On: Private equity is devouring the U.S. economy

[shiroiuma]

The politicians (not bureaucrats: bureaucrats don't make policy) aren't making these laws up all by themselves: they're responding to the whims of the voters.

Jim Crow laws were "fair and just" at the time, according to most people of the time; that's why the laws existed. The people wanted them (well, the majority who had political power anyway, obviously not the Black people). "Fair and just" is simply an opinion, and according to the people at that time, those shitty laws were fine. They weren't getting their morality from lawmakers; the people at the time simply had bad morals.

[von_lohengramm → shiroiuma]

Exactly. Just like how the British people just recently decided that privacy and encryption aren't "fair and just." After all, would a policymaker ever go against the desires of the voters?

> well, the majority who had political power anyway

You're making a massive assumption that this somehow equates to voters/the people.

[shiroiuma → von_lohengramm]

You're making a really strange and unfounded assumption I frequently see, where you seem to want to absolve the common people of all guilt.

The idea that common white people 100+ years weren't massively racist is, honestly, ridiculous and downright insulting. Racist policies didn't come from a few leaders that somehow got themselves elected; regular people believed that way too. There's no shortage of historical evidence for this fact, and you trying to deny it really sounds a lot like flat-eartherism.

[comrh → shiroiuma]

Of course "some people wanted the laws that were enacted", that's basically meaningless and not what OP said.

[shiroiuma → comrh]

OP insinuated that these laws were a result of some small minority of racist people. That's complete BS. The laws were the result of much of society being racist.

Go talk to your grandparents about how racist people were in those days.