Equality of opportunity does not lead to equality of results

[iiandyiiii]

Nigerian immigrants do even better, academically, than Asians, statistically: Data show Nigerians the most educated in the U.S.

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2015-10-13/it-isn-t-just-asian-immigrants-who-excel-in-the-u-s-

Is there some innate superiority in Nigerian culture? Should I bring up Nigerian culture as the superior culture that every group should seek to emulate, and the existence of this culture proves that all groups with less success simply don’t have the strength of culture that those magnificent Nigerians have? Or is this some interesting but odd outlier statistic that doesn’t really have much to do with culture, but rather the circumstances that these immigrants happen to face and experience?

Seems like the latter to me. Or maybe I can just bring up the supposed superiority of Nigerian culture to Asian culture any time culture finagles its way into these conversations.

[Velocity]

@RitterSport

So, how do you propose measuring equality of opportunity?

IMHO, equality of opportunity can be measured in holding everyone to the same criteria - i.e., everyone is invited to try out for the high school football team through physical tryouts that test people’s 40-yard dash, weight lifting, skill in catching a football, etc. This is done without bias, nepotism or favoritism - in other words, it would ***not ***be equal opportunity for the coach to say, “Adam ran a 4.2 dash in the forty, but I’m going to keep him off the roster in favor of Michael, who ran a much slower 5.1, because Michael is the principal’s son.”

This equal opportunity doesn’t mean an equal chance of success - some people are simply born slow, or maybe handicapped, or can’t catch a ball with their hands to save their life - but the opportunity is offered to everyone.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

tldr: this is a lot of straw and excuse making with little evidence for your claims

@Little_Nemo

It’s racism. …One possibility is that there’s some inherent trait in black people that makes them choose not to work as much. They have a laziness gene or something like that. In my personal opinion, that’s a racist view.

Is there anyone on this thread or any other that has made this claim? ANYONE? Or are you just setting up straw men so you can label anyone that disagrees with you as a racist?

Another possibility is that black Americans are discriminated against in the job market; employers are less likely to hire a black job applicant than a white job applicant.

You have a cite for this discrimination?

Or maybe it’s background. Black people are more likely to have received a poor education because the school where they grew up received less money.
[/quote]

You realize that there are asians in those neighborhoods as well and while it makes a difference, they are not crippled by their education.

Or black people are more likely to have a criminal record because the police are more likely to arrest them.

Cite? I know there is evidence that there is more police brutality against blacks but I haven’t seen a study saying that the disparity in criminal records is the result of police bias.

These are all outside factors. None of these were choices the black person made. They were choices that other people imposed on them.

It’s not even necessarily true that people are choosing to discriminate against black people based on their race. The employer might be honest when he says he chooses applicants with no criminal record over applicants with criminal records. He’s not being racist; it just happens that black people are more likely to have a criminal record and his race-neutral policy leads to the outcome of him hiring less black people.

And the cop will tell you that he doesn’t choose who to arrest based on their race. He arrests the people who commit crimes. And the reason he arrests more black people is because they’re more likely to be committing crimes.

So now the crimes are not the criminal’s fault?

By themselves, neither policy is a sign of racism. But connect them together and look at the pattern. Why do black people commit crimes? Because they need to earn money and they have a hard time getting a regular job. Why do black people have a hard time getting regular jobs? Because they have a criminal record.

This is not a chicken and egg problem. Blacks are not born with criminal records.

And once the pattern is established it feeds into itself. If black adults are more likely to be committing crimes then black children are more likely to grow up knowing people who commit crimes - and therefore are more likely to have entry into a life of crime. And if black adults aren’t working regular jobs, then black teenagers are less likely to be part of an employment network where somebody will say something like “Hey, there’s an opening in the warehouse. Call up Phil and tell him I know you. I’ll put in a good word for you.”

So their environment practically forces them into a life of crime?

Shodan pointed out that children raised by single mothers are more likely to have problems in their later lives. But boys who have problems in their lives are more likely to grow up and abandon their children. And girls who have problems in their lives are more likely to grow up and be abandoned.

Children who go to bad schools are going to have more difficulty graduating and having a good academic record. So they’re more likely to be unemployed and poor. And unemployed poor people have less money. And schools in neighborhoods where there’s less money are going to be underfunded and bad. The bad schools produce the poor people and the poor people produce the bad schools.

There are very few places where we can point to a single thing and say “This thing is wrong. Stop doing it.” We solved most of those problems fifty years ago. Now we’re looking at subtler problems. You see one problem and try to figure out what factors caused it. Then you try to figure out what caused those factors. Then you try to figure out what caused the things that caused the factors. And a lot of times you end up back where you started. The problems are part of a cycle.

Apparently you believe it’s part of a cycle that blacks are powerless to break without the help of white folks. Boy it’s a good thing there are so many white allies out there scolding other white people.

Some people just shrug their shoulders and say “What can you do? The problem is too big to solve.” I don’t believe that. We’ve seen huge things like world wars and moon landings done successfully. I feel we can solve big problems if we’re willing to do the work.

With the “we” in this case being white people once again.

Other people will say “Why should I care? It’s not my problem. I’m white (or I’m Asian-American).” There’s the issue of morality but I’ll put that aside. Instead I’ll say it’s in your self-interest to do something about other people’s problems. When other people are poor or uneducated or criminals, you have to pay for their problems. Even if you choose to stop paying for any form of social assistance, you’ll still be paying because you see an increase in crime and you’ll need to pay more for police and prisons. Even if you’re not personally poor or uneducated or a criminal, you benefit from living in a society where other people are also not poor or uneducated or criminals. It’s in your self-interest to pay for programs that reduce poverty and bad education and crime, even if you just look at it from a financial point of view. Spending the money now to reduce the things that cause these problems will mean you don’t have to spend the money in the future on the problems.

Asians understand racism in ways that white people generally do not. There are not a lot of asians in this country that thinks that racism doesn’t exist. There are not a lot of asians in this country that don’t agree that racism is worse for blacks than it is for asians.

So in your opinion is there anything that blacks can do to improve their own situation or is it really all in the hands of the white man?

[Airbeck]

@iiandyiiii

There are negative aspects to inner city gang culture in Chicago, just like there are negative aspects to poor rural Appalachian culture, and Wall Street culture, and the million other sub-cultures around the country and the world.

We are on the same page, and I agree with your post. The only issue I have is with the use of “inner city” regarding gang culture in Chicago. I’ve lived here all of my life, and the areas with poverty and gang presence have nothing to do with the inner part of Chicago. The innermost part of the city would be downtown and the loop, where the board of trade is and the center of commerce. Englewood on the south side, with more gang activity, is nowhere near what could be considered the inner part of Chicago.

I feel like the term “inner city” itself is always inaccurate and is usually used by people that are, let’s say, less sympathetic to the plight of those living in those impoverished areas. I try to not use the term for that reason.

Aside from that, great post.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Little_Nemo

If arguments about racism fall apart when you discuss Asian Americans, what does that prove?

it proves that your arguments about racism are flawed.

If I said “Look, Americans of Scottish descent don’t experience racism” does that prove that racism isn’t a problem? Of course not, it just proves that Scottish-Americans don’t experience racism. That’s great for Scottish-Americans. Now can we go back to talking about the people who aren’t Scottish-Americans and who are experiencing problems?

Are you saying that asians don’t experience racism or haven’t had a history of racism in this country? Do you really think that the asian experience with racism in this country has been anything like the scottich experience?

[iiandyiiii]

@Airbeck

We are on the same page, and I agree with your post. The only issue I have is with the use of “inner city” regarding gang culture in Chicago. I’ve lived here all of my life, and the areas with poverty and gang presence have nothing to do with the inner part of Chicago. The innermost part of the city would be downtown and the loop, where the board of trade is and the center of commerce. Englewood on the south side, with more gang activity, is nowhere near what could be considered the inner part of Chicago.

I feel like the term “inner city” itself is always inaccurate and is usually used by people that are, let’s say, less sympathetic to the plight of those living in those impoverished areas. I try to not use the term for that reason.

Aside from that, great post.

Fair enough, thanks for the education!

[RitterSport]

@Velocity

IMHO, equality of opportunity can be measured in holding everyone to the same criteria - i.e., everyone is invited to try out for the high school football team through physical tryouts that test people’s 40-yard dash, weight lifting, skill in catching a football, etc. This is done without bias, nepotism or favoritism - in other words, it would ***not ***be equal opportunity for the coach to say, “Adam ran a 4.2 dash in the forty, but I’m going to keep him off the roster in favor of Michael, who ran a much slower 5.1, because Michael is the principal’s son.”

This equal opportunity doesn’t mean an equal chance of success - some people are simply born slow, or maybe handicapped, or can’t catch a ball with their hands to save their life - but the opportunity is offered to everyone.

I think it’s silly to concentrate on sports here, but you’re already assuming away any bias on the part of the coaches, and sports is not a totally objective endeavor anyway – do you think motivation and coachability have nothing to do with success in sports?

In any case, by the time kids are trying out for high school sports, there have already been huge differences in opportunity – some kids don’t have enough food, or poor medical care, etc. Kids with non-English-speaking parents or parents who work two jobs may not even know about the tryouts. Kids who care for their younger siblings can’t take the time to tryout. If a kid has to work after school to support her disabled mother and can’t try out for high school fencing, does that kid have an equal opportunity?

I totally agree with you that equal opportunity doesn’t mean equal chance of success, but I can’t think of a better way to measure it, and your way doesn’t even work for the limited world of sports, let alone broader societal measures.

So, I ask again – what’s a better proxy for measuring equality of opportunity than actual real-world results? Again, concentrating on measures across groups, not within the group.

[Delayed_Reflex]

@iiandyiiii

Nigerian immigrants do even better, academically, than Asians, statistically: https://www.chron.com/news/article/Data-show-Nigerians-the-most-educated-in-the-U-S-1600808.php

Bloomberg - Are you a robot?

Is there some innate superiority in Nigerian culture? Should I bring up Nigerian culture as the superior culture that every group should seek to emulate, and the existence of this culture proves that all groups with less success simply don’t have the strength of culture that those magnificent Nigerians have? Or is this some interesting but odd outlier statistic that doesn’t really have much to do with culture, but rather the circumstances that these immigrants happen to face and experience?

Seems like the latter to me. Or maybe I can just bring up the supposed superiority of Nigerian culture to Asian culture any time culture finagles its way into these conversations.

Well according to your first cite, it could definitely be argued that Nigerian culture is superior for achieving academic performance - from the article:

The reasons Nigerians have more post-graduate degrees than any other racial or ethnic group are largely due to Nigerian society’s emphasis on mandatory and free education.

“The typical saying in a Nigerian household is that the best inheritance that a parent can give you is not jewelry or cash or material things, it is a good education,” he said. “It is expected.”

Part of the circumstances that these immigrants happen to face and experience is the cultural milieu that they grew up in, and I absolutely believe that Nigerian society’s value of scholarship helps their emigrants succeed.

Now obviously, I do not believe “Nigerian culture = values scholarship”. But the trait of valuing scholarship appears to be more widespread within Nigerian culture than other cultures, and i think this manifests in the proportion of skilled workers coming from Nigeria vs. other countries. Do you think otherwise?

[iiandyiiii]

Nm

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@iiandyiiii

You didn’t provide any cites that they are “the least wealthy group” (and IIRC, you’ve said the same before in another thread and I showed you cites that proved this was incorrect, but I don’t recall which thread). In any case, unless you’re seriously arguing that Asians (or white people!) are the most mistreated “out group” in the country (or in NYC), then this wouldn’t apply to my point anyway. My point is about how the groups with the worst outcomes are treated, not the groups with generally “good” outcomes.

Of course I provided cites. Someone even came along to prove that there was one year when asians were only the 2nd poorest group in NYC in 2015 so they weren’t ALWAYS the poorest group.

Your point is that the REASON for those bad outcomes is a lack of opportunity because opportunity=outcome and i am saying that it could be something else like culture and i support that notion with evidence that opportunity/=outcome in some cases. That culture might play a rather large role in outcomes.

So the Jews of Europe had a “deficient” culture? Native Americans? Native Australians? The Armenians in Turkey? The dozens of other groups that suffered genocides (or near-genocides)? That doesn’t seem like remotely a serious argument. If this is seriously what you’re arguing, then it’s a horrendously bigoted and hateful argument.

So you think we are committing genocide on blacks?

Do you have a cite for this because it hasn’t been reported on by any of the major news outlets.

This is not my argument. I’m not even sure what this has to do with my argument.

I am asking how the system is being rigged against blacks and hispanics and not against asians? because you keep blaming everything on racism but for some reason these omnipotent racists seem to not only be taking it easy on the asians, they are elevating asians above whites in some ways. These racists are bad at being racist.

[Chingon]

@Velocity

IMHO, equality of opportunity can be measured in holding everyone to the same criteria - i.e., everyone is invited to try out for the high school football team through physical tryouts that test people’s 40-yard dash, weight lifting, skill in catching a football, etc. This is done without bias, nepotism or favoritism - in other words, it would ***not ***be equal opportunity for the coach to say, “Adam ran a 4.2 dash in the forty, but I’m going to keep him off the roster in favor of Michael, who ran a much slower 5.1, because Michael is the principal’s son.”

This equal opportunity doesn’t mean an equal chance of success - some people are simply born slow, or maybe handicapped, or can’t catch a ball with their hands to save their life - but the opportunity is offered to everyone.

This could only be posted by someone who understands very little about sports beyond perhaps a video game.

[Chingon]

And we’re now back into a loop of /r/goldenrace posts.

[Kearsen1]

@Little_Nemo

It’s racism. See? I’ll say it.

Let’s use a specific example; unemployment. Black Americans are more likely to be unemployed than white Americans. Why?

One possibility is that there’s some inherent trait in black people that makes them choose not to work as much. They have a laziness gene or something like that. In my personal opinion, that’s a racist view.

Another possibility is that black Americans are discriminated against in the job market; employers are less likely to hire a black job applicant than a white job applicant.

Or maybe it’s background. Black people are more likely to have received a poor education because the school where they grew up received less money. Or black people are more likely to have a criminal record because the police are more likely to arrest them.

These are all outside factors. None of these were choices the black person made. They were choices that other people imposed on them.

It’s not even necessarily true that people are choosing to discriminate against black people based on their race. The employer might be honest when he says he chooses applicants with no criminal record over applicants with criminal records. He’s not being racist; it just happens that black people are more likely to have a criminal record and his race-neutral policy leads to the outcome of him hiring less black people.

And the cop will tell you that he doesn’t choose who to arrest based on their race. He arrests the people who commit crimes. And the reason he arrests more black people is because they’re more likely to be committing crimes.

By themselves, neither policy is a sign of racism. But connect them together and look at the pattern. Why do black people commit crimes? Because they need to earn money and they have a hard time getting a regular job. Why do black people have a hard time getting regular jobs? Because they have a criminal record.

And once the pattern is established it feeds into itself. If black adults are more likely to be committing crimes then black children are more likely to grow up knowing people who commit crimes - and therefore are more likely to have entry into a life of crime. And if black adults aren’t working regular jobs, then black teenagers are less likely to be part of an employment network where somebody will say something like “Hey, there’s an opening in the warehouse. Call up Phil and tell him I know you. I’ll put in a good word for you.”

Shodan pointed out that children raised by single mothers are more likely to have problems in their later lives. But boys who have problems in their lives are more likely to grow up and abandon their children. And girls who have problems in their lives are more likely to grow up and be abandoned.

Children who go to bad schools are going to have more difficulty graduating and having a good academic record. So they’re more likely to be unemployed and poor. And unemployed poor people have less money. And schools in neighborhoods where there’s less money are going to be underfunded and bad. The bad schools produce the poor people and the poor people produce the bad schools.

There are very few places where we can point to a single thing and say “This thing is wrong. Stop doing it.” We solved most of those problems fifty years ago. Now we’re looking at subtler problems. You see one problem and try to figure out what factors caused it. Then you try to figure out what caused those factors. Then you try to figure out what caused the things that caused the factors. And a lot of times you end up back where you started. The problems are part of a cycle.

Some people just shrug their shoulders and say “What can you do? The problem is too big to solve.” I don’t believe that. We’ve seen huge things like world wars and moon landings done successfully. I feel we can solve big problems if we’re willing to do the work.

Other people will say “Why should I care? It’s not my problem. I’m white (or I’m Asian-American).” There’s the issue of morality but I’ll put that aside. Instead I’ll say it’s in your self-interest to do something about other people’s problems. When other people are poor or uneducated or criminals, you have to pay for their problems. Even if you choose to stop paying for any form of social assistance, you’ll still be paying because you see an increase in crime and you’ll need to pay more for police and prisons. Even if you’re not personally poor or uneducated or a criminal, you benefit from living in a society where other people are also not poor or uneducated or criminals. It’s in your self-interest to pay for programs that reduce poverty and bad education and crime, even if you just look at it from a financial point of view. Spending the money now to reduce the things that cause these problems will mean you don’t have to spend the money in the future on the problems.

Yes, you use it exactly how the Democrats for the last few decades have used it, Racism is the cause of every bad thing by any minority (well, except Asians)

I don’t find that to be the case. With AA, they have more opportunities than they had in the past, and in some cases a racist advantage over the same and sometimes more qualified ‘other’

But you know what, it’s an excuse. An excuse to blame everything on racism because its all the rage currently.

It’s wrong. (granted, maybe not ALL wrong always but a good chunk of the time)

[iiandyiiii]

@Damuri_Ajashi

Your point is that the REASON for those bad outcomes is a lack of opportunity because opportunity=outcome and i am saying that it could be something else like culture and i support that notion with evidence that opportunity/=outcome in some cases. That culture might play a rather large role in outcomes.

I don’t think culture is necessarily separate from opportunity. Black people live in American culture. How they are treated is part of their opportunity. And you’ve presented no evidence that black culture doesn’t value education, or promotes crime or laziness, etc. You’re just assuming that lesser outcomes somehow indicate something about culture.

So you think we are committing genocide on blacks?

Do you have a cite for this because it hasn’t been reported on by any of the major news outlets.

You said deficient cultures die out. Are you saying that black culture isn’t deficient? Or that it won’t die out? I’m saying it’s ridiculous to blame culture for groups dying out, and showing examples for groups that quite obviously didn’t die out due to a deficient culture.

I am asking how the system is being rigged against blacks and hispanics and not against asians? because you keep blaming everything on racism but for some reason these omnipotent racists seem to not only be taking it easy on the asians, they are elevating asians above whites in some ways. These racists are bad at being racist.

The system doesn’t care about racism - it doesn’t care about white or black or Asian people. It cares about protecting and serving the wealthy and powerful. Racism is a very useful tool for that, but not all types of racism. Asians are relative newcomers in any significant numbers to most of the country - perhaps the system hasn’t found them to be a threat. Perhaps their numbers are too small to worry the wealthy and powerful, or perhaps the wealthy and powerful would prefer to recruit Asians rather than set others against them. I don’t know. I just know that we’re not special. You’re not special. We’re all just human, and there’s nothing special about the present. The same rules and trends through history still apply. These little conflicts, including nonsense about supposedly toxic cultures of millions of Americans, are just tools for the rich and powerful. The real enemy of opportunity for all is the system.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@iiandyiiii

This still doesn’t have anything to do with my argument.

There’s no point to going on and on about this stuff when you just twist absolutely everything, no matter what it is, to “Asian culture is awesome!”

Maybe Asian culture really is the best in the world. Even if that’s true, it’s totally irrelevant to any of my arguments.

Your argument was that there are no significant differences between large groups that would explain the differences but culture is a significant difference between races that can explain some of the differences between groups.

I’m not saying that asian culture is awesome and trying to rub it in people’s faces about how awesome asian culture is. I am saying that culture can be a distinguishing factor that can affect outcomes.

[Chingon]

So we’re back to “black people suck”, but it’s not genetic – it’s that black people are predisposed to generate a shitty culture that produces people that suck.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@iiandyiiii

The “rigged by whitey” just shows how simplistic this issue is so often seen. These systems weren’t “rigged by whitey” – they were rigged by the wealthy and powerful. Not to protect and serve “whitey”, but to protect and serve the wealthy and powerful. Most of them are white, but these systems hurt a lot more white people than they help. They only help the rich and powerful, and any other benefit seen by whites on the lower end due to discrimination is massively beat by the way they’re exploited. Racism is a tool for these systems, since poor whites + poor blacks + poor Hispanics + poor other groups would be an absolute juggernaut and unstoppable political force, and the wealthy and powerful need these groups to oppose each other. And attacks on culture just help this system.

Black people are just human beings. They’re really not different in any significant way from those of you who aren’t black. The vast majority are peaceful, love their families, are very willing to work hard, and just want a decent chance at a comfortable life and good future for their families, just like any other group. That’s black culture, at least the most important parts. There are negative aspects to inner city gang culture in Chicago, just like there are negative aspects to poor rural Appalachian culture, and Wall Street culture, and the million other sub-cultures around the country and the world. There’s no simplifying this stuff for groups of millions; the vast majority are just regular, decent people who want decent lives and good futures for their kids.

Refusing to see this and insisting upon blaming millions of decent folks, many of whom are suffering despite having tried to do the right thing, just aids the system, which seeks to divide the poor and suffering so that the wealthy and powerful can continue to exploit as they see fit.

Noone is saying blacks are bad people. but do you think there is anything blacks can do to help themselves or do they have to wait for someone else to help them?

[iiandyiiii]

@Damuri_Ajashi

Your argument was that there are no significant differences between large groups that would explain the differences but culture is a significant difference between races that can explain some of the differences between groups.

I’m not saying that asian culture is awesome and trying to rub it in people’s faces about how awesome asian culture is. I am saying that culture can be a distinguishing factor that can affect outcomes.

Maybe, but when the system is so massively tilted and unfair, I see no possibility of evaluating the effects of different cultures on achievement.

[iiandyiiii]

@Damuri_Ajashi

Noone is saying blacks are bad people. but do you think there is anything blacks can do to help themselves or do they have to wait for someone else to help them?

There’s plenty that individuals can do to make their lives better, regardless of race, in most circumstances. When it comes to big group outcomes, it’s the system that is to blame, not the individual decisions of millions, most of whom are decent people just trying to do the best they can.

[Ravenman]

@Damuri_Ajashi

I’m not sure all of these statements are true.

I agree.

So to a point academic success correlates with happiness.

Cite?