On Thu, 24 Apr 2008 09:43:26 -0700, Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom>
wrote:

>Stephen wrote:
>> I think what she is saying is that people who are born into a
>> "privilege" don't see that the "privilege" is a privilege and don't
>> take it into account when dealing with people who were not born with
>> that "privilege".
>
>I think calling it a "privilege" is disingeuous myself. Almost all the 
>stuff she talks about being a "privilege" is stuff that a politician 
>would call "rights".  It's not a "privilege" to be treated fairly by the 
>courts, or to be allowed to live without being hassled by your 
>neighbors, or to avoid being beat up for no reason when you walk down 
>the street.
>
>The idea that you'd want to take these "privileges" away from someone in 
>order to be "more fair" is absurd in my mind.

Sorry Darren, I didn't mean to start it up again :)

If you had the right to sleep with a bride before her wedding. Do you
not think it "fairer" for that right to be taken away than for
everyone to be given that right?
-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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Stephen wrote:
> If you had the right to sleep with a bride before her wedding.

I would think that would be a privilege. ;-)

-- 
   Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
     "That's pretty. Where's that?"
          "It's the Age of Channelwood."
     "We should go there on vacation some time."

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"Gilles Tran" <gil### [at] agroparistechfr> wrote in message
news:4810a102$1@news.povray.org...

> Now obviously people in Group A are innocent and are not responsible. But
> there's still a pending debt to pay to contemporary Group B and the only
> people who can pay it are Group A, who are, after all, living off the
> interest of grandpa's crimes. If you're from Group B, hearing Group A say
> "Well, I don't care" doesn't really cut it.

However there's a big difference between reparation and retribution. All too
often the tendency seems to be towards the latter.

Take a look at SA currently. Yes, apartheid was wrong. Very wrong. But does
that make Affirmative action (aka reverse apartheid) right?

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Gail Shaw <initialsurname@sentech sa dot com> wrote:
> Take a look at SA currently. Yes, apartheid was wrong. Very wrong. But does
> that make Affirmative action (aka reverse apartheid) right?

  The most worrying thing happening there is the nuclear plant.

  Racism (regardless of the skin color of the racists and the victims)
is bad enough, but when it escalates to a point where there's a danger
of a nuclear disaster, something is extremely wrong.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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"Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
news:4810e351@news.povray.org...
> Gail Shaw <initialsurname@sentech sa dot com> wrote:
> > Take a look at SA currently. Yes, apartheid was wrong. Very wrong. But
does
> > that make Affirmative action (aka reverse apartheid) right?
>
>   The most worrying thing happening there is the nuclear plant.

Take a lot of the news you hear from here with a large pinch of salt. That
'story' is especially exaggerated

>   Racism (regardless of the skin color of the racists and the victims)
> is bad enough, but when it escalates to a point where there's a danger
> of a nuclear disaster, something is extremely wrong.

You seem to know something I don't....

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On Thu, 24 Apr 2008 05:55:54 -0400, Warp wrote:

> Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
>> On Wed, 23 Apr 2008 19:11:06 -0400, Warp wrote:
> 
>> >   The history of a person started when he was born.
> 
>> Gads, I smell another semantic battle coming up here, so I'll bow out.
> 
>   No, it's not about semantics.

Sure it is.  My history is not limited to events that happen to me - I 
was not talking about a personal history, I was talking about collective 
history, which is the most common usage of the word "history" in the 
English language.

>   You claim that a person's history consists of his ancestors' history
> besides his own life. I disagree. Why should it have any effect on your
> actions what your ancestors did or didn't do? Why should your own
> ancestors' actions have more effect on yours than the actions of someone
> else's ancestors?

Because the mistakes made by those who came before me (whether related by 
blood or not) are mistakes I personally would care not to repeat.  
Similarly, in my role here at work, I try to do things that don't counter 
decisions made by the people who came before me - unless those decisions 
were, in my judgement, bad decisions to begin with.  Then I fix them.

I can't just come in and say "right, everything we did before is null and 
void, I don't care who promised you what, we're starting over from 
scratch".  If we did that on a national/global scale every generation, 
we'd never get anywhere, and we CERTAINLY wouldn't make any progress.

>   And in this thread in particular: Why should the social status (in
>   this
> case being an immigrant) of your distant ancestors have any effect on
> your own social status or your opinions? You are not your ancestors. You
> are not what they were. You are you, and what you are depends only on
> what you have done.

No, that's simply not true.  That the families that came into the US (for 
me about 4 or 5 generations ago) were permitted to enter this country, 
even though they didn't speak English (well, some of them did - they came 
from England) and were welcomed (generally) without people saying "Hey, 
<derrogatory term>, why don't you learn some goddamned English?  YOU'RE 
IN AMERICA NOW, SPEAK ENGLISH YOU FRIGGIN IDIOT!" does inform my opinions 
on matters like this.  As well it should.  Doesn't mean I'll always agree 
with them, but that past informs my decisions and opinions in the current 
world situation.

Oddly enough, most of my friends describe my attitudes as being more 
European than American as a result.  Seems I'm not alone in thinking this 
is the right way to approach decision making about matters of public 
policy.

Jim

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On Thu, 24 Apr 2008 09:43:26 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> It's not a "privilege" to be treated fairly by the courts, or to be
> allowed to live without being hassled by your neighbors, or to avoid
> being beat up for no reason when you walk down the street.

Some might argue, though, that it is if your situation is such that you 
are not.  There's the idea (which is what you describe), and then there's 
the reality (which many in the US live in every day).  It *shouldn't* be 
a privilege, I'd agree with that - it should be something everyone has 
access to.

> The idea that you'd want to take these "privileges" away from someone in
> order to be "more fair" is absurd in my mind.

I agree with this.  For example, the way to fix "not everyone is treated 
fairly by the courts" is not to make the situation so it reads "everyone 
is treated unfairly by the courts".

Jim

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On Thu, 24 Apr 2008 10:26:44 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> Stephen wrote:
>> If you had the right to sleep with a bride before her wedding.
> 
> I would think that would be a privilege. ;-)

Depends on the bride. ;-)

Jim

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On Thu, 24 Apr 2008 09:24:33 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> But yes, they didn't really stand a chance because of the technological
>> differences - that doesn't mean they didn't try or that they weren't
>> willing to do so.
> 
> True. I misread your original post that I followed up to. Your
> "unwilling, or didn't try" came out as binary alternatives in my brain
> rather than two restatements of the same idea.

Not a problem - completely understand how that happened. :-)

Jim

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Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> >   You claim that a person's history consists of his ancestors' history
> > besides his own life. I disagree. Why should it have any effect on your
> > actions what your ancestors did or didn't do? Why should your own
> > ancestors' actions have more effect on yours than the actions of someone
> > else's ancestors?

> Because the mistakes made by those who came before me (whether related by 
> blood or not) are mistakes I personally would care not to repeat.  

  Which is precisely what I said: It doesn't matter who *your* ancestors
were. "Your ancestors also did this or that" is completely irrelevant.

  If I'm to learn from past mistakes of humanity, why should I make any
distinction between whether those people were my ancestors or not? That's
absolutely and completely irrelevant.

  The original point in this thread was that you shouldn't treat immigrants
with disrespect *because your ancestors were immigrants too*.
  No, that's not the reason why you shouldn't treat immigrants (or anyone
else) with disrespect. That's just an irrelevant argument which doesn't
make any sense.

> I can't just come in and say "right, everything we did before is null and 
> void, I don't care who promised you what, we're starting over from 
> scratch".  If we did that on a national/global scale every generation, 
> we'd never get anywhere, and we CERTAINLY wouldn't make any progress.

  I didn't even understand that.

> >   And in this thread in particular: Why should the social status (in
> >   this
> > case being an immigrant) of your distant ancestors have any effect on
> > your own social status or your opinions? You are not your ancestors. You
> > are not what they were. You are you, and what you are depends only on
> > what you have done.

> No, that's simply not true.  That the families that came into the US (for 
> me about 4 or 5 generations ago) were permitted to enter this country, 
> even though they didn't speak English (well, some of them did - they came 
> from England) and were welcomed (generally) without people saying "Hey, 
> <derrogatory term>, why don't you learn some goddamned English?  YOU'RE 
> IN AMERICA NOW, SPEAK ENGLISH YOU FRIGGIN IDIOT!" does inform my opinions 
> on matters like this.  As well it should.  Doesn't mean I'll always agree 
> with them, but that past informs my decisions and opinions in the current 
> world situation.

  Sorry, I still don't understand. Informs?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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