Post: #1

http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/prog...es/6437058

Get a load of this:

Quote:Is having a loving family an unfair advantage?

So many disputes in our liberal democratic society hinge on the tension between inequality and fairness: between groups, between sexes, between individuals, and increasingly between families.

The power of the family to tilt equality hasn’t gone unnoticed, and academics and public commentators have been blowing the whistle for some time. Now, philosophers Adam Swift and Harry Brighouse have felt compelled to conduct a cool reassessment.

Swift in particular has been conflicted for some time over the curious situation that arises when a parent wants to do the best for her child but in the process makes the playing field for others even more lopsided.

‘I got interested in this question because I was interested in equality of opportunity,’ he says.

‘I had done some work on social mobility and the evidence is overwhelmingly that the reason why children born to different families have very different chances in life is because of what happens in those families.’

Once he got thinking, Swift could see that the issue stretches well beyond the fact that some families can afford private schooling, nannies, tutors, and houses in good suburbs. Functional family interactions—from going to the cricket to reading bedtime stories—form a largely unseen but palpable fault line between families. The consequence is a gap in social mobility and equality that can last for generations.

So, what to do?

According to Swift, from a purely instrumental position the answer is straightforward.

‘One way philosophers might think about solving the social justice problem would be by simply abolishing the family. If the family is this source of unfairness in society then it looks plausible to think that if we abolished the family there would be a more level playing field.’

I'm only giving a little here. You really should read the rest.

The far left fringe used to say the family was oppressive and should be done away with. Now it's being done away with gradually but the ones that remain confer an "unfair advantage" on their kids. Is it oppressive or advantageous? What about the empowered single moms?

Then there's this part:

Quote:‘I don’t think parents reading their children bedtime stories should constantly have in their minds the way that they are unfairly disadvantaging other people’s children, but I think they should have that thought occasionally,’ quips Swift.

Post: #2

When I saw the Author's last name Swift I thought of Jonathan Swift (Gulliver's Travels, A Modest Proposal)?

This person is an idiot, a caricature. Does he also suggest that the unfairly advantaged ones could donate their parents as food for the disadvantaged as an updated Modest Proposal?

Post: #3

Harrison Bergeron is the logical endgame of progressivism.

Post: #4

Having your father in your life is an UNFAIR advantage.

Having siblings is an UNFAIR advantage.

Having no siblings is an UNFAIR disadvantage.

Having a "nuclear" family is an UNFAIR advantage.


They'll constantly make excuses for ANYTHING, always playing the victim card.

I'd ask when it ends, but it'll never end.

Post: #5

Yes, I was hoping this was going to be a Swiftian-joke, as well.

The modern Liberal Modest Proposal:
1. Encourage the dissolution of the nuclear family
2. Declare remaining stable nuclear families to have an unfair privilege
3. Demand policies and funds to "rectify" this "inequality," coincidentally creating more make-work for liberals, consolidating liberal power and status, and lining liberal pockets
4. Profit
5. Circle back to 1.

Unfortunately, liberals want to have their cake and eat it too. Single mothers and other "alternative" households are just as good as traditional, nuclear families! But traditional, nuclear families are somehow able to imbue their children with privilege!

Of course, these liberals miss the endogeneity entirely.

The kinds of parents that live in nice suburbs with nuclear families and get nannies, etc. for their kids are disproportionately high in IQ, conscientiousness, and impulse control, which they pass on to their kids genetically.

Secondarily, the benefit of living in nice suburbs is not because nice suburbs have some magical privilege-imbuing effect, but rather because the kids can associate with other kids disproportionately high in IQ, conscientiousness, and impulse control. Go ahead and bus kids around, and you will just create within-school cognitive stratification.

Post: #6

It's a stupid question.

It is undoubtedly a huge advantage.

Perhaps everyone should agree to not learn to read, so that the illiterates don't feel bad?

On second thought maybe it isn't really a bad question, because it higlights just how dumb worrying about "unfair advantages" are. Everything in life is about getting unfair advantages. Do you have an in-demand skill that lets you demand a high salary? That's an unfair advantage, and good on you for getting that advantage.

Post: #7

You didn't build that.

Your kid doesn't belong to you.

Post: #8

The road to great unhappiness is paved with people who live their lives measuring what they feel they have against what they believe others to have.

Post: #9

Notice at how much hate fills these SJW's hearts:

- They want to kill the love between men and women
- They want to kill the love between children and parents
- They want to kill the love between people within a community

According to these SJW's any slut that gets knocked up is now the communities responsibility. The mother has no consequences, just entitlements.

Keep pushing SJW's. Only a matter of time before the common man snaps back and starts the massacre of these insane tyrants.

Post: #10

That article could have been two sentences long. "Please read XYZ Chapter of the Communist Manifesto. Thanks, bye."

Post: #11

(05-05-2015 05:11 PM)Grange Wrote:  ‘One way philosophers might think about solving the social justice problem would be by simply abolishing the family. If the family is this source of unfairness in society then it looks plausible to think that if we abolished the family there would be a more level playing field.’

This has to be satire. Instead of encouraging more stable families amongst society, the answer is to get rid of all families? Sounds a lot like communism to me. Their goal is not to create prosperity, but to make everyone equally miserable in the name of fairness.

Also, most psychology research that shows what benefit parenting brings are essentially useless for this reason:

Steven Pinker Wrote:Most studies of parenting on which this advice is based are useless. They're useless because they don't control for heritability. They measure some correlation between what the parents do, how the children turn out and assume a causal relation: that the parenting shaped the child. Parents who talk a lot to their kids have kids who grow up to be articulate, parents who spank their kids have kids who grow up to be violent and so on. And very few of them control for the possibility that parents pass on genes for -- that increase the chances a child will be articulate or violent and so on. Until the studies are redone with adoptive children, who provide an environment but not genes to their kids, we have no way of knowing whether these conclusions are valid.

As for improving social mobility, here is another uncomfortable fact; Rates of social mobility are low across all societies. Modern Sweden, which has very high levels of govt. intervention has not managed to increase rates of social mobility above that of medieval England, which had basically no real intervention. Much of one's success is determined by ancestral lineage, and it takes an average of 10-15 generations for one to regress to the mean.





If you REALLY want to dramatically fix inequality, you'd have to somehow remove assortative mating from human nature. Stop letting high IQ males mate with high IQ females. Of course, that's a ridiculous proposal but that would be the only way to correct for "unfairness".

Post: #12

Quote:'One way philosophers might think about solving the social justice problem would be by simply abolishing the family. If the family is this source of unfairness in society then it looks plausible to think that if we abolished the family there would be a more level playing field.’

It's a farce he uses the word philosopher in that sentence. The bolded part above is a non-sequitur. Last I checked, philosophers obey the rules of logic.

It's like saying since the stomach is the source of hunger, therefore we need to abolish the stomach to end world hunger. Possibly one of the dumbest fucking idiots I've ever read.

Post: #13

No way. A curvy, empowered single mother who reads cookbook recipe stories for its child to sleep is superior. It is nuclear family kids that are disadvantaged. The nuclear family has a poor mother who is oppressed by the dad and the patriarchy.

Post: #14

Quote:'One way philosophers might think about solving the social justice problem would be by simply abolishing the family. If the family is this source of unfairness in society then it looks plausible to think that if we abolished the family there would be a more level playing field.’

So what he's saying seems to be "Gays and Lesbians should not be allowed to adopt children."

Nothing new here: the destruction of the family unit was always a Leftist goal.

Post: #15

(05-05-2015 06:09 PM)Samseau Wrote:  Notice at how much hate fills these SJW's hearts:

- They want to kill the love between men and women
- They want to kill the love between children and parents
- They want to kill the love between people within a community

According to these SJW's any slut that gets knocked up is now the communities responsibility. The mother has no consequences, just entitlements.

Keep pushing SJW's. Only a matter of time before the common man snaps back and starts the massacre of these insane tyrants.

I keep repeating myself, but I do state that this is perfectly in line with the desired end-goal of Brave New World where children are best brought up completely detached from their parents:



I just read about Sweden where the author explains that one of the reasons why the Swedes go along with the current suicidal policies is because almost all of them go to state sponsored child care by the age of 1-2. They get their daily dose of state indoctrination from an early age on.

Having a nice home with both biological parents is an incredibly unfair advantage indeed. Never mind being born with a trust fund and family connections that stretch to presidents and prime ministers. That means nothing I am sure.

Post: #16

Typical Year Zero insanity -- these "philosophers" LOL feel they are in a good position to "consider" and "decide" how an institution like the family should be redesigned from scratch going forward, based on paper thin "arguments". What monstrous fools!

Their actual conclusion, if you read the rest of that inane article, is "in favor" of the family, though they would forbid "elite schooling" because they have determined that it leads to "inequality" without any offsetting "benefits" (unlike the benefits of parents reading to their kids which they are kind and thoughtful enough to "allow" going forward). It is a remarkable and true fact that these Year Zero freaks feel their "philosophy" degree, and the fact that they can publish "peer reviewed" babble in some journals read only by other freaks of like disposition, entitle them to pronounce such judgments advocating the fundamental restructuring of the most basic and age-old human institution.

And lest someone think that this kind of Year Zero academic baby talk is harmless -- this is far from being the case. Since these are "academic philosophers" that get published in "peer reviewed" publications, their nonsense chatter is considered fit to be cited by legislators as "research" supporting this or that Year Zero law. Almost all the insane laws that we are dealing with now, such as "Yes means Yes" and others, have originated in academic "research" of one kind or another which is then used to support these outrages after being popularized in the media. And that is how it goes. Of course it does not necessarily mean that these particular freaks will have any significant influence, but it is important to realize that they are not merely harmless lunatics whose ravings can be safely ignored.

Post: #17

I would agree that having a family with both parents is an advantage and hence should be encouraged. By this reasoning, other models such as having only a single mom should not be glorified and certainly not be held up as an example.

It's BS how so many people these days rather then make the effort to live up to a positive ideal try to drag everyone down to the same level. "If I can't do it then no one else should be able do". The fable of the fox and the sour grapes is more relevant today then it ever has been.

Post: #18

Aldous Huxley looks more and more like a genius every single day.

Anyone who's never read Brave New World should read it if they want to know the logical end of SJWism.

HSLD

Post: #19

I've always thought that John Rawls was overrated as the completely dominant thinker in modern political philosophy but at least he doesn't think reading to your kids is unfairly disadvantaging other kids. After all it's in the interest of the poor that someone's kids keep growing up to be engineers and doctors. Instead of thanking stable families for producing high functioning kids they shit on them because not everyone can do it? Those fucking ingrates.

Post: #20

They're saying having non-deformed arms and a head is an unfair advantage. We should start beheading people and chopping off limbs to level the playing field.

We have to somehow quash this in its infancy. These people actually have to die.

Post: #21

(05-05-2015 07:50 PM)CactusCat589 Wrote:  They're saying having non-deformed arms and a head is an unfair advantage. We should start beheading people and chopping off limbs to level the playing field.

We have to somehow quash this in its infancy. These people have to die.

There is no need for anyone to die, and no one on the forum is calling for that.

What we need to do is to call these people and others like them out for the Year Zero freaks they are, and make clear that their academic credentials do not make their nonsense "arguments" any less demented.

Post: #22

"‘I had done some work on social mobility and the evidence is overwhelmingly that the reason why children born to different families have very different chances in life is because of what happens in those families.’"

Wrong. Genetics matter, possibly more than environments.

I don't even have to cite a study. Know why? Because when Lesbians and infertile couples go to sperm banks THE FIRST CRITERIA THEY LOOK AT IS I.Q. Those sperm banks screen for academic achievement and intelligence.

If genetics in intelligence didn't matter, then they should get the women to go fuck a homeless guy and be done with it. It'd be cheaper than injecting sperm from Ivy Leaguers.

These people on the left piss me off with their hypocrisy.

Post: #23

April fool's day has came a little late I see, you almost got me there for a second OP!

Post: #24

(05-05-2015 05:56 PM)2Wycked Wrote:  The road to great unhappiness is paved with people who live their lives measuring what they feel they have against what they believe others to have.

Post: #25

(05-05-2015 08:03 PM)Days of Broken Arrows Wrote:  "‘I had done some work on social mobility and the evidence is overwhelmingly that the reason why children born to different families have very different chances in life is because of what happens in those families.’"

Wrong. Genetics matter, possibly more than environments.

I don't even have to cite a study. Know why? Because when Lesbians and infertile couples go to sperm banks THE FIRST CRITERIA THEY LOOK AT IS I.Q. Those sperm banks screen for academic achievement and intelligence.

If genetics in intelligence didn't matter, they get the women to go fuck a homeless guy and be done with it. It'd be cheaper than injecting sperm from Ivy Leaguers.

These people on the left piss me off with their hypocrisy. If it's only environment that matters regarding intelligence, they should let the homeless be sperm donors.

Yes, it's amazing how people's views suddenly change once they have skin in the game.

Revealed preferences, for the win.

People's words often lie, but their actions more rarely do.