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There should be an Internet law for the phenomenon of taking systemic or statistical analyses personally and then dismissing them on that basis. It’s so common and always just results in a mess of people commenting past each other.

That it’s possible to work one’s way out of poverty or to maintain a healthy weight through willpower or what have you is simply irrelevant when talking policy. Its only possible role is to dismiss the problem or discourage action. The reverse is also true: that a system could hypothetically make it easier for one to succeed is irrelevant to the individual who’s trying to decide what to do to improve their life in the system that currently exists.




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