> why not just use the full mathematical set of people (ie everyone). you can't get anything more powerful in order to change society, and no other group is as blameworthy for current status quo.

First you need to explain whether by "use" you mean in social science (as an explanation) or in politics (as a strategy). I think that either case doesn't work well. Obviously, all sorts of trivial sets are the causes of everything, but a useful model must be more refined to provide insight on the mechanics of the process (and as a strategy, that's just hard).

> So where should the effort go to cause social change in the EU, and whose citizens deserve being blamed for faults?

I don't know. I'm not a political strategist (I'm not a social scientist, either, but I studied some).

> it also widely criticized for lacking the ability to make predicts from a theory and thus verified the validity of said theory. The lack of verification is where science normally leaves and cultural, religious or political believes begin.

That's not quite true. Social science, as well as biology and computer science to some degree, deal with intractable dynamical systems. On a large scale, it is a mathematical impossibility to make predictions about biological systems, computer programs and social dynamics. Biologists can't predict evolution -- only explain it retroactively -- but that doesn't mean they don't understand the mechanics. Likewise, social science can only make predictions in very constrained conditions, like those studied in social psychology. If science were restricted to studying only tractable processes, we wouldn't get very far. Also, the word "science" may not be the best word to describe social research, anyway, but that doesn't mean that the knowledge gathered there is religious or political.

> Do you have data that shows that homeless people with black skin have less power than homeless people with white skin?

I wasn't quite talking about homeless people. Unless a homeless person denies access to food and shelter to people of other races, I won't call them racist. But as to data, how about this[1]. In the US, blacks are more likely to be incarcerated than whites of even much higher economic status:

What's more, even young black people who follow the rules and are never incarcerated are less likely than similar white people to accumulate wealth as they get older. As of 2012, the median household wealth of black participants in the study who had never been incarcerated at some point in their lives was $16,200. Those who had been incarcerated had zero wealth at the median.

Among white participants who had never been incarcerated, however, median household wealth was $192,000 by 2012. The median white participant who had been incarcerated reported wealth of $5,000.

[1]: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/03/23/poor-...

Well, we do have the model of culture, which is a trivial set when thinking about groups of people, but refined when grouped by values and concepts. They define groups of people and impact power distribution, but is distinct in its aspect to be supported and enforced both by those with power and those without.

To take a few examples, female and male identity is defined by the same culture. A man will apply male identity as defined by culture, but also be expected (and enforced) to do so by both men and women in that culture. When we look at groups and define men as having more power as a group, it doesn't address if they have more power to change the cultural rules. The power a man has to voluntarily wear women clothing should be a hint towards that aspect, and if they have more power to do so than a woman wearing men clothing.

Similar, in the caste system, people from all castes shared and enforced the culture. People of high caste supported it, and people of low caste supported it as that meant that they themselves were not at fault. In the end it took a common effort to remove it from law in places like India, but as a cultural values it is yet to fully be eradicated.

> In the US, blacks are more likely to be incarcerated than whites of even much higher economic status:

Well, I did ask this before. Is "acted on", even if beneficial, a power? A lot of feminism theory when looking at movies and story telling criticize that being "acted on" diminish a person identity and power. Even if its a beneficial outcome in the case of incarceration, the person involved can't affect it or control it.

Looking at it from a cultural (and using the trivial set), we can easily see how such outcome can happen. I recall a test where actors, a white man, a white woman, a black man, and a black woman acted as if they stole a bike in broad daylight. The outcome matches perfectly the cultural expectation, with only the men drawing negative attention. The black man got the worst, while the white women got positive attention in that bystanders went and actually helped her to cut the protective chain of the bike. From a cultural perspective, society collectively define thieves as white women < black women < white men < black men, as least to most likely.

If we tried to predict this result using perceived power of each group, we would get something like W/M < W/F < B/M < B/F, with the potential to switch W/F and B/M depending if we regard race or gender as the more powerful sub group. Regardless, neither provide an accurate prediction, as white males end up second to worst when looking at the actual result.

From a cultural perspective, where we define it as controlling what power each group has, it does make sense that not all groups have the same power in all situations. It also make sense to define that the group that culture defines as having power, are themselves not able to control culture. At most, the group can proportionally affect culture, similar to that of a large sub group of citizens can affect the election result without the group having a majority.

> To take a few examples

If you're talking about political strategy, then there's not much I can say, as I have no idea what is the best strategy to dismantle a caste system. But if you're talking about a descriptive model, then I don't think cooperation is the same thing as support. The definition of power is exactly the ability to get others to serve your interests. The fact that a group with less power (the influenced) cooperates with a power structure that serves the powerful (or the influencers) is no indication that the interests originate there, too.

> If we tried to predict this result using perceived power of each group, we would get something like W/M < W/F < B/M < B/F

I think that you're assuming that power (or lack thereof) manifests itself in precisely the same way in every situation (male/female or while/black). It is, I believe, an incorrect assumption. Because men are dependent on women in many ways, it is not in their best interests to have women incarcerated more. My expectation would be that in every scenario, the outcome would be the one that best serves the interests of the group with power, regardless if they happen to coincide with the interests of the less powerful group in that particular scenario. Also, social dynamics that shape social perception are, of course, statistical and work globally. Locally we can get behavior that doesn't tell the whole picture. For example, if you only considered how men and women behave on dates, you may wrongly conclude that women have more power because men pay for them and open the door for them.

> it does make sense that not all groups have the same power in all situations

That may be true, but on the scale any researcher who studies social structures who isn't a psychologist is interested in, the more powerful group gets its way in almost every case. It's just that social dynamics that perpetuate such large-scale power are usually not visible on a small scale.

What benefit is it for a group to have themselves incarcerated? I could see how one group could grant protection to themselves and their interdependent group, but it seems strange, even contradicting, that the group with power would grant protection to someone else but then not do so to themselves.

And if we allowed such concept to enter the calculations, every other power indication must be put into questioning. Social science commonly make a point of gender distribution in the work environment. We naturally conclude that since more men are in CEO/higher pay position, that must be a result of power. However, a Chinese study showed that >80% of women won't consider dating a man if he doesn't own his own apartment and earn above a cultural set amount. 50% even consider it wrong for man to be outside if not earning that amount, as he should stay inside and work until he has increase his earning. Does this mean that women in such culture are the one in power, and that they just happen to give up power in the work force since its in their best interest to have men with high income?

If we are to include such relations, and from my perspective, results that are not Nash equilibrium, we end up with an impossible high burden of proof on social science. The researcher would basically have to prove the non-existence of such relationships.

> if you only considered how men and women behave on dates, you may wrongly conclude that women have more power

Its not easy comparing two asymmetrical reproductive strategies and asking which one are in more control, but a general consensus seems to be that whoever invest most are the party that are more discriminative and more selective. Where humans end up depend generally on the one studying it, and the methodology used, and local extremes.

> the more powerful group gets its way in almost every case

Depend on the time scale. If we look at an elected party, they will by definition get their way in almost every case until next election. At that point, their power, which was given by society as a whole, can be removed. The question is then, where that power ever part of the group or was it just granted?

Going back to cultural values, it doesn't change as rapidly. By allowing groups to have different power in different situation, it is also less rigid in its predictions. If the same cultural values are kept over time, you also get the effect that groups gets their way consistently over time as per the culture. The thing that would disprove culture as the culprit of power, is if a group had power to change such culture. Do you know of any such case?

> What benefit is it for a group to have themselves incarcerated?

I don't understand what you're referring to.

> However, a Chinese study showed that >80% of women won't consider dating a man if he doesn't own his own apartment and earn above a cultural set amount... Does this mean that women in such culture are the one in power, and that they just happen to give up power in the work force since its in their best interest to have men with high income?

But that is the whole point of the power discourse. Power shapes social norms.

> Its not easy comparing two asymmetrical reproductive strategies and asking which one are in more control

I think it is fairly obvious that men have more power in most cultures.

> The question is then, where that power ever part of the group or was it just granted?

The power is "a part of the group", but it ebbs and flows. Government is a mechanism that interacts with power (like all social mechanisms). If the government structure is binary, i.e. only one party can be in control at any one time, then this will naturally amplify power fluctuations because that's how binary mechanisms work.

> it is also less rigid in its predictions.

It's very hard (or even impossible) to make predictions in an intractable dynamical systems. That's just a mathematical reality. That's why social science doesn't try to make predictions on a large scale and over long durations, because that's just mathematically impossible. Similarly, biologists are unable to make predictions about evolution. They have no choice but to be content with retroactively explaining the dynamics.

> The thing that would disprove culture as the culprit of power, is if a group had power to change such culture. Do you know of any such case?

Plenty. The French revolution has dramatically changed cultural perception of aristocracy and hereditary power. More recently, feminism has changed cultural norms dramatically. It was once believed that women don't have the (biological) mental faculties to be good doctors or lawyers. The deeper and more internalized cultural norms are, the longer the process. There is an amazing book called The Civilizing Process[1] by Norbert Elias that chronicles the gradual social development of disgust. It shows how things we perceive to be visceral are actually the product of social processes.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Civilizing_Process

> I don't understand what you're referring to.

The swirling mustached man who in western culture symbolize evil and criminality. If men as a group has all the power, why would men as a group allow men to be incarcerated in higher rate than women? We have similar situation with the phrase "women and children first". Why would the group with power sacrifice their life for members of a less powerful group?

> I think it is fairly obvious that men have more power in most cultures.

In the context of dating? Social science looks at outcomes, and women are more discriminative and have more decision of the outcome. Outside of some extreme local situation where some elderly religious male leader decides whom a woman will form a religious bond with, which in my country is highly illegal and carry prison sentence, I can't say there is much signs that men decide the outcome of dating. Looking at proxies for dating culture (ie romantic movies), that impression is further reinforced that women decide the out come of dates and men only have the option to try date enough women until one will accept him.

But any conclusion must come with the consideration that men and women has asymmetrical strategies when it comes to dating.

> Power shapes social norms.

Or social norms shapes power. If men must be bread earners in order to be successful in reproduction rituals, those who are more inclined to do so will reproduce at an evolutionary higher rate than others. Such incentives should, through not guarantied, impact the power balance in the work force. In cultures that do not have such culture should as a result have a distinct different power distribution in the work force. I would guess (since I don't have the data) that Chinese society has a more extreme gender segregation in the work force than countries where income has a lower impact on dating.

> Government is a mechanism that interacts with power

One could easily think that it is the citizens that control the government that votes a party into power. The common phrase, S/He who pays the piper calls the tune, implies a power relation. Naturally, a political party has power, but revolutions general happens to parties that travels too far from the cultural structure. Somewhat ironically, cultural changes often happen in the turmoil.

> Plenty. The French revolution has dramatically changed cultural perception of aristocracy and hereditary power.

I might be mistaken, but it wasn't aristocracy and hereditary power that was in control of the French revolution. It seems that the group in power did not get their way, and the cultural changes came from the less powerful groups working together.

Old style feminism did change cultural norms, and most what I have read and seen was caused by the goal to create change by targeting cultural values. They were not the group with power, and the change was not cause by getting the most powerful group to change culture. Instead culture was changed from within by changing gender norms and expectations. There is plenty of old Swedish movies that illustrated 1980s parents that attempted to eliminate gender identity as a concept, switching or removing gendered clothing and toys.

New feminism, which is a style of feminism I strongly oppose, is the idea that men and women have different strengths, perspectives, and roles in society. Difference feminism success seem to mostly be about pinning groups against groups and causing what people call the gender war. Old feminism advocated that everyone are human and differences in society is caused by a harmful culture, one that they had a good track record in fixing. Since everyone are human, they even managed to make the word feminism to be a synonym to the word equal, which seems quite hijacked by new feminism.

The Civilizing Process sounds interesting and valuable read, but not sure how it links back to the concept that a powerful group shapes society and culture. Going back to racism, the initial proposition was that the group with most power deciding what the culture is. My view is that the culture decide the power balance of groups and culture is formed by everyone in society. In order to fix a bad culture, one need to change society norms and expectations, and you can't do so by only addressing the most powerful group.

> If men as a group has all the power, why would men as a group allow men to be incarcerated in higher rate than women?

I'm not sure I understand the premise. The fact that a group is powerful (and therefore serves itself) does not imply that the members of the group are necessarily allies. Even shared interests do not imply alliance. In fact, the more powerful each member of the group is, the less reason there is for them to be allies. Powerful groups usually become allegiant to one another only when threatened by a large accumulation of less powerful groups (that together have a lot of power).

> In the context of dating?

Maybe not, but this is getting into very specific contexts. I'm generally talking about social, or political power, in the context of distribution of resources. This is what most social scientists mean when they say "power" and don't qualify the context. Dating is quite special anyway in that the dynamics usually involves a very small number of people, so there can't be interesting alliances.

> Or social norms shapes power.

It's not either or. Nearly all dynamical systems involve feedback. But from a political point of view, what matters is that social norms are malleable. I won't go so far as to say that biology plays no role in social norms, but I don't think we have any reason to believe that our society today is anywhere near the boundary of biological forces.

> If men must be bread earners in order to be successful in reproduction rituals, those who are more inclined to do so will reproduce at an evolutionary higher rate than others.

Regardless of my previous statement (feedback etc.), I should warn against relying too much on behaviors attributed to a prehistoric past, which is largely unknown. We're not sure exactly about the different roles men and women had in prehistoric society.

> One could easily think that it is the citizens that control the government that votes a party into power.

Yes, but one citizen does not vote a party into power. Lots of citizens have lots of power.

> It seems that the group in power did not get their way, and the cultural changes came from the less powerful groups working together.

Less powerful groups working together is precisely a way to gather power. That's why capitalists hate unions. A worker alone has far less power than the capitalist. But combined, they are quite fearsome. It is a very crude and simplistic description, but the power of the rich is in their money, and the power of the poor is in their numbers. It's just that it's much easier for a rich man to yield his power than for a large group of poor people, because they must coordinate.

> New feminism,

I don't like this distinction. Feminism is simply the ideology of having women attain the same power as men. Feminists simply have different strategies of attaining those goals. When people start talking about "new" vs. "old" feminism, I get the sense that they really cherry pick some feminist strategies that they like and some that they don't.

> The Civilizing Process sounds interesting and valuable read, but not sure how it links back to the concept that a powerful group shapes society and culture.

Only indirectly. The thesis is that the top echelons of society want to distinguish themselves from the hoi polloi by adopting behavior that is more refined. Eventually, the lower classes want to resemble the high classes, and mimic the same behavior, and the cycle starts again. What is interesting is how internalized things have become that we can literally throw up when seeing behavior that was once common place. I mentioned it as an example of social dynamics shaping norms.

> and you can't do so by only addressing the most powerful group.

Ah, maybe that's the source of the misunderstanding. The most powerful "group" does not necessarily hold most of the power. Power is spread, just not equally. To give a simple example, to change policy in an aristocracy, you could either convince one king and thirty noblemen, or 100,000 peasants that would revolt. In modern society, power is not that concentrated, and I don't think it's ever enough to convince just one group (although we may be getting there) no matter how powerful it is.

Since we are getting to the point where the HN formats are making lines be quite short, I would just like to say thanks. My goal by continuing the discussion was to see the view and understand the arguments when discussing groups with power as a source for racism (and by extension, other ism's). Out of happenstance, only two days ago I also listened on a keynote that highlighted the importance to listen and see the human in on-line discussions.

> Powerful groups usually become allegiant to one another only when threatened by a large accumulation of less powerful groups

Such groups are very temporarily in coherency, and don't seem to match the concept of "white men" when described as a cause for ism's. If anything, grouping people based on race or gender without a very specific context seems to loose all the attributes of a allied group with aligned interests and goals.

> Nearly all dynamical systems involve feedback ... Eventually, the lower classes want to resemble the high classes, and mimic the same behavior

I think studies done by Robert Sapolsky on social ranking in baboons to be quite enlightening on this. He showed that if you group individuals by ranking, number 3 competes with 2 and 4 but not with 1 and 5. To theorize, I think that when individuals of a class mimics the behavior of whoever is at top, they do so in order to primarily compete with the nearest ranking members of the same class. The power relation between the top and those at the bottom becomes very indirect and largely unintended through this mechanism.

> I should warn against relying too much on behaviors attributed to a prehistoric past

Fully agree, and mostly bring it up as a point where we tend to view men as powerful because some nation forbids unmarried women to be outside, while we have similar situation in nations where unwealthy men are also not allowed outside. The variation in culture has a much bigger impact on power distribution and liberty than gender has on a global scale.

> [New feminism]. I don't like this distinction. Feminism is simply the ideology of having women attain the same power as men. Feminists simply have different strategies of attaining those goals.

If we look at the left and right politics, both strive to attain economical progress and prosperity. The distinction is in the strategies of attaining those goals, the values behind it, and from that a lot of effort and energy is expended to fighting each other. A think a major factor in this is when two strategies conflict with each other, you end up with two opposing ideologies with the same goal.

To take a few example, Difference feminism encourage and promotes diversity, and have a large undertone of biology in their message. A company should strive 50% women and 50% men because men and women are different and brings different values. The older feminism movement want to eliminate the defining aspect of diversity, and have companies only see the humans behind the applicants for which the natural result should be, spread over enough companies, 50/50.

To bring a second area of conflicting strategies, lets bring up domestic violence. A key statistics that new feminism commonly brings up is that 80% of reported perpetrators are men and 20% are women, often witch explicit implication of testosterone as a biological cause for violence. A common phrase used by feminist is "men violence against women". However, if we look for supporting evidence in homes where there is two men living together, or two women, we don't get the expected result of higher and lower violence based on gender. What we find is that regardless of the genders, the amount of domestic violence is identical.

New feminism reaction to that data can be read in several papers and reports, released in the last 20 years. The full title, often cut in half, is now days "Mens violence against women and violence by people in same-sex relationships", perfectly matching the data and (in my view) completely missing the point. Looking from the perspective that we are all humans, wouldn't it be better to ask why 80% of the time men are implicated as the perpetrator in heterosexual relationships? I would even go as to say that the strategies should simply focus on reducing the human behavior of turning verbal arguments into physical confrontations, rather than focus on gender.

> to change policy in an aristocracy, you could either convince one king and thirty noblemen, or 100,000 peasants

To change culture in an aristocracy, I don't think its enough to convince one king and thirty noblemen. They can influence peasants to mimic the higher class behavior with incentives of higher social status, but that will inherently be within the constraints of existing culture that defines the social structures. If someone want to attain change outside of those, the only method that historically has worked (as far as I seen) is by getting those 100,000 peasants to align with the new values. Wealth and power can help or slow that progress, but it can't force or stop it (although we may be, as you say, getting there, which is a very scary thought).

To go back a bit and talk about racism, if we want to stop racism we can't only talk about white men. Having people to see humans rather that skin color takes a value change, and it is currently very ingrained into everyones mind. The black panther movement was by my interpretation an reflection of the white supremacy movement, putting skin color as an defining feature in create the in-group and out-group. Similarly, new feminism is doing a similar thing to gender.

> Since we are getting to the point where the HN formats are making lines be quite short

Just click on any of the comments to make them the root.

> If anything, grouping people based on race or gender without a very specific context seems to loose all the attributes of a allied group with aligned interests and goals.

But "allied group" and "aligned interests" are very different things. When we study groups, we don't always care what one person in the group feels towards others in the group, or whether person X and person Y are business competitors. X may really want Y to fail, but even the opposite outcome is better to X than a communist revolution. Anyway, it is a fact that white men have been more powerful than white women or black men in the West, at least for the past few hundreds of years.

> The distinction is in the strategies of attaining those goals, the values behind it

I think that different values result in very different goals, and I think that conservative and white Americans have very different notions of how they want the world to look. Jonathan Haidt has a nice talk about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b86dzTFJbkc

> often witch explicit implication of testosterone as a biological cause for violence

I don't think that's the implication at all. It's unlikely that feminists would emphasize a biological cause, and besides, I don't thing they (should or do) care what the cause is.

> I would even go as to say that the strategies should simply focus on reducing the human behavior of turning verbal arguments into physical confrontations, rather than focus on gender.

I don't know.

> if we want to stop racism we can't only talk about white men.

Again, I don't know how to stop racism, and I must admit that I haven't closely followed the political messaging by different advocacy groups, so I'm perfectly willing to accept that the messaging was wrong.

> white men have been more powerful than white women or black men in the West

So how do we define power in this context. If members of the group has conflicting goals and conflicting interests, how do the group as a whole "get their way most of the time"?

We could use a proxy like wealth and work position, but that leaves us with the problem that quite explicit in the Chinese culture. If men are culturally forced to seek wealth and profession, is that power? When there such major incentive for men to seek wealth, which I will emphasize by cite OkCupid (West data) statistics blog: "If you're 23 or older [male] and don't make much money, go die in a fire". The effect of wealth for men is as correlating and explicit as looks are for women.

Comparing white men with black men works better using that proxy, through there is additional factors. The most powerful factor for wealth is being born by wealthy parents (per any article I have read on the subject of wealth). Unless a nation has an immigration that matches the wealth of people currently living there, those people are going to be at a major statistical disadvantage in their ability to gather new wealth.

Politics is however a nice proxy for checking if a group is getting their way most of the time, since plenty of political decision intentionally impacts group of people. When balanced in respect to wealth, do schools in black areas get less funding/focus then schools in white areas? Do parks get more built/funded in white areas than black areas? If so, is it because of the political representation (ie, since black population in the US is 8%, the 92% will carry a majority in all decision and in theory dominate any decision). This is part of the problem why most nation aren't rule by popularity vote, since high population density of cities would dominate the lower population of the rural area and carry a majority in all political decisions. However, the cost to such system is that all votes don't counts as equal, and all system that I know of is based on land and not on race.

> It's unlikely that feminists would emphasize a biological cause

A common comment I see is that new feminism is extremism, and they don't represent the mass movement that view everyone as humans. While I do hope that is true, key note speakers on tech conferences is heavily weighted in the new feminism camp, and when it comes to political activism, there seem few who represent the view that cultural roles and values in gender and race is harmful.

> how do the group as a whole "get their way most of the time"?

I think you're making the mistake of confusing intent with outcome. Power, like pressure, is a statistical property. Gas particles don't need intent in order to have communal properties. Also, I think you're associating judgment with power, as if someone is saying that having power is bad. I think it's important to first understand what power is as a neutral attribute, and only then understand the criticism (which, BTW, boils done to "with power comes responsibility").

> If men are culturally forced to seek wealth and profession, is that power?

Yes. Again, power is not about how you feel and what you want, but what you have. I know nothing of Chinese culture, but Chinese men may suffer terribly from stress and depression, but they still have power.

> since plenty of political decision intentionally impacts group of people.

Right, but, again, we're talking statistics here. If some decisions affect me negatively and some affect me positively, but overall, 80% are positive for me and 80% are bad for you for, say, the past 50 years, then, obviously, there's something going on here.

> the 92% will carry a majority in all decision and in theory dominate any decision

Being a majority is a great source of power. If the majority doesn't treat the minority equally, that's discrimination.

> and they don't represent the mass movement that view everyone as humans.

You may be more sensitive to these things than me, but I don't think you're being fair. "Black lives matter" isn't about white lives. It points out that blacks are discriminated against and that should stop. Feminism, old as new, points out the discrimination and unfair distribution of power between men and women. It's not about men's problems. If I'm getting mugged and I yell, "help, someone is mugging me", I don't think it's fair to say, "why aren't you also yelling for the woman getting raped two blocks over?!" Advocacy groups are supposed to focus on one problem, or one kind of problems. Simply saying "everybody has problems" may be absolutely true, but would terrible advocacy. Also, distinction between new and old advocacy is pretty much a constant. People always say, we were fine letting you have what you asked for yesterday (even though they really weren't fine), but now you're asking for too much or stepping out of line.

> Yes. Again, power is not about how you feel and what you want, but what you have.

Knowing the source is critical to solve a problem. If cultural pressure is the source, shouldn't it be solved? Seems a bit to me like blaming black people for being in prison, demanding that they should fix the issue of being jailed more than white people.

A key feature of science is to figure out and understand how a system works and what affects it. How successful has efforts in the past been in trying to get people that are forced into a situation to also fix the problem of being forced?

> If some decisions affect me negatively and some affect me positively

This was part of what I was wondering about. Could you define in what way 80% of decisions have been positive for say, men in general in the last 30 years? In order for things to be positive for the group as a whole, the decision can't be significant contradicting within the group. I can't think of any interest that is that exclusively an interests to men but the opposite for women, and carries a significant majority.

> If the majority doesn't treat the minority equally, that's discrimination.

Should 8% get equal 50% influence? With winner take all decision, majority will always dominate the minority. In an election, the winning 51% get 100% representation, while the loosing 49% get 0%. That is not equal, and many nation solve this in a imperfect way by having more than 2 party system, through practically all retain some limits.

A problem with the word discrimination in this context is that intent is lost. 92% voting what they want and 8% voting for something else is generally not considered discrimination since the 92% don't intentionally try to miss treat the 8%. You need intent for discrimination, which is by its nature create before the end result.

> Advocacy groups are supposed to focus on one problem, or one kind of problems.

A common reply I get, but there is three major issues with it. First, feminism proclaims to be about gender equality, and over half its existence the movement stood for that. Its only in the last 30 years that the movement changed course.

Second, having an alternative movement that focus on Mens Right is bad for everyone. Equality don't need to have competition between two polar movements. If your house on fire, the fix is not to use fans and try to cool it down. Having two polar movements with the same goal is only causing less understanding, more fighting, and less empathy, and shouldn't a movement about equality stand for more than that?

Third, it should be said that sex segregation has only gotten worse in the last 30 years, a trend that many people are surprisingly surprised about. Difference feminism is sometimes, rather hushed, accused of this, and I don't disagree.

> we were fine letting you have what you asked for yesterday

Except when that what people asked yesterday, and what people are asking tomorrow, is polar opposites. One side want people to be treated equally regardless of gender and race. The other side want people to be treated different based on gender and race, but demand that the outcome to be equal. You can only fulfill the later demand by taking back the earlier and reversing progress.

> "Black lives matter"

I always found that adding the word "too" transforms the message. I also think it is way too early to evaluate the movement, as it could go as black panther movement and be about guns and violence, or it could be about reducing murder caused by racial tensions. The later has general support in society.

As a side note: Thanks for the link to Jonathan Haidt talk. Very interesting, through I have heard some exception to the left politics being pro-science and pro-lenience with crime. In particular, feminist (assuming left) groups successfully lobbied to prevent medical research on causes for rape, with statements that such research could result in lower jail sentences and people avoiding justice with insanity pleas.

P.S.

> In particular, feminist (assuming left) groups successfully lobbied to prevent medical research on causes for rape, with statements that such research could result in lower jail sentences and people avoiding justice with insanity pleas.

Do you have a source for this? This sounds like fake news or a gross distortion.

Robert Sapolsky, on talk about sexual behavior and aggression. If it is in one of the lectures I suspect, its about 3.5 hrs I would need to go through to give you an exact time stamp.

I couldn't find any primary source. The most reasonable assumption is that it is false or distorted enough that it may as well be. In any event, in the hypothetical universe where this is true, this does not represent any kind of feminism I'm familiar with, and I try to be as radical a feminist as possible.

You reaction is expected, even if I had hoped for a bit more open mindness.

The context is rather simple, scientific, and the time Sapolsky spent on it very short as it was just a brief mentioning.

Studies has shown that one particular part of the brain lights up on both situation involving arousal and situations involving threat. The theory suggested from this is that part of those committing sexual assault do so because their brain confuses signals of arousal with signal of threats.

As a side note to the above, he shortly mentioned that the researchers of the study wanted to create a official medical criteria/condition/wordIdon'tremember from this theory in order to raise funds for further research. However, politicians got involved and blocked it because of lobbying from feminist groups on the argument that doing this could lower jail sentences for convinced rapists.

The end result being that the feminist groups blocked this research on rape. It also match perfectly with the political rethric when it comes to rape, as I often see feminist group putting weight on the "fact" that those who commit sexual assault are completely healthy and "do not have a higher rate of Schizophrenia than anyone else", as if all mental conditions were linked to Schizophrenia.

> The end result being that the feminist groups blocked this research on rape.

This is the part I find hard to believe. I couldn't find any mention of such an event occurring.

> as I often see feminist group putting weight on the "fact" that those who commit sexual assault are completely healthy and "do not have a higher rate of Schizophrenia than anyone else", as if all mental conditions were linked to Schizophrenia.

I have never encountered the feminist position you're referring to.

That position (regarding Schizophrenia) was something I read when I was interested in reading what the feminist political party in Sweden thought about the subject (after listening on that lecture), and clicked on the first link Google gave.

Could be a fringe view, which would be great.

I think it's a very fringe view.

> Knowing the source is critical to solve a problem.

Right, but I think it's important to separate social science from politics, even though the two are related, just as we separate science from technology.

> If cultural pressure is the source, shouldn't it be solved?

I don't think social pressure is the source of power, but just the form it takes, but I agree that in order to change society, those who work to change it would eventually need to address such social pressure. It's just that these things tend to change on their own once material conditions have changed -- but it takes time. It's a little like those who claimed that soldiers would never be able to accept integrated units in the military. Instead of sending psychologists to treat the white soldiers' anxiety, they just integrated the units. After a while, everybody got used to it, and the social pressure and norms changed. Social norms almost invariable (history shows) follow practice, rather than the other way around. Social action therefore strives to change practice, and the norms follow. I am not aware of cases where action can first directly change norms. Sometimes norms change "naturally", due to technological or material changes that are not a result of social action.

> How successful has efforts in the past been in trying to get people that are forced into a situation to also fix the problem of being forced?

Isn't that what revolts are? Revolts fix the problem for both sides.

> Could you define in what way 80% of decisions have been positive for say, men in general in the last 30 years?

First let me say that things have gotten better for women. But the lack of social-security-paid maternity leave and subsidy of child care, still work against women in the US.

You could say that social norms demand that this be the case, but, like I wrote above, I think history shows that social norms are usually reflections of material conditions rather than something deeply ingrained, and also nobody said that power doesn't have any downsides. It's like a king who feels lonely at the top; lonely he may be, but he's still the king.

> Should 8% get equal 50% influence?

No, but it should get 8%.

> In an election, the winning 51% get 100% representation

I'm not interested in fixing the system or in whining about it; just in describing it.

> since the 92% don't intentionally try to mistreat the 8%.

I'm not sure. E.g., in America, the Republican party has been working for years to curtail the voting power of blacks below their share in the population.

> You need intent for discrimination

I don't think so. I can invite people to a party on the roof of my building, which has no elevator. I discriminate against handicapped people without intending to.

> Its only in the last 30 years that the movement changed course.

I strongly disagree with that.

> shouldn't a movement about equality stand for more than that?

I don't know; I know absolutely nothing about political strategy.

> The other side want people to be treated different based on gender and race, but demand that the outcome to be equal.

I disagree; that's not what that side wants at all. That side wants everyone to be treated in a way that recognizes that people are different, but doesn't want the outcome to be the same for every person individually. Nobody is asking that a single, uneducated black mother from Philadelphia be granted a Harvard diploma or get a job as a New York lawyer. They just want the statistical power distribution to be fair. I see no contradiction between this and any previous demands.

> it's important to separate social science from politics

If you don't recognize the politics in science, you end up with eugenics and bias in the data.

If you separate science from politics, you get decision not anchored in reality. The biggest improvement to government process (a field rarely talk about) in the last 200 years was the cost-benefit analyses. Scientific methods are a core part of government.

> It's just that these things tend to change on their own once material conditions have changed

Lets structure this a bit, since we have two different theories: is it social values that leads to material conditions, or is it material conditions that leads to social values.

If its the first case is true, we should see signs of social values being changed while material conditions lagging behind. The opposite should be true for the second case.

I would claim that the case of the solider lacks to mention a critical third-party. Its not that the soldiers themselves that decided to integrated the units. Its an outer force, in this case the military leadership who do not share the same cultural values of the soldiers, and that outer force is what forces a material change for which later results in a cultural acceptance by the soldiers.

Take Japan after WW2. Its was not that the Japanese suddenly decided to change their cultural views about Imperial rule. The allies, who did not share the cultural views of those in Japan, imposed a material change (ie, the forced surrender and statement from the emperor). After a time, citizens of japan accepted the new reality and cultural values and norms changed.

An other case would be to look at the revolution that created the Soviet Union. People didn't just suddenly decide to create a revolution, and then after a few years have cultural values changed. The cultural values changed much earlier, primarily because of lost wars, which cause people to loose faith in the tsarist autocracy. The process was very slow, and took somewhere between 100 and 50 years, ending with the revolution. At that point, Social norms had already changed, a fact that the Tsar Nicholas II where very aware of.

To ground this into current situation with men being more pressured into taking higher paying jobs than women, the government as a third-party would need to basically go in and decide who works where and how much people should get paid, and the government would need to have a different cultural view than the rest of the population. I doubt either requirement could happen, the first because communism had already tried it, the later because a government with different cultural views than the population is unlikely to get voted in.

> But the lack of social-security-paid maternity leave and subsidy of child care, still work against women in the US.

Is that a positive decision for men? I know that where I live, Sweden, both those things exist and our work market is even more gender segregated that the US work market.

If we consider the extreme pressure that the dating site data shows, how much will a few months/year of paid leave change things. Will men start to seek women who can support a family, thus sending social pressure for women to seek higher paying jobs? Will women change their cultural values of seeking men with higher paying jobs?

Looking at Sweden, what it did is to silence the false myth that women are a bigger risk to employ than men. It did not change the cultural expectancy that society has on from female and male roles in society.

> the Republican party has been working for years to curtail the voting power of blacks

There is indeed political efforts to win at all costs and to try prevent voters from voting rather than win them over. I would not go and claim it is anything supported by white men as a group, but rather a fringe behavior by people whose income is based on being an politician. A other word for it would be corruption, buts its not commonly used word for describing such behavior.

> I can invite people to a party on the roof of my building, which has no elevator. I discriminate against handicapped people without intending to.

There will always be people who are unintentionally discriminating against if we remove intent from discrimination. Claustrophobic people can't use elevators, Acrophobes can't be on the roof, and Agoraphobia don't like open spaces. Its a meaningless term if everything everyone do is unintentionally discrimination towards someone.

>> Its only in the last 30 years that the movement changed course. > I strongly disagree with that.

I can see the effect in sex segregation. Before it, the trend where going towards less segregation. After it, to more.

> That side wants everyone to be treated in a way that recognizes that people are different

How is that different from saying that they want people to be treated different? Just because you added the word "recognizes", don't change underlying statement.

The story of Rosa Parks isn't how society failed at statistical power distribution where half the time men sat in front and women in the back of the buss, and other half of the time they should have switched places. Such system don't recognizes that people are more alike than different. Recognizing peoples similarity is more important than to recognizes the minute way people are different, and it just happen that I prefer a society that focus on similarities than a society that focus on differences.

> If you don't recognize the politics in science, you end up with eugenics and bias in the data.

That's not what I meant. I meant let's separate the science (i.e., what the reality is) from the technology (i.e., how to apply what we've learned about reality). Both are important and intertwined, but I need to know when you're talking about the science and when you're talking about the technology.

> I would claim that the case of the solider lacks to mention a critical third-party. Its not that the soldiers themselves that decided to integrated the units.

Of course. That's how social action usually takes place: by forcing those who oppose it after obtaining a coalition with enough power to do that.

> The process was very slow

That's exactly what I said in my previous comment. Social norms can change in two ways: quickly after a material change (sometimes due to social action and sometimes due to a sudden technological or environmental change), or slowly and "naturally". But social action almost invariably changes conditions first (by shoving them down people's throats).

> I know that where I live, Sweden, both those things exist and our work market is even more gender segregated that the US work market.

Indeed, that is a very interesting phenomenon and one that is currently being studied. I don't know if we have a good explanation for it yet. But again, this is mixing science with technology. That certain laws work in favor of men doesn't mean that removing them would shift the balance in favor of women (as there may be other forces in play). If I have a noose around my neck and am slowly suffocating, there is no question that this is bad. But that doesn't mean that cutting the noose is better, as I may be hanging over an abyss. So this is why it is crucial to separate observation and description from prescriptions. We can discuss them both (although I know little about political action) but they are not the same thing.

> It did not change the cultural expectancy that society has on from female and male roles in society.

1. Not yet (in the US, it took the south over 100 years to get over blacks' perception as subhuman; in fact it may not even be complete). 2. See above.

> I would not go and claim it is anything supported by white men as a group

You're using that word again: support. When talking about power we don't care what you think, feel or support. We care about the power you have. Those actions work to increase the power of whites. Whether all, some or a tiny minority of whites actually support those actions is irrelevant to this descriptive analysis.

> Its a meaningless term if everything everyone do is unintentionally discrimination towards someone.

That's why social scientists take great care to explain what kind of discrimination they're talking about. But your example of the elevator isn't completely artificial. Look at all the laws enacted to make public places accessible to disabled people.

> Before it, the trend where going towards less segregation. After it, to more.

Sorry, I don't see it.

> Recognizing peoples similarity is more important than to recognizes the minute way people are different, and it just happen that I prefer a society that focus on similarities than a society that focus on differences.

But we're not talking about individial differences. In America, blacks and whites aren't different in some minute way. One group has been enslaved for two centuries, and then forcibly put down for another two centuries. We're talking about major, catastrophic differences in the way society has treated different groups for centuries. We can't just say, alright, from now on we're all the same, because centuries of gross discrimination and exploitation have already made significant material marks that should be addressed.

> That certain laws work in favor of men

Could you be a bit more explicit. A lack of social-security-paid maternity is not technically a law, and as I mentioned, where I live it exist and is gender neutral.

A few years ago I did an experiment and made a few data searches through the Swedish law, looking at what laws explicit mention gender. Recalling right, there were six laws that explicitly mentioned women, and zero laws that mentioned men. Out of the six, four where identical written laws which guaranties that women can request a female employee in certain situation (like when arrested and searched). Personally I don't see why the law don't just grant this to everyone, which is how the medical system works (you can always request a doctor of your own gender).

Of the remaining two, one is an oddly from of insanity clause for infanticide. Not sure why pregnancy induced depression isn't just include in the practice that deals with insanity clauses, but for some reason the law writers just decided to add it under the murder section and there explicitly write that women can be given a lower punishment for infanticide in such situations.

The last law is one that I find quite sexist and lumps together women and children as incapable of contacting the victim of crime support agency after being a victim of a crime, and thus forces the police to do it for them. The effect is that statistically 7 times more funds is used when a woman is a victim of a crime then a man. I have very little understanding for why the law can't just provide this service for everyone regardless of gender, except that government funding for victim of crimes support would have to be significant increased.

> it took the south over 100 years to get over blacks' perception as subhuman

This is true, but I would assume there where a trackable trend over that time span with decreased racism. Would you say there is currently a identifiable trend in changing cultural expectancy that society has on from female and male roles? If so, where would you say it points to?

> You're using that word again: support. When talking about power we don't care what you think, feel or support. We care about the power you have.

A major issue with using a single method in analyzing the world is that simplifications tend to give the occasional wrong conclusion. If we where to use the same method for power in assessing which farm land is benefiting from global warming, it would not say anything about causes. The group that causes global warming, and the entities that would benefit from a few degree hotter climate are not connected. When assessing the cause of voter suppression, the group not being suppressed is unlikely to hold an significant insight to the cause.

> laws enacted to make public places accessible to disabled people.

Yes, laws tend to be discriminative in what group they want to protect and what solutions are considered acceptable. This was very clear during the burka controversy last summer in Europe. Everyone was busy talking how laws that dictate what to wear on beaches was discrimination, completely ignoring that the existence of nude beaches shows that such laws already exist in public beaches. Society has just agreed that discrimination against nudists are acceptable and people who disagree should just create their own beaches out of sight.

> One group has been enslaved for two centuries, and then forcibly put down for another two centuries

Trying to repay bad blood from over 400 years is a recipe for war. Those perceiving themselves as a victim for things that happen centuries before they were born have increased stress and fight-or-flight responses, if I recall right.

> We can't just say, alright, from now on we're all the same

This just might be a bit socialistic comment, but yes we can. Those that have significant material marks, be that from being born to parents that got discriminated against or who randomly happen to end up on the lower end of the social ladder, should regardless get enough tools by society to climb out of extreme poverty. The historical cause is of lesser importance than the present need. Society should recognize past wrongness, but its a poor reason to exclude people who also need help. Help to everyone is inherently equal.

After I wrote last comment about Rosa Parks, I recall the german experiment of having women only compartment on trains, segregating women and men. 50% of the time, the female compartment will be in the front, and 50% of the time it will be in the end of the train. Do you find that compatible with the successful abolishment of gender segregation in buses that the feminist movement fought for?

> A lack of social-security-paid maternity is not technically a law

What do you mean? It is a property of the legal system.

> looking at what laws explicit mention gender.

BTW, that's not a very good way to find legal discrimination. For example, suppose there was a country with no laws against rape (some Arab countries are not far from that). It doesn't mention sex, but women are raped by men far more than the other way around, or even (grown) men by other men. Such an absence is a clear legal discrimination against women (and probably children).

> Personally I don't see why the law don't just grant this to everyone

I don't know, as I'm not familiar with those laws and their goals, but you should always keep thinking about power. It's OK to treat men and women differently if it doesn't create a power disparity. The goal isn't to make women and men identical, but to allow them to have equal power.

> I have very little understanding for why the law can't just provide this service for everyone regardless of gender, except that government funding for victim of crimes support would have to be significant increased.

Again, I'm not sure, but my guess is that this is a "black lives matter" point, aimed to fix a discrepancy in reality. Laws are not written in a vacuum, and sometimes laws are aimed at specific people who are discriminated against at the time the law is written. One of the first things you learn when you study history is that a new law tells you a lot about changes in society, because people don't legislate against things that don't happen or they don't perceive as threats (the threats can be imaginary). The law is not the code for a simulation program; it is a set of steps for using the collective power of the stat to interact with social reality.

> Would you say there is currently a identifiable trend in changing cultural expectancy that society has on from female and male roles? If so, where would you say it points to?

Of course, and it seems pretty obvious to me. As recently as a few decades ago, women who put having children on hold to have careers were viewed as freaks. Just watch Mad Men.

> Society has just agreed that discrimination against nudists is acceptable

Nudists are not a social group just as chess players aren't, and it isn't a religion, either. It's OK to argue whether forbidding nude beaches is right or wrong, but it has nothing to do with the issue of burkas on the beach.

> Trying to repay bad blood from over 400 years is a recipe for war.

It's not "bad blood". Those are real effects, which are a major cause for current conditions. And where did you get 400 years? As recently as 50 years ago, there was a legal separation of blacks and whites in the US as well as overt economic discrimination.

> The historical cause is of lesser importance than the present need.

I agree. Fixing the wrongs isn't about the past, but about fixing the current effects of past deeds. If I steal your car so you can't get to work, giving it back isn't a matter of settling past issues, but correcting the problem of you not having a car because I stole it.

> Do you find that compatible with the successful abolishment of gender segregation in buses that the feminist movement fought for?

I am not familiar with that experiment or its goals.

> It is a property of the legal system.

A lack of something is not a property. The legal system lacks infinite number of things. Its not a meaningful definition if infinity is included.

> It's OK to treat men and women differently

And there we got a key disagreement. It is not OK to treat people different based on gender. Any such treatment will cause local power disparities, like bias that cause real harm.

>> why the law can't just provide this service for everyone > my guess is that this is a "black lives matter" point

The reason why the law treat women as incapable to pick up the phone and contact the agency is rather obvious. Cultural views and values. The problem is the result of power disparities for victims, where gender has a seven time factor in dictating who gets support and who doesn't. As a group, victims of crimes is one that should also be discriminated against because of their gender.

> As recently as a few decades ago, women who put having children on hold to have careers were viewed as freaks.

One of the theories behind that "interesting phenomenon" that is gender segregation in nations like Sweden, it describe how women after world war 2 started to have more time to spend on a career rather than spending all time on raising children. Men however are still stuck with the same expectation to support the raising of children, so their role in the work market has been static. Neither is a cultural change away from women being solely valued for their ability to raise children, nor men being valued solely for their ability to support the raising of children.

> Nudists are not a social group just as chess players aren't

Unsure if you are aware, but I find that comment highly offensive. Lets just start by quoting the lead in the wikipedia article on Naturism. "Naturism, or nudism, is a cultural and political movement practising, advocating and defending personal and social nudity". There exist a long history of nudism philosophy, culture, and values. I find your comment similar to someone saying that black people are not a social group, just as people wearing glasses aren't.

People who believe that clothing is constraining their identity is equally discriminated by a law that require specific form of clothing on beaches. All the effect of discrimination, like being hurt and feeling rejected is current reality of those people. The stigma of "being the wrong kind of person" and having that discrimination not even acknowledged is very harmful.

> And where did you get 400 years? >> One group has been enslaved for two centuries, and then forcibly put down for another two centuries

Two centuries, plus two more centuries, is four centuries.

And what material marks has been created for which black people exclusively can have? Is there a reason why the solution to those problems should not be used on society as a whole for anyone with the same material situation? It sound to me like you want solution to only go to people of black people because they deserve it more because of past injustice?

> I am not familiar with that experiment or its goals.

http://www.thelocal.de/20160329/is-germany-introducing-sex-s...

My question stand: Is it compatible with the successful abolishment of gender segregation in buses that the feminist movement fought for?

> A lack of something is not a property. The legal system lacks infinite number of things. Its not a meaningful definition if infinity is included.

Of course it is! In math, the subset of the reals that includes all non-rational numbers less than or equal to five, has the very clear, very meaningful property of not containing the infinity of numbers greater than five. It also has the very meaningful property of not including the infinity of rationals. Whether you want to define a set by what it includes or what it excludes is merely a matter of convenience, and each can be more or less meaningful depending on context. Infinity poses no problems, because things can be put into meaningful sets.

> It is not OK to treat people different based on gender.

That is your moral viewpoint. There have been many ethical discussions on this. Let me just give a quick outline of why this may be perfectly OK. If the current conditions of the population are the result of negatively discriminating against women, a very reasonable way to correct the social discrimination is by having the law give special treatment to women. There's no point debating this at length here, though, as ethical values are deeply ingrained and are very personal. I just want to point out that there are several ways of looking at this, and several reasonable ethics.

Like I said before, social sciences study the society that we have, not an imaginary model of society made of spherical cows. Similarly, I assume that activists are interested in changing the society we have by enacting laws for this society. Questions of what's fair in an ideal society may serve as inspiration for writing a constitution that should last forever, but simple laws are like a steering wheel. If the car has a flat tire and swerves to the right, a law dictates that the wheel should be held turned to the left, even if it doesn't make any sense to drive an unharmed car in this way and may even spell disaster. If the reality is that the car has a flat tire, then the law should address that reality.

So, when you see a law, don't ask "is it fair in an ideal society?" but try to see what conditions in real society the law is trying to address, and whether or not you think that would help.

> Any such treatment will cause local power disparities, like bias that cause real harm.

I think that's an empirical question. If your goal is to minimize harm (and that is a liberal goal, but not always a conservative goal, so I'm not saying that must be your goal), you just need to see which causes more harm: taking corrective action against existing discrimination or not.

> As a group, victims of crimes is one that should also be discriminated against because of their gender.

Victims of crimes are not a social group. It's a very different form of discrimination.

> Neither is a cultural change away from women being solely valued for their ability to raise children, nor men being valued solely for their ability to support the raising of children.

I think we have a strong disagreement over facts here.

> There exist a long history of nudism philosophy, culture, and values.

That doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how nudists consider themselves; what matters is how they are perceived by society. Society views nudism as a practice, not as an identity (similarly, BTW, to how homosexuality was perceived in classical times, just to show you how things change). In addition, I don't think nudists' power is curtailed by society, which is the main idea here. Whether or not naked bathing is allowed on certain beaches has no effect on the power (influence) of the nudists in society.

> All the effect of discrimination, like being hurt and feeling rejected is current reality of those people.

Like I said in an earlier comment, feelings of hurt and rejection are usually what conservatives attribute to liberal goals because that is a feature of conservative thought. Liberal thought is about power. Similarly, sociologists are not concerned with feelings of rejection -- that's what clinical psychologists do; they study the flow of power. A person like Donal Trump can feel very hurt and rejected, but that doesn't change how much power he's got.

> Two centuries, plus two more centuries, is four centuries.

Yes, but those 400 have barely ended. It's not ancient history. People the age of my parents have lived through that.

> And what material marks has been created for which black people exclusively can have? Is there a reason why the solution to those problems should not be used on society as a whole for anyone with the same material situation? It sound to me like you want solution to only go to people of black people because they deserve it more because of past injustice?

Again, you're talking politics. I don't know or want to talk about what laws are fair. I want to explain how the social sciences analyze society. But just to explain the reasonableness of an ethical system that is different from yours, let me point out that the same material conditions can be due to different causes. John may not have a car because he lost all his money gambling. You don't have a car because I stole it (so now I have two cars). An ethical system that would compel me to give you back your stolen car is not necessarily discriminatory towards John.

> Is it compatible with the successful abolishment of gender segregation in buses that the feminist movement fought for?

Probably. Why? Because social activists like feminists fight for equality of power. The same segregation can be a vehicle for curtailing women's power or it may not. Let me give you an example: Suppose I have a bar and I put a sign on that says, "gays, please sit in the back room where no one can see you". Now suppose I have a sign that says, "gay party every Tuesday night in the back room!" Questions of fairness aside, even though the result is the same, the first curtails a groups power and the second does not. Why? Because seats on a bus or in a bar are not themselves sources of power. I can't influence more people from the front seats of the bus than from the rear seat. What matters is whether you send a signal that some group is worth less. If people see signals that some groups are worth less all day, they come to believe they're worth less, and that is how the group's power is harmed. Now, you could say that the second sign makes people believe that straight people are worth less because they don't get a party. But this is wrong, because it is already an axiom of current society that straight people are not worth less.

> because things can be put into meaningful sets.

It can be if they have meaningful attributes to differential themselves. To anchor that to social-security-paid maternity, it only relevant as an attribute if it has been considered but then rejected. Such qualification would distinguish it from any arbitrary element of the infinite set, and the qualification can be supported by facts.

> I just want to point out that there are several ways of looking at this, and several reasonable ethics.

This is why I earlier mentioned that difference feminism and Egalitarianism to be like the left and right. Both claim to have the same goal but significant different in values and ethics. Acknowledging the similarities is important, but also understand why most focus is on the differences.

> not an imaginary model of society made of spherical cows

No one has been talking about theoretical society. I could interpret it as an attempt to devalue ethics based on equality, but there we would just hit a wall of disagreement.

> try to see what conditions in real society the law is trying to address, and whether or not you think that would help.

So the law in question clump together women and children and define them as incapable to ask for support. The conditions that brought that law is ridden with cultural values of women, and caused by values that defines women as helpless victims. The local power disparity is very clear, as is the harm.

> If your goal is to minimize harm ... you just need to see which causes more harm: taking corrective action against existing discrimination or not.

Or let me put the same question. What causes more harm: Taking actions that treat people equally, or take discriminate action in order to save money.

> Victims of crimes are not a social group.

This is the second time you define what is and isn't a social group, and I don't find it fact based. To reference Robert Sapolsky, a special skill of human behavior is its ability to be part of multiple social groups at the same time. Victims of crimes is a group that deserve societys protection and understanding. Its not a place where gender should have a seven times impact. Its the other side of the coin that lets race and gender be the most significant factor in determining punishment for criminals.

> I think we have a strong disagreement over facts here.

The good thing with science is that science change when the facts change or when people provide better theories (often praised as the difference between science and religion).

> It doesn't matter how nudists consider themselves; what matters is how they are perceived by society

This is also why not all religions are treated equal. A Muslim friend once said that smaller religions that didn't have 20% global followers in the world should not have their believes respected in the same way. From egalitarianism view I disagree, and its a poor method for harm reduction.

> Whether or not naked bathing is allowed on certain beaches has no effect on the power (influence) of the nudists in society.

Since nudism is generally banned and made illegal in practically all societies except when done in excluded areas, I would say it has a very direct and explicit power effect on them as a group. We could of course say that beaches are minor thing, but so we could also say about burka wearers being denied access to beaches has no effect on the power of the Muslims in society. Just because nudists are a popular group to discriminate against doesn't make it less of a discrimination nor ethical.

Clothing is a central part of practically every culture that exist, similar to gender identity. Native culture is easiest distinguished by what they chose to wear. It is rooted deep in signaling, and can be easily identified in the most common religions to the smallest of sub cultures. Looking at nudists and transgenders, its questionable which group causes more reaction from people who defends their cultural views by denying others.

> sociologists are not concerned with feelings of rejection

Harm reduction is however important, and self identity is a key reason why society at large should be supportive of transgender rights. We should be careful when ever hate, discrimination and disempowerment is direct against people who society defines has having the wrong self-identity.

> An ethical system that would compel me to give you back your stolen car is not necessarily discriminatory towards John.

We are and have talked about equality of results. Retrieving a stolen car is more justified, and as a species we are more geared towards punishing injustice than fairness (Ref: game theory). It does however make it a poor building block for a ethical model, and a bad roadmap for equality. If cars ownership were a essential material state (and it isn't), providing cars for everyone would be an acceptable solution.

> Probably. Why? Because social activists like feminists fight for equality of power.

And here we got a key contradiction between activism done by equality feminism and difference feminism. One pulls one direction, the other in the opposite direction. Just because difference feminism believes that its for the greater good doesn't make it less of a contradiction.

A key message that this kind of gender segregation sends out is that gender-identity is a key attribute for which people should be sorted into. It creates a local power disparity, where women is viewed as worth more than men in some areas, less in other.

> What matters is whether you send a signal that some group is worth less.

This is a key aspect for most political movement, be that new feminism, Egalitarianism, mens right movement and so on. No one want to see signals that some groups they identify with are worth less all day long. Its harmful.

> Victims of crimes is a group that deserve societys protection and understanding.

They are. Perhaps I wasn't making myself clear: they are not a social group in the sense studied by sociologists and historians who study power, racism etc..

> I would say it has a very direct and explicit power effect on them as a group.

It does not. Power is basically influence. Whether or not nudists are allowed to take their clothes off in public beaches bears zero impact on their influence in society (e.g. the money they can acquire, the high-position jobs they can get, the political office they can be elected to etc.)

> but so we could also say about burka wearers being denied access to beaches has no effect on the power of the Muslims in society.

No, because Muslims are discriminated against outside beaches because they're Muslim. Nudists are not. Therefore, like segregating buses, this sends a signal.

> Looking at nudists and transgenders, its questionable which group causes more reaction from people who defends their cultural views by denying others.

Again with reactions :) This is not about reactions, not about feelings, and not about identity. I am talking only about power. The reaction to the way transgenders dress is only relevant in this context based on their existing status in society. If I (not a transgender) would walk outside wearing women's clothes on Halloween and would get laughed at, it is completely different -- in this context of power -- from a transgender who gets laughed at, because of the transgender's existing status. Same goes for Muslims.

> punishing injustice than fairness

It is not about punishing past injustice. It is about correcting (stopping) an ongoing injustice. You don't have a car because I am currently still holding on to it.

> Just because difference feminism believes that its for the greater good doesn't make it less of a contradiction.

I think you're obsessing too much about the details, and I can't help you because my value system is not disturbed by the same things that disturb yours. Unless I were a veteran feminist activist considering a certain political tactic, I just wouldn't worry about the differences between "difference feminism" and other forms of feminism. The differences between different feminist activities are much more subtle than you make them out to be.

I care about politics in the large -- who wins, who loses -- and not so much about the ethics of every single law. I have never studied the philosophy of law or ethics, so I can't contribute much there.

> No one want to see signals that some groups they identify with are worth less all day long. Its harmful.

Right, but sociologists -- again -- don't study what's right or wrong, and are not concerned with how people feel. If men were actually made significantly less powerful than women in society, or if whites were actually made significantly less powerful than whites, then that would be something that's very interesting to historians and sociologists. As this is currently far from reality, these things you talk about are simply outside the scope of most of social science. I guess they're in the realm of ethics.