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  1. #241

    Re: This is something I didn't intend to post.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ranger View Post
    Did you read the articles ? I mean is it crying racism if it is in fact racism ? I think as much as filnfarth is on the left and the crazy side you are on the opposite with equal zeal. I have not seen you legitimize racism as it is an actual problem. This leads me to believe you either do not think race is a big problem or it is not a problem at all. I can not agree with either and I do not think you read those articles, if you did I apologize, but after reading those I would be more interested in hearing your opinions if you maintained your stance after reading those. If you just took the lazy route and did not read all of them I am not really interested because this is no longer a debate about learning but about arguing.
    And here lies the problem. I'm not a leftist. I am a realist. I live it so I see it. Not a fan of Sharpton and those who are paid to sell out their brethren for a few hundred thousand dollars. I don't want to be labeled for living and telling the truth, and this is why black republicans are rare birds.

    But as you pointed out, much of the stolen wealth sits in middle class of white America and the same folk telling the masses to pull themselves up by the bootstraps are the same fools sitting on stolen wealth. So kids see the hypocrisy.





  2. #242
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    Re: This is something I didn't intend to post.

    Quote Originally Posted by darb72 View Post
    Oh, do you have some insight into my mind? Let's keep that thought about the wheelbarrow and the chickens between us, alright. I'd hate for people to think I'm weird.
    20 pages into this thread, and I have to be honest with you when I say that I'm shocked that people are still taking you serious enough to continue to respond to you.





  3. #243

    Re: This is something I didn't intend to post.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ranger View Post
    Sorry for how long it took for me to reply. I looked back through my statement and I did mention that they are only doing these things for the ratings. So I guess I agree with you agreeing with me on that. I will say though that I think that is exactly the problem. It points to a much bigger problem. Why is it easier to believe that black people are inherently more evil than that being a media portrayal. ? I think that is the heart of what I am getting at I certainly do not believe that nobody s responsible, I guess the difference is the demographic that I am placing at fault, which is, the human demographic.

    You then cannot place the fault with the media, if they indeed are simply 'playing to the crowd', as you agreed with. You need to blame the crowd. So, in essence, media portrayals are moot.
    Next I will take issue with your description of believing 'black people are more evil'. I don't recall anyone on this board as even hinting at blacks being 'more evil'. That is extreme hyberbole.

    Oh and to delve more into media representations, let's point out that poorer portrayal of blacks in the media (if they truly occur) occur outside of the mainstream of media. The broadcast networks, cable news outlets and major newspapers like the NYT, Washington Post, LA Times et al. simply do not have a prejudicial viewpoint of blacks and are not portraying them more poorly. They are most definitely not portraying them as more evil.





  4. #244

    Re: This is something I didn't intend to post.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ranger View Post
    I think that the problem is that the culture that we breed. You call them platitudes, but I think platitudes is an intellectually dishonest way of saying it. I do not think this is a common thought. I think it is far less common to accept that we are all to blame from the top down, instead of the more common approach in my opinion, is singling out one demographic and making them the bad guy. I mean seriously look around, how often do we see the actions of a few being used t paint a picture with broad strokes to make it the rule ? That is the reason I do not see it as a platitude.
    I think here is where we are talking past each other. It is by necessity when discussing issues by large groups, that one understands the points made are as a whole, and that it does not reflect that one thinks ALL parts of the group correspond to the description. For example, because one says that the family unit of blacks is broken because 70% of black children are born out of wedlock, does not meant that ALL black families are broken, or that someone believes all black families are broken.
    Now the platitudes I was speaking of, is general 'feel good' talking points. We can all lift us up together yada, yada, yada. What does that mean in practicality? For instance, the lions share of the work of fixing the black family, lies within the black community. So while we 'all' could help (by for example reducing the role govt has in allowing broken families to prosper), saying all of us need to do it, is simply a platitude, and in practical matters, the black community needs to do it. Now because one says that, well, you are saying that we are placing fault. And apparently that's a bad thing. Well, the world can use a little more placing fault. Hence many say we need real talk on race relations, but in reality, people are reluctant to do it. IMO that's because while wanting to help the black community, many 'social justice' espousers are reluctant to place fault. For fear of 'offending'.





  5. #245

    Re: This is something I didn't intend to post.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ranger View Post


    ....but you have to realize that the wealth distribution in this country is predicated off of inherited wealth which is almost never in the black community.
    This is simply not the case.

    "For the top income quintile, gifts and inheritances amount to 13 percent of household wealth, according to research published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. For the top wealth quintile, they amount to 16 percent. For the hated “1 percent,” inherited wealth accounts for about 15 percent of holdings. Contrary to the story the Left likes to tell about economic inequality in the United States, those numbers have gone down over recent decades — by almost half for the wealthiest Americans. Meanwhile, inherited money makes up 43 percent of the wealth of the lowest income group and 31 percent for the second-lowest."



    http://www.nationalreview.com/articl...n-d-williamson





  6. #246

    Re: This is something I didn't intend to post.

    Quote Originally Posted by blah3 View Post
    You then cannot place the fault with the media, if they indeed are simply 'playing to the crowd', as you agreed with. You need to blame the crowd. So, in essence, media portrayals are moot.
    Next I will take issue with your description of believing 'black people are more evil'. I don't recall anyone on this board as even hinting at blacks being 'more evil'. That is extreme hyberbole.

    Oh and to delve more into media representations, let's point out that poorer portrayal of blacks in the media (if they truly occur) occur outside of the mainstream of media. The broadcast networks, cable news outlets and major newspapers like the NYT, Washington Post, LA Times et al. simply do not have a prejudicial viewpoint of blacks and are not portraying them more poorly. They are most definitely not portraying them as more evil.
    I would first like to say thinks for bringing something to the table as far as supporting your side of things, that took effort and I respect that. To use your reference is where I think you hit the nail on the head, we are talking by that. So let me extend an olive branch. I think we are seeing a lot of the same things and that you are interpreting the data one way, and myself another.

    So to that end I will fully endorse the statement that when the media "plays to the crowd" it is a direct reflection on society, and without our unspoken complicity by clicking on, viewing, and buying their articles that we endorse what they say to a point. We may not agree but by doing those things we pay the wages for them to continue their work. That is a solid observation and I think that it would be hard to rebuke that with a legitimate argument. So on that particular topic we are in agreement. I am not trying to say that the media is the sole reason, I am more trying to say that they write inflammatory articles which people will believe because after all they are a "news" agency. That does not absolve your average American from responsibility by any stretch, but I think we should make a concerted effort to hold the media accountable as responsible reporting is something that should be a mainstay. Instead of showing things that have no real basis in fact, why cant we show a hard working black man ? I mean honestly, have you seen any stories like that amongst the myriad of bad ones ?

    To the point about one race being inherently more evil. I was not meaning to accuse anyone here, it was moreover again aimed at the media. Looking at stories around the media I would venture to say that the overwhelming majority of news about black people is negative, I can not assign an accurate percentage and I am aware of this, but I would say 85% or so is negative from my observations (no facts or data support that). The point of this is that I do not think that they are responsibly reporting when they cast news stories like that instead of ones showing the better side of humanity and the black populace of this country. It is just disproportionate to the facts in my opinion is all I am saying.

    Quote Originally Posted by blah3 View Post
    I think here is where we are talking past each other. It is by necessity when discussing issues by large groups, that one understands the points made are as a whole, and that it does not reflect that one thinks ALL parts of the group correspond to the description. For example, because one says that the family unit of blacks is broken because 70% of black children are born out of wedlock, does not meant that ALL black families are broken, or that someone believes all black families are broken.
    Now the platitudes I was speaking of, is general 'feel good' talking points. We can all lift us up together yada, yada, yada. What does that mean in practicality? For instance, the lions share of the work of fixing the black family, lies within the black community. So while we 'all' could help (by for example reducing the role govt has in allowing broken families to prosper), saying all of us need to do it, is simply a platitude, and in practical matters, the black community needs to do it. Now because one says that, well, you are saying that we are placing fault. And apparently that's a bad thing. Well, the world can use a little more placing fault. Hence many say we need real talk on race relations, but in reality, people are reluctant to do it. IMO that's because while wanting to help the black community, many 'social justice' espousers are reluctant to place fault. For fear of 'offending'.
    I can also get behind this, if you were using the "feel good" part as a definition of platitudes then I can see why you said it. I was more talking about the traditional definition of taking a popular point of view. Which I do not think I was doing, but I guess the perception is every bit the reality on the internet.

    To the real talk aspect I think you have a point. I think people are to afraid of offending people, but I also think that there is also plenty of people who instead of admitting that by and large we all got us here it is easier to point fingers.

    The point of black families being born out of wedlock and broken homes is certainly a valid stance as there are many black children who are derived of a successful template on what to do from the people close to them. When the highest earning person on your street is slinging drugs, there is no mystery as to why there is a self perpetuating cycle of problems. I do not think this can be ignored, and to your point, yes for those people they are responsible and it is not anyone else's responsibility to correct their choices.

    I think all of these things, however, are interconnected with each other. What I mean is that black men are more likely to get longer sentences for the same crimes, unfair treatment in job interviews, and so on. I read your article below where I will expand on this as I think there are some things there to be addressed and are good points.

    Quote Originally Posted by blah3 View Post
    This is simply not the case.

    "For the top income quintile, gifts and inheritances amount to 13 percent of household wealth, according to research published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. For the top wealth quintile, they amount to 16 percent. For the hated “1 percent,” inherited wealth accounts for about 15 percent of holdings. Contrary to the story the Left likes to tell about economic inequality in the United States, those numbers have gone down over recent decades — by almost half for the wealthiest Americans. Meanwhile, inherited money makes up 43 percent of the wealth of the lowest income group and 31 percent for the second-lowest."



    http://www.nationalreview.com/articl...n-d-williamson
    After reading that article 2 things became apparent to me, the person who authored that article is someone who is a conservative (not a bad thing), and someone who has done some homework.

    To expand on what I said, I do not think it as simple as he asserts when he says, sometimes it really is as simple as saying,"Just get a job." I do not like to align myself with Ronald Reagan as I think he has done some irreparable harm to this country, but he was correct in saying,"The best economic policy, is a job." There is a lot of truth in that statement. What I am saying is that there has been a lot of research done into why a lot of qualified black job seekers are still not employed. Such as the study that people with names that "sound black" are less likely to get a call back. I think that is a very telling statistic that if you allow it to stand on its own merit will explain a lot of the jobless black community.

    I will say that it certainly will not fix all of it, a lot of it is just plain laziness to which you will not get an argument out of me about. I do not think it is concentrated in one group, but I do think for a large portion laziness is a lot of the reason they do not have jobs and the other is education. I think that developing inner city schools in poverty stricken neighborhoods is worth more than social assistance 1000 fold. I think that educating the poor is the best ticket to upward mobility in this country, but why is it that when we dump money into the school system we still have schools in the state that they are in ? What if the position of truancy officer was applied to everyone and was given more teeth to enforce attendance. What about increasing the pay of teachers and the number of teachers to reduce the teacher/student ratios ? Would you agree with the statement teachers are underpaid.

    I am all for a meaningful discussion on race but I would also like to assume that is on a lot of us. Instead of the "fight for 15" (which is not a bad thing), why don't we have a social project that works in conjunction with newly elected politicians that has the aim of paying teachers what they are worth ? I mean you want to solve poverty I think it has a lot to do with education, and yet we look at inner city schools with poverty and we do not seem to be really concerned about that or how that money is spent.

    Then you fix those schools and then you are still stuck with a pay gap between white and black candidates who have the same degree. This is a much tougher issue to solve because to this point the black guy has done everything society has asked of him and yet he is not reaping the rewards. So what do we do about things like that.

    To prevent from taking up a whole page, I will say that I think all of this is interconnected and that may be the disconnect between us. I mean just think about it. Take a singular issue, and then think of all the things it takes a person to get that level and ask all of the things that went into it. I guess I am cursed with the need to look at the whole picture, not to say you are not, just that I see things in totality and have trouble with putting a singular answer on specific issues because I think everything bleeds into where things are.





  7. #247

    Re: This is something I didn't intend to post.

    You brought up a lot of valid points and now this has become a meaningful discussion. If you could shed some light on how you look at things autonomously in our community and the methodology of being able to separate things I would be all over that, I could truly benefit learning how to cancel out the variable in the equation so to speak.





  8. #248

    Re: This is something I didn't intend to post.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ranger View Post
    You brought up a lot of valid points and now this has become a meaningful discussion. If you could shed some light on how you look at things autonomously in our community and the methodology of being able to separate things I would be all over that, I could truly benefit learning how to cancel out the variable in the equation so to speak.
    I'm sure that the way people look at things is based on the make up of the individual. So, when looking at complex things, I tend to look for the root cause. To flesh this out a little more, I work(ed) in a lab setting. Often times a lab setting supporting a manufacturing product. Which had me get involved in investigations to why something did not work as intended (failed). The goal was to find out what was the culprit of that failure. So, for example, take a pregnancy test. Why did it say positive when the lady was not pregnant? Now, you could say the company failed as a whole, but that does not explain why it failed (and how to fix it). There are lots of parts in pregnancy test, the strip, the housing, the collection pad, the anti-bodies on the strip, the color mechanism etc. etc. etc. Now lets say it was the strip that was bad. This takes out the plastic housing, the collector pad, the color mechanism. Now, they could have an effect, but the defect is in the strip. Now there could be one culprit, the positive test line was mistakenly put on the strip, or the anti-body was defective. OR there could be multiple things that lead up to the strip being bad, including poor raw materials, equipment, drying, storage etc....
    Granted this can be less cut and dry in dealing with people and all the complex interactions, but the premise is the same.





  9. #249

    Re: This is something I didn't intend to post.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ranger View Post

    To the point about one race being inherently more evil. I was not meaning to accuse anyone here, it was moreover again aimed at the media. Looking at stories around the media I would venture to say that the overwhelming majority of news about black people is negative, I can not assign an accurate percentage and I am aware of this, but I would say 85% or so is negative from my observations (no facts or data support that). The point of this is that I do not think that they are responsibly reporting when they cast news stories like that instead of ones showing the better side of humanity and the black populace of this country. It is just disproportionate to the facts in my opinion is all I am saying.
    Pulling out small portions to comment on, because the board can become unruly with very long posts.
    Here my comment would be, I would say that 85% of news in inherently bad (like you from observations). The news generally reports negative things. To take a color neutral example, generally the news does not say the local company hired 7 new employees to fill positions (unless it's like the President or CEO). But it will reports that 10% of the workforce was laid off from that company.
    We cannot take offense, or glean more from a news story, then the facts that are reported.





  10. #250

    Re: This is something I didn't intend to post.

    Quote Originally Posted by blah3 View Post
    I'm sure that the way people look at things is based on the make up of the individual. So, when looking at complex things, I tend to look for the root cause. To flesh this out a little more, I work(ed) in a lab setting. Often times a lab setting supporting a manufacturing product. Which had me get involved in investigations to why something did not work as intended (failed). The goal was to find out what was the culprit of that failure. So, for example, take a pregnancy test. Why did it say positive when the lady was not pregnant? Now, you could say the company failed as a whole, but that does not explain why it failed (and how to fix it). There are lots of parts in pregnancy test, the strip, the housing, the collection pad, the anti-bodies on the strip, the color mechanism etc. etc. etc. Now lets say it was the strip that was bad. This takes out the plastic housing, the collector pad, the color mechanism. Now, they could have an effect, but the defect is in the strip. Now there could be one culprit, the positive test line was mistakenly put on the strip, or the anti-body was defective. OR there could be multiple things that lead up to the strip being bad, including poor raw materials, equipment, drying, storage etc....
    Granted this can be less cut and dry in dealing with people and all the complex interactions, but the premise is the same.
    See now I understand that and think I employ that same tactic, where I get tripped up is that the root cause is almost impossible to discern in the human capacity.

    Just like this argument, What is the problem, Racism or Poverty ? Is Racism prevalent because of poverty ? Is poverty prevalent because of racism ? deciphering a single root cause is generally damn near impossible for me because I can understand both sides.

    You can argue Racism is because of poverty, because desperate people do desperate things and they deal with the repercussions. You can say poverty is due to racism because of social stigma and not having as equal opportunity is portrayed. You can say education is the root cause because as a general rule when you know better you do better. You can say benevolence is killing us because of the adage "Give a man a fish you feed him for a day, Teach him to fish you feed him for a lifetime." You can take the benevolence thing and go back to the unwillingness or lack of teachers.
    Which then begs the question why ?Answering that question you bring it full circle to racism or poverty.

    That is where I get stuck in these debates. I see everything has a connection, in effect, the chaos theory.

    When you are dealing with humans fleshing out abstract concepts in a world that is anything but abstract you find yourself in circular logic that leads to nothing really.

    Which is why you can say feel good platitudes, but truthfully aren't both "sides" (wish there was a better word) going to have to make some concessions for the other to fix the problem ? I guess identifying the root cause is easy, figuring out why it is the root cause is where all the variables come into play and those are almost impossible to solve with a single thing.





  11. #251

    Re: This is something I didn't intend to post.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ranger View Post

    I think that developing inner city schools in poverty stricken neighborhoods is worth more than social assistance 1000 fold. I think that educating the poor is the best ticket to upward mobility in this country, but why is it that when we dump money into the school system we still have schools in the state that they are in ? What if the position of truancy officer was applied to everyone and was given more teeth to enforce attendance. What about increasing the pay of teachers and the number of teachers to reduce the teacher/student ratios ? Would you agree with the statement teachers are underpaid.

    I am all for a meaningful discussion on race but I would also like to assume that is on a lot of us. Instead of the "fight for 15" (which is not a bad thing), why don't we have a social project that works in conjunction with newly elected politicians that has the aim of paying teachers what they are worth ? I mean you want to solve poverty I think it has a lot to do with education, and yet we look at inner city schools with poverty and we do not seem to be really concerned about that or how that money is spent.
    So, I'm going to apply my brand of root cause analysis here. I agree that a good education will solve a lot of problems (not overnight mind you).
    So, why aren't the inner city kids getting a great education? You posited teacher pay. I disagree that teachers are underpaid. Now to give that comment more nuance, there are a few teachers who are underpaid. There is a small number that are paid what they are worth. And some that are overpaid. I would put the overpaid category as the biggest, fair next, overpaid least.
    Take for example a (good) teacher working at a school, where the kids do very well, test scores are great. Take that same teacher, working in the same district, and place her at the worst performing school, she is going to have little effect on the scores. She will be making the same same amount of money, following the same teaching guidelines, yet scores will be much lower. Did that teacher suddenly become a bad teacher? Well seeing how it's the same person, that is very unlikely and can be eliminate from the cause. Is it the curriculum? Well, again, same curriculum from same district. So, very unlikely. To cut to the chase, the major change is the student body. But of course, they are kids, so they aren't really the main culprit here. It's the family behind the kids. They don't value education enough. OR they simple don't have the time to invest in making sure the kid in engaged in getting a good education. Mostly because, well, they are single parent households. Quite possibly young, with poor skills of their own. So what do you get with young mothers, with poor skills on their own, with no father in the picture? You get poor performing kids, and a cycle of poverty. So, yes, multiple factors contributing, but the main culprit is families not invested in education.





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