🚀 go-pugleaf

jim patterson <jrp32@nospambellsouth.net> said on git.general:

> Sorry but experience in life, not in listening to what others say life
> is, shows me a very different story.

I agree.  And actually I have some first and experience and some
secondhand experience with these things.  Plus I've done plenty of
reading on the subjects.  

Experience is very good.  But it's also good to hear from others to get
different points of view.

> Many of the poor of the past have been able to rise out of their
> situations.  That is hardly immobile.

But we're talking about two groups who haven't:  the blacks in this country
and the Irish (more specifically the N. Irish) in GB.  Just because
other groups of poor people were able to rise out (often in spite of
social barriers) doesn't exclude other groups from not rising out.  

In this country, the typical pattern is that the first generation (after
immigrating) is poor and probably will not move up from that.  Part of
the reason for this is probably due to not fitting in with the culture.
Often immigrants will hang onto the customs of the Old Country and
simply won't be able to completely adjust.  I could go live the rest of
my life in France or Egypt or Australia and never truly fit in.  Plus,
there's usually a language barrier with the new immigrants.  The second
and third generations have the benefit of growing up in this country and
growing up with American customs and not so much of the influence of the
Old Country and subsequently are able to land better jobs and go further
in society.

Blacks in this country still have social barriers that they have to
face.  If they didn't, then affirmative action would not be an issue
(and no, I don't think affirmative action is a great way to break the
cycle of poverty).  There is still racism in this country and there is
still prejudice against those who are of the black race.  There is still
segregation in this country, too.  I know in my neighboorhood growing up
that everyone was white.  It is/was a nice middle class neighboorhood,
but no blacks.  Now there are I think 3 black families living there.
But I remember a lot of talk about how "property values" were going to
go down just before that first black family moved in.  

As for the N. Irish, the area is poor.  There aren't many jobs there.
For the most part, you live and you die in the same place, and you don't
have many choices as far as getting jobs.  There's a pretty good chance
that you won't be college educated.  There's a pretty good chance that
you will drink in the same pub that your daddy drinks at.  And not
everyone can just pick up and move to a place where there is a job.

> Although i am sure the Captains of Industry have been painted as evil
> capitalists to you, you will find that most of them, not all, had very
> poor childhoods.

Ford no, I like being poisoned and sold out for the sake of someone
else's profit.

Andrew Carnegie is a good example of a poverty stricken lad who made
some nice dough in his life.  If I remember correctly, it was kind of a
fluke:  apparently as a boy he saved the life of someone important and
that person taught him Morse code and he was then able to get a job as a
telegraph operator which lead him on the fath to fortune.

I dispute your figures that most had poor childhoods, though.  Yes,
there are some who did, but I doubt that it would be most.  I would
think most came from middle to upper class families.  Then again, you
could be using a different defininion of "Captians of Industry".  

It is possible for some people to go from being dirt poor to fabulously
rich (and vice-versa), but I think you'll find that is very rare, even
in our "free" and "classless" society.

I also think you're misusing your statistics:  let's assume for a moment
that 90% of the upper 1% of our society did start out poor.  Saying that
there is significant social mobility is making an incorrect assumption
for not taking into account the other 99% of the population's mobility.
You've only proven that it is possible to go from being dirt poor to
filthy rich.  


> But all the sociologist types continually harp on how once poor,
> always poor, throughout the succeeding generations.

> Sorry, it just ain't so.

I never said that once poor, always poor was a general rule for
everyone, only that it seems to be the case for blacks in this country
and the N. Irish.  And even in those cases there are exceptions to the
rule.  

I'm merely trying to point out that despite your beliefs to the
opposite, there might be social causes at play.  You sound almost like a
fizzix teacher start a problem with "assume a frictionless surface..."

-- 
    Jacob Sherwood   :: "We are all fucked.  It helps to remember that."
 pointy1@angband.org :: -- Quoted from George Carlin in _Brain Droppings_