Racism + Rand Paul
- Thread starter yelhsamezo
- Start date
I guess we have different definitions of racism. I believe it is racism when someone is discriminatory or abusive towards someone based on their race, not when they are simply supporting the right of private business to operate without government interference. Nothing Rand said indicates that he would ever even so much as associate with someone who was racist or someone would run a business in a discriminatory fashion.
If I'm to carry the logic, it would probably mean I'm homophobic because I support the first amendment rights of the Westboro Baptist Church to protest against gays.
Depends on what businesses and what regulations.
What does that have to do with this topic? Because someone has libertarian views, they automatically want to do away with child labor laws?
Actually, I kinda would prefer if the government contracted out to independent agencies and universities to inspect food and drugs.
That is why there are libertarians. You have your values, and other people have their values. You don't need to call them "racists" just because they try to adhere to their values.
You know, up until a few days ago I would have not believed a libertarian would condone racism for the sake of businesses. And that is what it is: condoning racist views of business owners.
But that's fine.
Actually, it might be kinda fun to watch those businesses crash and burn who would deny services to anyone based on race. It's such a backwards idea. Take a look at the ban list on AZ for their illegal immigration/ racial profiling legislation. People won't put up with that anymore.
Yeah, that is generally the idea. That is how the market is suppose to work. If people don't like how a business is run, they can take their money elsewhere. That is why the Montgomery Bus Boycott worked. If anything, Rand is being rather true to the civil rights movement by saying that change should come from the people who want it, and not from the government imposing its will on the affairs of private business.
Ok makes sense.
I'm just all tied up with the whole giving-racists-the-impression-that-racism-is-ok
in the first place. I could just imagine the social upheaval it would initially cause.
I'm just all tied up with the whole giving-racists-the-impression-that-racism-is-ok
in the first place. I could just imagine the social upheaval it would initially cause.
Wait, so you don't see the problem in that?
For example - sub-countries and sub-ghettos, with any prejudice group possible? That is what the TV host was trying to explain in the interview too. Is it so hard to reason not from principle, but from how it actually works?
For example - sub-countries and sub-ghettos, with any prejudice group possible? That is what the TV host was trying to explain in the interview too. Is it so hard to reason not from principle, but from how it actually works?
I still see a problem with it. It just made sense to me this way:
If the only voting power people have is their money, then those businesses practicing segregation or denying services would either go out of business as they went out of favor... or they'd thrive IF that's what people actually wanted.
There are still problems with it, and I don't morally agree with it.
Which is why I said: It would cause social upheaval. Besides, not everyone has the money to give them an equal voice in this scenario. And I can imagine all sorts of other forms of racism legislation like this would seem to condone.
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The problem is when government gets involved and passes laws to segregate people or enforce discriminatory business policies. For example, enforcing a bus company's policy to make black people sit in the back of the bus or go to jail. It would be very difficult for a private business to discriminate against a racial group without government backing.
There is a government-supported law to enforce a company to put black people on the back seats? Or I misunderstood?
Issues of segregation are universal, not local. If they are to be decided locally, especially in a very diverse country, it effectively means dividing it into sub-regions. (as if it's not already WAY too segregated)
Concerning westboro baptist church: they don't especially vote on our laws, and they have the right protest of course.
Concerning if we don't like how a business is run we can take our money elsewhere: so that's it? We'll just spend our way out of our problems, nevermind creating laws. It doesn't seem as if the Montgomery bus boycotts
changed everything on their own.
There was even a time when people didn't have the option of spending their money where they pleased. People fought and died for even for those rights (see the Ludlow Massacre and the Wagner Act) and the only way they were guaranteed rights was through legislation. It's like we're assuming things have always been guaranteed to go our way. And if someone doesn't think it matters it's for the same reason most of the population doesn't vote: they're marginalized and properly distracted.
And with the passing of the AZ leg, the problem of the economy, the supreme court case allowing corporations a hand in elections(after being granted the rights of a human being with the resoures of 1000s+), real wages on the decline for the average person while CEOs make 40 times that, the rise of the tea party, Obama extending the patriot act behind closed doors, journalists losing rights by state courts Id say we're headed for big change and not the kind Obama likes to talk about. It's during these kinds of times throughout our history that we give up our civil liberties.
Concerning if we don't like how a business is run we can take our money elsewhere: so that's it? We'll just spend our way out of our problems, nevermind creating laws. It doesn't seem as if the Montgomery bus boycotts
changed everything on their own.
There was even a time when people didn't have the option of spending their money where they pleased. People fought and died for even for those rights (see the Ludlow Massacre and the Wagner Act) and the only way they were guaranteed rights was through legislation. It's like we're assuming things have always been guaranteed to go our way. And if someone doesn't think it matters it's for the same reason most of the population doesn't vote: they're marginalized and properly distracted.
And with the passing of the AZ leg, the problem of the economy, the supreme court case allowing corporations a hand in elections(after being granted the rights of a human being with the resoures of 1000s+), real wages on the decline for the average person while CEOs make 40 times that, the rise of the tea party, Obama extending the patriot act behind closed doors, journalists losing rights by state courts Id say we're headed for big change and not the kind Obama likes to talk about. It's during these kinds of times throughout our history that we give up our civil liberties.
There was. You ever hear of Rosa Parks?
All that I am saying is that private businesses cannot effectively segregate based upon race without the government backing them. As long as the government takes a nondiscriminatory stance, then businesses can be free to be discriminatory simply because they can't profit from doing so. People will simply take their money elsewhere.
My only argument in this thread was that Rand is not a racist simply because he endorses a political position which favors keeping government out of the affairs of private business. If you want to drag 50 other topics to be a red herring to that argument, then feel free. I think I have a made a sufficient argument that Rand was simply being true to his values.
If they have it.
That's the whole point, the haves and have-nots are not proportionally distributed among social sub-groups. And such laws are only going to stretch the gap even wider. Economic racism is still racism.
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What laws? Rand only said that he would not have supported one section of the Civil Rights act of 1964 that dealt with forbidding private businesses from discriminating. He supported every other part of that law, particularly those sections that dealt with forbidding the government from discriminating. Segregation can only exist if the government enforces it. Businesses simply cannot effectively discriminate against people based upon their race. They lose money by doing so and lose the customers to businesses that won't discriminate. How could customers simply going to someone else for their goods and services lead to a "widening of the gap" as you put it?
You can use the whole planet as example, to answer that - why do you think there's (at least) a billion people malnourished? The business does not serve the people, the business serves the people with money. Otherwise it would rush to feed those malnourished billions as first priority over anything else. But they have no money, so nobody cares. People with no money DO NOT EXIST on the economic map. They are as good as dead.
So, similar structure will happen within the american society, under such discriminatory-tolerant policy.
Segregation, based on race, or any other prejudice, is the easiest way to accumulate local power in fewer hands. And you don't start from ideal distribution, there's already existing ownership and wealth distribution, which favors certain social subgroups. It is more profitable for them to separate themselves from those poorer social subgroups, so the economic (and racial) gap will only increase.
So, similar structure will happen within the american society, under such discriminatory-tolerant policy.
Segregation, based on race, or any other prejudice, is the easiest way to accumulate local power in fewer hands. And you don't start from ideal distribution, there's already existing ownership and wealth distribution, which favors certain social subgroups. It is more profitable for them to separate themselves from those poorer social subgroups, so the economic (and racial) gap will only increase.
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It sounds like you have an issue with capitalism in general. I'm not arguing the merits of free market ideology, simply defending Rand's comments. I just know if his ideas were completely incorrect then the Montgomery Bus Boycott and most boycotts like it, would never have been effective. And you can assume, if you so wish, that capitalism will support racial segregation, but the fact of the matter is that history does not support that conclusion. Repeatedly, people who wish to maintain a segregation have had to use the government to maintain it.
There is no evidence to support the belief that as long as the government was nondiscriminatory, that even if businesses were allowed to discriminate, that they would be able to effectively do so in the market.