Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Philosophy Club

[Sculptor1]

I suppose the DEI propaganda has worked and the American people have consciously and unconsciously applied thier innate misogyny and racism to prefer a crinimal because they simply could not imagine a short black woman in the Whitehouse.
I'd say God help you all, but God is half the problem of the American psyche.

What a missed opportunity.

[Sy Borg]

I am for the former. Treat people equally, based on merit and need. As for past discrimination, if everyone is treated equally, gradually things will even out. Why rush progress based on ideology rather than simply treating people as individuals and letting nature take its course, rather than making policy based on demographics? Societies can simply allow the progress that automatically happens from industrialisation and digitalisation to happen organically. Tinkering creates the risk of unforeseen problems, eg. the welfare cycle, transitioning young children.

I can agree with treating people equally based on race. I cannot agree with treating them equally based on wealth and income. The wealthy are holding the spoils of past discrimination and the poor are suffering the lingering effects of past injustices. We should have more empathy than it takes to tell millions of people to wait a few generations for things to even out a little bit.

More important even than justice is the lost opportunity of getting the full potential out of all those folks who are stuck on the bottom, whether as a result of discrimination or the poor efforts or bad choices of their parents or grandparents. With each generation, we lose out because people with great potential are put in situations where that potential is inevitably wasted as they get a poor education in a dangerous and unhealthy environment with few resources available for them to use to break the cycle. I truly believe that society would get a good return on the money invested in helping the poor to advance. The fact that it also speeds up the advance of justice makes it a no-brainer. I don't see any valid 'reverse discrimination' argument against this approach.

That's not what is happening. Decisions are being made on the basis of race and gender, regardless of income. If you are white or straight male, you are an Oppressor, no matter how poor you are, and if you are black or female, you are the Oppressed, even if you are in the top 1%.

No one here is arguing against helping families get out of the welfare cycle, or against progressive taxes.

[LuckyR]

I suppose the DEI propaganda has worked and the American people have consciously and unconsciously applied thier innate misogyny and racism to prefer a crinimal because they simply could not imagine a short black woman in the Whitehouse.
I'd say God help you all, but God is half the problem of the American psyche.

What a missed opportunity.

Don't you understand? A Black person is probably a criminal also.

[Mo_reese]

I suppose the DEI propaganda has worked and the American people have consciously and unconsciously applied thier innate misogyny and racism to prefer a crinimal because they simply could not imagine a short black woman in the Whitehouse.
I'd say God help you all, but God is half the problem of the American psyche.

What a missed opportunity.

Kamala Harris was chosen by Biden because she was female and non-white and those that worship at the alter of the neo-liberal Democratic elite were over joyed (DEI personified). But when it came to a second term, which Biden promised he wouldn't seek, the Dem elite were in a bind. Obvious to everyone that Biden was not strong enough for a second term but how would they get out of not running Harris? They knew she couldn't stand up to campaigning and real questioning. So they left a staggering Biden in until the last hour and then switched him out for Harris like a magic trick. Maybe no one would notice that she babbled on and on, not making any sense. I think people noticed. But also, 76% of Democratic voters do not support Biden's assistance of Israel's genocide. Harris didn't have the guts to agree but instead courted war criminal Dick Cheney and his daughter. People noticed.

[Sculptor1]

I suppose the DEI propaganda has worked and the American people have consciously and unconsciously applied thier innate misogyny and racism to prefer a crinimal because they simply could not imagine a short black woman in the Whitehouse.
I'd say God help you all, but God is half the problem of the American psyche.

What a missed opportunity.

Don't you understand? A Black person is probably a criminal also.

A black person is a criminal.?
WTF does that mean?

[Sculptor1]

I suppose the DEI propaganda has worked and the American people have consciously and unconsciously applied thier innate misogyny and racism to prefer a crinimal because they simply could not imagine a short black woman in the Whitehouse.
I'd say God help you all, but God is half the problem of the American psyche.

What a missed opportunity.

Kamala Harris was chosen by Biden because she was female and non-white and those that worship at the alter of the neo-liberal Democratic elite were over joyed (DEI personified). But when it came to a second term, which Biden promised he wouldn't seek, the Dem elite were in a bind. Obvious to everyone that Biden was not strong enough for a second term but how would they get out of not running Harris? They knew she couldn't stand up to campaigning and real questioning. So they left a staggering Biden in until the last hour and then switched him out for Harris like a magic trick. Maybe no one would notice that she babbled on and on, not making any sense. I think people noticed. But also, 76% of Democratic voters do not support Biden's assistance of Israel's genocide. Harris didn't have the guts to agree but instead courted war criminal Dick Cheney and his daughter. People noticed.

RUbbish. Harris was objectively the better candidate.
Clearly she would have been better to have gone through the whole nomination process, but the Democratic Party had the opportunity to challenge her candidacy but did not.
SHe was more than qualified for the job in all the ways Trump is not fit for the job.
Your 76% number - where did you get that? Or are you just making it up.
Had Harris sided with Palestine she would have been slaughtered by the media. And seriously I do not think this issue had any bearing on the result of the election. Unless you are trying to pretend that Democrats did not vote for that reason, when they saw the danger of Trump they stayed away from the ballots?
Supporting Cheney was a gamble. But there were so many Republicans coming out in support of her, that one more was not going to make a difference.
I really think that the reasons I gave above are the difference that made the difference- racism and misogyny.

[Mo_reese]

Not sure where I saw the 76% number but here they say 75% https://news.gallup.com/poll/642695/maj ... -gaza.aspx
Harris was not a good candidate when she didn't have a script in front of her she was horrible. I agree that racism and misogyny were most like factors, but how can we tell if we have a bad candidate that happens to be non-white and female? The Elitist Democratic party establishment has long ago dropped using issues in their campaigns and it was obvious that Harris was not chosen for VP because of her stances on issues. After the shenanigans by the DNC in 2016, 2020 and then again in 2024 some people gave up on hoping the Dem party would be honest. There were around 100 million eligible voters that failed to vote. The Dem Party should have wooed them but that might require some honest promises of progressive legislation.

[LuckyR]

Don't you understand? A Black person is probably a criminal also.

A black person is a criminal.?
WTF does that mean?

Sorry, sarcasm is difficult to convey sometimes.

[Sy Borg]

Too much emphasis on identity and not enough on policy. Governments are not supposed target groups, but govern for everyone. All this targeting "black women" or "Latino males" etc is cynical and superficial. It's a campaign tactic that has worked in the past but people are now seeing through it, so new strategies will be needed, hopefully more sincere and less manipulative.

[Sculptor1]

Don't you understand? A Black person is probably a criminal also.

A black person is a criminal.?
WTF does that mean?

Sorry, sarcasm is difficult to convey sometimes.

I'll allow that you were being ironic, that MAGA types assume that skin colour is essentailly criminal. IS that what you meant?

[Mo_reese]

Too much emphasis on identity and not enough on policy. Governments are not supposed target groups, but govern for everyone. All this targeting "black women" or "Latino males" etc is cynical and superficial. It's a campaign tactic that has worked in the past but people are now seeing through it, so new strategies will be needed, hopefully more sincere and less manipulative.

I certainly agree but do I do not believe there is a chance in hell that the Democratic Elite will change their spots. They should have read the room when the Queen Neo-Liberal, Hillary Clinton lost to Trump. She called the Republicans "deplorables" in public and I bet she called Sen Sander's followers the same in private.
The hubris of the Democratic Elite has no limit. Obama the King of the Neo-Liberals once told, via his chief of staff, the Left to "sit down and shut up".
In 2020 the Democratic National Committee doubled down on their hubris by appointing Biden, a doddering old fart to stumble his way thru the presidency. Then can the anointment of Kamala "word salad" Harris.
The billionaires that control the Dem Elites badly want to control the US but never bad enough to give the People anything. They won't be hurting under Trump.

[Lagayascienza]

True, the Clintons and Bidens won't be hurting under Trump. Those who will be hurting are Trump's base in the US rust-belts. If those deluded suckers think deporting immigrants, cutting social security and funding corporate bailouts with their taxes will get their jobs back or raise their salaries, then they are sorely mistaken. Raising wages is the last thing that corporations and the billionaires who own them want. Instead of employing workers they will continue to invest in automation so that workers are not needed. And even if the rust -belt masses realized their mistake, there will be no one worth voting for at the next election because there is no social democratic party in the US that would address their problems. There are just the two parties controlled by elites. The billionaires and corporations will make sure it stays that way.

[Sy Borg]

Actually, I think Trump's base will thrive as new opportunities arise with reduced regulation. That's why they voted for him. Contrary to what university-educated extremists always claim, right wing voters are not stupid or naive. That's why they are rejecting the lies of the mainstream media. The left should be doing that too. It seems to me that gaslighting the public is a MSM habit - when faced with the choice of telling the truth or spinning the subject matter or neglecting key information to induce a line of thinking, they seem to reflexively opt for the latter.

[Lagayascienza]

I hope for their sake you are right, SY Borg. However, blue collar workers didn't thrive last time Trump was President and I doubt they will this time. I think that things will continue as they have for many decades now and likely get worse for workers because of the continuing corporatization of everything and falling real wages due to increasing automation. But billionaires will become trillionaires and the political elites will continue to do very well. What's not to like?

[Mounce574]

I agree that DEI is doublespeak. The fact that an unqualified person is hired based on any attribute (race, gender, religious, etc) instead of a qualified person that doesn't fit in the category is why we, in the United States at least, have so many things that are in lawsuits for negligence. I would much rather hire Bill the straight white guy who knows what he is doing instead of Muhammad from the Middle East that doesn't have a clue about what he is working on. (These are generalizations, so please don't consider this as being negative towards any one group).
In the book Caudacity, the author, John Falcone, states "Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) is Affirmative Action on steroids. DEI doesn’t elevate minorities with teaching or training to meet employment qualifications; no, DEI either reduces the employment qualifications until minorities qualify or prioritize their race over qualifications."

I'm not certain in what context "unqualified" candidates are selected, it would be enlightening if an example could be provided. In the cases I'm familiar with, there is an overabundance of candidates who meet the selection criteria, ie they're all "qualified". That's the standard scenario in high demand situations such as entry into medical school, law school, Ivy league universities, tenure track professorships etc. Say Blacks are 10% of the population but are 5% of qualified medical school applicants. No matter what anyone does 75% of all of these qualified applicants won't be selected. In the distant past 1% of the class was Black, later 5%, it never reached 10%. Would it be OK if it was 10%?

Unqualified: Flight 3591, Boeing 767-375BCF, N1217A, Trinity Bay, Texas, February 23, 2019. Aircraft Accident.
Both pilots were hired to fit DEI policies.
There is also the issue with FEMA recently