A near impossible literacy test Louisiana used to suppress the black vote(openculture.com)
openculture.com
A near impossible literacy test Louisiana used to suppress the black vote
https://www.openculture.com/2024/10/take-the-near-impossible-literacy-test-louisiana-used-to-suppress-the-black-vote.html
466 comments
This is super interesting. The Slate author who originally posted the Tangipahoa test followed up, with a bunch of extra information, and a pointer to a '63 Louisiana District Court case ruling the constitutional interpretation test you linked to unconstitutional:
https://web.archive.org/web/20161105050044/http://www.laed.u...
https://web.archive.org/web/20161105050044/http://www.laed.u...
The original Slate article: https://slate.com/human-interest/2013/06/voting-rights-and-t...
The follow-up, in which the author chronicles their (unsuccessful) search for an original: https://slate.com/human-interest/2013/07/louisiana-literacy-....
The follow-up explicitly notes that the word-processed version shown in the original article is a modern update; a typewritten version that is supposedly closer to the original is shown at the bottom of that article (and available at https://web.archive.org/web/20160615084237/http://msmcdushis...), although the provenance of this version is also unclear ("McDonald reports that she received the test, along with another literacy test from Alabama, from a fellow teacher, who had been using them in the classroom for years but didn’t remember where they came from.")
The follow-up, in which the author chronicles their (unsuccessful) search for an original: https://slate.com/human-interest/2013/07/louisiana-literacy-....
The follow-up explicitly notes that the word-processed version shown in the original article is a modern update; a typewritten version that is supposedly closer to the original is shown at the bottom of that article (and available at https://web.archive.org/web/20160615084237/http://msmcdushis...), although the provenance of this version is also unclear ("McDonald reports that she received the test, along with another literacy test from Alabama, from a fellow teacher, who had been using them in the classroom for years but didn’t remember where they came from.")
Right, and you'd assume that if it was widely delivered in Louisiana, there'd be contemporaneous records; what that test is doing is pretty obvious.
since what that test was doing was trying to illegally deprive black people of their right to vote I'd think they'd try to keep it as hidden as possible, which is what I would recommend one do when breaking the law.
How hidden can you keep a test that many thousands of voters take?
You don't. You'd find contemporaneous accounts from people who'd taken the test and complained about it. That's how the social science of history works. I think the consensus here is that the brain-teaser test is either not real, or was not widely used (nobody has been able to find an instance where it was).
A clarifying bit of context: there were extensive complaints about the multiple-choice constitutional interpretation tests that were given at the time.
A clarifying bit of context: there were extensive complaints about the multiple-choice constitutional interpretation tests that were given at the time.
> How hidden can you keep a test that many thousands of voters take?
After its taken, and presuming active measures were taken to prevent distribution other than for people taking it who would then return it, pretty easily. Paper is biodegradable, burns easily, can be shredded (and recycled into new paper), etc.
After its taken, and presuming active measures were taken to prevent distribution other than for people taking it who would then return it, pretty easily. Paper is biodegradable, burns easily, can be shredded (and recycled into new paper), etc.
how do you know how many people took the test? They don't need to use the super-secret fallback test to keep every black person from voting, the test was if all the other methods to keep them from voting didn't work, and then you didn't necessarily use all the test, you used some of the test, just enough to say they failed, and then what? Do you register the test somewhere?
Since the literacy test was used at the discretion of the authorities in charge of the vote they could choose who to give it to based on how likely they were to get away with using it.
I mean if you know the black people in your district will vote for a particular party you probably don't actually want to keep the black people in your district from voting, you want that party not to win because otherwise the party might help the black people living in your district.
If there are 1800 black people and 1100 white people that can vote in your district, then maybe you only need to keep 900 people from voting to be safe.
So then you announce you will be checking outstanding warrants at the polls, 600 people don't show up. You only need to keep 300 people from voting! So you start giving literacy tests to black voters but letting the white voters through - how many black people you think you will actually need to give that literacy test to before the rest of them wise up that you aren't going to be letting them vote?
I'd say maybe 20.
Now how many of them going to get copies of that test to do something about? What if you don't want to give them a copy of the test? How they going to get that copy of the test?
I'm sorry but I think this kind of thing would be pretty under-documented, just like most crime. I'm agreeing you can't keep it thoroughly hidden but hidden enough that it is difficult to say with any specificity this was the actual test used in that district on that day to fail these people.
on edit: removed something that was probably a bit rude, sorry, was going through some problems with kid at the moment and frustration transferred to my writing.
Since the literacy test was used at the discretion of the authorities in charge of the vote they could choose who to give it to based on how likely they were to get away with using it.
I mean if you know the black people in your district will vote for a particular party you probably don't actually want to keep the black people in your district from voting, you want that party not to win because otherwise the party might help the black people living in your district.
If there are 1800 black people and 1100 white people that can vote in your district, then maybe you only need to keep 900 people from voting to be safe.
So then you announce you will be checking outstanding warrants at the polls, 600 people don't show up. You only need to keep 300 people from voting! So you start giving literacy tests to black voters but letting the white voters through - how many black people you think you will actually need to give that literacy test to before the rest of them wise up that you aren't going to be letting them vote?
I'd say maybe 20.
Now how many of them going to get copies of that test to do something about? What if you don't want to give them a copy of the test? How they going to get that copy of the test?
I'm sorry but I think this kind of thing would be pretty under-documented, just like most crime. I'm agreeing you can't keep it thoroughly hidden but hidden enough that it is difficult to say with any specificity this was the actual test used in that district on that day to fail these people.
on edit: removed something that was probably a bit rude, sorry, was going through some problems with kid at the moment and frustration transferred to my writing.
If there is a credible threat of retaliation (violence, employment, housing) for even trying to vote, then this is very effective. Why take a big risk if you won’t get to vote anyway? This way you don’t actually have to give the test very often, everyone quickly figures out the “rules” and falls into line.
right, the test exists as the last unbeatable line of defense, not the first.
> I certainly hope you're not so naive
There is absolutely no need to take this tone, especially seeing as the person you are replying to is clearly in good faith.
There is absolutely no need to take this tone, especially seeing as the person you are replying to is clearly in good faith.
There is an actual SCOTUS case on these tests, confirming that they indeed actually exited, see Louisiana vs. U.S. (1965).
Also this sample test (https://lasc.libguides.com/c.php?g=940581&p=6830148) is from the Law Library of Louisiana, aka, the State Bar of Louisiana. Are you accusing the State Bar of Louisiana and the Louisiana Supreme Court of lying about the history of their state?
And this article (https://www.nola.com/news/politics/civil-rights-victory-50-y...) by NOLA actually goes through the history of the tests, citing contemporaneous reporting of the tests over several decades, though you would probably need physical access to the microfiche archives to confirm them yourself.
Unless you are suggesting that SCOTUS, SCLA, and the biggest newspaper in Louisiana are all conspiring together to make up these tests, the historical record for these tests existing is very well established.
Also this sample test (https://lasc.libguides.com/c.php?g=940581&p=6830148) is from the Law Library of Louisiana, aka, the State Bar of Louisiana. Are you accusing the State Bar of Louisiana and the Louisiana Supreme Court of lying about the history of their state?
And this article (https://www.nola.com/news/politics/civil-rights-victory-50-y...) by NOLA actually goes through the history of the tests, citing contemporaneous reporting of the tests over several decades, though you would probably need physical access to the microfiche archives to confirm them yourself.
Unless you are suggesting that SCOTUS, SCLA, and the biggest newspaper in Louisiana are all conspiring together to make up these tests, the historical record for these tests existing is very well established.
The question is whether the test in the article is a real example of a literacy test, not whether literacy tests existed.
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You think it is unlikely that a famously problematic-in-terms-of-race state issued a problematic-in-terms-of-race literacy test?
Or are that just the typical high standards of proof that coincidentally pop up whenever rightwing opinions receives legitimate criticism? Standards that they themselves never even remotely hold themselves to ("my sisters aunts dog heard on facebook")?
Or are that just the typical high standards of proof that coincidentally pop up whenever rightwing opinions receives legitimate criticism? Standards that they themselves never even remotely hold themselves to ("my sisters aunts dog heard on facebook")?
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What do you think a right wing position is? These were democrats writing literacy tests. Democrats were pro slavery, then pro jim crow. I imagine the right winge position is to support highlighting every real literacy test as a history the legacy of the democrat party.
The example literacy test you link to is dramatically more level headed than the one in the article. It's what you would expect a fifth grade level assessment to be.
In fact the site you link to even calls out the test mention in the article, stating that it seems it was used in one parish for one summer.
In fact the site you link to even calls out the test mention in the article, stating that it seems it was used in one parish for one summer.
Quick: how is the President of the Senate selected?
It's a trick question. It's the Vice President, who is elected by the people (a)... but not for the role of president of the senate. But it could also be the President pro tempoire, who is elected by the senate (b).
Also the first question presupposes we all go to church. What about synagogues or temples?
Question #5 is entirely discretionary depending on the context of what power you are discussing.
And that's the point: these literacy tests were filled with questions like these that let the test giver choose the right answer based on whether they wanted the test taker to pass.
It's a trick question. It's the Vice President, who is elected by the people (a)... but not for the role of president of the senate. But it could also be the President pro tempoire, who is elected by the senate (b).
Also the first question presupposes we all go to church. What about synagogues or temples?
Question #5 is entirely discretionary depending on the context of what power you are discussing.
And that's the point: these literacy tests were filled with questions like these that let the test giver choose the right answer based on whether they wanted the test taker to pass.
Yes. Which is why, even in the 1960s, even in Louisiana, state courts struck these tests down. I agree with you about them. The only disputed fact here is whether the "write backwards forwards" test was ever administered.
> Yes. Which is why, even in the 1960s, even in Louisiana, state courts struck these tests down.
I'm pretty sure the reason why, "even in the 1960s, even in Louisiana", state courts struck the tests down is that such tests categorically were ruled unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court in 1949, not because of the particular unfairness of particular tests as viewed by the state courts in the 1960s.
I'm pretty sure the reason why, "even in the 1960s, even in Louisiana", state courts struck the tests down is that such tests categorically were ruled unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court in 1949, not because of the particular unfairness of particular tests as viewed by the state courts in the 1960s.
> It's the Vice President, who is elected by the people
No he’s not: the Vice President is elected by the Electoral College, or if they do not do so then by the Senate (see the Twelfth Amendment).
Neither is the President elected by the people: he’s also elected by the Electoral College, or if they fail to do so then by the House of Representatives, voting by state.
No he’s not: the Vice President is elected by the Electoral College, or if they do not do so then by the Senate (see the Twelfth Amendment).
Neither is the President elected by the people: he’s also elected by the Electoral College, or if they fail to do so then by the House of Representatives, voting by state.
Fortunately, you only had to answer 4 of 6 correctly. https://www.crmvet.org/info/la-littest2.pdf
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These sorts of 'tests' are not unique to the south.
The record keeping and newspapers of the day would just sort of hint that they were necessary to maintain status quo.
Australian immigration had a similar literacy/dictation test for migrants under the 'White Australia' policy up until the 1940's. If the migration officer didnt like the look of you, you'd be given a test to dictate welsh instead english, as it was a 'prescribed english language'.
Australian immigration had a similar literacy/dictation test for migrants under the 'White Australia' policy up until the 1940's. If the migration officer didnt like the look of you, you'd be given a test to dictate welsh instead english, as it was a 'prescribed english language'.
That's kind of a weird paradox in general and it's how we lose a lot of information. Things that were ubiquitous didn't necessarily become recorded. Because it's just the way things were.
Why would you assume that?
Because the test we're talking about is comically unfair, and people were complaining in the press about multiple-choice constitutional knowledge tests that were only subtly unfair.
You... You realize that they could just have two tests in a drawer, and they give one to black people, and one to white people, including reporters and federal officials? Why are you dying on this hill??
Do you really think Black people would have been covered fairly in the press in the 1960's?
Fairly? No. At all? Obviously yes, because the unfairness of the tests we know to have been administered was widely covered.
Nonsense, of course they were in some press.
There were many white Americans fighting for equality for all. Heck, look at the recent BLM movement, the woke discussions, #metoo and more.
All of these things were possible because of the 60s, because of white legislators, white judges, white supreme court judges, pushing for change, enacting change, creating the US today which, while imperfect, is quite supportive of equality, both legally and culturally.
So yes, there was all sorts of main stream media pushing for equality.
Heck, the first interracial kiss on US primetime was in the 60s on Star Trek ToS.
There were many white Americans fighting for equality for all. Heck, look at the recent BLM movement, the woke discussions, #metoo and more.
All of these things were possible because of the 60s, because of white legislators, white judges, white supreme court judges, pushing for change, enacting change, creating the US today which, while imperfect, is quite supportive of equality, both legally and culturally.
So yes, there was all sorts of main stream media pushing for equality.
Heck, the first interracial kiss on US primetime was in the 60s on Star Trek ToS.
Some examples of racism were documented in some progressive outlets, therefore all examples of racism would have made it into the public record?
Maybe there was concern, when progressives were fighting this sort of thing, that if they picked the most unbelievable example, the naive public (those not familiar with the residents of a typical Klan-era backwater Louisiana parish) would question its veracity… as we see today…
Imagine you were going to forge a such a test? I don’t think I could make up something this ridiculous if I tried. I’d have to be practiced in generating trick questions, and motivated by malice to come close. Realistically, I’d give up and pick one of the readily-available real examples of poll tests to use.
Maybe there was concern, when progressives were fighting this sort of thing, that if they picked the most unbelievable example, the naive public (those not familiar with the residents of a typical Klan-era backwater Louisiana parish) would question its veracity… as we see today…
Imagine you were going to forge a such a test? I don’t think I could make up something this ridiculous if I tried. I’d have to be practiced in generating trick questions, and motivated by malice to come close. Realistically, I’d give up and pick one of the readily-available real examples of poll tests to use.
The Stack Exchange community seems to have concluded that it is not authentic: https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/57431/in-1964-w...
It's interesting that the Slate and crmvet pieces have updates about the search for authenticity, but this piece published today doesn't mention it.
It's been cited in other scholarly work that cites crmvet, so it's not surprising that, if it's not authentically a Louisiana test, it'll take awhile to clean up in the literature.
This one seems deliberately difficult to answer correctly, even with the requisite civics knowledge:
> The President of the Senate gets his office
> a. by election by the people.
> b. by election by the Senate.
> c. by appointment by the President.
The Vice President is the President of the Senate, but the duties are typically exercised (save the tie-breaking vote) by the President Pro Tempore of the Senate, a Senator chosen by whichever party currently has a majority. It seems both a. and b. could be considered correct.
> The President of the Senate gets his office
> a. by election by the people.
> b. by election by the Senate.
> c. by appointment by the President.
The Vice President is the President of the Senate, but the duties are typically exercised (save the tie-breaking vote) by the President Pro Tempore of the Senate, a Senator chosen by whichever party currently has a majority. It seems both a. and b. could be considered correct.
Question 5 is also quite (intentionally) ambiguous:
> The Constitution of the United States places the final authority in our Nation in the hands of...
> a. the national courts.
> b. the States.
> c. the people.
The answer key says c. is correct, but I think I would have answered a. You could also argue the States is correct, since they have the authority to amend the Constitution. The very concept of "final authority" is sort of antithetical to the Constitution.
> The Constitution of the United States places the final authority in our Nation in the hands of...
> a. the national courts.
> b. the States.
> c. the people.
The answer key says c. is correct, but I think I would have answered a. You could also argue the States is correct, since they have the authority to amend the Constitution. The very concept of "final authority" is sort of antithetical to the Constitution.
There is no ambiguity, (b) is unambiguously correct (more precisely, it puts it in that hands of State legislatures).
What about the Supremacy Clause? And aren't state legislatures elected by "the people"? You could argue about this forever.
State legislatures are elected by the people nowadays yes. But is that required by the Constitution or just a modern convention? I honestly don't know, as a 45 yr old born and raised in the US college educated nerd. The trump administration shenanigans revealed a lot of things we all took for granted to be mere convention or tradition rather than legal requirements.
Fair point, it's not just a modern convention but yes, I think in theory a state constitution could be changed to make the whole legislature appointed by the governor or chosen by lottery or whatever.
ArtIV.S4 "The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government", meaning elected by the People.
It would also be a republican form of government for the state legislatures to be elected by cities and/or counties.
The key issue and the whole purpose of that question is that also both a. and b. could be considered wrong.
If the person answers A, then the grader can state that this is correct if they like them, or assert that instead B is correct if they don't, so that the test can always provide the desired outcome.
If the person answers A, then the grader can state that this is correct if they like them, or assert that instead B is correct if they don't, so that the test can always provide the desired outcome.
The test comes with an answer key. See the second half of https://www.crmvet.org/info/la-littest2.pdf.
I'd argue even C could be seen as correct. The president chooses his running mate, after all.
C is also literally what happens if a new VP is needed for any reason (needs to get confirmed by Congress though).
I'd say C is the only correct answer actually. Neither the President nor his running mate are elected by the people; they're elected by the Electoral College. And the question isn't about the President Pro Tempore of the Senate.
I think that's the point of these questions, to have no clear answer.
So a presidential candidate picks a vice president running mate. Voters vote for the pair. The electoral college then, usually but not always, cast votes matching the voters.
So who decided? Technically the electoral college. Who were guided by the voters. Who voted for someone the president picked.
So a presidential candidate picks a vice president running mate. Voters vote for the pair. The electoral college then, usually but not always, cast votes matching the voters.
So who decided? Technically the electoral college. Who were guided by the voters. Who voted for someone the president picked.
The answer key is included, and the correct answer according to the test is indeed "the people".
The Political Party chooses the vice presidential candidate for its Elector.
Voters vote for an Elector, not a President/Vice President.
An Elector could pledge a different vice presidential candidate, and might get votes.
The vast majority of voters do not actually know truly how President and Vice President are elected
Voters vote for an Elector, not a President/Vice President.
An Elector could pledge a different vice presidential candidate, and might get votes.
The vast majority of voters do not actually know truly how President and Vice President are elected
And if there is a tie in the electoral college, then the senate elects the Vice President. I would argue that A, which is what the answer key says is correct, is the least correct of these three incorrect answers.
The Amendment making (c) correct in some circumstances was passed in 1967, so presumably would not be referenced by a test written before that date.
Good point. I was trying to look up what the procedure was for replacing a VP before that, but failed. It almost must have been done at least once before then right? I couldn't recall or find though.
There was, in fact, no procedure for replacing the VP; the move for the amendment to correct that came about after, and motivated largely by, the Kennedy assassination and the vacancy in the term Johnson completed; historically, vacancies in the Vice Presidency hadn't been considered important enough to do something about, but the Cold War changed that.
The Vice President is elected by the Electoral College, not the people, and the President Pro Tem of the Senate is not the President of the Senate, despite frequently performing the functions of the President, so, strictly speaking, all of the answers are wrong.
Except in the case where a vacancy occurs in the Vice Presidency during a term, in which case the President does appoint a Vice President who is confirmed by the House of Representatives, so (c) would in that case be correct -- but that wasn't true until 1967.
Except in the case where a vacancy occurs in the Vice Presidency during a term, in which case the President does appoint a Vice President who is confirmed by the House of Representatives, so (c) would in that case be correct -- but that wasn't true until 1967.
[deleted]
Agreed, from my limited web research the actual existence of use of this document has been questioned for many years. This is not a new topic, or a new artifact. I've found references to this verbiage going back as far as the 1960's.
Racism and/or vote fixing via the methodology claimed in this article would be a serious and despicable thing, however, as far as I'm aware, we are protected from this now and have been for a long time.
Speaking to many of the outraged commenters, Do you think that the example test is a reasonable analog of any state's voting process currently in use? If not, do you think an analog of this test could be enacted legally under current legal statutes? If so, what additional changes would you propose to supplement current statutes?
Racism and/or vote fixing via the methodology claimed in this article would be a serious and despicable thing, however, as far as I'm aware, we are protected from this now and have been for a long time.
Speaking to many of the outraged commenters, Do you think that the example test is a reasonable analog of any state's voting process currently in use? If not, do you think an analog of this test could be enacted legally under current legal statutes? If so, what additional changes would you propose to supplement current statutes?
We may be protected from the specific literacy tests mentioned here, but there are modern variations that accomplish the same goal of disenfranchising black voters.
North Carolina's legislature asked for data showing how white folks and black folks used various voting techniques (in person vs by mail, preregister vs day of register, etc) , and then modified the voting rules to specifically lower black votes. One judge used the phrase "with surgical precision".
They were so blatant about their true intention a federal court struck it down.
But other states saw what they did and managed to pass similar laws with just a tad more subtlety and plausible deniability.
But other states saw what they did and managed to pass similar laws with just a tad more subtlety and plausible deniability.
Haven't followed specifics in North Carolina. But it seems as though the structure of statutes allowed the court to disallow the action(s), hopefully via injunction to prevent inappropriate implementation. This would however, support the case that statutes and understanding of intent are there.
Hopefully in the other unnamed states/actions that have been taken since, the impact will be small, or preferably, their actions will face similar repeal.
Hopefully in the other unnamed states/actions that have been taken since, the impact will be small, or preferably, their actions will face similar repeal.
> Racism and/or vote fixing via the methodology claimed in this article would be a serious and despicable thing, however, as far as I'm aware, we are protected from this now and have been for a long time.
The protection took a major hit in 2013, when the US Supreme court made a 5-4 decision in Shelby vs. Holder [0], permitting some areas to (re-)start a strategy of imposing unconstitutional and discriminatory laws just before an election, with local authorities knowing that any court-case voiding their law can't arrive in time to matter. Then they just enact the same kind of discriminatory law before the next major election, over and over, with no real punishment.
While state legislatures aren't currently choosing to enact things quite as blatant as before, the same exploit makes it possible.
[0] https://www.naacpldf.org/shelby-county-v-holder-impact/
The protection took a major hit in 2013, when the US Supreme court made a 5-4 decision in Shelby vs. Holder [0], permitting some areas to (re-)start a strategy of imposing unconstitutional and discriminatory laws just before an election, with local authorities knowing that any court-case voiding their law can't arrive in time to matter. Then they just enact the same kind of discriminatory law before the next major election, over and over, with no real punishment.
While state legislatures aren't currently choosing to enact things quite as blatant as before, the same exploit makes it possible.
[0] https://www.naacpldf.org/shelby-county-v-holder-impact/
Thank you for including a link for reference. I may have missed some substance in the article, so help me out if I missed it. For my part, I'm not sure that the court would make additions to law, but maybe they should have allowed an option for Congress to update the law so that section 4 applied to all states? I can see that if you view section 4 of the VRA to be an important construct for citizen voting protections, nation wide application of the statute would only further protect the populace...
> Congress has repeatedly tried and failed to adopt a new Section 5 coverage formula, but there are signs that it is inching ever closer to success. In January 2022 the House passed a package of democracy reforms that included the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, which would have updated the Section 5 coverage formula. Though the package commanded the support of a majority of senators, it narrowly failed due to the inability of the body to reform its archaic filibuster rules.
-- [0]
The act would have set pre-clearance to occur based on a pattern of recent violations [1], and also made election day a holiday, promoted early-voting etc... So you can guess which party was for it and which was doing the filibustering.
Related, the NVRA has another section about how states aren't supposed to mass-purge voters right before an election [2] (whether it's blatantly discrimiantory or not) but without pre-clearance it may lack teeth.
[0] https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/prec...
[1] https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/4
[2] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-sues-virgi...
-- [0]
The act would have set pre-clearance to occur based on a pattern of recent violations [1], and also made election day a holiday, promoted early-voting etc... So you can guess which party was for it and which was doing the filibustering.
Related, the NVRA has another section about how states aren't supposed to mass-purge voters right before an election [2] (whether it's blatantly discrimiantory or not) but without pre-clearance it may lack teeth.
[0] https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/prec...
[1] https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/4
[2] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-sues-virgi...
InvaderFizz(4)
As other commenters have noted, in Louisiana specifically, these types of tests would have been per parish and would not have been uniform.
For a bit of a happier perspective and a personal american story - I descend from this area from emancipated slaves. The farm they worked on was given to them when the owner died, and they became prominent and educated members of the community and established a legacy that still exists today. I am always amazed at the adversity they must have faced when achieving success in reconstruction era - but from my research at least, the really bad systemic stuff didn't come til 40ish years after emancipation, like the "one drop" laws and stuff that was attempting to roll back the progress made during reconstruction. It's a really fascinating part of history I always try to learn more about.
For a bit of a happier perspective and a personal american story - I descend from this area from emancipated slaves. The farm they worked on was given to them when the owner died, and they became prominent and educated members of the community and established a legacy that still exists today. I am always amazed at the adversity they must have faced when achieving success in reconstruction era - but from my research at least, the really bad systemic stuff didn't come til 40ish years after emancipation, like the "one drop" laws and stuff that was attempting to roll back the progress made during reconstruction. It's a really fascinating part of history I always try to learn more about.
> It's a really fascinating part of history I always try to learn more about.
I suspect the regressive cultural backlash at the US at the moment as the "next generational" response the the civil rights campaigns in the mid-late 20th century.
I suspect the regressive cultural backlash at the US at the moment as the "next generational" response the the civil rights campaigns in the mid-late 20th century.
In my personal opinion directly race based stuff is behind us at this point. There's only one generation alive today who remember a time where it wasn't just taken for granted that all races have equal potential to yield high (and very low) achieving people and that generation is above "shaking things up" age.
I think regression will be along some other axis. My personal two suspects are a) some variant of gender roles and the way they've changed since the 1960s and b) the widespread acceptance of cultural diversity being a good thing and the idea that there can not be superiority between cultures. The "goodness" of both of these things has been challenged quite a bit recently either directly or by shifting circumstances on other fronts causing people to need to think more critically about those subjects. In contrast, the goodness of not being racist (at least on a first order level) has been sailing along quite successfully recently.
I think regression will be along some other axis. My personal two suspects are a) some variant of gender roles and the way they've changed since the 1960s and b) the widespread acceptance of cultural diversity being a good thing and the idea that there can not be superiority between cultures. The "goodness" of both of these things has been challenged quite a bit recently either directly or by shifting circumstances on other fronts causing people to need to think more critically about those subjects. In contrast, the goodness of not being racist (at least on a first order level) has been sailing along quite successfully recently.
> In my personal opinion directly race based stuff is behind us at this point. There's only one generation alive today who remember a time where it wasn't just taken for granted that all races have equal potential to yield high (and very low) achieving people and that generation is above "shaking things up" age.
All races may have potential but are absolutely not the same in opportunity and it very much is still a directly race based problem. If you want a trivial example, there's campaign messaging going on right now in the United States based on the racist idea that Haitan immigrants are killing and eating pets. If you look at the racial outcomes across the board they are much poorer for PoC in nearly every single possible thing you can reliably measure. From my view, there are still many of us that are of "shaking things up" age, I assure you, because much needs to be shaken up.
All races may have potential but are absolutely not the same in opportunity and it very much is still a directly race based problem. If you want a trivial example, there's campaign messaging going on right now in the United States based on the racist idea that Haitan immigrants are killing and eating pets. If you look at the racial outcomes across the board they are much poorer for PoC in nearly every single possible thing you can reliably measure. From my view, there are still many of us that are of "shaking things up" age, I assure you, because much needs to be shaken up.
They aren’t really regressions if they weren’t accepted in the first place. A look at the signs on display this time of year just a short drive outside my (major US) city easily convinces me that this is the case, too.
> the idea that there can not be superiority between cultures
I don't believe that. I don't even think that you believe it.
Here's culture A, which believes that there cannot be superiority between cultures. And here's culture B, which believes that there can be superiority between cultures, and in fact that B is the superior one. I'm pretty sure, based on what you said here, that you think that A is the superior culture, and that B should change into A (or at a minimum, that A should not change into B).
And if you can look at, say, the culture of Denmark, and that of Afghanistan, and think that neither is superior as a culture to the other, that seems to me to be almost wilfully blind.
I don't believe that. I don't even think that you believe it.
Here's culture A, which believes that there cannot be superiority between cultures. And here's culture B, which believes that there can be superiority between cultures, and in fact that B is the superior one. I'm pretty sure, based on what you said here, that you think that A is the superior culture, and that B should change into A (or at a minimum, that A should not change into B).
And if you can look at, say, the culture of Denmark, and that of Afghanistan, and think that neither is superior as a culture to the other, that seems to me to be almost wilfully blind.
Accepting that the notion of "superior" has to be culturally defined (it is a value judgement), it follows that cultures will always observe other cultures as inferior or superior based on their own definitions.
Cultures are fundamentally incommensurable and cannot be viewed from some abstract or neutral viewpoint. That doesn't mean to say comparison and discussion isn't informative - just not conclusive.
Cultures are fundamentally incommensurable and cannot be viewed from some abstract or neutral viewpoint. That doesn't mean to say comparison and discussion isn't informative - just not conclusive.
> Accepting that the notion of "superior" has to be culturally defined (it is a value judgement), it follows that cultures will always observe other cultures as inferior or superior based on their own definitions.
I think that's true. So when I say that Denmark is a better culture than Afghanistan, yes, I am making that judgment through the lens of western values. But as someone with four daughters, I simply cannot bend my mind far enough to consider Afghanistan's culture (or, perhaps, the Taliban's culture) as superior. (Though I admit that I might be able to if I were in the Taliban.)
But what I was aiming at was mostly the idea that it is morally superior to consider all cultures as having equal value. That position contradicts itself, even if the "morally superior" part is left unstated.
I will give you that all cultures have elements that are worthwhile.
I think that's true. So when I say that Denmark is a better culture than Afghanistan, yes, I am making that judgment through the lens of western values. But as someone with four daughters, I simply cannot bend my mind far enough to consider Afghanistan's culture (or, perhaps, the Taliban's culture) as superior. (Though I admit that I might be able to if I were in the Taliban.)
But what I was aiming at was mostly the idea that it is morally superior to consider all cultures as having equal value. That position contradicts itself, even if the "morally superior" part is left unstated.
I will give you that all cultures have elements that are worthwhile.
Very well said. We can appreciate that there are a plurality of perspectives while asserting our own predispositions, preferences and value judgments (and I would share yours in this case), all without giving in to the contradictions of moral relativism.
[deleted]
You're right I, here and now in 2024, don't believe it, at least not without some pretty tightly bounded limits. And when you take it to extremes like "afghans vs danes" I think it becomes clear that lot of other people also never really believed in limitless cultural tolerance and sensitivity to the same extent with which they peddled it and that there was always implied limits that were never verbalized.
Funny you mention Afghanistan. I almost did in my original comment. I think Afghanistan and the people we we spent 20yr propping up there is the wedge that will drive open the door to broader discussion domestically.
You can already see this starting to happen where people are getting more comfortable comparing the pros and cons of various subsets of American cultures. Will it turn into anything, IDK.
Funny you mention Afghanistan. I almost did in my original comment. I think Afghanistan and the people we we spent 20yr propping up there is the wedge that will drive open the door to broader discussion domestically.
You can already see this starting to happen where people are getting more comfortable comparing the pros and cons of various subsets of American cultures. Will it turn into anything, IDK.
That sounds like I misinterpreted your first comment. My apologies (I hate it when people misrepresent what I said).
In a similar vein, linked are math questions Russian universities would give to Jewish students to filter them out in entrance exams.
https://arxiv.org/abs/1110.1556
https://arxiv.org/abs/1110.1556
Australia had something similar to implement its "White Australia" policy. Apparently, British authorities objected to explicitly racist rules. So the scheme they came up with was that the border officials could, at their discretion, ask somebody coming into the country to pass a dictation test to prove their literacy. The test could be administered in any European language. Very few people managed to pass. Details:
https://www.nma.gov.au/defining-moments/resources/white-aust...
https://www.nma.gov.au/defining-moments/resources/white-aust...
> any European language
And the immigration officer could pick the language you were to be tested in.
Which led to one account I read of an immigrant who was polyglot with an interest in different languages. He could handle all of the languages the officer tried, until Welsh.
As I recall, this ended up in court, where the judge allowed the immigration, and pointed out that none of the immigration officers could understand Welsh themselves.
And the immigration officer could pick the language you were to be tested in.
Which led to one account I read of an immigrant who was polyglot with an interest in different languages. He could handle all of the languages the officer tried, until Welsh.
As I recall, this ended up in court, where the judge allowed the immigration, and pointed out that none of the immigration officers could understand Welsh themselves.
The person was Egon Kisch, a Czechoslovak communist, who arrived in 1934 for a speaking tour to raise awareness of what was happening in fascist Germany, and who the Australian government found far too 'revolutionary' to let in.
The full story is quite fun. He was initially refused permission to disembark, which he solved by leaping five metres from the ship, thereby making landfall (rather literally). The government then tried to exclude him using a dictation test, which could indeed be in any European language, and the test he failed was administered in Scots Gaelic. Some controversy arose when it turned out that the person giving the dictation test couldn't themselves understand Scots Gaelic, but the High Court ultimately ruled in Kisch's favour for the somewhat amusing reason that Scots Gaelic was 'not a European language' (at least within the meaning of the relevant law). [0]
Australia has a long and not-particularly-storied history of extreme border restrictions. Laws banning non-white migration persisted in one way or another until 1973, and in the subsequent fifty years Australia has done progressively more insane things to keep people out, including removing all of Australia from the Australian migration zone (so migrants never actually 'arrive' in such a way that might give them a right to seek asylum), using the navy to put people that arrived by sea back on boats and launching them vaguely in the direction of other countries, keeping people actually accepted to be refugees (!) off-shore in remote Pacific island concentration camps for years, and - during COVID - criminalising its own citizens leaving Australia for two years (and briefly even the return of Australian citizens home). [1]
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attempted_exclusion_of_Egon_Ki...
[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-56953052
The full story is quite fun. He was initially refused permission to disembark, which he solved by leaping five metres from the ship, thereby making landfall (rather literally). The government then tried to exclude him using a dictation test, which could indeed be in any European language, and the test he failed was administered in Scots Gaelic. Some controversy arose when it turned out that the person giving the dictation test couldn't themselves understand Scots Gaelic, but the High Court ultimately ruled in Kisch's favour for the somewhat amusing reason that Scots Gaelic was 'not a European language' (at least within the meaning of the relevant law). [0]
Australia has a long and not-particularly-storied history of extreme border restrictions. Laws banning non-white migration persisted in one way or another until 1973, and in the subsequent fifty years Australia has done progressively more insane things to keep people out, including removing all of Australia from the Australian migration zone (so migrants never actually 'arrive' in such a way that might give them a right to seek asylum), using the navy to put people that arrived by sea back on boats and launching them vaguely in the direction of other countries, keeping people actually accepted to be refugees (!) off-shore in remote Pacific island concentration camps for years, and - during COVID - criminalising its own citizens leaving Australia for two years (and briefly even the return of Australian citizens home). [1]
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attempted_exclusion_of_Egon_Ki...
[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-56953052
> Australia has a long and not-particularly-storied history of extreme border restrictions.
A joke I sometimes tell during conversations when australia comes up:
"You know, Australia is a great country so I once was thinking of migrating there. So I called the australian embassy. First thing they ask me is if I have a criminal record. So I answered oh I'm sorry, I didn't know that was still a requirement, and hung up."
A joke I sometimes tell during conversations when australia comes up:
"You know, Australia is a great country so I once was thinking of migrating there. So I called the australian embassy. First thing they ask me is if I have a criminal record. So I answered oh I'm sorry, I didn't know that was still a requirement, and hung up."
[deleted]
Thank you so much for the details! I got the island right but the wrong Celtic language, which caused my searches to fail.
[deleted]
Great story about Kisch, thank you. Five metres, that's some leap!
I have been told that relatives (born in Sri Lanka) were able to emigrate to Australia later in the 20th century (I would guess 50s or 60s) because they were able to prove that more than half their ancestry was European. I do not know whether this exempted this from the test or whether there was a simple race based bar to immigration later on.
Btw — how hard are these problems nowadays? Back then, 8 top Soviet students solved only half of them in a month — has anyone tried giving them to students now?
They seem a lot easier than USAMO problems, or even Putnam problems. I suspect that top students nowadays could easily solve them all in a day.
What a strange idea for someone from Germany. Here you are registered as a citizen and get a letter to your registered address and you take that to the voting station. Vote. Done.
> your registered address
There's no Anmeldung system in America. Actually voter registration is the closest thing you have to an official current address, and it's a lot easier to do (no appointment required).
There's no Anmeldung system in America. Actually voter registration is the closest thing you have to an official current address, and it's a lot easier to do (no appointment required).
Yes I know, which is strange, and I know many Americans are proud of it (no snooping state etc.) but overall I think there are more downsides to it. I feel this is an artifact from times without phone lines and computers with many small towns hundreds of miles apart (also see electorial college) and was a necessity but is now kept b/c of identity and tradition.
Because, yes Germany has always been fair, democratic and non discriminating.
I wish my home country could be as brutally honest with itself about its past and work as hard to make things right as Germany has been the last several decades.
The disturbing party coming up on the Right feels like Germany has blamed itself for too long. That “self-blame” is a lot of what has enabled modern Germany to be a much better place than it was before the war.
(I’m an American living in greater Nuremberg, and get to see monuments to Germany’s failures on a regular basis)
The disturbing party coming up on the Right feels like Germany has blamed itself for too long. That “self-blame” is a lot of what has enabled modern Germany to be a much better place than it was before the war.
(I’m an American living in greater Nuremberg, and get to see monuments to Germany’s failures on a regular basis)
>I wish my home country could be as brutally honest with itself about its past and work as hard to make things right as Germany has been the last several decades.
Given how Germany is treating those protesting its support of Israel's ongoing war, some would suggest that Germany isn't being quite as brutally honest one might imagine.
Given how Germany is treating those protesting its support of Israel's ongoing war, some would suggest that Germany isn't being quite as brutally honest one might imagine.
German honesty regarding its past is a modern phenomenon, if not outright propaganda. During the Cold War they were a lot less honest; the Nazi regime was often used as propaganda against the other side. e.g. West Germany would downplay Germany's capitalist class's role in Hitler's rise to power and emphasize the racial nature of the Holocaust. East Germany[0] would do the opposite, emphasizing capitalism and de-emphasizing antisemitism[1]. These different spins on the same events were intended to downplay their side's role in the Nazi regime, shifting all the blame to the other.
This is especially true in the West. Large swaths of the German capitalist class actively backed Hitler and the Nazi party, and got away with it. How they got away with it is particularly appalling. One of the most common defenses at Nuremburg was "I was just following orders", an excuse that was usually rejected. But there was one very specific kind of order that would reliably keep Nazis (Hugo Boss, IG Farben, etc) out of the noose: shareholder duties. In the name of anticommunism, there was an active campaign in the First World[2] to downplay the war crimes of German capitalists after WWII.
The AfD is not a result of Germany being tired of remembering. They're a result of Germany's denazification being incomplete - and politically influenced by the exact same economic forces[3] that put Hitler in the chancellor's seat in the first place. States create liberal democracies with free markets, businesses figure out how to exploit those markets, they get unfathomably rich before someone can stop them, they coopt or overthrow democracy, and then replace liberalism with tyranny.
Overthrow is possible because society has vulnerabilities that can be exploited through propaganda and outrage porn. You socially engineer the public into abolishing their own liberty to hurt the other that they hate. In America, that vulnerability was African Americans. In Nazi Germany's case, it was deeply rooted antisemitism. In today's Germany, it's immigration[4].
[0] The Stazi wants to know about your dancing skill and computer memory speed
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism_in_the_Soviet_Uni...
[2] As in, "aligned with American capitalism" world
[3] America's business elite were not that far behind Germany's in terms of planning to overthrow democracy. See:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_collaboration_with_Na...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot
[4] German immigration policy - and, to a larger extent, most EU external immigration policy - is built entirely for rich, self-motivated knowledge workers who can navigate bureaucracy and do all the integration work themselves. As a result, it has lots of poorly integrated immigrant populations with lots of scary right-wingers that the German right can use to scare German liberals into, themselves, becoming scary right-wingers. Fnord fnord fnord.
This is especially true in the West. Large swaths of the German capitalist class actively backed Hitler and the Nazi party, and got away with it. How they got away with it is particularly appalling. One of the most common defenses at Nuremburg was "I was just following orders", an excuse that was usually rejected. But there was one very specific kind of order that would reliably keep Nazis (Hugo Boss, IG Farben, etc) out of the noose: shareholder duties. In the name of anticommunism, there was an active campaign in the First World[2] to downplay the war crimes of German capitalists after WWII.
The AfD is not a result of Germany being tired of remembering. They're a result of Germany's denazification being incomplete - and politically influenced by the exact same economic forces[3] that put Hitler in the chancellor's seat in the first place. States create liberal democracies with free markets, businesses figure out how to exploit those markets, they get unfathomably rich before someone can stop them, they coopt or overthrow democracy, and then replace liberalism with tyranny.
Overthrow is possible because society has vulnerabilities that can be exploited through propaganda and outrage porn. You socially engineer the public into abolishing their own liberty to hurt the other that they hate. In America, that vulnerability was African Americans. In Nazi Germany's case, it was deeply rooted antisemitism. In today's Germany, it's immigration[4].
[0] The Stazi wants to know about your dancing skill and computer memory speed
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism_in_the_Soviet_Uni...
[2] As in, "aligned with American capitalism" world
[3] America's business elite were not that far behind Germany's in terms of planning to overthrow democracy. See:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_collaboration_with_Na...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot
[4] German immigration policy - and, to a larger extent, most EU external immigration policy - is built entirely for rich, self-motivated knowledge workers who can navigate bureaucracy and do all the integration work themselves. As a result, it has lots of poorly integrated immigrant populations with lots of scary right-wingers that the German right can use to scare German liberals into, themselves, becoming scary right-wingers. Fnord fnord fnord.
Minor thing, its "Stasi" for "Staatssicherheit" (or "Ministerium für Staatssicherheit") not Stazi. But I know it should be Stazi - it sounds more like something Colonel Klink would say.
In general as a reply, I'm not sure where you grew up in Germany (or if, because of Stazi). I grew up in West Germany in the 1970 and 1980 and there was not one week where there wasn't a story about German war crimes, genocide etc. in one of the large magazines. It was also a large topic in school. But it seems where you grew up things were different.
"In Nazi Germany's case, it was deeply rooted antisemitism. In today's Germany, it's immigration"
No it's the same. Racism together with the special case of antisemitism. People don't change.
"The AfD is not a result of Germany being tired of remembering. They're a result of Germany's denazification being incomplete"
Interesting view point. I would assume it is wrong (though I do think denazification in the East was incomplete), it doesn't have anything to do with being tired of remembering or incomplete denazification. Its just that people don't change, and they are nationalists, socialists and racists (just like the Nazi party - (National Socialists)) and with the rise of the populist right in the US and all over Europe, they thought they should band together again. The internet removed all gate keepers. Before that all other far-right parties in the West like "Die Republikaner" didn't get lots of traction but faded away fast.
In general as a reply, I'm not sure where you grew up in Germany (or if, because of Stazi). I grew up in West Germany in the 1970 and 1980 and there was not one week where there wasn't a story about German war crimes, genocide etc. in one of the large magazines. It was also a large topic in school. But it seems where you grew up things were different.
"In Nazi Germany's case, it was deeply rooted antisemitism. In today's Germany, it's immigration"
No it's the same. Racism together with the special case of antisemitism. People don't change.
"The AfD is not a result of Germany being tired of remembering. They're a result of Germany's denazification being incomplete"
Interesting view point. I would assume it is wrong (though I do think denazification in the East was incomplete), it doesn't have anything to do with being tired of remembering or incomplete denazification. Its just that people don't change, and they are nationalists, socialists and racists (just like the Nazi party - (National Socialists)) and with the rise of the populist right in the US and all over Europe, they thought they should band together again. The internet removed all gate keepers. Before that all other far-right parties in the West like "Die Republikaner" didn't get lots of traction but faded away fast.
Germany is self-blaming only to some extent or for some definitions of this notion.
Yes, they are well aware of what happened in 1930s and that there was Hitler, etc.
And still they conveniently fail to see any connection with today times. It is some unclearly defined Nazis who took over the control of Germany and did all the killings and destroyed a few countries around. But not anyone's grandfather was involved. And supposedly the companies which built their wealth on slave work and death of thousands continue to prosper.
Yes, they are well aware of what happened in 1930s and that there was Hitler, etc.
And still they conveniently fail to see any connection with today times. It is some unclearly defined Nazis who took over the control of Germany and did all the killings and destroyed a few countries around. But not anyone's grandfather was involved. And supposedly the companies which built their wealth on slave work and death of thousands continue to prosper.
"And still they conveniently fail to see any connection with today times."
Who is they? The people who brought far right leaders to court because those were shouting SA slogans? Surely not those. And I would argue, that the new right indeed does see the connection, they want to have that connection to today times (see shouting SA slogans).
"It is some unclearly defined Nazis who took over the control of Germany and did all the killings and destroyed a few countries around."
Not sure what that sentence means.
"But not anyone's grandfather was involved."
You seem to have missed the 1960/70s where the topic exactly was that "The fathers did this and didn't talk about it" (In the West, East Germany just declared themselves victims of the Nazis) - which directly lead into the red terror (Red Army Faction RAF) of the 1970s as a reaction to "old nazis".
And you seem to have missed the large Wehrmacht discussion in Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wehrmacht_exhibition (late, I know)
"And supposedly the companies which built their wealth on slave work and death of thousands continue to prosper."
Many companies have paid [0] (late, not enough IMHO) for using slave labor - at least that discussion led to every company pay a historian to write down that part of their history most ignored before. The biggest problem is not the companies but some rich people in Germany like the Quandts who are one of the richest families in Germany and own a large chunk of BMW - they got their money by slave labor, selling to the Prussian army and the Wehrmacht and by stealing from jews.
Compared to that, my (German) grandparents lost their large farms (not complaining, or accusing, but as a comparison) and everything else except their clothing and the clothing they could carry in two suitcases. They were not on the right side of "War Is a Racket".
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundation_Remembrance,_Respon...
Who is they? The people who brought far right leaders to court because those were shouting SA slogans? Surely not those. And I would argue, that the new right indeed does see the connection, they want to have that connection to today times (see shouting SA slogans).
"It is some unclearly defined Nazis who took over the control of Germany and did all the killings and destroyed a few countries around."
Not sure what that sentence means.
"But not anyone's grandfather was involved."
You seem to have missed the 1960/70s where the topic exactly was that "The fathers did this and didn't talk about it" (In the West, East Germany just declared themselves victims of the Nazis) - which directly lead into the red terror (Red Army Faction RAF) of the 1970s as a reaction to "old nazis".
And you seem to have missed the large Wehrmacht discussion in Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wehrmacht_exhibition (late, I know)
"And supposedly the companies which built their wealth on slave work and death of thousands continue to prosper."
Many companies have paid [0] (late, not enough IMHO) for using slave labor - at least that discussion led to every company pay a historian to write down that part of their history most ignored before. The biggest problem is not the companies but some rich people in Germany like the Quandts who are one of the richest families in Germany and own a large chunk of BMW - they got their money by slave labor, selling to the Prussian army and the Wehrmacht and by stealing from jews.
Compared to that, my (German) grandparents lost their large farms (not complaining, or accusing, but as a comparison) and everything else except their clothing and the clothing they could carry in two suitcases. They were not on the right side of "War Is a Racket".
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundation_Remembrance,_Respon...
I will take any day Germany self-blaming itself over Germany's Hegel and Nietzsche Kultur that killed tens of thousands of Belgian and French civilians in the first world war and millions of Jew, Russian, Polish, Ukrainian, etc... civilians in the second world war.
Germany's Hegel and Nietzsche Kultur that killed tens of thousands of ...
I know that sounds neat to say, but it has no connection to reality. Neither of those guys influenced the late German Empire or the Nazis (a few Nazi ideologues might have read Nietzsche, but they never understood him; meanwhile they absolutely rejected Hegel, and attacked people with accusations of Hegelianism).
I know that sounds neat to say, but it has no connection to reality. Neither of those guys influenced the late German Empire or the Nazis (a few Nazi ideologues might have read Nietzsche, but they never understood him; meanwhile they absolutely rejected Hegel, and attacked people with accusations of Hegelianism).
Not sure someone suggested that. Not sure what the argument is. The "Because" looks like it should be an argument. Also the sarcasm seems to make it an argument somehow.
Was it just an expressed opinion of "Germany was most of the time undemocratic, unfair and discriminating"? Yes, it wasn't democratic in the Kaiserreich from 1871 until 1918, it had huge democracy deficits in the Weimar republic from 1918 to 1933, it was a murderous, facist dictatorship from 1933 to 1945, and a Russian puppet state with fake elections from 1945 to 1989 in the East. So I would agree with that expressed opinion.
Was it just an expressed opinion of "Germany was most of the time undemocratic, unfair and discriminating"? Yes, it wasn't democratic in the Kaiserreich from 1871 until 1918, it had huge democracy deficits in the Weimar republic from 1918 to 1933, it was a murderous, facist dictatorship from 1933 to 1945, and a Russian puppet state with fake elections from 1945 to 1989 in the East. So I would agree with that expressed opinion.
Also because residents of Germany have a duty to always maintain an accurate registration of their current address with the county. So the German state actually knows where its voters live, making voter registration superfluous.
In case that was sarcasm, then I have to disagree. The current German state has an excellent track record when it comes to voter enfranchisement. Its shortcomings with the democratic process lay elsewhere. The last really questionable action relating to elections was the questionable ban of the communist party - in 1956.
In case that was sarcasm, then I have to disagree. The current German state has an excellent track record when it comes to voter enfranchisement. Its shortcomings with the democratic process lay elsewhere. The last really questionable action relating to elections was the questionable ban of the communist party - in 1956.
> The current German state has an excellent track record
"Current state" is a convenient wording to exclude 1933-1990
"Current state" is a convenient wording to exclude 1933-1990
Why would I exclude 1949-1990?
The current German state was made in the 90's.
Personally don't think the German Democratic Republic had an excellent track with enfranchisement.
Personally don't think the German Democratic Republic had an excellent track with enfranchisement.
I doubt this is real even for 1964 Louisiana. Whenever I move I change my drivers license and it automatically changes my voter registration and selective services (draft). Then they send your voter registration and you go vote there.
It's 2024 and they still don't have universal suffrage in the US, as convicted people cannot vote.
[deleted]
Leaving aside the topics of authenticity and the questions' historical context, it's interesting that the article claims that "most" of the questions are impossible, while >80% have a single clear interpretation. For example, "draw a line under the last word in this line."
I think whether some questions seem straightforward is a distraction. Most of us on this site have been specifically trained on strategies for test-taking, giving us an unfair advantage that we false attribute to intelligence.
> I was preparing for my last major standardized test, the Graduate Record Exam, or GRE. I had already forked over $1,000 for a preparatory course, feeding the U.S. test-prep and private tutoring industry... I wondered why I was the only Black student in the room...
> The teacher boasted the course would boost our GRE scores by two hundred points, which I didn’t pay much attention to at first— it seemed an unlikely advertising pitch. But with each class, the technique behind the teacher’s confidence became clearer. She wasn’t making us smarter so we’d ace the test—she was teaching us how to take the test....
> It revealed the bait and switch at the heart of standardized tests— the exact thing that made them unfair: She was teaching test-taking form for standardized exams that purportedly measured intellectual strength. My classmates and I would get higher scores— two hundred points, as promised— than poorer students, who might be equivalent in intellectual strength but did not have the resources or, in some cases, even the awareness to acquire better form through high-priced prep courses. Because of the way the human mind works— the so-called “attribution effect,” which drives us to take personal credit for any success— those of us who prepped for the test would score higher and then walk into better opportunities thinking it was all about us: that we were better and smarter than the rest and we even had inarguable, quantifiable proof.... And because we’re talking about featureless, objective numbers, no one would ever think that racism could have played a role.
> Excerpt From How to Be an Antiracist, Ibram X. Kendi
> I was preparing for my last major standardized test, the Graduate Record Exam, or GRE. I had already forked over $1,000 for a preparatory course, feeding the U.S. test-prep and private tutoring industry... I wondered why I was the only Black student in the room...
> The teacher boasted the course would boost our GRE scores by two hundred points, which I didn’t pay much attention to at first— it seemed an unlikely advertising pitch. But with each class, the technique behind the teacher’s confidence became clearer. She wasn’t making us smarter so we’d ace the test—she was teaching us how to take the test....
> It revealed the bait and switch at the heart of standardized tests— the exact thing that made them unfair: She was teaching test-taking form for standardized exams that purportedly measured intellectual strength. My classmates and I would get higher scores— two hundred points, as promised— than poorer students, who might be equivalent in intellectual strength but did not have the resources or, in some cases, even the awareness to acquire better form through high-priced prep courses. Because of the way the human mind works— the so-called “attribution effect,” which drives us to take personal credit for any success— those of us who prepped for the test would score higher and then walk into better opportunities thinking it was all about us: that we were better and smarter than the rest and we even had inarguable, quantifiable proof.... And because we’re talking about featureless, objective numbers, no one would ever think that racism could have played a role.
> Excerpt From How to Be an Antiracist, Ibram X. Kendi
The argument seems self-defeating: let's accept at face value Kendi's claim (following the teacher of the course) that students taking the course can expect a 200 point advantage, on average, over those not taking the course, then an average black student taking the course would gain a 200 point advantage compared to an average white student. That doesn't mean the testing is racist (in fact, if true, it would mean the testing is not racist), it means it favours the relatively wealthy. That's an injustice, and a flaw in the testing process, but it's not about racism, but about family wealth.
Of course, there are historical reasons for why the average black family is not as wealthy as an average white one, but the testing is not it - i.e. a poor white family is just as disadvantaged as a poor black family, according to the test - and Kendi was not so disadvantaged, by his own account.
Of course, there are historical reasons for why the average black family is not as wealthy as an average white one, but the testing is not it - i.e. a poor white family is just as disadvantaged as a poor black family, according to the test - and Kendi was not so disadvantaged, by his own account.
>Of course, there are historical reasons for why the average black family is not as wealthy as an average white one
From what I have been able to understand of writers like Kendi (see also e.g. Robin diAngelo), this statistical fact is itself, inherently, considered to be an example of "racism" (hence terms like "systemic" or "institutional" racism); and the ensuing (supposed) bias of the test towards the wealthy, another one (simply because it is ensuing).
From what I have been able to understand of writers like Kendi (see also e.g. Robin diAngelo), this statistical fact is itself, inherently, considered to be an example of "racism" (hence terms like "systemic" or "institutional" racism); and the ensuing (supposed) bias of the test towards the wealthy, another one (simply because it is ensuing).
>Most of us on this site have been specifically trained on strategies for test-taking,
I struggle to imagine why you would believe this to be the case. (I say this as someone who wrote, and did quite well in, several high school math competitions without making any particular effort to prepare for them.)
>giving us an unfair advantage that we false attribute to intelligence.
I struggle to imagine why this would be considered unfair, or not an actual sign of intelligence (assuming that the training worked).
I will refrain from providing the bulk of my rebuttal to Kendi, except to note:
> And because we’re talking about featureless, objective numbers, no one would ever think that racism could have played a role.
... Yes, that is exactly why racism could not possibly have played a role. The kind of "disparate impact" that Kendi seems to be alluding to here, is simply not compatible with the lay understanding of the concept of "racism", but only with a specialized academic one; but the potential for moral outrage attaches to the lay definition. The conflation that Kendi attempts is a classic example of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motte-and-bailey_fallacy .
I struggle to imagine why you would believe this to be the case. (I say this as someone who wrote, and did quite well in, several high school math competitions without making any particular effort to prepare for them.)
>giving us an unfair advantage that we false attribute to intelligence.
I struggle to imagine why this would be considered unfair, or not an actual sign of intelligence (assuming that the training worked).
I will refrain from providing the bulk of my rebuttal to Kendi, except to note:
> And because we’re talking about featureless, objective numbers, no one would ever think that racism could have played a role.
... Yes, that is exactly why racism could not possibly have played a role. The kind of "disparate impact" that Kendi seems to be alluding to here, is simply not compatible with the lay understanding of the concept of "racism", but only with a specialized academic one; but the potential for moral outrage attaches to the lay definition. The conflation that Kendi attempts is a classic example of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motte-and-bailey_fallacy .
Perhaps a better explanation might be that they're all capable of being considered ambiguous whenever and however the clerk administering the test desires them to be? In that sense, they were impossible because a clerk could reject any answers to that particular question for all sorts of absurd reasons: the line wasn't perfectly parallel to word, it was too far--or too close--to the word itself, the start and endpoints didn't align perfectly with the word, your line curled upwards at the end as you lifted your pen from the paper, etc.
Quite frankly, I doubt they even bothered with even that token effort to find excuses for failing people. They didn't need them. Everyone knew the game; if you were black under Jim Crow, you pretty much failed the moment they forced you to take it, regardless of your answers.
Literacy tests were only meant to give the threadbare illusion of objectivity to their disenfranchisement efforts and make that effort more efficient in the process. It's unlikely any state or county ever bothered to assemble a common "official" literacy test, or that officials ever put much effort into crafting a perfectly ambiguous question no one could every answer correctly. There was no need, and to the extent any did, it would likely have been just to make taking the tests as painful and humiliating as possible to punish the test-taker for not accepting that the fix was in, and to further discourage anyone else from bothering them.
Truthfully, the humiliating aspects of the various disenfranchisement mechanisms were almost certainly quite intentional. Fury over the perceived humiliation of the loss of the Civil War, and the changes wrought by Reconstruction, was the constant underlying theme of Redeemer[1] messaging. Simply regaining political power wasn't enough to slake that anger.
0. https://jimcrowmuseum.ferris.edu/question/2013/july.htm
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redeemers
Quite frankly, I doubt they even bothered with even that token effort to find excuses for failing people. They didn't need them. Everyone knew the game; if you were black under Jim Crow, you pretty much failed the moment they forced you to take it, regardless of your answers.
Literacy tests were only meant to give the threadbare illusion of objectivity to their disenfranchisement efforts and make that effort more efficient in the process. It's unlikely any state or county ever bothered to assemble a common "official" literacy test, or that officials ever put much effort into crafting a perfectly ambiguous question no one could every answer correctly. There was no need, and to the extent any did, it would likely have been just to make taking the tests as painful and humiliating as possible to punish the test-taker for not accepting that the fix was in, and to further discourage anyone else from bothering them.
Truthfully, the humiliating aspects of the various disenfranchisement mechanisms were almost certainly quite intentional. Fury over the perceived humiliation of the loss of the Civil War, and the changes wrought by Reconstruction, was the constant underlying theme of Redeemer[1] messaging. Simply regaining political power wasn't enough to slake that anger.
0. https://jimcrowmuseum.ferris.edu/question/2013/july.htm
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redeemers
More than 80%?
Ambiguous: 1 10 11 20 21 22 26 27 Ambiguous execution (e.g. "draw a line around"): 4 5 7 8 9 12 14 Easy on the face of it: 2 3 13 15 16 17 18 25 Nonsense: 6 23 24 28 29 30 Difficult to execute (e.g. "draw this complicated set of shapes in a small space while under time pressure without making any mistake"): 19
That's just my quick assessment and might vary for you but I probably took more than 10 minutes just to think about this. At best (and I was generous) 7 out of 30 questions are clear.
And that is assuming the questions have been formulated in good faith, which is evidently not the case. Question 2 could mean just as well instruct you to draw a line under the whole expression "the last word" in that line, or a line under "the last word in this line", or just under "line". Who's to say?
Ambiguous: 1 10 11 20 21 22 26 27 Ambiguous execution (e.g. "draw a line around"): 4 5 7 8 9 12 14 Easy on the face of it: 2 3 13 15 16 17 18 25 Nonsense: 6 23 24 28 29 30 Difficult to execute (e.g. "draw this complicated set of shapes in a small space while under time pressure without making any mistake"): 19
That's just my quick assessment and might vary for you but I probably took more than 10 minutes just to think about this. At best (and I was generous) 7 out of 30 questions are clear.
And that is assuming the questions have been formulated in good faith, which is evidently not the case. Question 2 could mean just as well instruct you to draw a line under the whole expression "the last word" in that line, or a line under "the last word in this line", or just under "line". Who's to say?
The don’t. In most, they ambiguously say draw a line “around” a letter or number. What is that? A circle?
How would you answer, "draw a line under the last word in this line"?
"draw a line under the last word in this line"
____Sorry, I expected "the last word in this line" to be underlined, not just "line". Right to vote denied.
“one wrong answer denotes failure of the test”
Yeah? Which word do you draw the line under?
Is there a word trick here I'm missing? I can only interpret it in the face-value sense of underlining the last word, "line".
Sorry, no votes for you; it was "word".
No, wait, you needed to underline every occurrence of the word "line".
Again, no idea if this test is real, just, that's the gimmick.
No, wait, you needed to underline every occurrence of the word "line".
Again, no idea if this test is real, just, that's the gimmick.
> Sorry, no votes for you; it was "word".
If it was this, there would be quotes around "word".
> No, wait, you needed to underline every occurrence of the word "line".
If it was this, it wouldn't say "last".
This particular one is not ambiguous.
If it was this, there would be quotes around "word".
> No, wait, you needed to underline every occurrence of the word "line".
If it was this, it wouldn't say "last".
This particular one is not ambiguous.
That's not the point. The test giver has free discretion to say either answer is correct or incorrect. You could argue that if the intent was to underline "word" that it would have quotes around it, but it doesn't matter because the test is not supposed to be fair or consistent.
Things like this were at the heart of what Jim Crow was in America. Selective and capricious enforcement of the law to disenfranchise and disadvantage black people at best, enable unaccountable violence against them at the worst.
Things like this were at the heart of what Jim Crow was in America. Selective and capricious enforcement of the law to disenfranchise and disadvantage black people at best, enable unaccountable violence against them at the worst.
That's a different argument than what started this thread. Cheating administrators have nothing to do with whether that question is ambiguous or not.
It's not cheating administrators, it's ambiguous questions with multiple possible answers.
As the judge of this test, I interpret your answer as incorrect. I expected the phrase, "the last word in this line" to be underlined. Test failed, no cheating required.
(Note that had you underlined the phrase, "the last word in this line", I would have still judged it incorrect, claiming that "word" or "line" should be underlined. Again, this requires no cheating.)
As the judge of this test, I interpret your answer as incorrect. I expected the phrase, "the last word in this line" to be underlined. Test failed, no cheating required.
(Note that had you underlined the phrase, "the last word in this line", I would have still judged it incorrect, claiming that "word" or "line" should be underlined. Again, this requires no cheating.)
>As the judge of this test, I interpret your answer as incorrect.
This makes you a cheating administrator in this hypothetical,
>I expected the phrase, "the last word in this line" to be underlined.
... because this expectation is not valid.
Quotation marks are not merely needed to make the question "unambiguous"; they are needed to make your interpretation possible.
This makes you a cheating administrator in this hypothetical,
>I expected the phrase, "the last word in this line" to be underlined.
... because this expectation is not valid.
Quotation marks are not merely needed to make the question "unambiguous"; they are needed to make your interpretation possible.
> This makes you a cheating administrator in this hypothetical
Actually, it doesn't.
> this expectation is not valid.
Actually, it is.
> Quotation marks are not merely needed to make the question "unambiguous"; they are needed to make your interpretation possible.
Actually, they are optional for that purpose, not required. Without them, the meaning is indeed ambiguous, with my interpretation indeed being valid.
The fact that we came up with 2 different, equally valid interpretations, just goes to show that the question is ambiguous.
Some other equally valid interpretations are explained by another poster here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41912790
Actually, it doesn't.
> this expectation is not valid.
Actually, it is.
> Quotation marks are not merely needed to make the question "unambiguous"; they are needed to make your interpretation possible.
Actually, they are optional for that purpose, not required. Without them, the meaning is indeed ambiguous, with my interpretation indeed being valid.
The fact that we came up with 2 different, equally valid interpretations, just goes to show that the question is ambiguous.
Some other equally valid interpretations are explained by another poster here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41912790
If it was this, there would be quotes around those 6 words, just like in your comment.
The quotes are needed to change this sentence from its clear meaning to these other ones.
The quotes are needed to change this sentence from its clear meaning to these other ones.
> If it was this, there would be quotes around those 6 words, just like in your comment.
If there were quotes around those 6 words, it would make the question unambiguous, sure. But without the quotes, my interpretation and judgement is still valid.
> The quotes are needed to change this sentence from its clear meaning to these other ones.
Actually, they are optional for that purpose, not required. Without them, the meaning is ambiguous. Just as you claim your interpretation is the "clear meaning", others have exactly as valid a claim to their interpretation being the "clear meaning".
If there were quotes around those 6 words, it would make the question unambiguous, sure. But without the quotes, my interpretation and judgement is still valid.
> The quotes are needed to change this sentence from its clear meaning to these other ones.
Actually, they are optional for that purpose, not required. Without them, the meaning is ambiguous. Just as you claim your interpretation is the "clear meaning", others have exactly as valid a claim to their interpretation being the "clear meaning".
>If it was this, there would be quotes around "word".
And who would you argue this to? The guy giving you the test who has the freedom to fail you for any reason they want?
There's no appeals court. These tests were not tests.
And who would you argue this to? The guy giving you the test who has the freedom to fail you for any reason they want?
There's no appeals court. These tests were not tests.
A that point you might as well flip off whoever it is you're grading, and I get that this is the point of the test, but it's hardly the questions fault. The question has one clear answer.
I get that the idea is that some questions create ambiguity using wordplay or subjectivity, but do you really think this is one of them? Your examples seem like a stretch even in the context of being unfair on purpose.
Yes, because it is well known that these tests were in fact designed to be unfair on purpose (to a specific racial group). So it's not a stretch to think that these "unfair on purpose" examples are realistic.
There are three reasonable interpretations I see. The instruction is clearly to draw a line under something. That something may be whatever is followed by "under", so you underline "the last word in this line". Or "in this line" just narrows it down, so only "the last word" is to be underlined. Or the whole "last word in this line" is meant as an instruction to be interpreted, so it's "line". In that case, be careful not to underline the period, as sentence marks clearly aren't part of a word. Or maybe they are.
Oh wait, it could also refer to "the last 'word' in this line", so you would need to underline "word".
Oh wait, it could also refer to "the last 'word' in this line", so you would need to underline "word".
Does anyone think it might be important to note in the head that this is 1964?
(That’s actually in the article’s own headline.)
(That’s actually in the article’s own headline.)
No, because the article was not written in 1964.
I feel like a rather large number of individuals are missing a key detail about these questions. It was intentionally about ambiguity. It was intentionally designed to allow the test grader to decide pass or fail, regardless of what the "correct" answer was. Do you realize that these "tests" weren't graded by an impartial judge. They were graded by people who saw it as their duty to deny certain individuals the right to vote.
Too many "rational" people who think that these were just clever word games and that "they seem fair," when being unfair was the entire point. As if the law, and the test givers were going to treat the people taking these tests fairly. I guess it's nice to have so many people who seem to think that the system would treat these people rationally and fairly. But that wasn't how it was. (Also, if you do think that, I highly recommend you go read some history books.)
Too many "rational" people who think that these were just clever word games and that "they seem fair," when being unfair was the entire point. As if the law, and the test givers were going to treat the people taking these tests fairly. I guess it's nice to have so many people who seem to think that the system would treat these people rationally and fairly. But that wasn't how it was. (Also, if you do think that, I highly recommend you go read some history books.)
They are quite difficult for me, as a foreigner. I can imagine that this was impossible to pass (if they are real of course) for a person who wants to exercise their rights. It comes with a lot of stress induced by difficult to understand and catchy quieries.
I imagine that one can always create a language typical to some group and impossible to overcome by people outside of this group. I'm trying to learn music as a person who has never attended music school, and even though there is a lot of terminology in English available in the internet, the terminology in my country is different, uses different symbols and are inaccessible for me. My kids learn them, when I see it I cannot make anything of it, because of different coding of the same ideas (like intervals, minor major etc.) in the system that is imposed in my country
I imagine that one can always create a language typical to some group and impossible to overcome by people outside of this group. I'm trying to learn music as a person who has never attended music school, and even though there is a lot of terminology in English available in the internet, the terminology in my country is different, uses different symbols and are inaccessible for me. My kids learn them, when I see it I cannot make anything of it, because of different coding of the same ideas (like intervals, minor major etc.) in the system that is imposed in my country
White-only primaries only ended in America 80 years ago:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith_v._Allwright
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith_v._Allwright
The test images look like they were written in Microsoft Word. Is this example fake?
Why? Because of the typeface and the numbered list?
> Why? Because of the typeface and the numbered list?
Yes, the typeface. And the numbered list looks suspicious too, now that you mention it. Also the kerning (look at the renderings of fi and fr in the document).
It wouldn't be the first time something like that gave away a forgery: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killian_documents_controversy.
I've seen documents from the 60s and earlier, and they never look like someone banged them out in MS Word with Times New Roman.
Yes, the typeface. And the numbered list looks suspicious too, now that you mention it. Also the kerning (look at the renderings of fi and fr in the document).
It wouldn't be the first time something like that gave away a forgery: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killian_documents_controversy.
I've seen documents from the 60s and earlier, and they never look like someone banged them out in MS Word with Times New Roman.
Check nneonneo's comment [1]. The test pictured in the featured article was retyped and reformatted from an earlier version, though the test itself might not be authentic.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41909793
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41909793
Feels like one of those psychological tests used to induce stress before evaluating other tasks (knowing the person is on edge).
Any test that needs 100% accuracy to pass when you are under pressure, filling ambiguous and unimportant questions, is simply bullshit. It's design to make you fail at will if you think about it. Even one ambiguous question is sufficient to fail an otherwise perfect submission: just say the answer was the other way around.
Any test that needs 100% accuracy to pass when you are under pressure, filling ambiguous and unimportant questions, is simply bullshit. It's design to make you fail at will if you think about it. Even one ambiguous question is sufficient to fail an otherwise perfect submission: just say the answer was the other way around.
I’m curious if anyone has the solutions to these.
The point is that the questions are phrased ambiguously such that a reviewer can credibly claim that a "correct" solution is wrong.
Take question 20:
> Spell backwards, forwards
Is "backwards" the object, with "forwards" describing how to spell it — as in, "Spell the word 'backwards', forwards"?
Or is it being used as an adverb, telling you how to spell the word "forwards" — as in, "Spell backwards the word 'forwards'"?
Take question 20:
> Spell backwards, forwards
Is "backwards" the object, with "forwards" describing how to spell it — as in, "Spell the word 'backwards', forwards"?
Or is it being used as an adverb, telling you how to spell the word "forwards" — as in, "Spell backwards the word 'forwards'"?
Wow, I hadn't even thought of that for that question. Disgustingly genius. The person administering the test can simply tell the person who took the test the opposite interpretation of however they answered, and that's it for their ability to vote.
It reminds me of the Simpsons episode with the spelling bee: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Sn5wyBDxn4
> "Your word is 'weather'."
> "Which one? Can you use it in a sentence?"
> "Certainly! 'I don't know whether the weather will improve.'"
(obviously the joke doesn't work as well written out)
> "Your word is 'weather'."
> "Which one? Can you use it in a sentence?"
> "Certainly! 'I don't know whether the weather will improve.'"
(obviously the joke doesn't work as well written out)
Also the Simpsons scene with the Smokey Bear statue: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-q-3fPYw_Y
> "Only who can prevent forest fires?" [You] [Me]
> Bart selects "You".
> "You pressed 'You', referring to me. That is incorrect. The correct answer is 'You'!"
> "Only who can prevent forest fires?" [You] [Me]
> Bart selects "You".
> "You pressed 'You', referring to me. That is incorrect. The correct answer is 'You'!"
"Me fail English? That's unpossible!"
What's even worse about this is this test wasn't given to everyone who wanted to vote, only those who gained their right to vote after the civil war.
White people were "grandfathered" in, literally.
White people were "grandfathered" in, literally.
A prime example of why "unionization" is good: You only need two people to do this differently and be told the opposite by the administrator (preferably the same one but not necessarily) and you've proved that it's BS.
That's all theory of course and in practice I bet people did talk about this afterwards and figured out it's BS and it didn't help either way. But it's easy to "find out" (and then try to do something about it) if you stick together. But if nobody sticks together on it and tries to do better for themselves by themselves, everyone does worse for themselves in the end.
That's all theory of course and in practice I bet people did talk about this afterwards and figured out it's BS and it didn't help either way. But it's easy to "find out" (and then try to do something about it) if you stick together. But if nobody sticks together on it and tries to do better for themselves by themselves, everyone does worse for themselves in the end.
Great, and now that you realize this you also realize why all these other right-wing schemes to suppress the vote are also unconstitutional. If you put some random jerk in a position to deny someone the right to vote based on ID card or signature rules, you have created a system for discriminatory disenfranchisement.
I think I've already got a pretty good handle on the modern-day disenfranchisement techniques, thank you.
Reminds of the Spelling Bee scene in the Simpsons:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWyYTJKOtDU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWyYTJKOtDU
And by "spell", do they mean just rewrite the word(s), write the word(s) with a s p a c e between each letter, or go to the examiner and spell it verbally?
Another possible solution is "backwards, forwards".
Without quotation marks, this task is inherently ambiguous.
Without quotation marks, this task is inherently ambiguous.
With the comma the second interpretation seems inapplicable to me.
It’s awkward, sure, but other questions use commas in that way. Question 19, immediately prior:
> Draw in the space below, a square with a triangle in it, and within that same triangle draw a circle with a black dot in it.
In that case, “a square with a triangle in it” is fairly unambiguously the object, which would make the sentence construction “[verb] [adverb], [object]” — exactly the same as the second interpretation of “Spell backwards, forwards”.
> Draw in the space below, a square with a triangle in it, and within that same triangle draw a circle with a black dot in it.
In that case, “a square with a triangle in it” is fairly unambiguously the object, which would make the sentence construction “[verb] [adverb], [object]” — exactly the same as the second interpretation of “Spell backwards, forwards”.
It seems inapplicable to you, but it will probably seem very applicable to the test administrator who doesn’t want people like you voting.
Kind of like modern App Store review. Google must have employed some history majors
A solution is available here: https://mrsjcoonan.weebly.com/uploads/2/3/6/2/23625108/liter...
But, my understanding is that the test is purposefully opaque, so that any answer can be considered “wrong”, at the discretion of whoever’s running the test.
But, my understanding is that the test is purposefully opaque, so that any answer can be considered “wrong”, at the discretion of whoever’s running the test.
Developers are so used to going through leetcode nonsense to get jobs that they're assuming that this is some kind of genuine but poorly written test to test literacy.
The way something like this was administered, was that tests returned by white people were given a cursory glance and accepted, and tests returned by black people were just rejected and given some random explanation as to why they were wrong, and then the test was chucked in the garbage. Nobody cared what the right answer was, all that mattered was there was some fig leaf explanation for why black voters couldn't vote. Mostly black voters stopped bothering to try after a couple of go arounds here -- not to mention the physical intimidation that went along with it. The point was to inculcate learned helplessness.
This wasn't the SAT, y'all.
The way something like this was administered, was that tests returned by white people were given a cursory glance and accepted, and tests returned by black people were just rejected and given some random explanation as to why they were wrong, and then the test was chucked in the garbage. Nobody cared what the right answer was, all that mattered was there was some fig leaf explanation for why black voters couldn't vote. Mostly black voters stopped bothering to try after a couple of go arounds here -- not to mention the physical intimidation that went along with it. The point was to inculcate learned helplessness.
This wasn't the SAT, y'all.
Their answer to #14 is wrong. The first part ("draw a line under the first letter after 'h'") is done correctly, with a line under "i", but the second part ("draw a line through the second letter after "j") is wrong. They should have drawn the line through "l", but they drew it through "m".
At first I thought "oh, they're just using a slightly different, but perhaps reasonable, meaning of "second letter after". But if that's the case, then they used a different meaning of "first letter after" for the first part.
#16 is also wrong: it calls for a black circle overlapping the left corner of a triangle, but they drew it overlapping the right corner.
And for #25, they wrote it out, but all of it did not fit on the line, and did not write the terminating ":" in the text, so that's technically incorrect too. (And it's debatable whether or not they were supposed to write out the text that's inside the triangle, or the "gotcha" of writing out the text in the question.)
I love that they gave up for the last two questions. I imagine most people who were forced to take that test did so too, assuming they even made it that far in the allotted time.
At first I thought "oh, they're just using a slightly different, but perhaps reasonable, meaning of "second letter after". But if that's the case, then they used a different meaning of "first letter after" for the first part.
#16 is also wrong: it calls for a black circle overlapping the left corner of a triangle, but they drew it overlapping the right corner.
And for #25, they wrote it out, but all of it did not fit on the line, and did not write the terminating ":" in the text, so that's technically incorrect too. (And it's debatable whether or not they were supposed to write out the text that's inside the triangle, or the "gotcha" of writing out the text in the question.)
I love that they gave up for the last two questions. I imagine most people who were forced to take that test did so too, assuming they even made it that far in the allotted time.
Question 29 is particularly cruel - even if someone somehow managed to provide "good" answers for the preceding 28 questions within ten minutes, then they were surely almost out of time, and just parsing that sentence took me about four readings.
They're basically all wrong, but that's the point. Essentially every one of these has another plausible interpretation where the answer given is incorrect. The rest you can just nitpick to death.
> 26. In the third square below, write the second letter of the fourth word.
Bzzzt. Answer was "h", it's the second letter of "the fourth word".
> 18. Look at the line of numbers below, and place on the blank, the number that should come next. 3 6 9 \_ 15
We said the number that should come _next_. You were meant to write 18.
> 9. Draw a line through the two letters below that come last in the alphabet.
We said to draw _a_ line. You drew two lines.
> 7. Above the letter X make a small cross.
We said above, yours is within the X.
> 26. In the third square below, write the second letter of the fourth word.
Bzzzt. Answer was "h", it's the second letter of "the fourth word".
> 18. Look at the line of numbers below, and place on the blank, the number that should come next. 3 6 9 \_ 15
We said the number that should come _next_. You were meant to write 18.
> 9. Draw a line through the two letters below that come last in the alphabet.
We said to draw _a_ line. You drew two lines.
> 7. Above the letter X make a small cross.
We said above, yours is within the X.
There are many ambiguous ones, but several here that are unambiguously wrong.
14, 15, 16 that others pointed out.
24. They printed 3 words when a single word was called for. The test is very clear about following the direction exactly, no more and no less. Also "mom" might be wrong, "wow" should be safe.
28. The vertical line is bisected in clearly unequal parts.
14, 15, 16 that others pointed out.
24. They printed 3 words when a single word was called for. The test is very clear about following the direction exactly, no more and no less. Also "mom" might be wrong, "wow" should be safe.
28. The vertical line is bisected in clearly unequal parts.
Their answer to #14 is wrong. They crossed out "m" and should've crossed out "l".
#8 is wrong, T should be crossed out because it's the first letter of "the alphabet".
#18 is wrong, after the 15 comes 18, so 18 should be written in the blank space.
Bastards.
#18 is wrong, after the 15 comes 18, so 18 should be written in the blank space.
Bastards.
It doesn't have answers for the last two and I think the number 16 is wrong (the circle is encircling the right corner). Also 25 doesn't fit on the line.
Would be interested to see what share of population would get all of those correct (if it's even possible). I for one wouldn't.
Sadistic stuff.
Would be interested to see what share of population would get all of those correct (if it's even possible). I for one wouldn't.
Sadistic stuff.
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What's the right answer to "Write down on the line provided, what you read in the triangle below"? The triangle contains "Paris in the spring".
Actually: Paris in the the spring
'the' comes twice
'the' comes twice
That's one trick part of the the question (a common trick, a lot of people don't read two "the"s in a row), but the other answer could be "what you read in the triangle below" as that's what the question states.
The other trick is that the line could be too short depending on your handwriting, in theory disqualifying the tested person regardless of what they write down.
The other trick is that the line could be too short depending on your handwriting, in theory disqualifying the tested person regardless of what they write down.
That's diabolical. But it's not certain if even that's correct. Depends on how the comma should be interpreted.
And the person who answered wrote the last two words such that they're not "on the line provided", so regardless of which phrase they're supposed to write, they got the question wrong.
Assuming they did write the correct thing, and assuming the test administrator would be unusually generous about the placement of the words, they still got it wrong: they left off the colon at the end.
Assuming they did write the correct thing, and assuming the test administrator would be unusually generous about the placement of the words, they still got it wrong: they left off the colon at the end.
It’s not a real test.
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The sheer unadulterated racism from the past is horrifying and sickening. Sure, we still have work to do, but I'm glad we've come so far in the last few decades.
We've removed some of the structural racism, but we've also gotten much better at hiding and "justifying" it.
Additionally, think about all the votes that were passed when these tests were present. Every one of those votes meant a huge and consistent portion of the population could not participate. Which probably created a situation where that population was at a disadvantage across many systems.
Even if they stopped doing this test in 19XX, it would take a significant amount of time to unwind not only the unfair policies enacted under it but also the damage done by those policies to families. We might still be undoing the damae from them.
A similar case is redlining -- city policies that forced immigrant and minority populations to live in certain areas, limiting those family's abilities to participate in the growth of housing value. A couple generations cannot accrue value from their homes, because they've been forced to live in a low value area. Even once redlining became illegal, those families were 60 years behind in an exponential growth curve. Fixing the policy is a great start, as was removing these tests, but we need to do more to actually make things right.
The sheer unadulterated racism from the past is still very much being felt in the present, as waves and ripples from past decisions and policies led to inequal financial and social outcomes that take generations to repair (if they ever can be repaired.)
Additionally, think about all the votes that were passed when these tests were present. Every one of those votes meant a huge and consistent portion of the population could not participate. Which probably created a situation where that population was at a disadvantage across many systems.
Even if they stopped doing this test in 19XX, it would take a significant amount of time to unwind not only the unfair policies enacted under it but also the damage done by those policies to families. We might still be undoing the damae from them.
A similar case is redlining -- city policies that forced immigrant and minority populations to live in certain areas, limiting those family's abilities to participate in the growth of housing value. A couple generations cannot accrue value from their homes, because they've been forced to live in a low value area. Even once redlining became illegal, those families were 60 years behind in an exponential growth curve. Fixing the policy is a great start, as was removing these tests, but we need to do more to actually make things right.
The sheer unadulterated racism from the past is still very much being felt in the present, as waves and ripples from past decisions and policies led to inequal financial and social outcomes that take generations to repair (if they ever can be repaired.)
It’s still here. We dress it up as voter ID or something similar.
Or racist police profiling and felony convictions for things white people would walk for (felony conviction = you lose the right to vote, effectively stripping someone of their citizenship. I don't know if it's for life, is it?)
The biggest thing we need to work is the subtle racism of low expectations.
The implication that acknowledging statistical reality that certain income groups and racial groups have less ID is in it of itself racist is, well, racist. Because then you can use this adject dismissal of reality to apply racist laws and claim they're not racist.
In the naivest, most shallow analysis Voter ID is not racist because black Americans are just as capable of receiving ID. The logic is fine, but purposefully ignorant.
The barrier to ID IS NOT just "do you have the physical/mental ability to get ID". The barriers are economic and geographic. When you don't put DMVs in black areas that becomes a barrier. When IDs cost money that becomes a barrier. When a motor vehicle is required that becomes a barrier.
In the naivest, most shallow analysis Voter ID is not racist because black Americans are just as capable of receiving ID. The logic is fine, but purposefully ignorant.
The barrier to ID IS NOT just "do you have the physical/mental ability to get ID". The barriers are economic and geographic. When you don't put DMVs in black areas that becomes a barrier. When IDs cost money that becomes a barrier. When a motor vehicle is required that becomes a barrier.
The subtle racism is that just because a DMV is a mile further away that black people somehow can’t figure out how to get ID.
The subtle racism is ignoring poor rural whites that face the same “challenges” of distance (even more so!) but are somehow ignored.
The subtle racism is making the claim over and over again without actually presenting any data.
The subtle racism is ignoring poor rural whites that face the same “challenges” of distance (even more so!) but are somehow ignored.
The subtle racism is making the claim over and over again without actually presenting any data.
Movement Advancement Project has some data about the de facto discriminatory effect of voter ID requirements [1] that separately accounts for for low-income people regardless of race [2] and black people in particular [3].
Here's something I wrote on the voter ID topic before [4] (disregard the citation numbers in the quote):
> A question that isn't for you in particular to answer is, in the current day and age, would the number of fraudulent ballots prevented by a new strict voter ID requirement be greater than the number of valid votes prevented by such a requirement? The current legal framework of obtaining government-issued IDs makes strict voter ID laws de facto voter suppression. 30 million people lacked a driver's license as of 2022 [2], and I'd be willing to bet that at least 1 million of them are US citizens of voting age. Let's assume that 25% of them would vote if they had the option to do so from their homes (a arbitrary but conservative hypothetical percentage in light of actual voter turnout percentages [5]). There's been no national election with 250000 fraudulent ballots. Any new voter ID bill that doesn't take this into account will almost certainly be voter suppression. The problem isn't the principle of requiring a voter ID. It's that the laws around getting an ID need to change prior to or simultaneously with laws that make ID a requirement for voting.
[1] https://www.mapresearch.org/id-documents-report
[2] https://www.mapresearch.org/file/ID-info-low-income-communit...
[3] https://www.mapresearch.org/file/ID-info-Black-communities.p...
[4] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41351632
Here's something I wrote on the voter ID topic before [4] (disregard the citation numbers in the quote):
> A question that isn't for you in particular to answer is, in the current day and age, would the number of fraudulent ballots prevented by a new strict voter ID requirement be greater than the number of valid votes prevented by such a requirement? The current legal framework of obtaining government-issued IDs makes strict voter ID laws de facto voter suppression. 30 million people lacked a driver's license as of 2022 [2], and I'd be willing to bet that at least 1 million of them are US citizens of voting age. Let's assume that 25% of them would vote if they had the option to do so from their homes (a arbitrary but conservative hypothetical percentage in light of actual voter turnout percentages [5]). There's been no national election with 250000 fraudulent ballots. Any new voter ID bill that doesn't take this into account will almost certainly be voter suppression. The problem isn't the principle of requiring a voter ID. It's that the laws around getting an ID need to change prior to or simultaneously with laws that make ID a requirement for voting.
[1] https://www.mapresearch.org/id-documents-report
[2] https://www.mapresearch.org/file/ID-info-low-income-communit...
[3] https://www.mapresearch.org/file/ID-info-Black-communities.p...
[4] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41351632
> Overall, roughly one in eight adults in this country—nearly 30 million people—lack a valid driver’s license, one of the most common forms of ID.
That's a strawman. I don't think anyone is promoting that a drivers license, and only a drivers license is the sole form of appropriate voter ID.
> There's been no national election with 250000 fraudulent ballots.
In 2020 "In Arizona, Biden won by 10,457 votes, and in Georgia, he won by 12,670 votes"
Arizona has 4,109,270 registered voters, so the margin was 0.2%, or 2 votes out of every thousand registered voters. Georgia has 7,004,034 registered voters so the margin was 1.8 out of every thousand registered voters as well.
That seems like a very small margin of votes is deciding elections.
Seems like even a small amount of voter fraud could have an effect?
That's a strawman. I don't think anyone is promoting that a drivers license, and only a drivers license is the sole form of appropriate voter ID.
> There's been no national election with 250000 fraudulent ballots.
In 2020 "In Arizona, Biden won by 10,457 votes, and in Georgia, he won by 12,670 votes"
Arizona has 4,109,270 registered voters, so the margin was 0.2%, or 2 votes out of every thousand registered voters. Georgia has 7,004,034 registered voters so the margin was 1.8 out of every thousand registered voters as well.
That seems like a very small margin of votes is deciding elections.
Seems like even a small amount of voter fraud could have an effect?
> I don't think anyone is promoting that a drivers license, and only a drivers license is the sole form of appropriate voter ID.
Even so [1]:
> More than one in ten (11%) U.S. adult citizens—or nearly 26 million people— lack any form of government-issued photo identification.
There are also people without birth certificates. Obtaining some IDs can be difficult without having other IDs. For example, depending on where you live, getting a driver's license is difficult without a birth certificate. (Ctrl-F for "Lack of birth certificate" on [2], though apparently South Carolina lets you get a voter registration card before you get a valid voter ID.)
The larger issue is that valid forms of ID for voting differ between states, and (beyond the topic of voting) the difficulty of getting what most people think of as common IDs differs between states. There might well be 100 thousand citizens across the US who would fall through the cracks if every state that didn't already require voter ID were to pass laws naively requiring voter ID for the 2028 election. Voting is a right for citizens, so state governments should go out of their way to make obtaining stable IDs convenient for citizens who lack them (accounting for, among other things, transportation difficulties and time spent on in-person verification that takes away from job time). If the federal government has no authority to unify ID requirements, then states should cooperate to standardize their requirements toward convenience. I would also like if every state (and I do mean every state) allowed payment statements and utility bills as valid identification for voting, because getting stable IDs such as driver's licenses or passports takes months.
> Arizona has 4,109,270 registered voters, so the margin was 0.2%, or 2 votes out of every thousand registered voters. Georgia has 7,004,034 registered voters so the margin was 1.8 out of every thousand registered voters as well.
> That seems like a very small margin of votes is deciding elections.
If the margin were something like 100 votes in a state, I wouldn't know what to do about it, but I would still be dissatisfied if a new voter ID requirement in the state blocked 10000 citizens from voting. When I wrote this before:
> Any new voter ID bill that doesn't take this into account will almost certainly be voter suppression. The problem isn't the principle of requiring a voter ID. It's that the laws around getting an ID need to change prior to or simultaneously with laws that make ID a requirement for voting.
What I meant to communicate was that any states passing new voter ID laws should near-simultaneously pass laws that making getting government-issued, voting-eligible IDs easier, especially for people who lack multiple forms of ID. And for sure, states should not be carelessly closing DMVs the way Alabama did in 2015 [3].
[1] https://www.mapresearch.org/file/MAP-Identity-Documents-repo...
[2] https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/voter-id#toggle...
[3] https://www.snopes.com/news/2015/10/01/alabama-drivers-licen...
Even so [1]:
> More than one in ten (11%) U.S. adult citizens—or nearly 26 million people— lack any form of government-issued photo identification.
There are also people without birth certificates. Obtaining some IDs can be difficult without having other IDs. For example, depending on where you live, getting a driver's license is difficult without a birth certificate. (Ctrl-F for "Lack of birth certificate" on [2], though apparently South Carolina lets you get a voter registration card before you get a valid voter ID.)
The larger issue is that valid forms of ID for voting differ between states, and (beyond the topic of voting) the difficulty of getting what most people think of as common IDs differs between states. There might well be 100 thousand citizens across the US who would fall through the cracks if every state that didn't already require voter ID were to pass laws naively requiring voter ID for the 2028 election. Voting is a right for citizens, so state governments should go out of their way to make obtaining stable IDs convenient for citizens who lack them (accounting for, among other things, transportation difficulties and time spent on in-person verification that takes away from job time). If the federal government has no authority to unify ID requirements, then states should cooperate to standardize their requirements toward convenience. I would also like if every state (and I do mean every state) allowed payment statements and utility bills as valid identification for voting, because getting stable IDs such as driver's licenses or passports takes months.
> Arizona has 4,109,270 registered voters, so the margin was 0.2%, or 2 votes out of every thousand registered voters. Georgia has 7,004,034 registered voters so the margin was 1.8 out of every thousand registered voters as well.
> That seems like a very small margin of votes is deciding elections.
If the margin were something like 100 votes in a state, I wouldn't know what to do about it, but I would still be dissatisfied if a new voter ID requirement in the state blocked 10000 citizens from voting. When I wrote this before:
> Any new voter ID bill that doesn't take this into account will almost certainly be voter suppression. The problem isn't the principle of requiring a voter ID. It's that the laws around getting an ID need to change prior to or simultaneously with laws that make ID a requirement for voting.
What I meant to communicate was that any states passing new voter ID laws should near-simultaneously pass laws that making getting government-issued, voting-eligible IDs easier, especially for people who lack multiple forms of ID. And for sure, states should not be carelessly closing DMVs the way Alabama did in 2015 [3].
[1] https://www.mapresearch.org/file/MAP-Identity-Documents-repo...
[2] https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/voter-id#toggle...
[3] https://www.snopes.com/news/2015/10/01/alabama-drivers-licen...
> What I meant to communicate was that any states passing new voter ID laws should near-simultaneously pass laws that making getting government-issued, voting-eligible IDs easier, especially for people who lack multiple forms of ID.
That seems like a reasonable idea and one that many voter ID proponents support.
> the way Alabama did in 2015
Your own article says that Secretary of State will be providing IDs to ensure the DMV closures don’t affect ability to vote.
That seems like a reasonable idea and one that many voter ID proponents support.
> the way Alabama did in 2015
Your own article says that Secretary of State will be providing IDs to ensure the DMV closures don’t affect ability to vote.
> Your own article says that Secretary of State will be providing IDs to ensure the DMV closures don’t affect ability to vote.
That was just Secretary of State John Merrill's claim, and I'm saying that it was a careless one. "There are still places to get voter ID, just 31 fewer places out of about 100" is not the same as "anyone who wants an ID can still get one". The burden of proof was on the Merrill to demonstrate that the Board of Registrar's offices and the mobile ID van (which in 2014 officially appeared 2 out of 25 times on weekends and 23 out of 25 times on weekdays usually during 9-5 hours [1][2]) would compensate for the lack of possibly closer-by DMVs.
Consider the context of the voter ID laws themselves [3]:
> Under the new law, which only went into effect in 2014, only a handful of forms of ID, including driver’s licenses, meet the requirements.
> Civil rights groups vehemently opposed the legislation, noting that these IDs are harder to obtain for minorities, who among other things are more reliant on public transportation. A state analysis showed that 500,000 registered voters lacked a driver’s licenses around the time the law was being put into effect.
What ended up happening after the 31 DMVs were closed was [4]:
> However, since the photo ID voting law went into effect in 2014, only a small portion of the estimated 250,000 Alabamans who do not already have the accepted IDs have obtained the free version. In 2014, an election year, only 5,294 of those IDs were issued, state officials told TPM.
> The number of IDs issued this year is even smaller. As of September 28, 1,442 IDs had been issued since January 2, 2015.
...
> However, as of last Monday, only 29 IDs were issued from the mobile units this year and four from the state capitol, according to the secretary of state’s office.
...
> Civil rights activists point to several reasons for why, they say, the free ID program has been ineffective. For one, many of the black residents affected by the DMV closures live miles from the county offices that issue IDs and African-Americans are more likely to be dependent on public transport.
And then consider what Merrill said about the DMV closures [3]:
> The way Merrill sees it, the closures will cause “a real inconvenience” for those seeking driver’s license, but have no bearing on Alabamans’ ability to vote, since the 67 boards of registrars remain open.
...
> The [state] ID is one of them,” Merrill said. “I don’t know why people don’t have driver’s licenses, except that they don’t drive. Maybe some of them can’t drive, but I don’t know.”
In the best light, Merrill didn't understand the burden of needing to rely on public transportation to travel possibly farther than you would have needed to if the DMV that used to be available stopped being available.
Tangentially, I feel as if Merrill, along with other Alabama officials, was being gaslit [5]:
> Collier reported that Mason proposed closing multiple driver's license offices throughout the State and asked ALEA to put together a plan. It was Collier's understanding that Mason intended the plan to be rolled out in a way that had limited impact on Governor Bentley's political allies. Collier claims he reported this to the Attorney General' s office because he was concerned about a Voting Rights Act violation.
...
> Ultimately, the decision to close the offices was reversed, in part, after the state litigated the issue with the U.S. Department of Transportation, which had claimed that the closures had a disproportionate impact on minority communities.
[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20141102180855/http://www.alabam...
[2] https://www.timeanddate.com/calendar/?year=2014
[3] https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/alabama-voter-id-dmv
[4] https://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/alabama-free-voter-id...
[5] https://web.archive.org/web/20170408201133/http://bentleyinv...
That was just Secretary of State John Merrill's claim, and I'm saying that it was a careless one. "There are still places to get voter ID, just 31 fewer places out of about 100" is not the same as "anyone who wants an ID can still get one". The burden of proof was on the Merrill to demonstrate that the Board of Registrar's offices and the mobile ID van (which in 2014 officially appeared 2 out of 25 times on weekends and 23 out of 25 times on weekdays usually during 9-5 hours [1][2]) would compensate for the lack of possibly closer-by DMVs.
Consider the context of the voter ID laws themselves [3]:
> Under the new law, which only went into effect in 2014, only a handful of forms of ID, including driver’s licenses, meet the requirements.
> Civil rights groups vehemently opposed the legislation, noting that these IDs are harder to obtain for minorities, who among other things are more reliant on public transportation. A state analysis showed that 500,000 registered voters lacked a driver’s licenses around the time the law was being put into effect.
What ended up happening after the 31 DMVs were closed was [4]:
> However, since the photo ID voting law went into effect in 2014, only a small portion of the estimated 250,000 Alabamans who do not already have the accepted IDs have obtained the free version. In 2014, an election year, only 5,294 of those IDs were issued, state officials told TPM.
> The number of IDs issued this year is even smaller. As of September 28, 1,442 IDs had been issued since January 2, 2015.
...
> However, as of last Monday, only 29 IDs were issued from the mobile units this year and four from the state capitol, according to the secretary of state’s office.
...
> Civil rights activists point to several reasons for why, they say, the free ID program has been ineffective. For one, many of the black residents affected by the DMV closures live miles from the county offices that issue IDs and African-Americans are more likely to be dependent on public transport.
And then consider what Merrill said about the DMV closures [3]:
> The way Merrill sees it, the closures will cause “a real inconvenience” for those seeking driver’s license, but have no bearing on Alabamans’ ability to vote, since the 67 boards of registrars remain open.
...
> The [state] ID is one of them,” Merrill said. “I don’t know why people don’t have driver’s licenses, except that they don’t drive. Maybe some of them can’t drive, but I don’t know.”
In the best light, Merrill didn't understand the burden of needing to rely on public transportation to travel possibly farther than you would have needed to if the DMV that used to be available stopped being available.
Tangentially, I feel as if Merrill, along with other Alabama officials, was being gaslit [5]:
> Collier reported that Mason proposed closing multiple driver's license offices throughout the State and asked ALEA to put together a plan. It was Collier's understanding that Mason intended the plan to be rolled out in a way that had limited impact on Governor Bentley's political allies. Collier claims he reported this to the Attorney General' s office because he was concerned about a Voting Rights Act violation.
...
> Ultimately, the decision to close the offices was reversed, in part, after the state litigated the issue with the U.S. Department of Transportation, which had claimed that the closures had a disproportionate impact on minority communities.
[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20141102180855/http://www.alabam...
[2] https://www.timeanddate.com/calendar/?year=2014
[3] https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/alabama-voter-id-dmv
[4] https://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/alabama-free-voter-id...
[5] https://web.archive.org/web/20170408201133/http://bentleyinv...
I have neither the time nor the inclination to dig into Alabama’s situation, but suffice to say finding an example of a state that does it wrong does not mean “we must absolutely never have voter ID because it’s impossible to ever do it correctly”
Almost all of Europe has effective voter ID laws or at least processes by which eligibility to vote is verified.
People love to call out how the US needs to adopt processes from Europe because it’s done in a better way. Voter ID sounds like a great place to start.
Almost all of Europe has effective voter ID laws or at least processes by which eligibility to vote is verified.
People love to call out how the US needs to adopt processes from Europe because it’s done in a better way. Voter ID sounds like a great place to start.
I think being completely unable to find a state that does it right does kind of mean "hey, we shouldn't do this"
What you're not realizing is the intention of these laws is to be racist and cause disenfranchisement. Therefore, that being the result is not a "failure" - that's what the laws were intended to do.
> Voter ID sounds like a great place to start
I don't understand why. Why are people so caught up on Voter ID that they're willing to push it even if the risk of disenfranchising people is there?
I think I can guess the reason why, but I don't want to be presumptuous.
We really don't have any problems with widespread election fraud due to identity theft. It's just not even a real problem. We don't have any evidence to support that. So, I don't know what these laws are intending to accomplish. Well, I do know, but for the hypothetical person who is not focused on disenfranchising people - what are they hoping to accomplish with this law? Do you know?
What you're not realizing is the intention of these laws is to be racist and cause disenfranchisement. Therefore, that being the result is not a "failure" - that's what the laws were intended to do.
> Voter ID sounds like a great place to start
I don't understand why. Why are people so caught up on Voter ID that they're willing to push it even if the risk of disenfranchising people is there?
I think I can guess the reason why, but I don't want to be presumptuous.
We really don't have any problems with widespread election fraud due to identity theft. It's just not even a real problem. We don't have any evidence to support that. So, I don't know what these laws are intending to accomplish. Well, I do know, but for the hypothetical person who is not focused on disenfranchising people - what are they hoping to accomplish with this law? Do you know?
> I have neither the time nor the inclination to dig into Alabama’s situation but suffice to say finding an example of a state that does it wrong does not mean “we must absolutely never have voter ID because it’s impossible to ever do it correctly”
I never said such a thing, and I even ended my second to previous reply saying the opposite. It's completely possible to require voter ID "correctly", but my impression is that lawmakers would rather do it quickly, by passing voter ID laws without even thinking about the millions of citizens who lack ID.
I dug into the Alabama example to support my claim that Alabama carelessly closed 31 DMVs in 2015 (and to suggest that you shouldn't take then Secretary of State Merrill's arguments at face value).
I never said such a thing, and I even ended my second to previous reply saying the opposite. It's completely possible to require voter ID "correctly", but my impression is that lawmakers would rather do it quickly, by passing voter ID laws without even thinking about the millions of citizens who lack ID.
I dug into the Alabama example to support my claim that Alabama carelessly closed 31 DMVs in 2015 (and to suggest that you shouldn't take then Secretary of State Merrill's arguments at face value).
Again, it's not a matter of "can't figure out"
It's factual that black Americans are more likely to not have ID, and therefore a law requiring photo ID would disproportionately affect them. That's not up for debate.
In addition, Voting ID laws have historically been a method of disenfranchisement. I certainly don't trust conservatives to not disenfranchise voters, particularly when the method they're proposing was originally designed specially to exclude black Americans from voting.
In the naivest, most shallow view, voting ID doesn't seem bad. But when you look at WHO is proposing it, the history of voting ID, the distribution of ID in the US, etc. (the broader context), it seems clear that the intention of those types of laws is not pure.
In addition to this, we have virtually zero evidence that voter fraud is a widespread problem. The topic of voter fraud is largely just "made up" following the insurrection on Jan 6th. To me, it seems suspicious that we're proposing and pushing laws to restrict voting when we haven't even been able to verify the problem exists in the first place.
It's factual that black Americans are more likely to not have ID, and therefore a law requiring photo ID would disproportionately affect them. That's not up for debate.
In addition, Voting ID laws have historically been a method of disenfranchisement. I certainly don't trust conservatives to not disenfranchise voters, particularly when the method they're proposing was originally designed specially to exclude black Americans from voting.
In the naivest, most shallow view, voting ID doesn't seem bad. But when you look at WHO is proposing it, the history of voting ID, the distribution of ID in the US, etc. (the broader context), it seems clear that the intention of those types of laws is not pure.
In addition to this, we have virtually zero evidence that voter fraud is a widespread problem. The topic of voter fraud is largely just "made up" following the insurrection on Jan 6th. To me, it seems suspicious that we're proposing and pushing laws to restrict voting when we haven't even been able to verify the problem exists in the first place.
> In addition to this, we have virtually zero evidence that voter fraud is a widespread problem
It doesn’t have to be widespread to have an effect on outcomes.
It doesn’t have to be widespread to have an effect on outcomes.
Okay, we don't have any evidence to show it has an effect on outcomes. No, a politically charged speech doesn't count as evidence.
I would have hoped that a more logical place like HN wouldn’t make the mistake of assuming because there is no evidence it’s proof something isn’t happening.
I understand it's not proof of something not happening.
I would have hoped a more logical place like HN would understand taking extremely risky measures, which have a history of disenfranchising people, isn't worth it when the problem they're attempting to solve cannot even be identified.
The reason people are so hesitant to implement Voter ID is that the people advocating Voter ID aren't very honest. They refuse to admit the racist history, they refuse to admit the disparities between demographics, and they refuse to acknowledge their own lack of evidence.
That's very concerning. It makes one wonder what their intentions are. If they are truly not attempting to disenfranchise people, then why not admit to the previous history and then explain how that will be avoided? That would ease everyone's concerns. A win-win. But they don't do it.
Do you not find that suspicious?
I would have hoped a more logical place like HN would understand taking extremely risky measures, which have a history of disenfranchising people, isn't worth it when the problem they're attempting to solve cannot even be identified.
The reason people are so hesitant to implement Voter ID is that the people advocating Voter ID aren't very honest. They refuse to admit the racist history, they refuse to admit the disparities between demographics, and they refuse to acknowledge their own lack of evidence.
That's very concerning. It makes one wonder what their intentions are. If they are truly not attempting to disenfranchise people, then why not admit to the previous history and then explain how that will be avoided? That would ease everyone's concerns. A win-win. But they don't do it.
Do you not find that suspicious?
Voter ID is not racist.
In Texas, there used to be DPS offices in most mid-sized towns and everyone just had to wait in line to get their driver’s license (principal ID for most Texans) or non-driver ID card.
Now, they’ve concentrated them into a few larger service centers that are often miles away from the cities they serve and require appointments, sometimes not available for several weeks… but with a few that spontaneously crop up at short notice.
Guess what does not work for people reliant on the meager public transportation infrastructure or getting rides from also time-strapped friends and family?
Germany, by contrast, requires every resident to register in the city or town they live in for an ID, whether they intend to vote or not, but even small towns have such an office, and as someone else pointed out, every citizen receives a letter 30 days before each election telling them exactly who/what is being voted on, where they are to go on Election Day (always a Sunday), and how to vote absentee if they’re not going to be in town that day.
Now, they’ve concentrated them into a few larger service centers that are often miles away from the cities they serve and require appointments, sometimes not available for several weeks… but with a few that spontaneously crop up at short notice.
Guess what does not work for people reliant on the meager public transportation infrastructure or getting rides from also time-strapped friends and family?
Germany, by contrast, requires every resident to register in the city or town they live in for an ID, whether they intend to vote or not, but even small towns have such an office, and as someone else pointed out, every citizen receives a letter 30 days before each election telling them exactly who/what is being voted on, where they are to go on Election Day (always a Sunday), and how to vote absentee if they’re not going to be in town that day.
>In Texas, there used to be DPS offices in most mid-sized towns and everyone just had to wait in line to get their driver’s license (principal ID for most Texans) or non-driver ID card.
They're still there, most mid-sized towns still have them.
>Now, they’ve concentrated them into a few larger service centers that are often miles away from the cities they serve and require appointments, sometimes not available for several weeks… but with a few that spontaneously crop up at short notice.
Yes they opened the big licensing centers and made them appointment only which is an improvement, you waste zero time. "Miles away" means nothing in Texas, the state is bigger than France.
>Guess what does not work for people reliant on the meager public transportation infrastructure
There is no public transportation infrastructure in most mid-sized Texas towns.
>or getting rides from also time-strapped friends and family?
Now with appointments you can plan ahead with family or friends that are time strapped.
They're still there, most mid-sized towns still have them.
>Now, they’ve concentrated them into a few larger service centers that are often miles away from the cities they serve and require appointments, sometimes not available for several weeks… but with a few that spontaneously crop up at short notice.
Yes they opened the big licensing centers and made them appointment only which is an improvement, you waste zero time. "Miles away" means nothing in Texas, the state is bigger than France.
>Guess what does not work for people reliant on the meager public transportation infrastructure
There is no public transportation infrastructure in most mid-sized Texas towns.
>or getting rides from also time-strapped friends and family?
Now with appointments you can plan ahead with family or friends that are time strapped.
[deleted]
Like many such policies it's not explicitly racist .. as a procedure it simply disenfranchises some demographics more than others; lower income brackets, people that have had difficult housing and record keepng pasts, indigenous voters on reservation lands lacking mailbox addresses, etc.
It's a mystery how that appears to proportionally exclude along racial and ethnic lines but it's assuredly not that by delibrate intent.
Just a happy accident really?
It's a mystery how that appears to proportionally exclude along racial and ethnic lines but it's assuredly not that by delibrate intent.
Just a happy accident really?
A fun fact is that this is specifically the question the academic framework of critical race theory was formed to address. How can systems that are not explicitly racist, that may actually have racial equity as explicit goals, still create racially disparate outcomes. It's an interesting area of study! No wonder people hate it.
It absolutely is. Go look at the racial demographics of the neighborhoods where DMVs are being opened and closed. And then ask yourself which racial groups, at large, are more likely to have time in their day to sit at an inconveniently located DMV and what party they most often vote for.
It certainly is, because the laws are passed with the intent that they won't be applied equally.
Incidentally, this is one of the things critical race theory actually talked about: how laws can be non-discriminatory on the surface, but deliberately created and applied in a discriminatory manner.
To trot out Wilhoit's Law again: "Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect."
Incidentally, this is one of the things critical race theory actually talked about: how laws can be non-discriminatory on the surface, but deliberately created and applied in a discriminatory manner.
To trot out Wilhoit's Law again: "Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect."
anonfordays(1)
Fair. It disenfranchises the poor across racial boundaries.
Poverty is not equal across racial boundaries and geography is also not equal across racial boundaries. Where you put the DPS matters, and the South is still very much segregated to some degree today. Naturally, the state government knows this and takes full advantage of it.
See also: Gerrymandering. Same concept.
See also: Gerrymandering. Same concept.
Totally. I’m being sarcastic. :)
I’ve worked in the ID space and know how the parts work together. When I found myself widowed and having to get a passport for my son, the process of getting a replacement social security card for him was incredibly onerous. 3 different visits! Mind you this was to get a replacement cardboard card - getting survivors benefits is a simple phone call.
Multiple visits is a barrier for folks without paid time off. Physical documents is a barrier for folks without unstable housing or noncustodial parents.
It’s interesting that all of this bullshit is required to exercise your right to vote. But we have the minimal possible controls on the right to bear arms in those states.
I’ve worked in the ID space and know how the parts work together. When I found myself widowed and having to get a passport for my son, the process of getting a replacement social security card for him was incredibly onerous. 3 different visits! Mind you this was to get a replacement cardboard card - getting survivors benefits is a simple phone call.
Multiple visits is a barrier for folks without paid time off. Physical documents is a barrier for folks without unstable housing or noncustodial parents.
It’s interesting that all of this bullshit is required to exercise your right to vote. But we have the minimal possible controls on the right to bear arms in those states.
Trust me, 2A will be thrown in the trash the moment poor people or minorities start arming themselves again.
Yeah, people forget Ronald Reagan passed some of the nationa's earliest gun control laws as governor of California partly as a response to groups like the Black Panthers arming themselves.
Voter IDs are free, they do not disenfranchise the poor.
Then maybe they should issue them at voting centers come election day.
Different organization with a different scope. Would be nice to have, but you must plan accordingly.
Why not merge them? Voter IDs can be driver’s licenses, passports, etc. So much bureaucracy. For the sake of efficiency, simply have sign ups for a voter ID card (similar to state IDs) at voting centers. Two birds, one stone. Easy.
I'm with you, it's sadly the nature of the beast. Think about the federal government alone: DoD military ID, veteran's ID, passport, social security card, etc. are all separate organizations with different scopes. It's madness.
So what’s one more, for voting? Or better yet, allow a way to quickly issue people state ID cards at DMV voting centers and other similar facilities. That way you get an ID for voting, and for other state identification purposes. Easy-peasy.
Texas does just that! When you apply for a driver's license or other state ID, you can elect to register to vote at the same time. Two birds, one stone.
Texas is hardly unique in this, since every state except those which continuously since 1994 have either not required registration or offered election day registration is required to do this under the federal National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (the “motor voter” law.)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Voter_Registration_...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Voter_Registration_...
Yeah and what would be even better is when you go to vote you can get an ID.
M4v3R(3)
Voter id is so far from this. You might have to jump through hoops to get an ID, but with literacy tests it was almost impossible for blacks to register.
One disproportionately effects black voters, with an (arbitrary guess) 80% effectiveness rate.
One disproportionately effects black voters with a (https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/impa...) ~10% effectiveness
Just because one is working better then the other doesn't mean they are any different in their purpose
One disproportionately effects black voters with a (https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/impa...) ~10% effectiveness
Just because one is working better then the other doesn't mean they are any different in their purpose
jhp123(1)
It's possible. It was designed to be. It was used because southern Blacks actually did have a lower literacy rate than Whites at the time and this was seen as the most expedient "filter" they could create.
The real racism was in all the ways to bypass the test. Grandfather clauses, land ownership clauses, "demonstrated understanding" options. Most White people challenged by the test wouldn't ever need to actually confront it.
These weren't the only requirements either. You had to be of "good character" and "understand the duties and obligations of citizenship under a republican form of government" and to be able to "read _and_ write."
Finally even if you were Black and managed all of this it wasn't at all a guarantee that your registration or vote would be accepted. Sometimes this understanding would be communicated in an act of violence.
The test is a tiny archival curiosity created by a much more overt system.
The real racism was in all the ways to bypass the test. Grandfather clauses, land ownership clauses, "demonstrated understanding" options. Most White people challenged by the test wouldn't ever need to actually confront it.
These weren't the only requirements either. You had to be of "good character" and "understand the duties and obligations of citizenship under a republican form of government" and to be able to "read _and_ write."
Finally even if you were Black and managed all of this it wasn't at all a guarantee that your registration or vote would be accepted. Sometimes this understanding would be communicated in an act of violence.
The test is a tiny archival curiosity created by a much more overt system.
It's not possible. Several of the questions have multiple valid answers. It's pretty obvious what the scheme is.
That comment is a reflection of my pedantry and I don't think we're actually disagreeing.
It's not possible to know the right answers because there never were any. This means the test has no predictive power, not that it's impossible, and again, since some Whites unable to prove education did have to contend with this, it was designed that way intentionally.
I feel "near impossible literacy test" is a terrible description. The "intentionally ambiguous literacy test" would be more apt.
More worrying is I am unable to find a definitive provenance for this document. It suggests it was used in the early 1900s but the print quality and format seems unusual in several ways to me. Which is why I attempted to reduce it in favor of considering the rest of the system.
It's not possible to know the right answers because there never were any. This means the test has no predictive power, not that it's impossible, and again, since some Whites unable to prove education did have to contend with this, it was designed that way intentionally.
I feel "near impossible literacy test" is a terrible description. The "intentionally ambiguous literacy test" would be more apt.
More worrying is I am unable to find a definitive provenance for this document. It suggests it was used in the early 1900s but the print quality and format seems unusual in several ways to me. Which is why I attempted to reduce it in favor of considering the rest of the system.
The reason that it is impossible is that there is no possible set of answers that would require the test-giver to acknowledge that a test-taker passed the test. Anyone the test-taker does not like can be failed.
That's the point. Have you never applied for any sort of license or permit or anything that the government agency really doesn't want to hand out? They're all structured and written this way.
Cite an example? This claim seems extraordinary, since people will sue over almost any process any local, state, or federal government creates.
Prior to the ruling in NYSRPA v. Bruen putting a stop to the practice the LTC application processes in the less permissive towns in Massachusetts were well known to have forms of this sort in addition to the basic state form as well as undocumented "soft requirements" and "nice to haves". In Boston proper you basically had to write an essay, or maybe that was Cambridge, I forget.
This test is a caricature of the type of test mentioned in the post above yours, but yes, on many federal tests I have taken, there are a lot of questions that are intentionally tricky or have no correct answers, only less wrong ones.
Most notably, pilot examinations for aviation and maritime certifications.
I think they use these types of questions to exclude rule memorisation and test the ability to reason about the intention or relevant effects of rules and principles of the art involved.
It seems like the intention is also to penalise the inability to reason about ambiguous situations, ensure that the subject can effectively divide attention (if you spend too much time focusing on these ambiguous situations trying to find a nonexistent perfect answer you will fail the test), and to filter out low cognitive ability in general.
I’m not a test design expert, however, so ymmv.
Most notably, pilot examinations for aviation and maritime certifications.
I think they use these types of questions to exclude rule memorisation and test the ability to reason about the intention or relevant effects of rules and principles of the art involved.
It seems like the intention is also to penalise the inability to reason about ambiguous situations, ensure that the subject can effectively divide attention (if you spend too much time focusing on these ambiguous situations trying to find a nonexistent perfect answer you will fail the test), and to filter out low cognitive ability in general.
I’m not a test design expert, however, so ymmv.
"Impossible" is apt, because it is not possible to answer all the questions on the test in an unambiguously, objectively correct manner.
"Impossible" also refers to how the test administrators used it: in order to make voter registration impossible for some people.
> That comment is a reflection of my pedantry
Stop with this sort of thing, please. It's just noise, and doesn't add to the discussion.
"Impossible" also refers to how the test administrators used it: in order to make voter registration impossible for some people.
> That comment is a reflection of my pedantry
Stop with this sort of thing, please. It's just noise, and doesn't add to the discussion.
eg...
> 28. Divide a vertical line in two equal parts by bisecting it with a curved horizontal line that is only straight at its spot bisection of the vertical.
I have no idea what a curved horizontal line is. A horizontal line is parallel to the X axis of the XY plane and has no curvature.
> 28. Divide a vertical line in two equal parts by bisecting it with a curved horizontal line that is only straight at its spot bisection of the vertical.
I have no idea what a curved horizontal line is. A horizontal line is parallel to the X axis of the XY plane and has no curvature.
Clearly racists are just living in non-euclidean space.
Looking at the test from a purely analytical perspective, I only found one that had several correct solutions, the one with the numbers in the circles that directs it he subject to draw a line passing under and over different elements.
I’d be interested to know which ones you saw as ambiguous?
FWIW the test is obviously mostly about tricking the test taker, and not that much about literacy. Along with one question that seems possibly designed to filter out people with a non-Christian interpretation of the cross as a geometric figure.
I’d be interested to know which ones you saw as ambiguous?
FWIW the test is obviously mostly about tricking the test taker, and not that much about literacy. Along with one question that seems possibly designed to filter out people with a non-Christian interpretation of the cross as a geometric figure.
"Write right from the left to the right as you see it spelled here"
Could be answered with:
right
right from the left to the right
right from the left to the right as you see it spelled here
Could be answered with:
right
right from the left to the right
right from the left to the right as you see it spelled here
Except only the first case can be written without quotes. It should have quotes, but it is valid without them. When you have two or more words, quotes are required to denote the words to quote. Only in the single word case can quotes be omitted without ambiguity.
That one is tricky but not actually ambiguous.
That one is tricky but not actually ambiguous.
There is no actual rule that requires quotes to make something a valid sentence.
For instance, "We need to make sure you agree to the conditions. Write I agree on the line below." is pretty unambiguous in its intention if you assume the writer is communicating in good faith, even if it could be quoted to make it clearer.
In the case of the original test, the lack of good faith is the entire point, which is why the sentence is considered ambiguous in this case. In a different context where you could assume good faith, you would be correct.
For instance, "We need to make sure you agree to the conditions. Write I agree on the line below." is pretty unambiguous in its intention if you assume the writer is communicating in good faith, even if it could be quoted to make it clearer.
In the case of the original test, the lack of good faith is the entire point, which is why the sentence is considered ambiguous in this case. In a different context where you could assume good faith, you would be correct.
There may be no actual rule (are their actual rules other than rules of thumb in English?) , but there is only one case in which quotation marks -could- be omitted in this context without being ambiguous, and that would be the case where only the proximate word was considered.
Any other interpretation fails to produce a consistent, sensible rule; therefore the only logical conclusion is to assume the single word case. The single word interpretation is clearly the less wrong answer.
Many tests accepted as being legitimate and foundational to regulating aviation, marine navigation, and other important occupations include questions that have no “right” answer, only a less wrong one. This is intentional and useful to judge certain aspects of understanding and judgment in those safety critical industries.
I don’t think this type of question is relevant to a “literacy” test, though.
I agree that the test is clearly given in bad faith, and is largely not a literacy test but rather a series of trick questions that require much more than literacy to analyse - but I reject the premise that this question in particular has no correct answer.
The question is in effect a multiple choice question with a few specific granular possible answers, with one being clearly less wrong than the others by process of elimination referencing the epistemological content contained in the question, with the operative assumption being that there is a correct answer.
The question would be more at home in a test to probe advanced reasoning or logic skills, perhaps even philosophy, but still it has exactly one arguably correct answer and therefore fails the bar for being irreducible in its ambiguity.
If you can provide a convincing argument based on a logical premise that supports an alternative answer other than the single word interpretation, I will be forced to reconsider my opinion. Until then, I maintain that this question has a correct answer.
The fact that the test is administered in bad faith and the answers may be judged in bad faith is immaterial; the test Could be perfect and still be judged in bad faith, so there is no argument about the technical validity of the test material anchored to the good faith of the examiner.
It can only be said that the process of the test and judgement is ambiguous, not the test itself, if the test itself is solvable.
It can also be said that the test was not designed to serve its stated purpose, or was poorly designed for its purpose, and that it was not meant to be given in good faith, but none of these statements has bearing on the solvability of the test questions.
Any other interpretation fails to produce a consistent, sensible rule; therefore the only logical conclusion is to assume the single word case. The single word interpretation is clearly the less wrong answer.
Many tests accepted as being legitimate and foundational to regulating aviation, marine navigation, and other important occupations include questions that have no “right” answer, only a less wrong one. This is intentional and useful to judge certain aspects of understanding and judgment in those safety critical industries.
I don’t think this type of question is relevant to a “literacy” test, though.
I agree that the test is clearly given in bad faith, and is largely not a literacy test but rather a series of trick questions that require much more than literacy to analyse - but I reject the premise that this question in particular has no correct answer.
The question is in effect a multiple choice question with a few specific granular possible answers, with one being clearly less wrong than the others by process of elimination referencing the epistemological content contained in the question, with the operative assumption being that there is a correct answer.
The question would be more at home in a test to probe advanced reasoning or logic skills, perhaps even philosophy, but still it has exactly one arguably correct answer and therefore fails the bar for being irreducible in its ambiguity.
If you can provide a convincing argument based on a logical premise that supports an alternative answer other than the single word interpretation, I will be forced to reconsider my opinion. Until then, I maintain that this question has a correct answer.
The fact that the test is administered in bad faith and the answers may be judged in bad faith is immaterial; the test Could be perfect and still be judged in bad faith, so there is no argument about the technical validity of the test material anchored to the good faith of the examiner.
It can only be said that the process of the test and judgement is ambiguous, not the test itself, if the test itself is solvable.
It can also be said that the test was not designed to serve its stated purpose, or was poorly designed for its purpose, and that it was not meant to be given in good faith, but none of these statements has bearing on the solvability of the test questions.
Which question(s)? They all seem to have single answers to me.
That being said, I would expect to fail this test.
That being said, I would expect to fail this test.
"Spell backwards, forwards"
Both "backwards" and "forwards" could be correctly interpreted as the adverb in this one. It could be asking you to "Spell the word backwards, in a forwards manner" or "Spell in a backwards manner, the word forwards".
It's ambiguous enough that someone grading the test who wanted the disqualify you could make the case you got it wrong, no matter if you wrote "backwards" or "sdrawrof".
Both "backwards" and "forwards" could be correctly interpreted as the adverb in this one. It could be asking you to "Spell the word backwards, in a forwards manner" or "Spell in a backwards manner, the word forwards".
It's ambiguous enough that someone grading the test who wanted the disqualify you could make the case you got it wrong, no matter if you wrote "backwards" or "sdrawrof".
The first question I see is:
1. Draw a line around the number or letter of this sentence.
I have no idea what "the number of this sentence" or "the letter of this sentence" even means.
1. Draw a line around the number or letter of this sentence.
I have no idea what "the number of this sentence" or "the letter of this sentence" even means.
Meanwhile I'm wondering what 'draw a line around' something means, when they use circle in other parts. If they meant circle, they'd have said circle, no?
You need to draw a line around the "1." part
It's debatable whether "1." is part of the sentence (and thus should be left alone). We wouldn't consider a non-alphanumeric bullet point to be part of a sentence.
Regardless of which you chose, if the examiner wished to disqualify you, they could simply say it's the opposite.
Regardless of which you chose, if the examiner wished to disqualify you, they could simply say it's the opposite.
No one says it's a part of the sentence. It's a number of the sentence, as in "this is the sentence number one".
I get you, but to my ears, the phrasing itself implies it's part of the sentence (unless the common phrasing was different back then).
Most people would say "The number _preceding_ this sentence". "of this" sounds like it's part of the sentence.
Most people would say "The number _preceding_ this sentence". "of this" sounds like it's part of the sentence.
That is wrong and you have failed the test. If you include the . you have clearly misunderstood the question. It did not indicate to draw a line around the number or letter and dot. Since you included the dot we will fail you. We are aware the question did not indicate the dot or not and it doesn’t matter. You failed, bye!
I don't argue that it's impossible for the examiner to screw you on the commas — that's always a possibility with an open-ended question. And yet this doesn't make all open-ended questions bad, it just makes then inappropriate for a situation with an adversarial interviewer (which I do agree include the voting process).
However I argue that the question by itself is fine: it is well defined and has only one reasonable answer. No one presented any other sensible answer so far.
However I argue that the question by itself is fine: it is well defined and has only one reasonable answer. No one presented any other sensible answer so far.
Here we have a subjective determination of objectivity.
Correct. This is how tests work most of the time in real life (open-ended, subjective) and attempts to fully remove ambiguity are often harmful.
My problem with the whole discussion here is that I actually fail to come up with an ambiguous answer to this question that I subjectively find reasonable. Can you positivity contribute by providing an alternative interpretation that you personally would find more plausible? Otherwise complains about subjectively are hollow. Everything is subjective but it only matters in cases people actually disagree.
My problem with the whole discussion here is that I actually fail to come up with an ambiguous answer to this question that I subjectively find reasonable. Can you positivity contribute by providing an alternative interpretation that you personally would find more plausible? Otherwise complains about subjectively are hollow. Everything is subjective but it only matters in cases people actually disagree.
As the first sentence of your reply to me effectively acknowledges that this thread has not objectively identified a unique correct answer, what I (or you) personally find plausible is beside the point. That being said, in the very post you are replying to, cryptoz has already implied an alternative that is no more subjective than yours, and which is also highly appropriate, given the covert purpose of questions such as these.
> ...attempts to fully remove ambiguity are often harmful.
Really? I'd like to see some real-life examples that are not just further examples of bad question-writing. Regardless, this is beside the point here, where there is a seemingly insurmountably high bar for making the case that removing ambiguity would make the situation worse (to be clear, the problem with tests like this is not just that an examiner might screw you, but that they are intended to be used that way.)
> ...attempts to fully remove ambiguity are often harmful.
Really? I'd like to see some real-life examples that are not just further examples of bad question-writing. Regardless, this is beside the point here, where there is a seemingly insurmountably high bar for making the case that removing ambiguity would make the situation worse (to be clear, the problem with tests like this is not just that an examiner might screw you, but that they are intended to be used that way.)
Number OR Letter, and it never specifies which one. It doesn't say first or last, or anything.
"1" is the number of the sentence, not a number in the sentence. As in "this is the sentence number one".
I don't claim this test is useful, but as a matter of fact the first question is not hard.
I don't claim this test is useful, but as a matter of fact the first question is not hard.
I thought the "number or letter" in that sentence is the "a" in "Draw a line".
> I have no idea what "the number of this sentence" or "the letter of this sentence" even means.
But then you can't believe it has two answers. If you don't understand the question you can't make any claims about it except maybe that you believe it is incoherent. As alexey-salmin says, the only reasonable interpretation is to circle the 1. to left of the question.
To claim that has 2 answers is similar to claiming a "Find x" style question has two answers (solving an equation vs. circling x). No, the question only has one reasonable interpretation. If the examiner is being unreasonable it is not a problem with the question and not something that can be deduced by examining the question.
But then you can't believe it has two answers. If you don't understand the question you can't make any claims about it except maybe that you believe it is incoherent. As alexey-salmin says, the only reasonable interpretation is to circle the 1. to left of the question.
To claim that has 2 answers is similar to claiming a "Find x" style question has two answers (solving an equation vs. circling x). No, the question only has one reasonable interpretation. If the examiner is being unreasonable it is not a problem with the question and not something that can be deduced by examining the question.
Good luck drawing a line around anything except a point at infinity.
It isn’t a literacy test, it’s a non-Euclidean geometry test!
“Spell backwards, forwards.”
Not to mention the very first part of that test says that anyone that can demonstrate a certain education level doesn't need to test it, meaning that any people disadvantaged by the system in not having a (demonstrable) education - which would be a lot of Black people - would have to take the test.
I don't think anyone with that necessary education would pass the test.
I don't think anyone with that necessary education would pass the test.
[deleted]
Ironically, if you don't have fair elections, then you don't have a republic.
You do, just not a democratic one. "Republic" just means it's not a monarchy.
Indeed, I was thinking of an elective republic, which is also how I think the founders conceived it. Example from Federalist 57:
>>> The elective mode of obtaining rulers is the characteristic policy of republican government.
We can debate how electors are chosen, but if the elected choose their own electors, then it's not a republic.
>>> The elective mode of obtaining rulers is the characteristic policy of republican government.
We can debate how electors are chosen, but if the elected choose their own electors, then it's not a republic.
[deleted]
I know, from a human rights point of view, this is very problematic. But imagine, if only people who can really understand written text, who can calculate, who understand how legal system works, who have basics of logic could vote.
Of course, those tests shouldn't be that ambiguous, but if they were phrased a bit more clear, these would be very simple. At the same time, English has changed in the last 50 years. That phrasing might have been common back then.
Of course, those tests shouldn't be that ambiguous, but if they were phrased a bit more clear, these would be very simple. At the same time, English has changed in the last 50 years. That phrasing might have been common back then.
I think there's a broad misunderstanding about the core goal of democracy.
It's obviously not the optimal system to ensure that the best possible decisions are taken, it's not designed for that.
It's more about allowing everyone to have a say in their destiny, to decide together what "best" means, even if it's somewhat objectively wrong.
Of course, you need significant balancing mechanisms to ensure that bad decisions are not too common. So you don't let the people micromanage everything and you build the system such that different parts of it keep each other in check. Sometimes it goes too far and the population has very limited choice over what's going on, sometimes it doesn't go far enough and the system is incompetent and chaotic. Often it's both, it's a hard problem.
But there's obviously better human organizational systems to take the right decisions towards a given goal or metric. That's why companies are not democratic, they are better at optimizing wealth creation (or whatever other metric), but we keep them sandboxed within the big-picture, keeping monopolies to a minimum (particularly the monopoly on violence, the core leverage of any government) so that they have a somewhat limited influence on people's lives. The military is not democratic either, neither is the justice system, nor many other performance-critical systems, they are more optimized to take better decisions at the expense of giving a choice to everyone they impact.
It's obviously not the optimal system to ensure that the best possible decisions are taken, it's not designed for that.
It's more about allowing everyone to have a say in their destiny, to decide together what "best" means, even if it's somewhat objectively wrong.
Of course, you need significant balancing mechanisms to ensure that bad decisions are not too common. So you don't let the people micromanage everything and you build the system such that different parts of it keep each other in check. Sometimes it goes too far and the population has very limited choice over what's going on, sometimes it doesn't go far enough and the system is incompetent and chaotic. Often it's both, it's a hard problem.
But there's obviously better human organizational systems to take the right decisions towards a given goal or metric. That's why companies are not democratic, they are better at optimizing wealth creation (or whatever other metric), but we keep them sandboxed within the big-picture, keeping monopolies to a minimum (particularly the monopoly on violence, the core leverage of any government) so that they have a somewhat limited influence on people's lives. The military is not democratic either, neither is the justice system, nor many other performance-critical systems, they are more optimized to take better decisions at the expense of giving a choice to everyone they impact.
I think you're being a bit naive. The test was designed to disenfranchise people, it was literally designed by people who didn't want black people to vote. You can't say "Well I guess it could've been less ambiguous" the whole point was to be ambiguous to give a pretext to disqualify black people from voting.
You can get 0 answers wrong and there would still be a way of throwing away your vote. Take question 11 - cross out the number necessary when making the number below 1 million. Do you cross out the excess 000s or do you cross out 1,000,000. Or do you cross out enough numbers to make the number below 1 million? The answer is it doesn't matter because (a) by giving you a multiple viable chance they've already managed to disenfranchise a percentage of the people they're targetting, and (b) whatever you do they can just claim the opposite interpretation and refuse you a right to vote.
There wasn't some high minded idealism behind this test. It was a tool for the people administering the election to select who they wanted to allow to vote. Any test you design will serve the same purpose, albeit some more efficiently than others.
You can get 0 answers wrong and there would still be a way of throwing away your vote. Take question 11 - cross out the number necessary when making the number below 1 million. Do you cross out the excess 000s or do you cross out 1,000,000. Or do you cross out enough numbers to make the number below 1 million? The answer is it doesn't matter because (a) by giving you a multiple viable chance they've already managed to disenfranchise a percentage of the people they're targetting, and (b) whatever you do they can just claim the opposite interpretation and refuse you a right to vote.
There wasn't some high minded idealism behind this test. It was a tool for the people administering the election to select who they wanted to allow to vote. Any test you design will serve the same purpose, albeit some more efficiently than others.
marcusverus(4)
I’ve thought this in the past, but I’ve changed my mind.
People with poor reading and logic and legal skills are still people, living in society, paying taxes, with lives just as complicated and interesting as mine. Who am I to say that they shouldn’t have a say in how things are run?
People with poor reading and logic and legal skills are still people, living in society, paying taxes, with lives just as complicated and interesting as mine. Who am I to say that they shouldn’t have a say in how things are run?
Stupid people have just as much right to have their societal problems heard and solved as the rest of us.
Nobody deserves to suffer or be ignored for the horrid crime of being born stupid or "mentally deficient" by your standards.
Nobody deserves to suffer or be ignored for the horrid crime of being born stupid or "mentally deficient" by your standards.
There much have been some misunderstanding, maybe I didn't word what I said very well; I agree with you! I don't really think anyone should be disenfranchised. That's what I meant by "Who am I to say that they shouldn’t have a say in how things are run?"
Were you responding to the parent comment?
Were you responding to the parent comment?
You misunderstand the primary purpose of a democracy: to prevent civil war by giving everyone a voice.
And in this it works remarkably well.
And in this it works remarkably well.
Some say that the Roman Republic lasted for so long because it gave just enough voice to the people so they felt heard and the ones in power could not afford to fully ignore them, while not giving the people sufficient power to elect someone that could up-end the oligarchic status quo that was proving to be so competent. There were also lots of checks and balances within the oligarchy to prevent any given radical person or faction from taking over.
For example, Consuls (president-like) were voted-in indirectly through a popular assembly (kinda like the Electoral College). They elected two Consuls that had to rule jointly and keep each other in check. Their term was only 1 year and they could not run for election again for the next 10 years. Consuls rarely had the chance to do any significant damage to the system or build-up power.
The Senators served for life and acted as a counterbalance. They were also elected rather indirectly by other popular assemblies, but they came mostly from the aristocracy that maintained a consistent tradition of Roman culture and morals, for better or worse. The thing is that there were enough of them (300, later 600) that internal competition always kept them in check and prevented anyone from getting too much power.
An interesting system.
But please do not take this as me advocating for such a system. The Romans were terrible violent oppressors by modern standards. A system of government lasting for a long time is not necessarily a good feature, it just means that it's good at keeping its power, nothing else. A status quo that cannot be easily changed is great if you are lucky and the status quo turns out to be good, but it's horrible if the situation is bad and there is no easy way to fix it.
I just wanted to give a bit of context.
For example, Consuls (president-like) were voted-in indirectly through a popular assembly (kinda like the Electoral College). They elected two Consuls that had to rule jointly and keep each other in check. Their term was only 1 year and they could not run for election again for the next 10 years. Consuls rarely had the chance to do any significant damage to the system or build-up power.
The Senators served for life and acted as a counterbalance. They were also elected rather indirectly by other popular assemblies, but they came mostly from the aristocracy that maintained a consistent tradition of Roman culture and morals, for better or worse. The thing is that there were enough of them (300, later 600) that internal competition always kept them in check and prevented anyone from getting too much power.
An interesting system.
But please do not take this as me advocating for such a system. The Romans were terrible violent oppressors by modern standards. A system of government lasting for a long time is not necessarily a good feature, it just means that it's good at keeping its power, nothing else. A status quo that cannot be easily changed is great if you are lucky and the status quo turns out to be good, but it's horrible if the situation is bad and there is no easy way to fix it.
I just wanted to give a bit of context.
Any test you can imagine would still be used to favor the rich and powerful, and to oppress and disenfranchise undesirables.
It doesn't matter how rational it seems. Government - particularly the racist oligarchy that is the US government - cannot be trusted to act with rational benevolence.
It doesn't matter how rational it seems. Government - particularly the racist oligarchy that is the US government - cannot be trusted to act with rational benevolence.
marcusverus(2)
> But imagine, if only people who can really understand written text, who can calculate, who understand how legal system works, who have basics of logic could vote.
Imagine as well that only the elite or nobility has access to education, reading / writing, etc. It would bring society back to the pre-Enlightenment era, or whenever it was that education / reading / writing / math / etc became available to anyone.
Imagine as well that only the elite or nobility has access to education, reading / writing, etc. It would bring society back to the pre-Enlightenment era, or whenever it was that education / reading / writing / math / etc became available to anyone.
This is the key problem of democracy, the educated part of the society is always minority.
I don't think education do much. People still stupidly vote for one of either republicans or Democrats based on trivial psychological reasons.
If education played some role you would probably might have seen an alternative party/form of government emerging over time as people became more educated.
If education played some role you would probably might have seen an alternative party/form of government emerging over time as people became more educated.
Plenty of democrats are trying to enable Ranked Choice Voting in the US, and that is a good step towards improving how the US voting system works, and reducing the power that the parties have.
Ranked choice voting for example means that Republicans in mostly Democrat states like california could be better represented than they currently are, by voting for a "more conservative" candidate who will still get democrat votes.
The republican party is explicitly against ranked choice voting despite this.
Ranked choice voting for example means that Republicans in mostly Democrat states like california could be better represented than they currently are, by voting for a "more conservative" candidate who will still get democrat votes.
The republican party is explicitly against ranked choice voting despite this.
> If education played some role you would probably might have seen an alternative party/form of government emerging over time as people became more educated.
But there are plenty of alternative parties / forms of government, it's just that in the existing political systems - especially in the US - it is reduced to a two-party system. First-past-the-post voting naturally leads to a two party system.
Basically, the US is doomed to stay in a two party system unless one of them decides to change the constitution or whatever dictates this system, or there's a successful revolution. (I don't think Jan 6th would be a successful revolution even if they, for example, killed all the senators).
But there are plenty of alternative parties / forms of government, it's just that in the existing political systems - especially in the US - it is reduced to a two-party system. First-past-the-post voting naturally leads to a two party system.
Basically, the US is doomed to stay in a two party system unless one of them decides to change the constitution or whatever dictates this system, or there's a successful revolution. (I don't think Jan 6th would be a successful revolution even if they, for example, killed all the senators).
Knowing facts and applying algebraic formulas indeed doesn't seem to be doing much, but I guess education about logic, critical thinking, biases, fallacies and debate _would_ play a role _if such education was emphasized_.
>But imagine, if only people who can really understand written text, who can calculate, who understand how legal system works, who have basics of logic could vote.
wasn't it basically the original Greek democracy?
wasn't it basically the original Greek democracy?
Imagine what would happen if you put a "who won the US 2020 election?" question on the form.
As of the end of 2021, about 65% of Republicans responders to relevant surveys believed that Trump won the 2020 election [1]. I'm hoping that the percentage has dropped to below 50% by now.
[1] https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2022/feb/02/viral-imag...
[1] https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2022/feb/02/viral-imag...
[deleted]
DeathArrow(2)
elzbardico(4)
even_639765(4)
giardini(1)
az226(1)
TIL voting right depends on literacy in America. Illiterate people have more rights in third world countries apparently.
No, this is incorrect. This has not been the case for 60 years now. These tests were discontinued as part of the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1964. That information is in the linked article, which is short and only takes a minute to read.
This example was also far from universal, certainly across the entire USA but even in Louisiana.
edit: reading other comments, it isn't clear whether this information is even true for a small subset of Louisiana 60+ years ago
This example was also far from universal, certainly across the entire USA but even in Louisiana.
edit: reading other comments, it isn't clear whether this information is even true for a small subset of Louisiana 60+ years ago
TIL yet another way MLK changed America.
The US talks up its history of freedom, but wasn't really a fully democratic country until the moon landings.
I'd personally move the date forward quite a bit. There are some fairly basic freedoms that were lacking up until recently.
Spousal rape started to be criminalized in the 1970s, but it took until 1993 for it to be criminalized in every state (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marital_rape_in_the_United_Sta...). Oklahoma and South Carolina were the two holdouts. It's still treated differently under the law in many states.
The Supreme Court struck down sodomy laws in 2003. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas)
Same sex couples couldn't marry in every state until 2015. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obergefell_v._Hodges) Some counties in the usual states ignored the ruling for years.
There are still some significant gaps in federal protection. Gender identity and sexual orientation are protected in the workplace and for housing, but not elsewhere.
Spousal rape started to be criminalized in the 1970s, but it took until 1993 for it to be criminalized in every state (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marital_rape_in_the_United_Sta...). Oklahoma and South Carolina were the two holdouts. It's still treated differently under the law in many states.
The Supreme Court struck down sodomy laws in 2003. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas)
Same sex couples couldn't marry in every state until 2015. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obergefell_v._Hodges) Some counties in the usual states ignored the ruling for years.
There are still some significant gaps in federal protection. Gender identity and sexual orientation are protected in the workplace and for housing, but not elsewhere.
The South was historically dependent on slavery and rebelled against the freedoms that the North always provided. The North won the war and only after that is there a country in the South to look down on. But the North, and the birth of the nation, was always about freedom. It just took a long time to get the South to come along.
And by that definition much of Europe isn’t fully democratic?
Most of Europe never had the level of formal, legal racism of the US. But it is worth remembering which European countries were dictatorships at around the same time (Spain, Portugal, Greece) and that Eastern Europe came to democracy even more recently.
Voting rights in parts of America before the Voting Rights Act depended on passing an arbitrary test that differed from jurisdiction to jurisdiction and may or may not have measured literacy and civics knowledge… if you were black (or native American, depending on state). You could be a well-regarded English literature professor at a black college and still have to subject yourself to what you knew was a farce being administered by someone far less literate than you in order to attempt to vote.
If you were white (“your grandfather could vote”), you were usually exempt, even if you could barely sign your name on your voter registration.
If you were white (“your grandfather could vote”), you were usually exempt, even if you could barely sign your name on your voter registration.
I think the weight of your vote should come from the amount of taxes you pay, up to some cap. Can someone explain to me like I’m 12 why this is a bad idea?
1. The richest 1% vote whoever makes them even richer, at the expense of all the other 99% poorer than them.
2. The other 99% people no longer play the "democracy" game with the rich, form their own government without the "voting power corresponds to how much tax paid".
3. The rich people country loses its foundation, thus can no longer sustain. The rich join the poor people country.
Beyond anything else, intentionally designing a political system around disenfranchising a class of people seems like a bad idea from a human rights standpoint. You're creating a system in which the wealthier citizens can systematically take the rights away from the poor. I think you know how that can go wrong considering you're asking this question specifically on this post out of all posts.
All extant and historical systems explicitly disenfranchise some people, children, criminals, foreigners, etc.
And we should work to remove such disenfranchisements from the system rather than simply accept them as a law of nature.
Why? Most people find it beneficial to disenfranchise criminals, don't want murderers walking free and hurting you. Why should people support policies that hurt them?
Citizens convicted of crimes are citizens just like you (I assume) and I. I don't think most people find it beneficial to disenfranchise them.
One obvious use case for not disenfranchising citizens convicted of crimes, is a politician who criminalizes opposition, thus making it impossible to vote them out.
As for policies which hurt people: policies favoring old folks often hurt the majority of people, but there isn't a big push to disenfranchise old people.
One obvious use case for not disenfranchising citizens convicted of crimes, is a politician who criminalizes opposition, thus making it impossible to vote them out.
As for policies which hurt people: policies favoring old folks often hurt the majority of people, but there isn't a big push to disenfranchise old people.
Unless you're arguing for the summary execution of all felons, we already allow murderers to walk free after serving their time. Hell, when those murderers are soldiers we give them medals and parades.
Sorry, technically those soldiers are killers and not murderers since when they take innocent lives it's endorsed by the state.
But if you think the presence of felons within society presents a social or public safety issue, consider that the real problem is that the justice system in the US is punitive and exploitative rather than rehabilitative, and what cultural and systemic issues might lead people to crime and violence in the first place, and to recidivism.
Sorry, technically those soldiers are killers and not murderers since when they take innocent lives it's endorsed by the state.
But if you think the presence of felons within society presents a social or public safety issue, consider that the real problem is that the justice system in the US is punitive and exploitative rather than rehabilitative, and what cultural and systemic issues might lead people to crime and violence in the first place, and to recidivism.
Disenfranchising all the retirees would certainly shake up politics.
There's points of principle and points of practicality. First - all men are created equal. Fundamentally, our political system should be designed around equality of all - otherwise why would the people who are less equal feel the need to support the system? If I only get 1/10th of the vote you get, why don't I take up arms and put my people in charge and count my vote 10x your vote?
In terms of practicality, your taxes this year? Your lifetime taxes? College students? No vote. What happens if I paid a million in taxes last year because I sold my company but nothing this year because I took a year out? Do state taxes count? What about state contracts, do we discount Elon Musks' vote because he receives so many state contracts for his companies like SpaceX? Or do we worry that Elon Musk gets tonnes of political power which he then uses to pressure the government into.. awarded him more SpaceX contracts? Those paying the most taxes are by definition those who have benefitted most from a well run country, surely they be penalized not given more power?
In terms of practicality, your taxes this year? Your lifetime taxes? College students? No vote. What happens if I paid a million in taxes last year because I sold my company but nothing this year because I took a year out? Do state taxes count? What about state contracts, do we discount Elon Musks' vote because he receives so many state contracts for his companies like SpaceX? Or do we worry that Elon Musk gets tonnes of political power which he then uses to pressure the government into.. awarded him more SpaceX contracts? Those paying the most taxes are by definition those who have benefitted most from a well run country, surely they be penalized not given more power?
To your first point; is progressive taxation fair or equal? Aren’t the high income earners being treated unfairly without getting anything in return for it?
To your second point; lifetime seems fair to me. Should college kids’ votes count as much as someone’s with more life experience? It doesn’t seem intuitive to me.
I get the plain “all humans are created equal” argument from an ethical perspective, but I don’t think this goes quite that deep. I would see this more as a tuning parameter for the efficiency of this system in the same way that criminal sentencing or any concensus based model we have where certain people have more “say” in it.
In a Christian sense, which you might find jarring, I’d regard the “all humans are equal” part a rule made by God, and “some humans should be given more decision power” a rule made by us that in no way contradicts God’s ultimate will.
To your second point; lifetime seems fair to me. Should college kids’ votes count as much as someone’s with more life experience? It doesn’t seem intuitive to me.
I get the plain “all humans are created equal” argument from an ethical perspective, but I don’t think this goes quite that deep. I would see this more as a tuning parameter for the efficiency of this system in the same way that criminal sentencing or any concensus based model we have where certain people have more “say” in it.
In a Christian sense, which you might find jarring, I’d regard the “all humans are equal” part a rule made by God, and “some humans should be given more decision power” a rule made by us that in no way contradicts God’s ultimate will.
Because it empowers those most favored by existing systemic biases extra power to protect those biases against progress toward equality.
Can you explain to me why votes should be weighted differently at all?
When you have a tough problem and need advice, do you turn to your unemployed uncle? The homeless guy on the street corner? Of course not. Not all opinions are of equal value. Pretending that they are of equal value is asinine.
No no, I turn to the nepo baby of a nepo baby of a nepo baby of a nepo baby of a man who once had a plot of land that happened to sit on top of an oil field.
They know what’s going on, and you can tell by their credit score.
They know what’s going on, and you can tell by their credit score.
Are there enough of these people for it to matter? Let’s say instead of there being 5000 of these “nepo babies” (whose parents and environment of course never taught them anything so that they’re useless members of society in charge of massive fortunes because of chance alone because that just suits your world view best) there were now 50000. What policy changes might they now implement that would shake the foundations of our society?
To be clear, I said nothing even close to what's in your parens.
Off the top of my head: decades long precedence on regulatory agencies' authority, abortion rights, and Presidential immunity have all undergone dramatic reshaping in the last few years in large part driven by only one ultrawealthy person (Leonard Leo, born to wealth).
Your question is silly.
Off the top of my head: decades long precedence on regulatory agencies' authority, abortion rights, and Presidential immunity have all undergone dramatic reshaping in the last few years in large part driven by only one ultrawealthy person (Leonard Leo, born to wealth).
Your question is silly.
I’m not sure “seeking the best advice on how to run a government” would even make the top-5 reasons to have a democracy, if you polled political scientists.
This is frankly dangerous thinking. You're committing a cardinal sin, you're looking down on other people. An unemployed and homeless uncle might have more wisdom than a 30 year old with 4 degrees.
Obviously democratic voting should be as equal as possible. In fact, with today's technology we should be striving for "direct democracy" more than ever.
Obviously democratic voting should be as equal as possible. In fact, with today's technology we should be striving for "direct democracy" more than ever.
marcusverus(1)
I guess it depends on the advice you're looking for but ...
* Unemployed uncle, I just got laid off from my FAANG company because the board needs to boost profits. Can you help me understand our welfare system so I can get on medicaid and unemployment?
* Homeless guy on the street, thanks for doing all that Occupy Wall Street stuff back in '11. What did you learn about organizing the fringes of society to try to change an unjust system? Any tricks I could apply to disenfranchised voters?
* Homeless guy on the street, I just found a giant sack of bagels in the dumpster. Are they good to eat or should I let them rot? By the way do you want some?
* January 17, 2038: Unemployed uncle, nobody can program anymore because we all just use AIs, however apparently talking into my tablet won't solve this Unix timestamp bullshit. What do you recommend?
Point is, sure, not all opinions of are equal value, but laying out judgements on others' opinions based on over-simplified mainstream prejudices narrows your ability to get good advice. That's partially what the article is about: blocking non-mainstream voters from making their voices heard.
* Unemployed uncle, I just got laid off from my FAANG company because the board needs to boost profits. Can you help me understand our welfare system so I can get on medicaid and unemployment?
* Homeless guy on the street, thanks for doing all that Occupy Wall Street stuff back in '11. What did you learn about organizing the fringes of society to try to change an unjust system? Any tricks I could apply to disenfranchised voters?
* Homeless guy on the street, I just found a giant sack of bagels in the dumpster. Are they good to eat or should I let them rot? By the way do you want some?
* January 17, 2038: Unemployed uncle, nobody can program anymore because we all just use AIs, however apparently talking into my tablet won't solve this Unix timestamp bullshit. What do you recommend?
Point is, sure, not all opinions of are equal value, but laying out judgements on others' opinions based on over-simplified mainstream prejudices narrows your ability to get good advice. That's partially what the article is about: blocking non-mainstream voters from making their voices heard.
Progressive taxation dictates that more productive people take on more responsibility for running society than less productive people.
[deleted]
If you want a plutocracy then that's how you'd do it.
Spoiler: the weight your vote is already determined by your worth, billionaires can lobby governments, average people can't.
Spoiler: the weight your vote is already determined by your worth, billionaires can lobby governments, average people can't.
[deleted]
> [NOTE: At one time we also displayed a "brain-twister" type literacy test with questions like "Spell backwards, forwards" that may (or may not) have been used during the summer of 1964 in Tangipahoa Parish (and possibly elsewhere) in Louisiana. We removed it because we could not corroborate its authenticity, and in any case it was not representative of the Louisiana tests in broad use during the 1950s and '60s.]
Each parish in Louisiana implemented their own literacy tests, which means that there wasn't really much uniformity in the process. Another (maybe more typical) test: https://www.crmvet.org/info/la-littest2.pdf