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Joe Biden 2022: Enter Dark Brandon


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2 hours ago, Johnny Sack said:

For the world, I agree luck has a whole lot to do with it.  Being born in Haiti means you are screwed.  Being born healthy in the USA means you are born on third base.

So I disagree with it when it comes to the United States.  Unless Asians are just the luckiest bastards in the USA (or it's not 95% luck it's because their culture that values education, the nuclear family, and hard work).

Say the quiet part out loud. It’s quite in vogue with your ilk.

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13 minutes ago, StassneyHorn said:

We get it, you love the model minority myth. 

YOU being born healthy in America put YOU on third base.

There is no myth.  Asians have the highest earnings by far of any racial group in the USA.  And it has nothing to do with luck.  Sorry that's an inconvenient truth.

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Ask @johnnysack how hard he's worked for his net worth.

He has multiple degrees (funded by his family's wealth). Well done.

He probably spent some time "learning the family trade" by spending a couple summers observing somebody making $7 an hour.

He's a hard working, boot strap kinda guy.

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17 minutes ago, YChang said:

Asians and Asian immigrants are not a homogeneous group in the US. It’s time to drop the model minority label.

The Asian category seems to be the most diverse category than any other one in the U.S. Indians, Japanese and Malaysians seem to be pretty different.

It makes zero sense to treat them as one group.

 

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6 hours ago, David Dennison said:

Too bad "should work hard" isn't 95% of not being poor. It's mostly luck.

There are shit tons of lazy slobs in "elite" high-paying jobs.  They may not have the greatest job security, but they usually manage to stay well-paid.

The poor do not have a monopoly on laziness or fecklessness.

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1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:

 

And I say this as someone who HAS worked hard -- incredibly hard -- to be where I am (which is plenty successful).  My hard work is absolutely an important ingredient in my success.  But if all I had was my hard work?  I'd most likely have been fucked.

1 -- natural gifts matter.  I was born with a pretty damned effective brain.  It's not much different than any number of athletes being born with great legs, a strong right arm, what have you.  I could work all my life, 10X harder than VY did, and I would never be the QB he was, because he was born with a whole lotta gifts that I wasn't in that respect.

2 -- help from others matters a lot.  My parents were really dedicated.  My mother read to me relentlessly from birth.  They sacrificed to send me to good schools.  They made sure that I was healthy, that I had food on the table, that I was safe from danger, etc.  Other family members helped and were important.  I had some very influential teachers and coaches who helped me see opportunities, and encouraged me.  

3 -- the state apparatus matters.  The State of Texas paid for my entire undergrad and law education.  That investment put me in a position to get a first-rate education without crippling my family or me financially.  A stable society with the rule of law meant that no greedy baron took my parents' shit, kicking us out on the street.  Functioning infrastructure meant that my parents could get to their jobs that paid well enough.  It meant that food made it to our grocery store's shelves.  Functioning emergency services meant that we weren't on our own if one of us had a medical emergency, or the house caught on fire.

4 -- luck matters.  My dad never died in a car wreck, leaving my mother and me destitute.  None of us had a life-threatening illness.  No natural disaster destroyed everything we owned.  We were able to live in an area where we weren't as likely to be victims of violent crime, and we got lucky that major crime never found us.

In the layer cake of "success," "hard work" is one of at least 5 layers -- there are probably others that I left out.  It's an important layer.  Shit, you can have all of the things I listed, but if you squander them, you fail.  That's actually the point.  Lose any ONE of those things, and you can easily fail.

It's "easier" for someone disadvantaged in the US to reach success than it is for someone disadvantaged in Haiti to do so.  True.  And nifty.  And so what?  WITHIN this society, someone who has all four of the things I listed above is WAY ahead of someone who just has "I'll work hard."  Not a little bit ahead -- light fucking years ahead.  Looking at someone who doesn't have one or more of the four things I listed and just saying "work harder" is asinine.  Sure, some folks succeed even without 1, 2, or even all 4 of those things.  But the odds are progressively worse.  And, plenty of people worked as hard as humanly possible, and STILL failed because of one or more of those factors going against them.  

No matter how hard I try or train, I was never going to be a QB who led Texas to beat USC for the title.  There was too much to overcome (seriously, watch me run my fastest....it's.....not good).  Yelling at me to "work harder!" wouldn't have helped.

Speaking as a hardworking, smart, fairly athletic, healthy, tall, attractive-but-not-TOO attractive white man who carries all of his hair darkly and thickly well into middle age as just the most obvious and recent example of nearly 50 years of charmed life I agree with all this. 

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Speaking as a hardworking, smart, fairly athletic, healthy, tall, attractive-but-not-TOO attractive white man who carries all of his hair darkly and thickly well into middle age as just the most obvious and recent example of nearly 50 years of charmed life I agree with all this. 

I can testify that you deserve little of your good fortune and none of your good looks, middling as they may be.
And you ain’t that tall, either.
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And I say this as someone who HAS worked hard -- incredibly hard -- to be where I am (which is plenty successful).  My hard work is absolutely an important ingredient in my success.  But if all I had was my hard work?  I'd most likely have been fucked.
1 -- natural gifts matter.  I was born with a pretty damned effective brain.  It's not much different than any number of athletes being born with great legs, a strong right arm, what have you.  I could work all my life, 10X harder than VY did, and I would never be the QB he was, because he was born with a whole lotta gifts that I wasn't in that respect.
2 -- help from others matters a lot.  My parents were really dedicated.  My mother read to me relentlessly from birth.  They sacrificed to send me to good schools.  They made sure that I was healthy, that I had food on the table, that I was safe from danger, etc.  Other family members helped and were important.  I had some very influential teachers and coaches who helped me see opportunities, and encouraged me.  
3 -- the state apparatus matters.  The State of Texas paid for my entire undergrad and law education.  That investment put me in a position to get a first-rate education without crippling my family or me financially.  A stable society with the rule of law meant that no greedy baron took my parents' shit, kicking us out on the street.  Functioning infrastructure meant that my parents could get to their jobs that paid well enough.  It meant that food made it to our grocery store's shelves.  Functioning emergency services meant that we weren't on our own if one of us had a medical emergency, or the house caught on fire.
4 -- luck matters.  My dad never died in a car wreck, leaving my mother and me destitute.  None of us had a life-threatening illness.  No natural disaster destroyed everything we owned.  We were able to live in an area where we weren't as likely to be victims of violent crime, and we got lucky that major crime never found us.
In the layer cake of "success," "hard work" is one of at least 5 layers -- there are probably others that I left out.  It's an important layer.  Shit, you can have all of the things I listed, but if you squander them, you fail.  That's actually the point.  Lose any ONE of those things, and you can easily fail.
It's "easier" for someone disadvantaged in the US to reach success than it is for someone disadvantaged in Haiti to do so.  True.  And nifty.  And so what?  WITHIN this society, someone who has all four of the things I listed above is WAY ahead of someone who just has "I'll work hard."  Not a little bit ahead -- light fucking years ahead.  Looking at someone who doesn't have one or more of the four things I listed and just saying "work harder" is asinine.  Sure, some folks succeed even without 1, 2, or even all 4 of those things.  But the odds are progressively worse.  And, plenty of people worked as hard as humanly possible, and STILL failed because of one or more of those factors going against them.  
No matter how hard I try or train, I was never going to be a QB who led Texas to beat USC for the title.  There was too much to overcome (seriously, watch me run my fastest....it's.....not good).  Yelling at me to "work harder!" wouldn't have helped.
Blows my mind that grown adults can't comprehend this.
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9 minutes ago, Okie State said:
12 hours ago, Brisketexan said:
And I say this as someone who HAS worked hard -- incredibly hard -- to be where I am (which is plenty successful).  My hard work is absolutely an important ingredient in my success.  But if all I had was my hard work?  I'd most likely have been fucked.
1 -- natural gifts matter.  I was born with a pretty damned effective brain.  It's not much different than any number of athletes being born with great legs, a strong right arm, what have you.  I could work all my life, 10X harder than VY did, and I would never be the QB he was, because he was born with a whole lotta gifts that I wasn't in that respect.
2 -- help from others matters a lot.  My parents were really dedicated.  My mother read to me relentlessly from birth.  They sacrificed to send me to good schools.  They made sure that I was healthy, that I had food on the table, that I was safe from danger, etc.  Other family members helped and were important.  I had some very influential teachers and coaches who helped me see opportunities, and encouraged me.  
3 -- the state apparatus matters.  The State of Texas paid for my entire undergrad and law education.  That investment put me in a position to get a first-rate education without crippling my family or me financially.  A stable society with the rule of law meant that no greedy baron took my parents' shit, kicking us out on the street.  Functioning infrastructure meant that my parents could get to their jobs that paid well enough.  It meant that food made it to our grocery store's shelves.  Functioning emergency services meant that we weren't on our own if one of us had a medical emergency, or the house caught on fire.
4 -- luck matters.  My dad never died in a car wreck, leaving my mother and me destitute.  None of us had a life-threatening illness.  No natural disaster destroyed everything we owned.  We were able to live in an area where we weren't as likely to be victims of violent crime, and we got lucky that major crime never found us.
In the layer cake of "success," "hard work" is one of at least 5 layers -- there are probably others that I left out.  It's an important layer.  Shit, you can have all of the things I listed, but if you squander them, you fail.  That's actually the point.  Lose any ONE of those things, and you can easily fail.
It's "easier" for someone disadvantaged in the US to reach success than it is for someone disadvantaged in Haiti to do so.  True.  And nifty.  And so what?  WITHIN this society, someone who has all four of the things I listed above is WAY ahead of someone who just has "I'll work hard."  Not a little bit ahead -- light fucking years ahead.  Looking at someone who doesn't have one or more of the four things I listed and just saying "work harder" is asinine.  Sure, some folks succeed even without 1, 2, or even all 4 of those things.  But the odds are progressively worse.  And, plenty of people worked as hard as humanly possible, and STILL failed because of one or more of those factors going against them.  
No matter how hard I try or train, I was never going to be a QB who led Texas to beat USC for the title.  There was too much to overcome (seriously, watch me run my fastest....it's.....not good).  Yelling at me to "work harder!" wouldn't have helped.

Blows my mind that grown adults can't comprehend this.

Most people are self-centered fuckheads that wouldn’t know empathy if it took a dump on their chest. 

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17 minutes ago, Neonmoon said:

Most people are self-centered fuckheads that wouldn’t know empathy if it took a dump on their chest. 

This right here.  And I was very much one of them.  Dont get me wrong, I felt sorry for them and donated money, but there is something about a densely populated city that gives you a bit more perspective.  I think it is because you are less removed from your fellow human beings.  You don't disappear into your McMansion. You see the same folks day in and day out, and you get to know them.

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I'll add another layer to it.  I did most of the right things, and my parents did most of the right things and were white in the post-war era, which set me up nicely, ala brisket.

And, I was adopted, so that was a stroke of luck all by itself.  All I know about my birth parents is that one or both of them were attorneys. 

But I was born with the addiction "gene," apparently.  That could have and almost did derail everything and put me under an overpass on 35.  But I managed to recover, which was some work.  And, also, the values with which I was raised made it easier, in terms of what I expected of myself, what was expected of me by others, and by available healthcare resources.  I feel extremely lucky and grateful for these things that enabled and assisted my recovery.  Even though it was ultimately a choice and required effort on my part. The majority don't recover.

Had I been unlucky enough to have been raised in a different, lower-class environment where being a drunk was more common and accepted, or even by my birth parents who were apparently educated, but also at least one of whom was probably an addict, I might not even be here, meaning certainly posting on Surly, and maybe not even on this earth.

Edited to add:  I should have left off "lower-class" above, because there are plenty of upper-class environments where substance abuse is condoned or accepted.

Edited by TwiceHorn
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I also think the importance of hard work alone shifts from generation to generation. Success builds on the previous generations' success. My Grandpa grew up poor and worked his ass off to become a very successful engineer. That opened doors for his kids which then opened doors for their kids. My kids have it better than I did. I don't pretend I grew up in the same world as my Grandpa though. We didn't start in the same place.

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As I read Briskettexan's posts and others who have either given up hope for our political institutions or way of life or are almost there and I read a statement by Biden yesterday in Buffalo with the families of the tragic hate crime, and I've been considering the language used.

Biden said, and I'll quote him here, "“American experiment in democracy is in danger like it hasn’t been in my lifetime.

We are implicitly acknowledging that what America is trying to do, in breadth and scope and sheer complexity, is an experiment. How many times have we used or heard that word in relation to the unique American motion of integrating politics, rights, people, business, freedoms, etc.?

Experiments have a reasonable expectation of failure. That is why we engage with them, to see if things work because we don't know the answer beforehand. 

I guess what I'm saying is, maybe we shouldn't be so surprised that our experiment might have worked when easier managed with a lower complexity of a smaller population size, a more homogenous group of people with more homogenous north star values. When opening up the aperture, our experiment might be too overloaded and fail at scale.

And failure in experimentation is okay. Trial and error are necessary. After all that is why we experiment. The risk and the problem is if we fail and we don't have any Plan B's or other hypothesis to test that could be better, which I think is where the doomscrollers should focus the conversation.

Edited by Vegas64
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11 minutes ago, Poe It Up said:

Let’s not kid ourselves here, hard work is the most important ingredient. You can succeed missing some other advantages, but without it you’re nothing short of fucked. 

No one is dismissing hard work just saying it isn't a sufficient condition for success.

 

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14 minutes ago, Poe It Up said:

Let’s not kid ourselves here, hard work is the most important ingredient. You can succeed missing some other advantages, but without it you’re nothing short of fucked. 

That is not true. The most important ingredient is who your parents are.

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That is not true. The most important ingredient is who your parents are.

Correct.
For every tale of “I had nothing and worked my way up,” there are plenty of tales of “I had every advantage and in spite of my mediocre to poor performance, am doing quite well.” I went to private school….I know LOTS of those guys.
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40 minutes ago, Poe It Up said:

Let’s not kid ourselves here, hard work is the most important ingredient. You can succeed missing some other advantages, but without it you’re nothing short of fucked. 

The vast majority of data on class mobility and wealth creation contradicts your opinion.

Education and access to capital (which are overwhelmingly linked to how wealthy your parents are) are by far and away the factors most closely linked to class mobility and wealth creation.

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2 minutes ago, trauma babe said:

Sorry, your worldview is incredibly dated and not in tune with reality. 

Oh, ok. I’ll tell you what, let’s do an experiment. You sit on your couch and I’ll go work. Then we’ll reconvene in a month and we’ll compare success.

 

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1 minute ago, Poe It Up said:

Oh, ok. I’ll tell you what, let’s do an experiment. You sit on your couch and I’ll go work. Then we’ll reconvene in a month and we’ll compare success.

 

This can't possibly be a serious response

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6 minutes ago, Snake Diggity said:

The vast majority of data on class mobility and wealth creation contradicts your opinion.

Education and access to capital (which are overwhelmingly linked to how wealthy your parents are) are by far and away the factors most closely linked to class mobility and wealth creation.

I have to say, I didn’t have family values on my Surly bingo card this morning. 

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1 hour ago, Okie State said:

I also think the importance of hard work alone shifts from generation to generation. Success builds on the previous generations' success. My Grandpa grew up poor and worked his ass off to become a very successful engineer. That opened doors for his kids which then opened doors for their kids. My kids have it better than I did. I don't pretend I grew up in the same world as my Grandpa though. We didn't start in the same place.

Right, and shouldn't that be the fucking point? What asshole wants their kids and grandkids to suffer as much as they did?

50 minutes ago, Poe It Up said:

Let’s not kid ourselves here, hard work is the most important ingredient. You can succeed missing some other advantages, but without it you’re nothing short of fucked. 

Lol, this is so naive. But I see many down the line have already pointed this out.

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1 minute ago, Poe It Up said:

Oh, ok. I’ll tell you what, let’s do an experiment. You sit on your couch and I’ll go work. Then we’ll reconvene in a month and we’ll compare success.

 

And if the person who sits on the couch comes from wealth, odds are he'll still be higher on the socio-economic ladder no matter how hard you work.

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8 minutes ago, Snake Diggity said:

The vast majority of data on class mobility and wealth creation contradicts your opinion.

Education and access to capital (which are overwhelmingly linked to how wealthy your parents are) are by far and away the factors most closely linked to class mobility and wealth creation.

Is it any wonder, then, that those who have this now are fighting so hard to keep it?

An argument could be made that your main job as a parent is to either endow or imbue, depending on your resources, the most and best privileged situation you can to your children.

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1 minute ago, Snake Diggity said:

What the fuck are you talking about

The poorest families are single parent households, you’re making an argument about the nuclear family. I mean, I agree with you, but it’s still nothing without busting your ass. 

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1 minute ago, Vegas64 said:

Is it any wonder, then, that those who have this now are fighting so hard to keep it?

An argument could be made that your main job as a parent is to either endow or imbue, depending on your resources, the most and best privileged situation you can to your children.

Of course.  It’s always been like that and it will never change.  And I don’t even think it’s inherently wrong.  But there need to be reasonable limits.  As was said above, pigs get fat, hogs get slaughtered.

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1 minute ago, Poe It Up said:

The poorest families are single parent households, you’re making an argument about the nuclear family. I mean, I agree with you, but it’s still nothing without busting your ass. 

Oh shit, my bad.  I didn’t realize I was responding to someone who was stillborn. 

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2 minutes ago, David Dennison said:

And if the person who sits on the couch comes from wealth, odds are he'll still be higher on the socio-economic ladder no matter how hard you work.

If it’s and buts were candy and nuts. Anyone can make up a hypothetical that doesn’t affect 99% of us. 

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  • immamac changed the title to Joe Biden 2022: Enter Dark Brandon


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