Harvey Newstrom wrote:
> I still have not gotten any explanation about why we are
> discussing this at
> all. Suppose we all concede that blacks commit more crimes, for
> the sake of
> argument. So what? Why is it so important to argue this?
I can't speak for others, but here's the reason I care about the questions:
If blacks DON'T commit more crimes (for any given number of persons) than
whites, then our legal system discriminates against them, because more
blacks than whites are arrested, convicted, imprisoned, and executed.
Although I'm not currently a member of a group that's discriminated against
by the criminal justice system, my concern is not merely altruistic. If our
system is set up to discriminate against certain categories of people,
there's no guarantee I myself won't someday BE a member of such an
unfortunate group.
> What is the
> relevance to Extropians?
Extropians anticipate living beyond the traditionally acceptable human
lifespan. In addition, some Extropians have, or at some point in the future
will have, undergone some form of bio-suspension. Although I tend to be an
optimist, I'm also a realist, and at the moment I think there's some greater
than zero probability that the human species is in for some traditional
rough times in the not so distant future. By traditional rough times I mean
economic depressions, shortages of food and water, shortages of medications,
microbial plagues. That sort of thing. In rough times it will be all too
tempting for people to decide that certain groups should be discriminated
against. It's not hard to imagine politicians pulling the plug on life
support systems for suspended people or making laws that people older than
85 are not entitled to medical care.
This could happen anyhow, of course. But to the extent that the legal system
deals with people as individuals rather than as members of groups, it's less
likely to happen. Racism is one form of judging people as members of groups
rather than as individuals. Therefore, I'd like to acknowledge and
discourage racism.
Barbara
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Fri Oct 12 2001 - 14:40:08 MDT