COLELA@SNYPLAVA.BITNET (l. anne cole) (02/09/90)
>>is suggesting that among humans there are those that are superior and >>those that rank below superior (notice *I* didn't say inferior), simply >>because some have a certain level of knowledge and others don't. > 'superior' is a value judgment, supplied by you. Leave it that > the educated/informed are DIFFERENT than the ignorant, and can > therefore be expected to behave differently. Until access to education is the same for all groups, this will be a source of prejudicial judgement. There is now talk of the formation of a permanent underclass. Access to education is becoming more limited, due to rising cost. The man makes a good point Several articles have appeared in the SIGCAS publication on this topic in the few years. Anne Cole - SUNY Plattsburgh
LCO114@URIACC.BITNET (Peter G. Rose) (02/09/90)
This is kind of long. Sorry, but I'm having difficulty being both clear and brief. A sure sign that I haven't thought about this enough... On Thu, 8 Feb 90 14:00:00 EST l. anne cole said: >>>because some have a certain level of knowledge and others don't. >> the educated/informed are DIFFERENT than the ignorant, and can >> therefore be expected to behave differently. > >Until access to education is the same for all groups, this will be >a source of prejudicial judgement. There is now talk of the formation >of a permanent underclass. Access to education is becoming more >limited, due to rising cost. The man makes a good point Several >Anne Cole - SUNY Plattsburgh This is a separate problem. I will conceede, because it is irrelevent to my point, that such an underclass may be forming/formed. Given that this is true, does it make sense that the court system should be oblivious to it? Perhaps so, if such blindess is going to help erase the distinction. But you have failed to show that it will. My position is that the court's handling of any given criminal should reflect how that criminal is likely to behave, the sort of crimes that person has and may commit. Maybe my memory is failing, but wasn't the origional post an objection to the difference between the way white and blue collar criminals are treated? I think that, as long as the CRIMES are different, then the response of the courts should be different. I am less sure of my ground when I say that as long as the criminals are different, they should be treated differently. I see the potential for abuses, but refusing to recognize reality doesn't seem to be a good response. IMHO, Jails are for people who's criminal tendancies cannot be curbed in any less violent way. I could be wrong, it happened once before.... Anyway what I was really objecting to was the fact that M. Joel stopped just short of accusing M. Haller of being a bigot. He attributed to Haller a position/worldview that was only peripherally related to anything Haller actually said, and then stopped just short of accusing Haller of bigotry for his supposed adherence to that view. M.Cole thinks that Haller's note/position contains some inherent social and political dangers. This may well be true, and is in any case a valid stance. M.Joel associates Hallers position with Bigotry/Prejudice by some process I do not understand. This is NOT valid. The position described by M.Joel is not equivilent to bigotry. It may, arguably, promote social injustice, but bigotry implies intent. I guess I was objecting more to what appears to be fuzzy thinking on M.Joel's part, than to the merits/demerits of either position. P.Rose (LCO114@URIACC.BITNET)