Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site kontron.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!ihnp4!pesnta!pertec!kontron!cramer From: cramer@kontron.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) Newsgroups: net.politics Subject: Re: Libertarians and ERA Message-ID: <120@kontron.UUCP> Date: Wed, 24-Apr-85 15:09:44 EST Article-I.D.: kontron.120 Posted: Wed Apr 24 15:09:44 1985 Date-Received: Fri, 26-Apr-85 02:21:53 EST References: <1340016@acf4.UUCP> <3564@alice.UUCP> <132@ttrdc.UUCP> <6323@ucbvax.ARPA> <479@cybvax0.UUCP> Organization: Kontron Electronics, Irvine, CA Lines: 66 > In article <6323@ucbvax.ARPA> fagin@ucbvax.UUCP (Barry Steven Fagin) writes: > > The freedom to discriminate against ANYBODY is part of a natural notion > > of liberty, not a perverse one. > > "Natural notion of liberty", huh? What makes it a natural notion of liberty? > That it fits in with your wishful thinking? > > Hey, I have a natural notion of liberty which includes the liberty to make > war (and otherwise coerce my neighbors.) Why shouldn't I? > > > Discrimination in a free market costs money (see Thomas > > Sowell, "Civil Rights: Rhetoric or Reality"). > > On the contrary. Discrimination can be extremely profitable. Consider (for > example) a deep south restaurant 30 or more years ago that serves only white > customers. If they started accepting black customers, their bigoted white > customers would desert in droves and go to other all-white restaurants. > If all the restaurants are coerced at once into changing policy the vicious > cycle will be broken. > -- > > Mike Huybensz ...decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!cybvax0!mrh If the hypothetical restaurant is more concerned with pleasing its bigoted white customers rather than its potential black customers, that suggests that bigoted white customers outnumber all others. (That sounds suspiciously like democracy in action, to me.) Let's assume for sake of argument that restaurant A does what you postulate. Unless there are *very* few restaurants in town, at least one of those restaurants has the potential to make a *lot* of money serving a black clientele. Unless the government takes steps to make sure that all the restaurants have the same policy. In fact, many of the discriminatory practices of the South were the result of laws *requiring* those actions. I suggest you look into the Plessy v. Ferguson case. (You should remember that from studying American history; that's the one where the Supreme Court ruled in the 1890s that "separate but equal" was Constitutional.) The case in question involved a Missouri law *requiring* railroads to provide separate accomodations for blacks and whites. The free market couldn't be relied upon to perform this socially desired function of discrimination, so the government made *sure* those greedy businessman did what the government wanted. South Africa's apartheid laws started in the 1920s as a set of restrictions on the jobs offered to blacks, because poor whites weren't always getting the good jobs. The restrictions on where blacks could live were passed because blacks had this disconcerting habit of buying or renting in desireable parts of town, and the government needed to take action to prevent integration of housing. (You'll find that a lot of the discrimination in housing in this country is left over from when cities explicitly prohibited blacks from renting or buying in certain parts of town.) National Socialist Germany had to pass elaborate sets of laws to make sure that Jews would be discriminated against; as an example, a German farmer had to prove Aryan ancestry back to 1800 in order to be a farmer. (I doubt that this law was enforced real vigorously --- there might not have been too many farmers left if they had.) Free markets don't guarantee that there will be no discrimination, but they make it likely that some business will refuse to discriminate because they see an opportunity to make some money serving a market segment that other business owners are too pig-headed to pursue. We don't need government to impose non-discrimination on the marketplace; the government has a long history, in almost all countries, of imposing its will on the marketplace, and with few exceptions, the imposition has been to promote discrimination.