Evil Finn?

[Chemical Ollie]

Anyway, black penises are a lot bigger than white penises. Just so you know... ;p

[This is redicoulous]

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
That actually doesn't imply that IQ is easy to raise, which is the point you really want to be making. (Most people aren't trained to take IQ tests, so that shouldn't really influence the averages derived from large samples.)

It's an example of how brain-stimulating activities raise IQ scores, and that's one of the biggies. Other factors involve having a supporting immediate social network, a good diet, understanding superiors and peers, and getting as many socially-repressive factors out of the way as possible.

It wouldn't surprise me in the slightest to discover that one of the more significant socially-repressive factors dragging down IQ scores is being patiently told that you're genetically inferior. If enough people keep telling black people that they are genetically dumb, the sense of rejection generated will drag down the IQ scores.

[Kuciwalker]

I'm not sure black Africans are surrounded by people calling them genetically inferior.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Caligastia

I assume you're referring to high black crime rates?

Is there ever an underlying reason perhaps, for some people asserting that black communities have a 'higher' crime rate ?

And is there any link between poverty and high crime rates, regardless of melanin quotients ?


Having read much of the social history of England from Elizabethan times to the modern day, I'm struck at how common crime is and was in overcrowded poor areas.

At how often those who make the observations or carry out the surveys are willing to lay the blame for this on ethnicity or religion or politics (Catholic Irish, Cockneys, gypsies, Eastern European Jews, anarchists, Socialists, ex-soldiers, professional beggars) as long as it fits in with their pre-conceived notions of what's wrong with the world and who's responsible for it.

Which of course is never 'them' or their 'friends' or their employers or supporters.

'The houses at St Giles were called "rookeries" because that suggested people packed into nests,' says Professor Dabydeen. 'It was a place of the marginalised and destitute, of pickpockets, of murders, rapes, illegal gambling, cockfighting – any imaginable human depravity took place in St Giles.'

The vast gulf between rich and poor fuelled crime rates, and fear of crime obsessed the rich. Newspapers – another new phenomenon – were passed round coffee houses and regaled their readers with sensational stories about highwaymen, murderers and executions. And the focus for wealthy Londoners' anxieties about crime was St Giles. Paranoia about this wretched quarter reached fever pitch in the early 1700s, when the urban poor seized on a terrifying new vice – gin.

Gin

The gin of the 18th century bore no relation to the respectable expensive spirit of today. A Dutch import, Madam Geneva (as she was called) was cheap and lethal. 'This new drink from Holland suddenly arrived among a people who weren't used to drinking spirits,' says Patrick Dillon. 'The strongest thing they had drunk before was strong beer, and suddenly for a penny a dram they could get this fantastic new drug. Stronger than anything they'd tasted before, it would instantly get them drunk. There was a famous signboard over gin shops that said: "Drunk for a penny, dead drunk for tuppence, straw for nothing" – of course, you got the straw to crash out on once you had drunk too much.'

The government fuelled London's gin craze by removing the restrictions on distilling, and soon the city was awash with gin shops. If you couldn't afford a glass of the spirit, you could buy a gin-soaked rag. It was estimated that a quarter of the buildings in St Giles were drinking dens. Its residents were infamous for guzzling vast quantities of gin and for a few hours escaping their miserable lives.

'The real villains of this debauchery, drunkenness and destruction of human life,' says Professor Dabydeen, 'were the landowners who made tons of money by selling their corn for the purposes of gin distillation. So there was an economic stranglehold on the poor. They were encouraged to consume something that would destroy their lives – a kind of a drug, the equivalent of crack cocaine.'

According to Patrick Dillon, 'London was seen as a town spinning out of control. There was a crime wave, and gin was seen to be associated with crime and prostitution. In addition, the spread of syphilis, which was the big health scare at the time, was seen to be associated with gin because women were thought to be turning to prostitution to fund their drinking habits.

http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/H/history/i-m/london4.html

Obviously it's those black genes betraying the po' white trash. Everyone knows white folks wouldn't do anything like that sort of thing without there being some kind of black involvement... although Hogarth seems to have skimped on the black criminal element in his depiction of the craze for cheap gin.

[Cort Haus]

They were mostly Irish* in St Giles though. I had a feeling the Hogarth would appear when I started reading the post. Denmark Street is so lovely though today. Centre Point, OTOH, isn't.

(*Source: John Richardson - History of Camden)

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
I had a feeling the Hogarth would appear when I started reading the post.

He's a good chronicler of the highs and lows of 'Enlightenment' England.

Whenever Thatcher used to burble on witlessly about 'Victorian' values, I used to wonder if she meant sentencing the hungry to jail for stealing bread, mass widespread prostitution of underage girls and levels of overcrowding in Stepney and Whitechapel that would have put Nairobi's and Bombay's slums to shame.


But then she didn't study history in any great detail, so was able to talk a lot of bollox at the drop of a blond hairpiece...

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by molly bloom
Whenever Thatcher used to burble on witlessly about 'Victorian' values, I used to wonder if she meant sentencing the hungry to jail for stealing bread, mass widespread prostitution of underage girls and levels of overcrowding in Stepney and Whitechapel that would have put Nairobi's and Bombay's slums to shame.

I always assumed she was aspiring to moral hypocrisy, sweatshops, a huge gap between rich and poor, and no organised labour movement.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Cort Haus

I always assumed she was aspiring to moral hypocrisy, sweatshops, a huge gap between rich and poor, and no organised labour movement.

[Caligastia]

Originally posted by Lazarus and the Gimp


Remember, Cal. This point started with me claiming it's easy to raise your IQ scores.

Go take loads of IQ tests. Your IQ scores will rise. Easy-peasy. Case closed. Buh-bye.

Go on. Argue the point. Claim that's not possible.

That doesn't have much meaning without knowing how much the scores will rise on average, and be honest Laz, you can't tell me the answer to that without looking it up somewhere can you?

Nope. Intentional strawman, or just an error caused by getting a bit cross?

First you say I'm coy, now you say I'm cross...are you playing amateur psychologist?

I think "political scientists" who argue that the genetic intellectual inferiority of black people means that only European or Asians can sort of Africa's economic problems are either evil or stupid. You may quote me on that. I've pointed out this exact point before in this thread, and I'm totally comfortable with it.

Ok, now that we've nailed that down, can you show me the absolute concrete proof of genetic intellectual parity between races that would warrant calling the man stupid or evil?

[Jon Miller]

The 60-70 IQ as genetic is enough to warrant calling the man stupid.

JM

[Caligastia]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
The 60-70 IQ as genetic is enough to warrant calling the man stupid.

JM

I haven't read his books, but I'd be surprised if he blamed it all on genes.

[Caligastia]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
Your understanding is wrong, then people with Down's have IQ's under 70. Those people just can't make a functional society by themselves. Even if the difference from the norm exacerbates the problem in industrial societies, Jon's point holds.

Mmm...that's not really what I meant, but without finding the original article I read I can't explain exactly.

i.e. the tests were flawed and weren't accurately measuring IQ.

Don't you mean intelligence?

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Originally posted by Caligastia


That doesn't have much meaning without knowing how much the scores will rise on average

Any rise is still a rise.

First you say I'm coy, now you say I'm cross...are you playing amateur psychologist?

Yes, and later I'll be playing Lady Bracknall.

Ok, now that we've nailed that down, can you show me the absolute concrete proof of genetic intellectual parity between races that would warrant calling the man stupid or evil?

Not necessary. You see, if he's overlooking the Flynn effect coupled with the recent higher rises of black IQ score results, in favour of an "inherent inferiority" argument he has no genetic evidence of, and using highly dubious methods of obtaining his data, I stand by the contention that he's evil or stupid.

And I'm not the only one.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Caligastia
Don't you mean intelligence?

No. Intelligence, IQ, and IQ scores are all distinct.

(If I administer the SAT and call it an IQ test, that doesn't make the average IQ suddenly ~1000, even if the average score is.)

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Incidentally, we've barely scratched the surface of one of the most contentious points in the opening post-

Differences in intelligence are the most significant factor in explaining poverty

Anyone else think that adverse climate, poor soils, endemic diseases, natural geological hazards, lack of easily-accessible and locatable resources, the relatively recent establishment of the nation in question, shortages of suitable livestock, hostile neighbours, lack of accountability in governments largely inherited as colonial hangovers, and a long history of exploitation by more developed nations might just be more credible factors?

Does this point make anyone feel more sympathetic to Professor Vanhanen's case?