Nature vs. Nurture and racism

Question, what is United Way?

The United Way is a non-profit organization whos goal is to help those in need. They sponsor many programs that do many good things such as feed the hungry, help educate children, provide shelter for the homeless and much more.

Just as a point of information, your dictum about whites being rural and blacks being urban only applies to the north. In the south, blacks are as ubiquitous in the rural areas as in cities.

ok.

It would be nice if "race" ceased to be an issue anywhere in the world. Unfortunately, what ought to be isn't so easy to accomplish. We can reform the laws, but to eliminate the subtle prejudices of the human heart are beyond us. Jim Crow Laws were an abomination, the systematic exclusion of minorities from exercising their civil rights was a disgrace. Up until just over two hundred years ago, very few people even questioned the notion that anyone different from their immediate community was inferior. Many people continued to think that there were several "human" races right up into the middle of the 20th century. It takes more than a couple of hundred years to change attitudes that go back beyond written history. The amazing thing is how far we have come to getting rid of all those old prejudices.

As a recipient of such a brochure, I'd be a lot more interested in what particular programs the money was going to rather than some classification of who it is going to. ("To whom it is going," ug...)

I guess this is sort of my point though. Doesn't categorizing races just point out differences between people. Differences are usually what we do not like about each other.

Yes, I suppose it does. However, it was using just such statistical data that we managed to overthrow Jim Crow, to force school integration, and to open the workplace to folks regardless of their "race", religion, age, sex, or sexual preferences. Those were all worthy advances toward a society that is truely open and available to all.

There are limits to the usefulness of descriptive, or inferential statistics. What they show is sometimes not entirely clear, and if an important variable is neglected results can become terribly skewed. We depend upon samples being truely representative and random, but that isn't always the case. People often think that trend lines will extend indefinitely, but any statistician will tell you how wrong that notion is. I think that a solid course in basic statistics should be a required subject for all lower-division undergraduates. High School graduates should at least have a nodding acquaintance with both the strengths and weaknesses most often encountered.

As a further clarification of "United Way', it is actually a funding organization that collects charitable contributions on behalf of its member organizations that include everything from the Girl Scouts to homeless shelters to the Red Cross to the YMCA to the Salvation Army, etc. The member organizations agree not to do independent fund raising except by special permission of United Way and in return the United Way does most of the legwork in recruiting volunteers and running periodic fund raising campaigns with the proceeds distributed among the members. The concept itself has worked well. The primary drawback has been hardship imposed on some organizations that do not qualify for United way plus a propensity of United Way to impose its own moral values on its members.

One of those moral values is favortism toward those organizations who most serve the poor and minorities and often the language is indistinguishable between references to the poor and to minorities.

I was once exec of a large organization who's imperative was "ELIMINATE RACISM WHEREVER IT EXISTS AND BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY". The initiatives required racial quotas for membership, staffing, and leadership positions. That wasn't easy in Salina KS which at that time had I think 2% black population and even smaller Hispanic and Vietnamese populations. The national office wouldn't accept our much larger German and Swede groups as minorities.

Neverthless, on a national level, we were at the forefront in breaking down the last barriers and utilizing affirmative action to the fullest. That was in the 1970's., It was the right thing to do at the time. (We were a United Way agency by the way.)

Now its 30 years later and those battles have been fought and won. A black person or any other minority and also any woman who gets an education and is willing to pay his/her dues to work up through the ranks now has essential parity in opportunity and earning ability. Most employers do not wish to exclude minorities, and those who do are afraid of repercussions if they are discriminatory.

I think now it is time to stop calling attention to race or ethnic origin and become truly color blind. That won't happen when we are constantly reminded and/or it is implied that minorities can't make it on their skills and abilities but must have government benevolence to succeed.

Maybe it is now racist to be so conscious of race?

I believe the main point in your nature vs nurture topic has more to do with the individual's home situation vs where they live.

It would be interesting to see what the results would be if United Way broke down their graphs with a single parent vs intact family comparison....

I have a problem of a comparison made between a single parent family and an "intact" family. There seeems to be a value judgment implicit in making such a distinction. The child or children of a single parent who gives them all the time and love of which the situation admits, and responsibly provides for their safety and supervision when s/he cannot be with them, are far better off than any child or children of an "intact" family in which the parents are socially "disabled" in any way. Rather be loved on a schedule than abused or ignored on a daily basis.

Agreed. But how many single parents are truly like that? I'm not making a value judgement here, I'm stating facts. Single parent households vs two parent households has been thoroughly studied, and the overwhelming findings are:

-Young people from single-parent families are 2 to 3 times as likely to have emotional or behavioral problems compared to those who have both their father and mother present. They end up in psychotherapy more than three times oftener, according to the National Survey of Children.

-A study which tracked every child born on the Hawaiian Island of Kauai found that five out of six delinquents with an adult criminal record came from families where a parent -- most always the father -- was absent.

-The rate of drug abuse is several times higher among adolescents living in a single parent household.

-Youngsters from single parent homes have much poorer records on measures of attendance, cooperation and effort at school. These children require more discipline, have considerably higher suspension rates, have lower GPA's, and repeat grades more often.

-Even after factoring in differences in economic and demographic background, students from fatherless families have lower college expectations, complete fewer years of schooling, and are far likelier to drop out of school altogether.

-Living in a single parent family decreases a child's chances of completing high school by over 40 percent for whites, and 70 percent for blacks.

And what I believe is the topic here, and probably the most important fact:

-The poverty rate in single-mother families, after all government transfers, is 31 percent, while the comparable figure for married mother-father families is 5 percent. Demographic adjustments show that a very significant portion of the rise in child poverty over the last two decades is attributable simply and directly to growing fatherlessness. The poverty of children in female-headed households is also much deeper and more persistent.

-Economic differences between family types translate into very real lifestyle gaps for children. For instance, 73 percent of children living with father and mother both reside in a home the family owns, while two-thirds of single-parent children live in rentals. A child's chances of residing in a public housing project are ten times higher when only his mother is present. His odds of living in a suburb are far lower.

Is it fair that men make more then women? NO! But is it a reality? Unfortunately, yes.

A single parent faces a far harder job raising children then a couple does. Some parents, like you describe, are able to overcome the odds to do this. Many, sadly, do not.....

I cannot dispute the demographics, but I do know that I never liked the tactics of The United Way. The approach that was used, during the drive, was was to put pressure on employees to sign up for contributing a day's wages to the cause. I saw it when I worked in radio and TV, and when I taught. Then, when it came to light that a former leader had stolen over one million dollars from the organization, the entire group was tainted and is still recovering from that scandal.

I also saw those tactics when I worked at UPS. As part of managment it was kind of a "mandatory Volunteer" situation. I much prefer giving my time then giving my money.