Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!bionet!hayes.fai.alaska.edu!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: friedl@mtndew.tustin.ca.us (Steve Friedl) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: MCI Call Blocking Message-ID: <12137@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 14 Sep 90 05:36:03 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Organization: TELECOM Digest Lines: 66 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 644, Message 10 of 12 > If AT&T were to say, "black people are more likely to commit fraud > using credit cards, so if a the operator detects a black person using > a card to call somewhere the credit card call should be declined" > would you be outraged about that? Hi Pat, Apparently, I have a different sense of outrage than you do. I believe that a company making an arbitrary decision such as you mention is stupid, but I believe one of the freedoms we have in this country is the freedom to be stupid. If I as an employer or purchaser decide to base my decisions on factors not germane to the matter at hand, I am limiting my choice and imposing higher costs on myself. I may be stupid, but it should be my right. I have a personal right not to patronize Jewish business or never let an Iranian in my house, why should businesses be any different? Still, I believe that AT&T's decisions for what I will call "redlining" are probably entirely justified on business reasons because I believe that they could be made utterly independent of any racial issue. I am sure that AT&T has extensive statistics on what kinds of calling patterns are most closely associated with fraud, and they do not take "redlining" lightly. I believe they probably just look at the numbers (independent of who is making the calls) and block those calls that have the highest risk of loss to them. They have an *obligation* to their stockholders to act in a manner consistent with a good return on investment. In this country we seem to have the notion that we are all created equal, and that any hint of any inherent differences cannot possibly be valid so the bringer-upper is a bigot. This is ridiculous. If AT&T's statistics show that (say) blacks from a certain part of town are more likely to commit fraud, people jump up and down and call names. These same people would probably try very hard to avoid going into this "equal" part of town unless they had to. Why would this be? In summary, (a) businesses should be able to choose those whom they deal with the same as you or I can choose, (b) business should be allowed to make stupid business decisions, and (c) that AT&T points out this "bad neighborhood" condition doesn't mean that they are causing the problem or even accusing anybody of anything. To make "redlining" illegal just means that I have to pay more, and I would be resentful of this in a pretty big way. To the extent that one wishes to attach some value to what I will call "social equality", they are welcome to purchase their phone services from those companies who are less fussy about giving credit. I just don't want telling *my* long distance carrier who they should deal with it. As they say, "vote with your pocketbook". Stephen J. Friedl, KA8CMY / I speak for me only / Tustin, CA / 3B2-kind-of-guy +1 714 544 6561 / friedl@mtndew.Tustin.CA.US / {uunet,attmail}!mtndew!friedl [Moderator's Note: Although my libertarian leanings cause me to agree with you wholeheartedly, the fact remains that the law in the United States today says the opposite, i.e. when you extend credit, you may not discriminate based on certain unlawful factors, one being race, another being ethnic origin. You say AT&T is not discriminating against Iranians who use their phone credit card to call Iran, but rather, they are refusing to extend credit to *anyone* -- regardless of ethnic background making calls from a certain neighborhood. When it happens that a neighborhood is mostly made up of one group of people, then the results are the same. PAT]