From: "E. Allen Smith" <EALLENSMITH@ocelot.Rutgers.EDU>
Date: Wed, 11 Dec 1996 21:10:36 -0800 (PST)
To: mjmiski@execpc.com
Subject: Re: Redlining
Message-ID: <01ICWIALAGOWAEL2O3@mbcl.rutgers.edu>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


From:	IN%"mjmiski@execpc.com"  "Matthew J. Miszewski" 11-DEC-1996 19:43:51.88

>>A "phone" is easy to get, too.  You can get a telephone number which
>>is linked to a voicemail box.  You can even get this number listed in
>>the telephone book, if you like.  The cost of this service should be
>>less than twenty dollars a month.  If you want to go wild, you can get
>>a pager linked voicemail number.  This means your pager goes off when
>>you get a message.  Handy.

	Actually, I've heard about one charitable project in which they were
giving homeless people voicemail numbers and doing just this. I believe it was
in Houston or someplace else in Texas, but my memory is horribly bad. A nice
effort.

>If I wanted to I could repeatedly issue heart-wrenching stories of poverty
>in America (similar, of course, to politicians using "real world examples"
>in speeches).  You seem to assume that this would be "wrong".

	As did Ronald Reagan in talking about "welfare queens"... as could I
in discussing how my grandparents got out of poverty and have two children with
MDs and one with a PhD. Statistics are preferable to anecdotal evidence for
just this reason; I've seen that over and over again in science. Anecdotes are
for lawyers talking to juries and demagogic politicians talking to the masses.

>Once again, we disagree.  You do not favor any form of government
>regulation.  I do favor some forms of government regulation.  It seems that
>the turning point for you is your belief that racism causes no real harm.
>I disagree.  If you really want to have a list of the harms caused by
>racism, I will list them in a seperate note to you.  I wish you could be
>intellectually honest enough to realize these harms.  I fear, however, you
>will not be.

	While it is perfectly true that racism causes harms, that is true of
most actions. When I choose to vote in favor of a Libertarian instead of a
Republican or a Democrat, I am harming the Democratic and Republican candidates
for a position. As I pointed out earlier, by _correctly_ deeming someone to be
a poor credit risk and not lending them money, a lender is doing that person
harm... to the degree that redlining due to racism causes harm.
	I believe, however, you're trying to claim that redlining due to
racism is causing the same sort of harm as a KKK lynching. I'm afraid that it's
pretty obvious that there are differences between the two. The KKK lynching is
forced on one side; the other is not. You might contend that refusing to loan
to someone is forcing them to do without that loan... but so is a refusal to
loan money to _anyone_. The ultimate extension of this idea would lead to
mandated savings accounts.
	In other words, there is a difference between what one should not do
and what one should be punished for doing. I happen to believe that anyone who
makes homophobic speech is doing something wrong... but I don't want various
list members locked up on that basis.

>I do not know where you live, but I live in the US.  Cryptoanarchy has not
>taken hold here yet.  As such, my discourse is regarding the political
>system in which I live.  As such I favor regulating behavior between the
>small number of protected classes and the small number of covered
>transactions (employment, housing, etc.).  You, OTOH, do not.

	Umm... you had earlier stated that you had decided that you were not
a libertarian, and did not have libertarian beliefs. This would appear to
imply that you would prefer to see such regulations even in a cryptoanarchic
society... where (as Red, TCMay, and others have pointed out) they would not
be possible. (I am not actually in favor of full cryptoanarchy, personally;
but I am a libertarian, and I believe that an increased use of cryptography
would not lead to full cryptoanarchy, but to a reduction in the size of
government to where abuses such as anti-discrimination laws were not
practical to enforce.)

>And neither do I.  On balance, I would not have accepted prohibition then,
>and I do not accept it now.  People also have a preference not to hire
>blacks.  I feel that that should not be an acceptable means of interaction
>between an employer and a prospective employee.  You do.  That is what I
>meant by drawing lines.  You feel that every employer (a creation of the
>state) should have the ability to act in a discriminatory fashion.  I
>disagree.  You and I do agree that when the personal excercise is for a
>drink, the government should not respond.  This is because, on balance, I
>believe that the excercise of that freedom is more important than the
>adverse effects of alcoholism.  And vice versa for employment discrimination.

	In other words, you are quite willing to shoot someone for being a
racist... for expressing their beliefs, even if they aren't doing so by
shooting at you. Ultimately, that's what we're talking about... if an
employer (or a bank, or an insurance company) goes far enough, they will find
a cop with a gun pointing it at them to enforce the fines et al. If it were
a bunch of KKK types wanting to lynch you (or anyone else), I'd be right behind
you saying they should be shot. But shooting someone for refusing to do
business with you is one act of murder that I'd prefer to keep government
around to _prevent_.
	I find it interesting that you claim that an employer is a creation
of the state. I suppose that you would not consider a Mafia kingpin, or a
Kali cartel boss, to be an employer? It appears that the employee-employer
relationship is one that gets set up in any economy that is large enough
and which has specialization of labor. It isn't a creation of the state.

>Once again, I would determine policy based on several competing interests.
>Aparently you would determine it on a notion of absolute freedom.  I am
>trying not to assume anything.  And for the record, I have only supported
>governmental intervention in currently accepted transactions, which do not
>cover individuals wanting to hold racist beliefs.

	Umm... the last statement is meaningless. Your first statement
essentially says that you're willing to give up freedom for security or
whatever else you deem important... not advisible in the long run; that's
how Hitler got started.

>I believe in regulating, in one instance, employment discrimination.  I do
>so because I have personally seen the economic impact on the Greater
>Milwaukee Area of such discrimination - both past and present.  I believe X
>also because I have been witness to the personal impact that such
>discrimination has upon people.  To take advantage of practices effective
>against poverty, several of which you have mentioned, it helps to have
>self-confidence and a degree of self-worth.  These are directly damaged by
>employment discrimination.  I believe that the elimination of redlining
>would help to increase capital flows into some of these affected areas.
>Even if, as you stated, the elimination would allow for a few token
>investments in order for banks to appear to be in compliance, that is a
>willing trade off for me.  It is not for you.

	I am not happy with people who discriminate either; I've run into
entirely too many of them. But I don't consider shooting people, or (as in the
present case) threatening to shoot them, to be a proper response. Quite
simply, your emotions are not a justification for the use of force; the use of
force against you (or someone else) is.

>^^^^^^^This was, of course, my explanation before.  Apparently you didnt
>see it.
>I was not using libertarian's ideal society in any derogitive way.  At one
>time I believed in it.  Through self-examination I decided that it couldnt
>work.  Is your point that you disagree with me or that Anyone who disagrees
>with you must be wrong?

	Given that you didn't give any cogent reasons _why_ a libertarian
ideal society wouldn't work, of course Red ignored it. Make an argument, not
rhetoric, not simple statements of your opinions. Your opinions are meaningless
without something to back them. That doesn't mean that you shouldn't be able
to have them or to voice them, of course... but it does mean that we shouldn't
allow governmental policy to be based on them.

> If you are really interested I will roll out what I perceive as the many
>harms caused by racism.  Unlike you, I am in no rush to call your reasons
>for your beliefs "good" or "bad".  You believe as you do.  You do so
>because of personal reasons.  I believe as I do, that racism harms people.

	I would like to point out that this is a prime example of the
Politically Correct variety of pluralism. Quite simply, one _must_
discriminate (in the older sense of the word) between beliefs that make sense,
beliefs that do not make sense, and beliefs on which one cannot tell (e.g.,
theism vs atheism). One should avoid making governmental decisions - decisions
involving force upon others - that are not based on beliefs that make sense.
You have yet to be convincing in arguing that your beliefs make sense.

>I do so because of my personal experiences.  Among these are employees
>explaining to me the nature of the discrimination that they have suffered,
>their inability to pursue any such claims because of a lack of both
>self-confidence as well as capital, the faces of their children that do not
>yet understand the nature of the world they have been brought into and the
>immense stress on familial relationships caused by the lack of a job caused
>by employment discrimination.  Ill even discard the borderline cases and
>refer to the slam dunk cases out there.  I live and work in Milwaukee, Red.
> People are fired and told they are fired because they are black.  I have
>settled cases with no dispute of these facts.  All of the personal harm and
>more was suffered by my clients.  This is part of the reason for my
>perception.  I wish I lived where you did where racism hurts nobody.  Just
>give me a general location and Ill start to move my clients there ;-|.

	Lack of self-confidence? Please reference my comments on emotions
above to see why this _isn't_ a justified reason to threaten violence. Being
fired because they're black? I'll perfectly well agree that this is wrong...
to use (an admittedly much lesser) example from my personal life, I've been
turned down for a job as a _word processor_ because I couldn't type fast
enough on a _manual_ typewriter (in case you're wondering, my measured
typing speed on a computer would have been quite fast enough).  I told them
they were idiots and walked out; I looked for a job someplace else. Let me
assure you that a job would have been quite helpful at that point.
	In other words, yes, people are assholes. This doesn't justify sticking
a gun into their faces, directly or indirectly, unless they're trying to kill
you, steal your property, or otherwise _truly_ harm you.
	-Allen