See my response to RNATB above.
No, it isn’t. It’s a function of the fact that illegal immigrants tend to seek out jobs in the construction field.
They do not show up in the US hoping to get jobs as accountants.
It’s amazing that something as basic, obvious and well known this has to be explained. But there you have it.
OK, I guess that settles it.
Well, now I much more completely understand why right-wingers lose all sense of reason when facing this menace. This is a group of people who can force themselves at will on to any job site! One wonders why they would restrict themselves to construction, given their special powers at subverting or evading completely any hiring protocols! Why not come and force their way into accounting jobs, if the hiring process has no effect on their ability to appear in any given work group!
Thanks for helping the scales to fall from my eyes. I join you in the opposition to this magical brown menace from the south! Is there a post I can stand along the border fence, my Minuteman brother? (Ooh, can I get some of those cool Jack Nicholson glasses, too?)
Ah. The construction industry is forced to hire illegal immigrants because they apply for jobs!
And of course, contractors who receive government contracts are bound to employ just as many illegal immigrants as any other contractor.
He misead my post as if it were a claim that most construction workers in the US were illegal immigrants, which it was obviously not.
Resorting to this type of silliness does not speak to the strength of your position.
No, they can’t force themselves etc. Happy now? But if a group tends to seek out employment in a certain field, they will tend to be over-represented in that field.
What this means as a practical matter, is that assuming that a given slice of that field contains some members of that group will be a reasonable assumption. Which happens to be what is being discussed.
Are you just copying Hentor’s posts, or is this two great minds thinking alike?
I daresay there are many more than two people who will share our opinion of your arguments after reading this thread.
Perhaps it’s evidence of the elementary logical conclusions from the flaws in your argument?
You gotta believe …
Well, our exchange has solidified some of my beliefs, this is true, but those have mostly been SDMB-specific personal perceptions.
Whether it’s been especially helpful to the larger debate, I don’t know. Hopefully the consideration of where and how some people go wrong in making assumptions based on population statistics has been informative. Clearly some people struggle with the definition of majority, but I acknowledge that there may be some gray area around what is a “vast” majority or not.
Let’s say that we observe three work crews in three different locations:
Crew #1: All white people.
Crew #2: Mixture of whites and African-Americans.
Crew #3: All Latino.
Is it not more likely than not that there are more illegal immigrants in crew #3 than in crews 1 and 2? If we can all agree with that, why is it racist to point that out?
Is it racist to point out that Blacks have a higher rate of sickle cell than whites?
3 out of 4 people with aids is a man. You are a man, therefore I assume you have aids. 10 men are standing in a group. I assume that 6 of them have aids.
You are a man. It is there for reasonable for me to require a blood sample from you.
It’s very simple.
Pointing out aggregate tendencies of ethnic groups = racism
racism = evil
[That’s why you get all these semantic discussions of the definition of “racism”]
Always remember: two legs bad; four legs good
You appear unable to distinguish between
[ul]
[li]most people with AIDS are men[/li][li]most men have AIDS[/li][/ul]
Whether it’s reasonable to require a blood sample is not determined solely by whether it’s more likely that you have AIDS than someone else.
He’s got it! By George he’s got it!
Now, to be sure, let’s check. Can you distinguish between
[ul]
[li]Most illegal immigrants are Hispanic.[/li][li]Most Hispanics are illegal immigrants.[/li][/ul]
No. Pointing out aggregates is not always bad. Using aggregates to take action against individuals is. Saying that African American girls have a higher rate of teen pregnancy is not racist in and of itself. If you use that as justification to not accept young black girls into an advanced education program because they are just going to get pregnant and drop out, that would be racist.
But aren’t you asserting that it was reasonable to question the immigration status of these workers because most illegal immigrants are Hispanic, even though most Hispanics are not illegal immigrants? Why
These are not the same. Progress is being made.
Now how about this?
[ol]
[li]Most gay men do not have AIDS.[/li][li]But a higher percentage of gay men have AIDS than straight women.[/li][li]In fighting AIDS, we should focus more on the gay community than on straight women.[/li][/ol]
Someone who says the above is not a bigot.
More importantly (in context of this discussion), someone who responds to the above by saying “but most gay men don’t have AIDS” is missing the boat.
I don’t consider checking someone’s legal status to be a punitive measure akin to not accepting people into advanced education programs.
You don’t only check for things that are most likely to be true. You check for all sorts of things that are most likely not true, just in case. And where you focus your checking is when you have a higher than average likelihood of being true.
The point made by TFD was that even if most individual Hispanics are legal, in a large group it’s most likely that some are. (I defended this to a limited extent in noting that you can’t dispute this by saying that 80% of individual Hispanics are legal.)
The point made by me was that the vast majority of Spanish speaking Hispanic construction laborers are illegal immigrants.
FTR, I’m not the guy saying that anyone needed to check anything. I think there’s a lot more to whether one should or shouldn’t check someone’s status than that. The discussion here is whether such a statement is “racist” (with the implication of bigoted) or not, not whether one should or not check the status of these people.
I thought you were getting it.
It’s not controversial to say any of the above. You’re trying to mislead by speaking about “communities” now. Of course, the issue in this thread, and your previous contentions here were not about broad communities, but about specific people.
So, if you were to assert that a particular man has AIDS because he is gay, then hopefully you can see what the problem would be. Similarly, if you assume that any specific group of gay men has AIDS because they are gay - problem.
Now, assuming that a particular person is an illegal alien because they are Hispanic - problem.
Did you want to talk about communities, or did you want to continue the line of logic you had previously advanced here?
I don’t think I can agree with that argument.
I don’t think it is wrong for anyone to suggest improvement to a process or to note when processes are not being followed correctly.
Not that I think a person who can see when people are not speaking English is primarily interested in process improvement.
If you want to make a big deal about what a “vast majority” means have at it. If one in five members of an ethnic group are illegal, I’d say that is huge and way out of proportion when compared to blacks, whites or Asians or any other ethnic group in America. I’d say the vast majority of blacks are legal.
Perhaps I need some educating here. Please explain this “selection bias”. I didn’t select this group. Whoever hired them did. For all I know this crew is entirely illegal or entirely legit. Still, I would suggest that investigating a crew of 10 Hispanics would yield a high probability finding an illegal immigrant.
You know what is really stupid ? When someone like you misrepresents a statement to suggest a fellow poster is stupid.
I did not say that it is reasonable to assume that two out ten would be illegal. I merely said there is a probability.
Can you not see the difference?