of many possible ways to try to analyze the veracity of Rossiter’s assertion.

    You seem now to have expressed your *personal* view of “affirmative action” as only “awarding ties to the more diverse”, a far cry from what I believe the consensus definition of “the left” would be. But you do seem to be sane on this issue, as your definition is not severely in conflict with the notion of equity. But I doubt “the left” would agree on your new definition, and so “their” sanity does remain in question, though you personally have escaped Rossiter’s charge by redefining one of the terms in conflict here.

    This is why I prefer that individuals discuss with individuals, and not make assertions on behalf of others. Perhaps we should have more clearly defined “affirmative action”, earlier, as I did for “employment equity”. I had thought the notion was a common one.

    Words are important, using them effectively is important, and making sure they are clearly defined to all before using them is important. It is all part of being and staying sane, and thinking and communicating clearly.

    “If I’ve missed something you think is important and you want to bring it up again, please do so.”

    Yes, ok. I think it is important (to YOU! not to me…) that you answer the questions I have courteously asked, to the best of your ability, until you run into contradiction, or problems of an insoluble or excessively complex nature. I believe the reason you do not “have the time” is that you fear the answers.

    Those before you, perhaps with more time, have asked, and answered.

    “If not left when young, you have no heart. If not right when older, you have no brain.” It’s an old adage, I didn’t make it up. Rossiter would just seem to have expanded it into a book (which I still [edBen: and still…] have not yet read).

    b2b