Why minorities always feel put upon
Lord Limbic
"MINORITY VIEWPOINTS, INDIVIDUALS, AND STATISTICS
Of more general concern than particular networks of personal associations is
the way that minority status-a crucial ingredient in many people's
identities-colors our view of many societal issues. In an oddly basic way, a
minority's viewpoint(s), and even an individual's, may be affected by
probability and statistics.
A thought experiment illustrates the point. (The term thought experiment
denotes an idealized investigation of a phenomenon that tries to capture its
essence without becoming bogged down in minutiae.) A supercharged area of
American life, race relations, certainly is in need of thought experiments,
simplistic though they may be. So let us experiment and assume that contrary
to fact, blacks and whites hold positions of equal importance and influence.
Assume further that about 10 percent of each group is racist, and that the
country is both residentially and professionally integrated. Given these
unrealistic assumptions it is not hard to demonstrate that since blacks
comprise approximately 13 percent of the population and whites the remaining
87 percent (for these purposes, whites are non-blacks), blacks still would
suffer disproportionately from racism.
The chance that a white will run into a black racist in any given encounter
with another person is 1.3 percent (10 percent of 13 percent), whereas the
likelihood that a black on any given encounter will do so is 8.7 percent (10
percent of 87 percent). This disparity becomes more pronounced as the number
of a person's contacts grow.
If a white person encounters 5 people, his or her chances of meeting at
least 1 racist are 6.3 percent, while the average number of racists he or
she will encounter is .07. By contrast, if a black person encounters 5
people, his or her chances of meeting at least 1 racist are 36.6 percent,
while the average number of racists he or she will encounter is .44. If a
white person encounters 25 people, his or her chances of meeting at least 1
racist rise to 27.9 percent, while the average number of racists he or she
will encounter rises to .33. If a black person encounters 25 people, his or
her chances of meeting at least 1 racist rise to 89.7 percent, while the
average number of racists he or she will encounter rises to 2.18.
The conclusion is that minority status by itself can make equal opportunity
difficult to achieve or maintain. In fact, if the already idealized above
mentioned conditions held, but now only 2 percent of whites and 10 percent
of blacks were racist, blacks would still encounter more racism than would
whites.
Most simple models can be made more realistic by introducing more
complicated assumptions. I'd like to add a couple to the example just
considered. First, replace racism with bias or general offensiveness.
Further, don't assume that individuals are biased or unbiased but rather
that they are biased to differing degrees, measured sim-plistically by
percentages. The numbers in this example would have to be massaged a bit,
but the same lesson would emerge: members of a minority group would
encounter more bias than would members of a larger group. Next, assume that
the minority group consists of only a few members, say a family. The effect,
of course, would be exacerbated. The family generally would be the recipient
of incomparably more bias or overall offensive-ness than it displayed to the
outside world ("generally" because the family might be quite nasty).
Let us take the scenario one step further and shrink the family to an
individual. Again, the individual generally would be the recipient of
incomparably more bias or offensiveness than he or she displayed to the
outside world (again, "generally" allows for the nasty exception). And we
are not only confronted with bias or offensiveness; all of us begin life as
small beings and know intimately what it is like to be powerless. Instances
of powerlessness are much more common than are instances of bias.
These elementary considerations shed some light on why so many of us feel
vulnerable and victimized. While most of us, at least by our own reckoning,
try to be kind and considerate to others, we very often find that "they" are
thoughtless and rude to us. Part of the explanation derives from arithmetic
and probability, but this insight should not be imparted to the snarling
driver stepping out of his car to contest your simultaneous discovery of
"his" parking spot.
Note that only one of the conventional elements of narrative played a role
in the aforementioned analysis: the simple notion of an agent's viewpoint.
The richness and complexity of most everyday situations make basic
arithmetic insights less visible. Similar observations hold for fictional
situations. Seeing events from the point of view of a character within a
story or through the eyes of the story's narrator is not conducive to
probabilistic reasoning. Almost any ostensibly improbable event is likely to
be explained away by the reader as resulting from some unspecified facts or
assumptions."
From "Once upon a number" by John Allen Paulos
---------------------------------------------
Regards
Lord Limbic
John D Salt
news:9t6flq$krcp$1...@ID-58787.news.dfncis.de:
[Snips]
> Most simple models can be made more realistic by introducing
> more complicated assumptions.
That's a mistake that someone with a PhD in mathematics ought to
know better than to make. Complexity does not equal realism. I
have seen plenty of models that are finely-detailed and wildly
unrealistic (skating for a moment over the problematic nature of
"realism" for the moment).
> world ("generally" because the family might be quite nasty).
I'd guess that it's the sub-editor rather than the mathematician
using "generally" in the sense of "mostly".
> These elementary considerations shed some light on why so
> many of us feel vulnerable and victimized.
I can't see anything here beyond the fairly obvious observation
that minorities have fewer people in them than majorities.
> Note that only one of the conventional elements of narrative
> played a role in the aforementioned analysis: the simple
> notion of an agent's viewpoint. The richness and complexity
> of most everyday situations make basic arithmetic insights
> less visible. Similar observations hold for fictional
> situations. Seeing events from the point of view of a
> character within a story or through the eyes of the story's
> narrator is not conducive to probabilistic reasoning. Almost
> any ostensibly improbable event is likely to be explained
> away by the reader as resulting from some unspecified facts
> or assumptions."
Now *that* is an interesting observation. Does he present any
evidence for it anywhere, do you know?
> From "Once upon a number" by John Allen Paulos
All the best,
John.
Bill Willis
Lord Limbic wrote:
Snip.
What is your point with this posting?. ISTM the post useds 100 lines to simply
state the obvious in a most convoluted way. You (or your source) conclude that
minorities are most likely to experience racism because they are minorities and
the greater the minority (numerically speaking) the greater likelihood of
experiencing bias?
Is this what this posting is about or am I missing something? Seems rather
intuitive to me and hardly needs to be explained and explained extensively at
that.
Bill
Jon
protection by making more and more laws aimed at curtailing the majorities
ability to discriminate against the minority. This will only give greater
and greater offence to the majority so thereby swelling the number,
percentage wise, that are racist.
"Lord Limbic" <limb...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:9t6flq$krcp$1...@ID-58787.news.dfncis.de...
billy
"Lord Limbic" <limb...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:9t6flq$krcp$1...@ID-58787.news.dfncis.de...
>
>
> Of more general concern than particular networks of personal
associations is
> identities - colors our view of many societal issues.
>
> From "Once upon a number" by John Allen Paulos
>
> ---------------------------------------------
>
> Regards
>
> Lord Limbic
Lord Limbic:
Using the word "colour" in another aspect of it "colouring many
societal issues", I would like to relate an incident:
A friend of mine has a young daughter who recently started, first
time, at a school where there are people from "another origin".
The following conversation took place between my friend and his
daughter:
Daughter: "Daddy? Why do some children at my school have a black
skin?"
Daddy: "You mustn't notice skin colour. It is no more to be noticed
than different hair colour."
Daughter: "But, daddy? Why do they have black skin?"
Daddy: maintains a brief silence then starts a conversation with me.
When out of "range" of his daughter, I asked Mike why he evaded the
question. He told me the school had given "guidance" to parents to
"play down" the skin colour question and should affirm the colour of
the skin should not be treated as important. He said he did not want
to conflict with the school's guideline as this would cause his
daughter confusion.
I avoided pointing out that the experience with my kids indicated the
more evasion there is about what a child can obviously see as a
"distinction which raises curiosity" makes the distinction increase in
importance along with the curiosity.
This, to me, is the core of the problem which I believe the school has
unwittingly created: In trying to make (black) minorities feel not
"put upon" by "noticing" their skin-colour, they make the skin colour
an issue.
My friend's daughter's question will not go away. But she has been
implicitly told she has entered a "sensitive zone". She may then feel
"uneasy" about skin-colour. Also, the black kids may feel their
skin-colour is and "unmentionable" which will make them feel "put
upon".
The plot has all sorts of "colorations."
regards, billy
*********************
John D Salt
news:djKJ7.10314$9Q.13...@news1.cableinet.net:
> There is also the point that if minorities are given (so
> called) greater protection by making more and more laws
> aimed at curtailing the majorities ability to discriminate
> against the minority. This will only give greater and
> greater offence to the majority so thereby swelling the
> number, percentage wise, that are racist.
[Snips]
I can't see how that follows.
Presumably, those members who wished to discriminate against a
minority were "racist" anyway, and those who did not intend to
discriminate will not be worried on their own account about being
forbidden to do something they never intended to.
All the best,
John.
Conor
Funny how the chinese and Japanese descent don't seem to feel too put
upon. Many just get on with life and are damned successful because of
it. IMO many of the asians in places like Leeds/Bradford feel it is
their right to have the rest of the country feed them etc.
--
_________________________
Conor Turton
conor_...@hotmail.com
ICQ:31909763
_________________________
A. J. Moss
>I can't see how that follows.
>
>Presumably, those members who wished to discriminate against a
>minority were "racist" anyway, and those who did not intend to
>discriminate will not be worried on their own account about being
>forbidden to do something they never intended to.
This presumption cannot be squared with recent events in Zimbabwe.
John D Salt
news:3bfabd6e...@news.junglelink.net:
In what way?
I cannot recall there being any particular legislation being
introduced to protect minorities in Zimbabwe anyway, so I don't
see how it is even relevant.
All the best,
John.