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If politics is downstream from culture...
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If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 29, 2020, 8:02 AM

...then culture is downstream from the realities of the way we live. Our available resources, technology, and living conditions.

We know crime rises out of poverty and lack of resources and social mobility. If your only two options are to work the drive-thru at Mickey D's for minimum wage (and still basically starve) or sell drugs, people tend to join gangs and sell drugs. There's a reason sailors who went pirate in the old days were often referred to as "desperate men". They were usually criminals back home, men with limited or no prospects. Some were runaway slaves. Pirate crews were racially integrated long before polite society was.

If a bunch of solid, high-paying jobs arrive that give those same people work, they tend to make their money that way because it's easier and safer. Human nature.

We like to say: "if you work hard you can make whatever you want of yourself"...but is that necessarily true? Not everybody is a good student...and the blue-collar agricultural jobs are drying up, big-time. In 1820 72% of the workforce was in farming or farm-related jobs. Today that number is just 1.3%. Manufacturing jobs are drying up bigly too, as a result of exporting jobs overseas...but especially because of automation, and those jobs are only going to dry up further as 3-D printing takes hold. Today only 8.5% of the population works in manufacturing, having lost over 5 million (high-paying!) manufacturing jobs since 1997. At America's peak 30% of the population worked in manufacturing. That number will similarly continue to erode.

Our wealthy-to-poor ratio is starting to more closely resemble countries like Mexico and Brazil. Those are essentially crime states. Cartels and gangs control the poorer neighborhoods and even regions. The rich live in heavily guarded private estates, and kidnapping anyone with money is pandemic.

So...what becomes of our own working class? What will they do for a living going forwards?

As a culture we have a higher proportion of resources-to-people than ever we have had at any point in the human race's history...but that's being offset by the fact that those resources are increasingly unevenly divided. The poor are getting poorer...because the rich are getting way richer.

Just asking, not proposing anything...but is it almost inevitable that some form of "socialism" might of necessity start being a necessity to avoid becoming a crime state or authoritarian dictatorship ourselves?

And if not, how do we avoid that?

(Again, politics follows culture...and culture follows from the reality of the resources, living conditions, and technology we possess.)

Thoughts? Possible solutions?

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 29, 2020, 8:12 AM

Don't have any idea about a solution but I'll agree with your premise here quoz.

We're in a mess.

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 29, 2020, 8:46 AM

Great post. I worry about this issue more than anything. I don’t have any idea either how to solve it. Bill Gates has floated the idea of taxing robots. Andrew Yang proposed the $1,000 or $2000 a month to every American.

Seems really strengthening technical education would be a good start. But so many jobs are going to be eliminated by robots, it’s hard to see a way to replace the lost jobs. Everyone was worried about cars eliminating jobs as well. As we all know that worked out fine, but this seems different than any other economic challenge from the past.

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 29, 2020, 9:31 AM

So, you’re saying that you are some kind of pirate? Knew it.

Good thing we got rid of that president that was trying his best (and succeeding) to bring manufacturing jobs back, and elected one that was part of the “those jobs are never coming back” crew. Hopefully we can all be baristas.

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 29, 2020, 10:43 AM

You're missing the point.

Sure, over the short term, you can bring back some manufacturing jobs. Over the long term they're all going away because automation gets better every year and 3-D printing is rapidly following behind that. Eventually there will simply be no manufacturing or agricultural jobs; everything we make will come off a printer and everything we eat will come out of an automated vertical warehouse farm.

The question I was asking is: what do working-class people do then?

Will there be enough service-type jobs for them? (I don't know, I'm asking!) And if there's not...do we just let 'em starve?

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 29, 2020, 10:43 PM

You are so full of it and I am wondering who brain washed you. I was in on the beginning of automation. You think that China will be completely automated? They use more manual labor than anyone other country maybe India may use more. These automation factories you speak of well tell me how long they will run. No one has a fully automated factory any where. The parts are still mechanical that run these plants. They will have to be replaced in 5 years or a little more. Where did you get your info? It sounds like someone who has theories only gave you these ideas. The reason all the plants went to Mexico and China was cheap labor and children labor. The CEOs and politicians are making money hand over fist and that is the reason. WOW is all I can say.

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 30, 2020, 5:10 AM

My dad is a robotics and automation engineer.

So there's that.

Yes, there will remain, for the foreseeable future, guys like my dad - who started as an old-fashioned mechanical engineer and then added electrical engineering and then programmable logic controls to his repertoire as the years went on. The guys who can maintain the automation.

But I'm talking the lower-end line workers...you know, the actual manufacturing jobs. His whole professional career was building machines that would replace the line workers...and he made a lot of money - and made the companies he worked for a lot of money - doing just that. I know. I saw a lot of those machines work...and with one machine with a single operator doing the work it had once taken 20 guys to do.

He had your charming and obviously effusive personality, too. (Awesome fella, my pops! We haven't spoken in more than 10 years now. Not really a people person, if you follow.)

And yes, dad, I am aware that Asian sweat shops are a thing.

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 30, 2020, 8:36 AM

Your problem is they will need an operator to make sure everything goes as according to plan. Visual inspection, repair spurs (so the production line does not stop). We are a long way from having a true fulling automated factory. They will have to be better material that will last longer, better camera inspection, better wiring that does not break will all the movement. I saying a century from now maybe we could have a fully automated factory. The lies being told today is just a cover for what is really going on in industry today. I will give you an example, Ford motors was making 1 1/2 X profit in a vehicle in the 1980s then after NAFTA by the years 2002 they were make 3 x profit for those same vehicles. You should talk with your dad that should never happen over politics. He is just mad as I am about the lies that have been told and our kids fall for it. We fill like we have failed as parents for our kids to fall for the lies being told. You cannot run a nation as a service industry. You have to be able to produce products that you need for security of that country.

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Crime also rises out of poor parenting or lack of a Father


Nov 29, 2020, 9:32 AM

Figure in the household. There are millions of kids in poverty that do not commit crimes.
And there are many kids in well-to-do homes that commit crimes. Maybe AC different kind of crime.

To me a strong family unit is the key, but liberal society does not focus on that...

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Fact check


Nov 30, 2020, 12:31 PM

Liberals love families ...

As long as they have either 2 mommies or 2 daddies

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Do three things, and one will be in the middle class:


Nov 29, 2020, 10:11 AM

1. Graduate high school
2. Have a job
3. Wait until marriage or age 21 to have children.

That is a statistical statement, per the census. The chance of the above demographic not reaching middle class is down around 2%. Race and status at birth is not a statistical factor. People born into middle class stay there because they tend to do those three things. People born in poverty but who do those three reach middle class at the same rate as those born there.

Of course crime goes up or down due to economic factors, but at the margins (though a significant margin), and in any case one has to show that crime causes poverty rather than one factor causing both. Before blaming human behavior on external circumstances, or comparing us to Mexico (go take a job down there - or anywhere - and report back), one has to account for the above stat.

I rarely hear a political liberal face that stat and say, "Hm. Maybe we should determine why people who dont behave that way are not doing so. Maybe we should figure out how to instill those values."

The question is why the majority of our political culture will not view poverty and prosperity as a values based matter. I very much disagree with your last statement: culture is not determined by resources, except a failed culture that thinks so. No person succeeds who thinks that life is a thing that happens to them.

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Re: Do three things, and one will be in the middle class:


Nov 29, 2020, 10:32 AM

So basically, in your world - those who can, do. You can always tell the folks with money; they always think this.

Those who don't, are intrinsically unworthy and are guilty of not having values...and thus deserve their fates.

Pretty much the long and short of it?

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I am surprised you would choose to react that way.


Nov 29, 2020, 11:21 AM

I didn't say anything like that. Didn't intend to. I believe the exact opposite.

If those three stats, or me pointing them out, cause you to make those statements about me, I would ask you to take a breath and lets think this through.

There is no questioning the role of history and environment in shaping how a person thinks and acts. Tell a child he's worthless or incapable, he'll act accordingly as an adult. Whoever is responsible for those voices, whether in the family or outside it, has to do the things necessary to change the message. If a certain environment is characterized by that message, we call that a cultural characteristic. It has to change. That cultural characteristic has to change.

There is no evidence that race or economic status is a hindrance to reaching middle class. If that were so, the stats would not be true (and they are). Once a person holds those three values, race and beginning economic status cease to be factors. The data simply tells us this. The party of science needs to follow the science. To blame race or money in the face of contrary evidence puts personal ideology above the welfare of others.

Why those voices of failure exist, and where they came from, and who is responsible, and what the fix is, is a subject requiring extreme honesty by everyone. In my own opinion, based on thousands of hours working in a homeless recovery program, the source is further back in history than many middle class want to believe. I have proposed what this is in other posts, and I promise you it is on the left of the political spectrum. Whether I am right or wrong, I cannot be said to be anything like what you described me to be.

However, this is not about wealth inequity or resources. Those are other subjects. DC cannot fix the subject you are raising. It is fixed by the time a person is 8 or 10, and is done by the people around him/her.

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Re: I am surprised you would choose to react that way.


Nov 29, 2020, 11:59 AM

Okay, sorry. Thought you'd gone all Ayn Rand on me there.

The thing I am aware of with most homeless people and criminals is that there's a bone-deep sense of hopelessness to their lots. There's this existential fatalism to their mindsets that's almost impossible to erase. You work with the homeless - I have as well, though not nearly to the extent you seem to have - you start looking for the ones you can actually reach. Hope itself has largely become dangerous to most of them; they are where they are (in their own heads) because they either deserve it and there's nothing they can do to become worthy because they're just pieces of sh!t anyway, or they project the other way and decide it's the world itself that's bent and there's nothing they can do to change it. Or they often do both.

Therefore...effit. Live day to day. Survive another hour, another minute. Tomorrow, if it comes, can take care of itself.

It's very tough to reach someone with that belief. They're really good at insulating themselves from hope. They've failed or been let down too often.

But it's still a belief, not a fact. A "belief" is just a strongly-held opinion. The fact is, if you believe you can, you probably can. If you believe you can't, that too becomes your reality. As you pointed out...that belief or lack of belief gets embedded very, very early. And there are critical points in all of our lives where we're only going to be as good or as bad as the people we have around us.

But again, lack of belief is still just a belief. That belief can change. We have the power to change it. Many people just don't understand that, IMHO, because they don't know how...or have never been taught how.

It's also true that bad circumstances and lack of affirmation and validation can destroy any of us at any point in our lives if those situations persist long enough. None of us are islands. Life can beat you down, if it goes badly enough. And desperation is toxic to belief. Stay desperate and scared long enough and you stop even thinking of what exists beyond today.

Wealth doesn't guarantee success, certainly. But it also dramatically increases your odds, in ways people don't credit, IMHO.

I am curious where you think this sense of existential despair originates. You seem to have alluded to some belief there but didn't articulate.

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LOL. No worries. My post was a bit strident. If you assumed


Nov 29, 2020, 4:42 PM

I was going Ayn Rand, I assumed you were going AOC.. It's just part of the fun of internet conversations. "Clark, Audrey's frozen from the waist down." "It's all part of the experience, honey."

Sorry to be gone for a while. Errand with Mrs Tulsa.

One of the difficulties in this subject, at least for me, is keeping straight whether I am talking about Econ 401 or the 7 year old just starting school. They are not unrelated, but they are not the same, imo. Whatever inequities exist, our economy is not short of money or opportunity for anyone today. Sorry, that was a mental vacation.

You are exactly right, I think. Every person has the same abilities, and much the same opportunity, but some people have instilled in them the idea that they can't be what they see on TV, so, as you said, 'eff it, live day to day." It's a lot deeper than that - we both know we're talking shorthand - but yes that describes it well.

I don't mean to make much of my experience with homeless folks; probably is the same as yours. The local Salvation Army has a program where someone who is willing to live by its minimal rules is given a bed and meals for 180 days, 6 months. It's a hit-the-reset-button opportunity. I and three other volunteers started a mentoring program, which is basically forming a community of like minded men these guys can count as their buddies after they graduate the program, rather than going back to the same ol' guys and girls on the street, back to the same life. We take for granted the degree to which our family and friends keep us between the ditches via daily subtle reminders: we were raised to see life a certain way, and our community reinforces that daily. It was the guys in the program, not us, who said they need that. They were fearful of graduating, because literally everyone they know is in the life and they know they would be back there. So we're helping them create another community to call 'home'.

It's a very slow go, for exactly the reason you said. This isn't a Hallmark movie, and the reality is that of every class of 35 homeless guys (roughly equal white and black) there are 2 or 3 who can make the mental switch. They all want to, but for many the false self identity is so deeply ingrained that they go back to what they know. In their slang, "Keisha" is the girl who says, "Oh baby, come back home", when all she wants is someone to support the life. Whether it's Keisha, a gang member or an alcoholic dad, one phone call and boom, they're gone. Don't want a job, don't want to share an apartment with one of the program guys. They want something they adopted as a self view in childhood.

"Eff it, I'd rather live day to day." People say to me, "Oh, you're saying they would rather be homeless." No, I'm not saying that. Sure, they'll take a house and a car. But if the choice is between Keisha and a 9-to-5, they have an internal view of self and tomorrow that won't let them choose anything but Keisha. They have looked me straight in the eye and said, "I will see you tomorrow", and when I show up the guys say, "He went back to Keisha an hour after you left yesterday." But you keep doing it for the 2 or 3 that might be in the next class.

Off the rez for a sec, but I want to say this: I am not any better than them. My dysfunctions just happen to be in different areas. This isn't about good and bad, or them getting 'better', or more like me. Heaven forbid. We're all in the same boat. I'm so shallow that if it were up to me I would have quit a couple of years ago, but we four volunteers keep telling each other, "Remember why we do this. It's not about the guy who just left." So in reality its more about us, supporting each other, than it is about them. That kind of community is what the guys in the program want for themselves.

Anyway, it's not their fault. I have gone on too long already, hopefully only affirming what you have already said. But I will briefly (I promise) propose where I think the poverty mentality is coming from:

The greatest sin of the US is not slavery, but the failure to give back to the slaves what was taken from them, and it wasn't money but their stake in themselves and society. They were taught to not own a future, their destiny, or even their family. Fathers were sold away, destroying an entire cultural understanding of what a husband and father is, or even a wife and mother. Education was not instilled as a value. In short, we took away their humanity.

At the end of the Civil War we gave them legal freedom, but not human freedom. How to do that is another subject, but for now lets say we owed them what was taken. It would take at least a generation to restore it back to them, but we didn't do it. We still haven't. We are paying the price today, a price that gets larger as the debt remains on the table.

Generational poverty is not unique to the US. It exists everywhere. However, what is unique to us is that we institutionalized it in a known segment of society and have never addressed it. Generational poverty is no longer a matter of race, but defines entire inner cities. I think we can address it, and it would be an endeavor worthy of who we are, and would unite us in a great common cause. It would require personal effort and sacrifice from almost everyone. Businesses and neighborhoods would have to develop measures of success that go beyond profit and sales values, though those would have to remain also (that is a very much larger conversation).

I would love to see this discussed, and perhaps get the leadership on board to make it happen. But I don't think whites and blacks together actually want to do it. We would rather turn the issue into a political battle to be used for personal ambition. Not blaming anyone, just saying that's where I think we are.

So, when I see people (not you) talk about wealth inequity, and I see them immediately jump to taxation as the fix, I sort of see red. Taxes didn't cause this, taxes can't fix it. A tax scheme is a poor substitute for a call to a higher vision. Vision is what we are missing, not taxes.

Thanks for listening to a rant. You're a patient and tolerant person.

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I'm enjoying this sub-thread between you two wordy blokes***


Nov 30, 2020, 12:10 PM



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Re: Do three things, and one will be in the middle class:


Nov 29, 2020, 10:40 PM [ in reply to Re: Do three things, and one will be in the middle class: ]

No it means that rich commit crimes, poor commit crimes! Stop treating the people who commit crimes like the victim and start holding people accountable for said crimes! Raise your kids better! Teach them that all life is precious! Teach them that working hard and doing things the right way puts you on a better path to have a decent life! Teach your kids to respect others, especially the elderly, authority figures and veterans! Teach your kids to have class and don’t do anything to give them a bad reputation, most importantly, tell your kids to help the helpless. Also tell them that even though we live in America, we can’t, I repeat can’t take care of others unless we can take care of ourselves.

Follow these simple guidelines and I assure you that things will end up in the positive more times than the negative!

It’s that easy!

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Re: Do three things, and one will be in the middle class:


Nov 29, 2020, 9:27 PM [ in reply to Do three things, and one will be in the middle class: ]

Tulsa,

Could you lead me to the source of your stats. I would like to look into this further.

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It was the Brookings Institute that first collated


Nov 29, 2020, 10:18 PM

the census data along those demographics. Appealing to authority is a logic error, as you know, but in this case Brookings is considered to be on the left side of center, so they are not motivated to debunk a 'wealth inequity' narrative. Doesn't make them correct, but bias is not the issue.

To know whether they are correct, one would have to examine the raw data they looked at. A few years ago when this article was published, and it was part of the current chatter, it was readily available, and I saw it. Right now, it doesn't pop up on the first internet searches. I can help you look for it, but not knowing how deep you wanted to go I am simply linking one of their articles:

https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/three-simple-rules-poor-teens-should-follow-to-join-the-middle-class/


As to wealth inequity as a subject, that cannot be reduced to simplistics. Is the tide lifting all boats or not? Is one concerned with the size of the pie, or only his share of it? One way to look at that is the size of the middle class, and even that becomes a political football.

This is one interesting view of the middle class from the 70s to now:

https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/three-charts-based-on-todays-census-report-show-that-the-us-middle-class-is-shrinking-because-theyre-moving-up/

But yes, wealth inequity can be a sign of something happening in the economy that is not optimal. I mean, who wants an oligarchy like Russia (lets don't forget, however, that the Russian worker is way better off today than the day before Marxism was abandoned, so the rise of oligarchs hasn't been objectively bad economically. Its just not nearly what the economy should be). Sure, I'm all for examining why oligarchs develop and keeping the playing field more level. My own view of this is that we have approved waaaay too many mergers. Congress used to be very leery of them, through the 70's, but since then have rubber stamped them, creating the inequity we talk about today.

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Re: It was the Brookings Institute that first collated


Nov 30, 2020, 10:33 AM

Tulsa,

This is a good start. I am interested enough to do some more work on it. Thanks.

I agree about oligarchy (although I could argue that we are already there). But yeah, larger and larger conglomerates, industry domination, corporate welfare and effective tax avoidance are all tipping the scale in the wrong direction - with significant consequences. I don't look at it as good vs bad but as better vs worse.

I also think that it is often overlooked that if the lower and middle classes had more money, they would spend it on the very things that would explode our economy - new businesses, jobs, etc. Demand side economics is the real jet fuel for our economy.

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See there is not an exact amount of money that gets


Nov 29, 2020, 10:34 AM

distributed between people. If the economy is strong then businesses make money and people work. If the economy is weak then there are no jobs at all.

Probably the worst thing we do as a county is tell people that if they can walk here and sneak across the border then they are good. We have under the table jobs that don't pay much but at least its a job. Current low wage earners will be replaced, but we get cheap goods and services in place.

If you are poor in Africa or India, you can't walk here, you will have a much harder time getting here.

Manufacturing jobs cause pollution so we don't want those jobs here. We can't compete globally with our wage structure and regulations.

We are about to remove a lot of low wage workers with increased "minimum" wages. It's coming. We will see kiosks and self service increase to lower costs.

High School Education is free yet 20% of black Americans do not graduate and overall only 81% graduate in SC. Those 20% that do not finish school will have to compete with illegal aliens that are willing to work for less or they end up on the government dole.

Decrease the pie size and it doesn't matter how much you tax middle America. Small business net income is twice as large when the economy is good. There is more to tax regardless of the tax rate. When you cripple the economy only the rich and the politicians win.

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Good to start with First Principles & The Social Compact


Nov 29, 2020, 2:55 PM

First order is to remind ourselves of Hobbes' description of the Social Compact which the founders of our country realized should be the basis upon which we organized ourselves. Mix that in with a little bit of what Adam Smith wrote in the Wealth of Nations. Only then can you possibly remedy the Darwinian forces that have always been at the heart of such inevitable conflict.

You could argue that our success as a country has largely depended on our willingness to invest in the foundation of our social compact, aka "the people". What we have cultivated along the way is what has also driven growth in our economy from day one: primarily advancement in the sciences and technology.

The more we innovate, the more we will grow our economy. The opposite also seems to be true.

Over the last 50 years we have transitioned from manufacturing to information and services related to information. What will be the dominant driver of growth in the next 50 years? Energy? Bio-tech? Space?

The health and well-being of our society depends on our respect for the social compact, so that would be primarily investing in all levels of education, workforce training, and social support to keep people from falling into the stages of desperation that eventually foment the kind of crime and unrest that you are concerned with.

It is actually interesting lately to see so much interest from private industry in this topic, because they realize that the whole building depends on the health of the foundation, not just those at the top.

What is ironic is to see so many people call this idea socialism, and attempt to discredit it as part of some kind of globalist agenda, when it is really the glue that has held the country together since day one.

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I wonder...


Nov 29, 2020, 3:36 PM

if your terms are too broad and the topic might be better served by subdividing the gap between the rich and poor, defining who is rich, why they are rich, who is poor and why they are poor, whether or not some of those who are being considered poor today are poor considering the poor of past time...

Can we specify income categories and examine each alone before we generalize between a McDonald grille worker and Bill Gates? Typically when a math problem is too complicated to solve we try and subdivide to enable us to work on one solution at a time.

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 29, 2020, 8:30 PM

I could speak for hours on this topic, but not tonight Quozz. Maybe tomorrow..

But we have to ask ourselves, Does automation free all men from the burden of repetitive labor, resulting in a shorter work week and a higher standard of living for everyone, or do we stay on our current course where the gains in automation only enrich a few, while the rest of the world lives in extreme poverty?

If you see the earth's resources as our common heritage, the answer is simple. It will take several generations, but we would have to change our thinking when it comes to concepts of ownerships, intellectual property, and a society that focuses more on collaboration than competition to drive production.

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 29, 2020, 9:35 PM

Q,

IU would argue that the drastic inequity of wealth check out video below) exacerbates all of the other considerations. If we could ameliorate that, it would give lots of people the wherewithal to better adapt to changing circumstances.

As a fan of science fiction, many of the books i enjoy take place in a society in which physical labor is no longer a requirement - thanks to automation. The question is how do we transition through to that point without crushing lots of human beings.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTj9AcwkaKM&ab_channel=TDC

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 30, 2020, 12:10 PM

I listened to the book Broken Ladder...My assessment:

After listening to this book I am suspicious of the entire field of sociology. The very simple experiments they do claiming to “design out” all parameters except the ones they are looking for do not convince me, in general.

Think about if it were possible to model human behavior using mathematical equations. Imagine the number of equations and parameters it would take. A 1000 x 1000 matrix of equations and spatial-temporal-dependent unknowns/inputs? The complexity is just about beyond ones imagination. But alas, these sociologists can design an experiment, repeatable by many others, that proves their simple, but biased, conclusions.

The premise of the book assumes that these elite, educated people/sociologists know how things should be. They know what defines happiness, based on rigorous scientific studies, and therefore, they have license to tell us how to get there. They know who and why people are victims and can readily identify the perpetrators. They know what is fair and not fair.

You see, this is how they see themselves (ref to high horse cartoon) compared to others.

What I think a lot about is what the book does not talk about, study, or reference.

Nature.
How does the fundamental trait of living things (people) identifying with like living things (people) come into play? They make a big deal about the doll study. White kids pick white dolls, black kids pick 50/50 – to roughly summarize the results. Conclusion: implicit bias by whites. I call BS. The USA is what, 75% white, 15% black, 15% other or something like that. How can Payne ignore the fact that white kids have seen mostly white people in their family life, school life, and TV time. Similarly, most black kids surely have seen more whites on TV than blacks, and unless they never leave their home or possibly their neighborhood, they will be exposed to significant percentages of white people. How can Payne ignore such a fundamental question as to how that affects kid’s choice of dolls? Maybe this experiment does nothing more but confirm people, as most animals, have some natural, innate predisposition to prefer others that seem most common to them – the ones they have seen and spent the most time with.

Other obvious takes:
• China town. How many cities have a china town? Lots. Do the Chinese have an implicit bias against whites? Or others? Why do so many China Towns exist in various cities in the US? We know why – people naturally prefer their own kind. A race hustler might call it implicit bias. A scientist might call it an observation of nature. Just because you prefer to be around your own kind, consciously or subconsciously, it does not mean you dislike or work against others not similar to you!
• There are many other examples where certain ethnic groups are concentrated in one area or another. Polish areas in Chicago. Run the doll test on these kids and what will the results be?
• Run the doll test on Japanese citizens living in Japan. Run the doll test on white and black kids in South Africa? What will those results show and how do they compare to the USA?
• What would happen if we could run a doll test on animals? Do we suspect animals would pick dolls like themselves? Payne liked the bee study that showed bees react similarly to people on the low-end of the equality scale with respect to live fast, die young phenomena. But, Payne ignores other obvious comparisons with non-humans and their inherent natural/biased ways of living.
o I run the experiment on my dog all the time. When he sees a dog on TV, he reacts. He does not react when there is an elephant (or monkey, lion, …) on the TV. My little Baxter must be one biased SOB! One can argue Baxter prefers all dogs and not just other Maltese-Shitzus, which is a better comparison to the white-black situation…So Baxter is not biased against others like white people are. Arguing against myself!
o Lions and Tigers can be mated in captivity, but don’t think that happens in the wild. Why not? They are both cats…
o How about the theory/model of natural selection? This theory seems to fit many natural observations. Is there any parallel to be drawn between rungs on the ladder and being naturally selected in or out? I believe the political correctness of the day will not allow this type of thinking to enter the mind of folks like Payne.
• Run the hiring test in Japan or China, providing identical resumes of a white/black American (or pick your non-Japanese flavor) and a native Japanese/Chinese person. I am pretty sure the conclusions would be similarly strong – Japanese have an implicit bias against all non-Japanese peoples based on who they select for the job. Is it really bias?
• When does nature stop being nature and become something else that we deem should be controllable, fixable, changeable?

Social Media, Media and Political Correctness.
This is a huge issue in the book that reduces its credibility IMO….If inequality is one of the biggest problems society faces, then social media and media MUST be brought into the conversation as the mechanism by which the perception of inequality is realized and, indeed amplified.

• The fact that Payne completely ignores the role of social media, political correctness, and current society is enough in itself for me to claim the book is not credible. Payne tells us more people know executive and CEO salaries and due to that knowledge, more people will perceive themselves lower on the equality ladder. What about the role and motivation of people constantly publicizing CEO salaries and creating victims? The first mainstream/famous person I recall ever talking about this repeatedly is Barack Obama.

• There’s a major problem in what he says about the relative inequality between the large majority of people. Payne says this has not changed much since the 1980s. He says what has changed is the enormous wealth of the very tippy top of the food chain.
o But, who is ever exposed to these people? Not me, not you, not anyone I know and not anyone at the poverty level. How can the fact that Bill Gates (or insert any name) is a gazillionaire be meaningful to me in terms of my perception of inequality? It isn’t.
o However, if my IQ is low(er) and I listen to people telling me (constantly) the reason I don’t have a gazillion dollars is because I’m not white, then Bill Gates’ position on the ladder could very well be a problem for me in terms of my perception of inequality.
o Or, and this is a major part of the issue, even without a low IQ, if I subscribe to mainstream media and social media, which by definition pretty much means you are living within a liberal bubble, you will be convinced of your low position on the ladder by any number of measures and causes.
o This is because people at the top of the Democrat ladder have figured out that playing into this highly emotional issue and making nearly everyone a victim gets them votes. It’s that simple, that easy. And, they spin up an entire ecosystem built around this concept that is a self-licking ice cream cone.
? This is no different than Germany in the 1930s. Arguably Germany was the smartest and most advanced country on the planet, filled with leading researchers and scientists. However, skilled use of propaganda (information warfare – repeating the same ideas over and over) turned regular, intelligent people into people that marched other living humans (Jews), including women and children, into death chambers, and believed they were justified doing it. Think about it. You and I can be converted into people that over a span of several years under the right societal conditions will march innocent women and children to their death! This is very difficult to admit and understand, but history says it is true.
? No one can argue that propaganda does not work. It works as has been proven over and over.
? No one can argue that the mainstream media, the media that touches the huge majority of Americans the most, is liberal. Very liberal. If someone does not admit this, I don’t want to have a conversation with them because they are clearly so not objective (unobjective?) it’s not worthwhile. Indeed, it is easy to argue the mainstream media is just about radical left-wing. Example: socialism used to be a word just as bad as communism. Not anymore. Socialism is not only okay to talk about, we nearly had a socialist presidential candidate.

Neighborhood inconsistency. Near the end of the book Payne suggests if you are of lower financial status, moving to a more equal neighborhood can help ones perceptions of inequality and the bad things that go along with that. I do not get it. He told me it is the super rich, the CEOs, etc. that are the crux of the problem. These CEOs, for example, do not make 5x or 10x the lowest employee’s salary, they make 300x, which is viewed as far too much by pretty much everyone. In either imaginary neighborhood we are talking about, zero of the super rich will be there, so I don’t understand how living in a more equal neighborhood solves (or partially solves) the problem if ones judgment of equality is based on people that, by definition, pretty much have to live somewhere else besides your neighborhood.

Progressive/liberal motives.
How can rational and critically thinking individuals not believe there are other reasons (biases) that may motivate theories like the broken ladder? For example, it is clear progressives/liberals want more government so it can do more. They want the government to do social engineering, like the Wake Country School Board does every year by reassigning tens of thousands of students. They want more big government social programs – after all, it is how Payne and co. make their living. One of the ways to bring ladder rungs closer together is to create federal laws that cap wealth and/or redistribute it. I am sure there are a host of other ways big government can control the epidemic of inequality. Or, maybe our government design is the fundamental problem – do you believe that Payne believes the move to more socialist principles would help? Maybe he believes adopting just a few communist ideals might help as well.

I’d like to see a study on people that make < $70k. Payne says the threshold of “pain” is about $70k/yr annual salary (maybe he said $75k). I’d like the study to determine the source of the feelings of inequality. “Whoops – we can’t do that study because we may find out the source is us!”

Sports.
The sports data/conclusions also can tell you just about all you need to know about how Payne (and sociologists) make far too simple (and incorrect/incomplete) conclusions based on data. He found that salaries and inequality on sports teams was pretty much inversely proportional to winning. I.E., more inequality, more losses. What a sack of $hit conclusion! Does the fact that a backup lineman makes $400k/yr and the best lineman makes $4M/yr cause the same types of stresses on the backup that Payne suggests affects low-rung people in society? Payne is saying that somehow these low-rung effects manifest themselves in the micro chasm of the NFL team environment in a way that causes the team to lose games. I don’t believe it.

There are tons of parameters involved in making a team win in the NFL. I’d say with only 32 teams, you would have to look at each and every individual team and understand where they are and where they are trying to go before slapping a common and simple explanation of the data. There are tons of non-linearities and complex relationships that come into play - salary caps, franchise players, injuries, locker-room personalities, location/market, draft pick order, ownership desires, etc. For example, Payne’s argument implicitly assumes all team owners always have the same desire to win. I do not necessarily believe that is the case. For some it is purely a business and to the extent winning helps business, they are for winning. I’m sure some owners are happy with a .500 season and routinely pulling in $XXXM/year.

How about the time the MLB Marlins bought themselves a world series by fielding a team with more than its share of franchise players? Surely the inequality on that team must have been record-breaking! But, they won the series. I’m not suggesting inequality means the team wins the World Series, btw, just pointing out one case that breaks Payne’s observation.

Paradox.
Payne tells us many times increased salary/pay/material possessions does not lead to more happiness, but it does lead to perceptions of inequality by those on lower ladder rungs. If the people at the top of the ladder are not happy, why are the liberal progressives so hell bent on taking their inequality away (taking their money)? Maybe so they become happier? Rhetorical. I know the answer would be they would rather lift up the lower rung people to get them over the knee in the curve.

Why not take up the mantra that these high rung people that you (lower rung people) look up to are not happy because of XYZ. Make it so that lower rung people do not covet a higher rung!

Who are the people that can least afford a smart phone? The lower rung people. Who are the people most vulnerable to the ills of inequality – the same lower rung people. I’d like to see a study on what social media sites lower rung people frequent, what the content of their social media discussions is, what websites they read, etc. How do these ideas, concepts, and group-think elements affect their perception of others? How do they contribute to the perception of inequality? How do people’s feelings of inequality vary as a function of social media?

Conflict of interest.
We have to recognize Payne makes a living off inequality and victim-finding. Does this fact bias his approach and results? Here is a list of some of the grants he received:

• 2016-2018 Russell Sage Foundation
• Cast as a criminal: How moral typecasting leads to racial prejudice. Co-PI (with PI Kurt Gray)

• 2013-2016 National Institute of Child Health and Human Development
• Children’s Implicit and Explicit Stereotypes about Academic Abilities. Co-Principle Investigator (with Beth Kurtz-Costes).

• 2013-2015 Russell Sage Foundation
• The Politics of Inequality in a “Classless” Society, Principal Investigator.

• 2009-2011 UNC University Research Council
• Gender and Race Stereotypes in Black and White Youth. Co-PI, with Beth Kurtz-Costes.

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NC's takeaways


Nov 30, 2020, 3:08 PM

-"Conclusion: implicit bias by whites. I call BS."
Stating an "implicit bias" doesn't mean that environmental factors aren't taken into account. It just means that there are attitudes or stereotypes that affect our understanding, actions, and decisions in an unconscious manner. And yes, implicit-biases would tend to favor our own racial group..

-If we did it the doll test with polish kids, japanese kids, south africans, ummmmmm animals maybe it'd be different.
Uhh...yeah. Don't think Payne really disagrees with you here, but I doubt even he'd be able to see the relevance.

-China towns do exist for a reason. Here you go. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/american-chinatowns-history_n_6090692


Some more flawless logic below:

-We shouldn't let poor people know that there is massive wealth inequality in this country. Actually, we should convince them that they're better off than the ultra wealthy because even those people are unhappy.

-I don't like your "$ack of #### conclusions" about how players are paid in the NFL, so I don't believe them. Here are some things I'll list that I have no idea what the impact might be. Oh and one time, in the MLB, the Marlins won a world series

Here's a list of some definitely very biased organizations that funded Payne's research. I know they're biased because I don't like the conclusions that he finds. Look at the titles of these papers he wrote! (Honestly, I'm not sure if you know this, but the titles of papers aren't written before the research is done, they're written to reflect what the data and analysis show)

NC, your ability to just shrug off any conclusions that you don't like is remarkable, but until you find actual compelling evidence that suggests a claim of Payne's is wrong (which would be another source with a different claim than his and scientific data that backs this new claim up) you should probably stop playing sociologist-buster.

Finally, some food for thought. Social media and the internet shed light on the massive amount of wealth inequality (which you admit exists) in our society. I don't think this is a necessarily bad thing. I think the more people are informed, the better they can use their democratic power to choose leadership that represents their interests. An uniformed population will bring that ignorance with them to the voting booth.

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 29, 2020, 10:24 PM

It’s going to be fixed soon! Biden is only going to tax the rich and everything else is going to be free for everybody!
No killing, no stealing, no looting or rioting! No Covid! Heck even no more police officers taking innocent lives ! Life is going to be great!

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Watch a soap opera and your life will become


Nov 30, 2020, 12:44 PM

drastically less dramatic

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 30, 2020, 12:02 PM

Interesting...

We are doomed if we/everyone adopt the ideas that a professional salary, housing, internet, cell phone, health care, etc. are human rights.

We, as a society, cannot create a system that motivates people not to work or disincentivizes millions to work. We must adhere to the concept of individual responsibility no matter what. Otherwise, we fail as we are doing today.

Why does Joe Q Public have the salary of CEO's thrown in his face? Because, he is being told he is a victim and deserves more than he has. Why is he being told this? Well, we know why...

In reality, the CEO, in most cases, deserves what they are getting paid and it can be backed up by results. These people work 70 hrs/week and their life is their job. If the CEO fails and is still paid ridiculous amounts, then it is the BoD that has to be looked at/blamed. But, whatever, the salary of CEOs is not a problem affecting poor, black communities.

The black culture has to change or nothing will change. No amount of BLM love and freebies will ultimately make any difference. If anything, freebies causes skills to atrophy and people will never be able to work and add value to a company/business/etc. because they don't know how. They don't know the concept of a starting wage, working hard, showing up, impressing your boss, getting a promotion and making more money. And, doing this year over year, saving money and taking advantage of compounding and delayed gratification. Their culture says "I need $300 shoes today." If this culture does not change, nothing changes - white people cannot give them a new culture.

So much of this "support" to blacks is a complete joke...all this kneeling BS, BLM signs, white suburbanites putting signs in their yard, no justice no peace - it is all complete BS because it is meaningless in terms of solving the problem. Signs will do nothing. Blacks have to first help themselves and commit to educating their youth. Once this happens they have to be educated on how society works - you don't get rich in a week! Companies would rather not hire a felon.

Social media is a huge problem that has to be dealt with. Not sure a culture change can happen with status quo.

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Re: If politics is downstream from culture...


Nov 30, 2020, 12:42 PM

You seem to be a very troubled person. Your response has very little to do with offering an answer to the OP's question, but you (once again) shared your opinions on the state of black people. Do you have any thoughts on how white people on Applachia and middle America can work themselves out of poverty? What about how Native Americans or Hispanics can do the same? Your constant diatribes regarding your options on "black culture" are old and sad. If you are a Christian, you should consider prayer about your feelings.

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