affirmative action: I believe is a necessary evil as white society has refused to correct the wrongs of the past. After 400+ years of systemic physical and economic oppression you can't just expect to say "we're now going to treat you as equals" and everything is ok. That is not to say improvements haven't been made but when power structures are designed to suck the economic and physical power from one group of people still today (i.e. Ferguson, MO), then drastic measures are necessary. I'd prefer a merit based system, but a true merit based system should provide equally safe and secure environments for all citizens to thrive.
> or online public spaces (where everyone should be treated with respect regardless of the merit metric).
This is bullshit.
Yeah, I agree. It is more wishful than true. I would say everyone should be treated with respect up and until, but then it is always a question of who is measuring. But it doesn't take much for some real vile shit to bubble up unfortunately. Sometimes it's just the edge cases (usually blamed on a small minority of the group), but often it comes from the middle as well or is representative of the groups mindspace.
(If all that makes sense. It's 5am and I'm still up working so I may just be rambling).
a true merit based system should provide equally safe and secure environments for all citizens to thrive
Incorrect. The best and worst part of a meritocracy is that, if you don't have merit you don't belong.
There is no obligation to "all citizens". Now, the corollary to this is that, if a citizen proves their merit, they must be rewarded for it, because that's the social contract in play.
But, there is no reason that the system has to reward unproven individuals just because of some diversity quota...in fact, that's a really good way of destroying the ecosystem (same point made in article) because it undermines the very philosophy the group is predicated upon.
Yes, true if speaking of a pure meritocracy. I was more imagining something close to our current society but merit based (one where people aren't just discarded for lack of certain merits).
I don't disagree that a system has to reward unproven individuals. My point in most of these comments is that we, no matter how much we say we are choosing based solely on merit or production, most often are not. We are a bundle of overt and hidden biases.
affirmative action: I believe is a necessary evil as white society has refused to correct the wrongs of the past. After 400+ years of systemic physical and economic oppression you can't just expect to say "we're now going to treat you as equals" and everything is ok. That is not to say improvements haven't been made but when power structures are designed to suck the economic and physical power from one group of people still today (i.e. Ferguson, MO), then drastic measures are necessary. I'd prefer a merit based system, but a true merit based system should provide equally safe and secure environments for all citizens to thrive.
> or online public spaces (where everyone should be treated with respect regardless of the merit metric). This is bullshit.
Yeah, I agree. It is more wishful than true. I would say everyone should be treated with respect up and until, but then it is always a question of who is measuring. But it doesn't take much for some real vile shit to bubble up unfortunately. Sometimes it's just the edge cases (usually blamed on a small minority of the group), but often it comes from the middle as well or is representative of the groups mindspace.
(If all that makes sense. It's 5am and I'm still up working so I may just be rambling).