DrZoidberg said:
Are you somehow claiming that blacks are somehow inferior to whites? Physically or mentally? That is what you are saying isn't it?
... race card too. There was absolutely nothing in my statement that even implied such nonsense.
Strawman, how? Isn't this exactly what you are claiming? Isn't that a direct implication of it?
... You believe because
you want to believe. ... You throw around trumped-up accusations of racism like a five-year-old with a can of Silly String ...
I didn't accuse him of racism.
Once again you prove your unlimited ability to believe things because you want to believe them. You want to believe you didn't accuse him of racism, so you believe it. The fact that your words are right in front of you, and you can read them, and you can plainly see that that's exactly what you did, is of no importance to you. Only the story you tell yourself, in which you are by definition the good guy, matters to you.
I accused him of making a poorly constructed argument. Racism may be the implication of what he wrote. That's why I asked him to clarify. Note that I asked. I didn't say he was a racist.
Here is what an accusation of a poorly constructed argument and a request for clarification look like:
DZ: Have you never wondered why poor people more often break laws than rich people? Do you think they're morally worse people? There's got to be some explanation?
sb: I am not a sociologist but would assume that there are a hell of a lot of unrelated causes involved such as mental stability, no respect for others, a sense of entitlement, etc. etc.
DZ: That's a poorly constructed argument. If that were the right explanation then it would imply that poor people are a lesser quality of human. (Do you agree that that follows? If not, I'll elaborate.) And if poor people are a lesser quality of human, then, since blacks in USA make a hell of a lot less than whites in USA, it would follow that blacks are physically or mentally inferior to whites. (Do you agree that that follows? If not, again I'll elaborate.) So by reductio ad absurdum your premise must therefore be incorrect. Do you agree that the conclusion I derived from your premise is incorrect?
Here is what an accusation of a poorly constructed argument and a request for clarification do not look like:
"Are you somehow claiming that blacks are somehow inferior to whites? Physically or mentally? That is what you are saying isn't it?"
You do not appear to be enough of a newcomer to the English language to be unfamiliar with what the construction "That is what you are saying, isn't it?" means. You might as well claim "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" isn't an accusation of wife-beating because it's phrased as a question.
I am curious as to what your or Scepticalb's theory behind blacks lack of financial success in USA? If there are no class differences, ie everybody has an equal chance to succeed in life, why are there systematic discrepancies? That is what is meant by social class or belonging to a social class.
You say that as though either of us should regard you as a legitimate participant in a substantive discussion. If you want serious answers to serious questions, first give us a reason to think you are emotionally mature enough to be able to respond to another person's posts without fabricating a position and imputing it to him.
...we used to sanction rule violations with the stocks, flogging, branding, cutting off body parts, and hanging, and we decided to stop doing those things because we decided they were barbaric... The reason we continue to use prisons after two hundred-odd years of trying not to be barbaric is simple inertia, combined with inability to identify a new punishment to replace prisons with that we have been able to collectively convince ourselves would be effective.
False dichotomy again. The options aren't execution, corporal punishment and prison. There's hundreds of alternative types of punishment.
Case in point. No, I did not offer a false dichotomy, because I was explaining the historical cause of the present situation; I was not offering an argument in favor of continuing it. You are not illiterate enough to have any imaginable reason to think I was saying the options are execution, corporal punishment and prison. What makes you think suggesting that that's what I was saying is an acceptable way for a civilized person to participate in a conversation?
Here's one, ankle monitor.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ankle_monitor
The seminar went into this <snip>
Your opinion that this would be an effective replacement is simply
irrelevant to the issue in dispute. You know as well as I do that ankle monitors are not, in point of fact, a punishment to replace prisons with
"that we have been able to collectively convince ourselves would be effective". You have therefore not produced a substantive counterargument
against what I said.
I presented the actual history in order to disprove your libelous contention
that laws are designed around protecting rich white people's property and the laws are designed around redefining their stealing so that it's legal, while poor people crime is judged as harshly as possible. What is known as security theatre. The goal isn't to protect people, it's to make people feel safe, in spite of not being protected at all
First, write a post that shows you know how to refrain from libeling people for not having believed whatever you happen to believe.
Then ask people their theory behind whatever you think they need a theory for.