re: Structural/Systemic Injustice

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I disagree wholeheartedly. Every woman has the choice to not get married, have babies and live off the government. Every single woman who is able to have kids can easily make that choice yet most women do not.

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Right.
But the corollary is fortunately "most women" are not subject to the intergenerational, poverty and behavior we are addressing here.

In that vein, Murphy Brown was a TV character created to imply that women could have it all, including single parenting, with little consequence to career success. Indeed, for women with financial resources, that model can work. But to set that character up as a realistic "heroine" for the average young woman was, and is, ridiculous. Dan Quayle, for all his warts, attempted to point this out, and was eviscerated by the progressive liberal class for his effort.


We need to do better!

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And that's really what's central to my "this is bullshite" stance. The rhetoric from these "justice" types rely heavily on the false impression that there is some sort of concrete definition. They do this to set up the narrative that if you are against them, then you are against "justice" and thus you are bad/evil/whatever.

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But, what's the alternative? Do we just not ponder these types of things since there is so much disagreement?

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I'm going to address those questions in reverse order.

We can, and should, ponder them but we have to do so in the proper context and realization that just because something unfortunate happens to someone it isn't necessarily an "injustice."

The problem with going beyond that is that we tend to lump instances with loose commonalities into a rigid "problem" category and then assign a singular "fix" to everything in that category. When it doesn't work, it's used as "proof of systemic (or structural or institutional or implied or etc) injustice." This is why I went into the questions about why Sandy was at the point of having limited living options. Different answers to just that category of questions will determine different fixed for her specific issue.

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The framework basically says that there are so many individuals pursuing their own interests and survival that some of their actions have unintended consequences that unintentionally harm others, who are already marginalized for separate reasons. That seems like a reasonable idea.

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Well, yeah, but that's not an "injustice," that's just the chaos of life. If two bears are fighting over a mate and during the melee they knock over a tree which destroys a bird's nest and eggs, we don't classify that as an injustice to the bird we just call that "nature" or "life."

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I think concessions can be made without going the full-out class warfare route.

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Nope. The structural/systemic qualifier defines the "injustice" as being part of society, thus it's setting one class of the society against another.

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we can say "yeah, people should have access to decent affordable housing."

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Agreed and that's the pondering stage. The further beyond that you go though, the more you get into the realm of demanding action which ends up negatively impacting one group for the sake of another.

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When people don't see anyone who looks like them or comes from their type of situation do the things many posters here think is possible/easy/likely for them to do - those things seem as out of touch as walking on the moon.

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How does that apply in this context? In the general hypothetical that you responded to, are you suggesting there are no persons having achievement that they can use for case studies?

The prolification of identity politics has not appeared to have had any measurable impact on poverty. Its impact on achievement does not appear to be statistically significant. It has had the isolated areas of achievement for some persons that may have been part of underutilized classes, but these are just the victors of the new systems and not the leaders of any true equitable movement

I understand your point, but I think you are shooting at the wrong topic. Policy analysts focus too heavily on presuming rational behavior when modeling outcomes of their policy decisions. Indeed, many graduate policy programs fail to include any training on behavioral economics. Stress, poverty, feelings of victimization can actually induce irrational decision making

In the anecdotes you and others quoted, we only see the specific decisions, not the range of all choices that could be made. Indeed, in what was quoted, the item kept constant was the maintenance of what sounded like a pretty fungible job.

Our policy choices of assistance (eg subsidized transportation, subsidized housing) don’t take into account that an actor is more likely to choose a short term, suboptimal solution (like buying a car bc it’s a shinier and short term fix choice). However, our marketing departments do take these into account

For these reasons, I do think the micro-interventions advocated and performed by Durflo and Banerjee have far more potential than some of these top down systems

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No? But have you ever considered why it's imperative for you to make every post a personal indictment or attack? Have you considered responding to a thread with an idea about the topic instead of posting random insults? Just wondering what your motivation for doing that is.

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Didn't you just lash out at him for being a worthless man, so to speak?

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But, what's the alternative? Do we just not ponder these types of things since there is so much disagreement?

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That’s a false choice, and an initial answer is don’t present false choices. The type of qualitative analysis in this speech can be useful, but when the researcher reduces an issue to a singular case study, they can’t then be exasperated when the critics solve the individual problem in the case study

But the issue is bigger than that. It’s not true research or the basis of policy study. It’s entirely being used for a rhetorical purpose. It’s designed to get an emotional reaction and when it achieves counter action, the speaker will just feign exasperation

Transportation could be a solvable issue. Jobs programs could be a solvable issue. The behavioral reasons for irrational choices could be solvable. When the only acceptable outcome is to elicit a shame reaction— it’s just divisive and counterproductive.

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whether structural or systemic injustice exists at all,

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Of course it exists - because it is the end product of those instituting the structural or systemic situation. However the true "injustice" is in the treatment of those who the politicians are labeling as he causes of their 'systemic injustice.'

It comes from politicians who try to establish a 'following' by pretending to
fight 'systemic injustice' and in the process establish the 'injustice' they are pretending to fight. They cannot campaign on logical debate - they have to invoke some undefinable 'insult' to their 'followers'.

Consider - what would the present democrat party campaign about if not for the existence of something they define as "systemic injustice"

They invented it - they nourish it - they thrive on it. Without that, they'd have to campaign on logical grounds rather than just bellowing out about 'systemic injustice.'

Throughout the development of civilization, people established norms of conduct that best allowed them to flourish in the environment they were born into.

As civilization advanced, ways were incorporated to eliminate most of what we would presently consider 'injustice' and we have come pretty far in eradicating the REAL injustices.

We confronted the last great insult to 'justice' with the civil war to eliminate slavery in our nation. In the south, many injustices toward the defeated white population were endured for a century - long after any direct association with those who 'enslaved' others.

Democrats today cannot let go of their primary campaign weapon - they must invoke 'slavery' as their best weapon against the rest of the productive population - they overdramatize any incident that goes badly for the black person if blame can in any way be directed to the white person. === the George Floyd incident is the most glaring example of ACTUAL injustice with the conviction of the white police officer. They got there scalps and are still on the hunt for others.

Their problem is that actual racism lie wholly in the democrats party - They are the ones whose future is based on maintaining the black polulation in a condition of misery and poverty - all the while they try to placate them by promising more 'free stuff' <-- which is the poison pill for any society.

Once on sector of society is convinced they can "make it" by forcing the rest of that society to provide all their needs, overlook their criminal behavior, hole them to any semblance of morality in their community, and encouraging them to PROTEST as their first reaction to any perceived problem.

YES = systemic injustice exists - the DEMOCRATs created it and would and maintain it, because they would starve without it.

Try joining the productive society - get married - have children that you take care of and provide them a moral baseline for conducting their lives - abandon the idea that everyone who doesn't 'look like me' owe you anything other than a fair deal - quit demanding positions of authority that you are not qualified to perform based on your skin color or sexual preferences.

In other words - GROW UP and join the productive element of society.

edit - blacks better be careful - the democrats are "moving on" from concentrating on blacks and are importing massive populations from other disadvantaged countries so that they can establish a whole NEW population which is being 'systemically' racist against.

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Structural/Systemic Injustice

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This is the only part of your post that I read. There was no need to take it seriously past that point.

How difficult is it for you to imagine there might be disparate outcomes based on no fault of society or government?

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The behavioral reasons for irrational choices could be solvable.

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I'm going to argue that this problem would not be as solvable as you think.