Reminds me of a quote, I think, from Luis Farrakhan, who was making a speech encouraging his audience to have pride, embrace who they are, etc. He was going into an example of how people waste their time and money straightening their hair. "It's not a permanent," he said, "it's a temporary."
It's actually much more complicated. It's a pity you can't see anything beyond a direct correlation between race and wealth and success. What I'm suggesting is that when you're hiring people, you're hiring *people*, not a statistic. What I'm saying is that, at that interview, if you don't look beyond race but rather let your statistics color your view, then you might let some really quality people slip through your fingers.
Anthrax exists. Some was actually sent to someone important (a news anchor, if I recall correctly, but I may be wrong). Suddenly, it was all over the news. Suddenly, my poor mother was anxious about opening her mail because there might be anthrax in it.
I reminded her that nobody with access to anthrax wanted her dead. I reminded her that as a middle class suburban piano teacher, she totally flies under the radar. And while she was annoyed that I minimized her concerns, she is still around and kicking all these years later.
There are inappropriate hiring quotas which get called into play in some circumstances. There have been people who have been incorrectly promoted or hired in some sort of attempt to meet an artificial standard. There are indeed knee-jerk liberals who enforce "political correctness" standards wherever they go.
However, like it or not, if that woman, or that black guy, or that latino got promoted over some white guy, chances are that they were a better fit for the job. Just because that white guy thinks it's a conspiracy doesn't make it so. There's far more racism still than there is reverse racism.
Again, all those bad things you talked about exist, but if someone wants to use them as an excuse for their failures, they're fooling themselves.
I would suggest that in every group--whether you divide by race, gender, religion, or otherwise--you'll find a wide distribution of talents and capabilities, given similar environments. And regardless of how you divide them up, there is going to be more overlap between groups than distinction.
I can't prove that there wouldn't be some factor that wouldn't be more prevalent in one group than another, but that might be more about how you divide up the groups than anything else.
Example: we've all heard tell about the fantastic Kenyan marathon runners. Part of it is cultural, part of it is geographic (they train at altitude), and part of it could be genetic (maybe good runners got to sire more children in the days of yore), but does this mean we can look at any Kenyan and say that they'd be a great marathon runner? That they'd be better than a British or a Japanese runner? And what if we expand out to all "black" people? How do Kenyans balance out against, say, Ethiopians for running skill? Do we assume that Ethiopians are good runners because they're black and from the same continent as Kenyans? What about Senegali people? Maybe they're flat-footed?
The key here is, when you look at a person, are you seeing them, or are you seeing a statistic? If you see a statistic, that is racism, pure and simple.
Can you break that down by city or county or state? How many poor white people are there in West Virginia or Colorado, or the California Central Valley? How does their wealth correlate to their level of education or achievement? How do they do compared to other groups in their same region?
You're painting with a really, really broad brush. If you look at a black person and think, "well, he's statistically less likely to be able to do the job", then you're racist, regardless of the statistics you quote.
Close friend of mine was homeless in high school, lived out of a van with his family, including his two younger sisters. They'd been living on the edge of poverty since he was a little kid. Funny thing was, nobody knew what he was going through, because, well, he somehow managed to become student body president and keep his grades up, eventually getting into a top-tier university. He's now a VP of a major technology PR firm.
His sisters did well, too. One is a successful television/stage actress, and the other is an attorney.
What do you think their racial background is? I've already told you their economic background.
You're so close, I'll bet you can probably taste the understanding. It's not political correctness and hiring quotas; it's the *perception* of political correctness and hiring quotas that is causing loss of morale and increased agitation affecting the productivity of those who are affected by that perception.
See, here's the thing: not being racist is not the same thing as 'political correctness and hiring quotas'. If you wonder about political correctness and hiring quotas every time you see a minority being hired or promoted, you (and I mean the general you; I don't know you personally at all) have got to ask yourself some pretty serious questions.
The OP was asking, quite reasonably, what evidence would it take for you to stop believing in global warming or climate change
Easy: how about a ten year, statistically significant downward trend.
In the mean time, just in case, let's find ways to reduce our carbon emissions, just in case. If that helps the downward trend become more significant, then we're all winners!
But-but-but-but... Glen Beck says it's not true! I know... NASA is a (say it with snarl...) federal agency! They're like a whole bunch of space faring Hitlers!
You're absolutely right. I've got nothing against US companies using some level of outsourced labor, but if it turns out that they imported 15,000 Serbians (or whatever group) and are using that number to vaunt their "diversity" metric while not tapping the local market for labor, it's the height of cynicism.
That's funny. You don't know anything about "equal opportunity laws", do you? What encourages slack is the old boys' network that allows people who are connected to get ahead while other people do al their work. How do you get connected? Well, it's often based on the color of your skin.
Right. Nobody hires people because they have positive prejudices for them based on race, gender, religion, etc., over someone else for whom they have negative prejudices. It never, ever, ever happens.
The equal opportunity system is absolutely not flawed, at least not in the direction that you're suggesting. It's actually set up so that only the most egregious offenders get busted. They do indeed do statistical analysis, and they use a wide range of data from the appropriate region to determine the likelihood of discrimination. Then, once they have determined that it's worth further investigation, they investigate.
You would be amazed at how often people are caught red-handed with memos, emails, minutes and more where it's handed down from on high--or at least from the middle--that guidelines beyond the requirements for the job are communicated clearly to those in the position to do hiring.
How do I know? Let's just say I've got connections to the DOL.
I see more middle class white men complaining around the water cooler about political correctness and hiring quotas. Funny, because if they didn't spend so much time bitching about such things and concentrated on their jobs, they'd probably be CEOs by now.
Shortly after the US took over Iraq, I went through a background check for some work I was doing for the DHS. One of the questions I was asked was, "Are you, or have you ever been a member of an organization which would consider the use of violence to overthrow government?"
Given the context of Iraq, I was intrigued by the lack of a definite article. "This" or "our" or even "the" would have been different. But the question seemed so general. But the FBI guy giving me the interview clearly didn't have a sense of humor. So while it took all the self control I could muster, I stifled the urge to say, "Well, I am a citizen of the US..."
He must have seen me smirk or something, though, because since then I've been on the "turn your head and cough" list every time I try to board a plane. All for a three-day contract.
Well, he could never get his hands on it if you don't put it on the Internet. When someone posts pictures of themselves throw-up-drunk on a public FaceBook page and then wonders why they didn't get a job at their local church, they shouldn't be surprised.
Slashdot Mirror
The summary says "or", not "of".
Reminds me of a quote, I think, from Luis Farrakhan, who was making a speech encouraging his audience to have pride, embrace who they are, etc. He was going into an example of how people waste their time and money straightening their hair. "It's not a permanent," he said, "it's a temporary."
Shakedowns.
LOL!
It's actually much more complicated. It's a pity you can't see anything beyond a direct correlation between race and wealth and success. What I'm suggesting is that when you're hiring people, you're hiring *people*, not a statistic. What I'm saying is that, at that interview, if you don't look beyond race but rather let your statistics color your view, then you might let some really quality people slip through your fingers.
Let me paint you a picture.
Anthrax exists. Some was actually sent to someone important (a news anchor, if I recall correctly, but I may be wrong). Suddenly, it was all over the news. Suddenly, my poor mother was anxious about opening her mail because there might be anthrax in it.
I reminded her that nobody with access to anthrax wanted her dead. I reminded her that as a middle class suburban piano teacher, she totally flies under the radar. And while she was annoyed that I minimized her concerns, she is still around and kicking all these years later.
There are inappropriate hiring quotas which get called into play in some circumstances. There have been people who have been incorrectly promoted or hired in some sort of attempt to meet an artificial standard. There are indeed knee-jerk liberals who enforce "political correctness" standards wherever they go.
However, like it or not, if that woman, or that black guy, or that latino got promoted over some white guy, chances are that they were a better fit for the job. Just because that white guy thinks it's a conspiracy doesn't make it so. There's far more racism still than there is reverse racism.
Again, all those bad things you talked about exist, but if someone wants to use them as an excuse for their failures, they're fooling themselves.
Did I say I work for the DOL? The final line to your quip should be: "Those who can not comprehend the simplest of statements, hurl insults."
Nice of you to include the 's/', though statistically speaking, racists are more likely to be male ;)
I would suggest that in every group--whether you divide by race, gender, religion, or otherwise--you'll find a wide distribution of talents and capabilities, given similar environments. And regardless of how you divide them up, there is going to be more overlap between groups than distinction.
I can't prove that there wouldn't be some factor that wouldn't be more prevalent in one group than another, but that might be more about how you divide up the groups than anything else.
Example: we've all heard tell about the fantastic Kenyan marathon runners. Part of it is cultural, part of it is geographic (they train at altitude), and part of it could be genetic (maybe good runners got to sire more children in the days of yore), but does this mean we can look at any Kenyan and say that they'd be a great marathon runner? That they'd be better than a British or a Japanese runner? And what if we expand out to all "black" people? How do Kenyans balance out against, say, Ethiopians for running skill? Do we assume that Ethiopians are good runners because they're black and from the same continent as Kenyans? What about Senegali people? Maybe they're flat-footed?
The key here is, when you look at a person, are you seeing them, or are you seeing a statistic? If you see a statistic, that is racism, pure and simple.
Can you break that down by city or county or state? How many poor white people are there in West Virginia or Colorado, or the California Central Valley? How does their wealth correlate to their level of education or achievement? How do they do compared to other groups in their same region?
You're painting with a really, really broad brush. If you look at a black person and think, "well, he's statistically less likely to be able to do the job", then you're racist, regardless of the statistics you quote.
Close friend of mine was homeless in high school, lived out of a van with his family, including his two younger sisters. They'd been living on the edge of poverty since he was a little kid. Funny thing was, nobody knew what he was going through, because, well, he somehow managed to become student body president and keep his grades up, eventually getting into a top-tier university. He's now a VP of a major technology PR firm.
His sisters did well, too. One is a successful television/stage actress, and the other is an attorney.
What do you think their racial background is? I've already told you their economic background.
Wow; a reasoned and even-handed, non-extremist discussion of a race-related issue on /.! You, my friend, are awesome.
You're so close, I'll bet you can probably taste the understanding. It's not political correctness and hiring quotas; it's the *perception* of political correctness and hiring quotas that is causing loss of morale and increased agitation affecting the productivity of those who are affected by that perception.
See, here's the thing: not being racist is not the same thing as 'political correctness and hiring quotas'. If you wonder about political correctness and hiring quotas every time you see a minority being hired or promoted, you (and I mean the general you; I don't know you personally at all) have got to ask yourself some pretty serious questions.
Easy: how about a ten year, statistically significant downward trend.
In the mean time, just in case, let's find ways to reduce our carbon emissions, just in case. If that helps the downward trend become more significant, then we're all winners!
But-but-but-but... Glen Beck says it's not true! I know... NASA is a (say it with snarl...) federal agency! They're like a whole bunch of space faring Hitlers!
I appreciate the clarification, but doesn't any of this sound like "shell game" to you?
You're absolutely right. I've got nothing against US companies using some level of outsourced labor, but if it turns out that they imported 15,000 Serbians (or whatever group) and are using that number to vaunt their "diversity" metric while not tapping the local market for labor, it's the height of cynicism.
That's funny. You don't know anything about "equal opportunity laws", do you? What encourages slack is the old boys' network that allows people who are connected to get ahead while other people do al their work. How do you get connected? Well, it's often based on the color of your skin.
You don't even think you're racist, do you?
That's funny. You probably don't think you're racist, do you?
Right. Nobody hires people because they have positive prejudices for them based on race, gender, religion, etc., over someone else for whom they have negative prejudices. It never, ever, ever happens.
The equal opportunity system is absolutely not flawed, at least not in the direction that you're suggesting. It's actually set up so that only the most egregious offenders get busted. They do indeed do statistical analysis, and they use a wide range of data from the appropriate region to determine the likelihood of discrimination. Then, once they have determined that it's worth further investigation, they investigate.
You would be amazed at how often people are caught red-handed with memos, emails, minutes and more where it's handed down from on high--or at least from the middle--that guidelines beyond the requirements for the job are communicated clearly to those in the position to do hiring.
How do I know? Let's just say I've got connections to the DOL.
I see more middle class white men complaining around the water cooler about political correctness and hiring quotas. Funny, because if they didn't spend so much time bitching about such things and concentrated on their jobs, they'd probably be CEOs by now.
Oh, come on; if you had just used nitric acid for any purpose at all, wouldn't you want to tell the world? That's SO COOOOOOL!
http://xkcd.com/691/
You're not missing anything. The parent post is a vain attempt at humor. Or a troll.
Shortly after the US took over Iraq, I went through a background check for some work I was doing for the DHS. One of the questions I was asked was, "Are you, or have you ever been a member of an organization which would consider the use of violence to overthrow government?"
Given the context of Iraq, I was intrigued by the lack of a definite article. "This" or "our" or even "the" would have been different. But the question seemed so general. But the FBI guy giving me the interview clearly didn't have a sense of humor. So while it took all the self control I could muster, I stifled the urge to say, "Well, I am a citizen of the US..."
He must have seen me smirk or something, though, because since then I've been on the "turn your head and cough" list every time I try to board a plane. All for a three-day contract.
I don't know if you meant to say "traitor" or "trailer". You're one letter off from each.
Well, he could never get his hands on it if you don't put it on the Internet. When someone posts pictures of themselves throw-up-drunk on a public FaceBook page and then wonders why they didn't get a job at their local church, they shouldn't be surprised.