Lobbyists that want to redraw voting district lines so that minorities get more representation....
The city's Latino population is now at nearly 30 percent. Alderman Danny Solis, who heads the City Council's Latino Caucus, says the ward map the Black Caucus proposed is simply a starting point. It would drop one majority black ward and create two more majority Latino wards.
"The numbers we have now are not enough. The figure speaks for themselves. We are in need of more Hispanic wards in the city of Chicago," Solis says.
my proffessor mentioned this today... I think gerrymandering is bs because it gives an unfair representation to a manority group through reverse discrimination. We should be color blind in our districting.
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Anonymous2011-10-31 22:07
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Anonymous2011-10-31 22:16
Gerrymandering is a necessary evil in any democracy. Shit's as old as ancient Greece and it won't ever go away.
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Anonymous2011-10-31 22:36
we just need a semi autonomous computer like skynet to automatically draw these lines. DoD get to work
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Anonymous2011-11-01 16:12
I just don't think that special interest groups, whether ethnic, religious or anything else in nature ought to be making these decisons. Like >>3 said, "We should be color blind in our districting."
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Anonymous2011-11-01 16:37
>>8
You might feel differently if you were a member of a minority group that got literally no representation. Whether ethnic, religious or anything else. I'm just sayin. Obviously gerrymandering isn't a perfect solution though.
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Anonymous2011-11-02 3:55
>>9
I'm an individual, I'm the smallest minority in the world. When am I going to get special rights and privileges?
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Anonymous2011-11-02 11:59
>>10
False analogy. You are one 300,000,000th of the population (assuming you're American). Having one 300,000,000th of Congress that actually represents you isn't a "special right". Congress cannot be divided by 300,000,000. It can be divided by 100 though. If your group were 1% of the population wouldn't it make sense if 1% Congress were made up of someone sympathetic to your group?
I'm not >>10, but if blacks are moving out and latinos are moving in at the rate this article says, then why are the districts not becoming latino majority naturally by replacement? Why are the lines having to be redrawn. It seems to me that in voting numbers are supposed to be what matters, I don't understand Solis' statement, "The numbers we have now are not enough." It sounds to me like he does want special privileges.
>>12
Because once you divide an area into districts it becomes "winner take all". A minority might make up 40% of the population but if it's evenly distributed throughout all the districts then that minority won't get a single representative. This is an extreme example but you get the idea.
Also, the lines are having to be redrawn because every time a census is done the districts are updated. One district = x amount of people. As the population changes the districts by definition change. They have to be redrawn. And there's just no damn way to do it without fucking someone over.
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Anonymous2011-11-04 12:27
>>11
It makes sense to teach people they do not need to label and divide themselves from the rest of society in order to unite in a cause.
TY for the explaination, I actually didn't realize that districts get changed so often. I had the impression that they were going out of their way to push for something unusual. Guess this is bad news for all those people who were against filling out their census:(
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Anonymous2011-11-04 22:10
>>15
I'm not following. Can you clarify with an example maybe?
>>16
You're welcome. And yes, that's exactly why you should fill out your census.
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Anonymous2011-11-05 1:28
>>17 http://www.npr.org/2011/10/31/141457122/chicago-leaders-spar-over-redistricting
As can be seen clearly people are preoccupied with pointless divisive issues of race, bickering over how many black, hispanic and polish-american wards there should be, basing the choice of their representative not on actual issues but the color of their skin.
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Anonymous2011-11-05 12:04
basing the choice of their representative not on actual issues but the color of their skin.
You're just making that up. The two are not mutually exclusive. In fact a latino or black representative will probably be the only candidate that actually shares their views on most issues. For example, they tend to be very conservative on specific social issues like gay marriage but liberal on most other issues. A white politician who is lenient on immigration but against gay marriage would be practically non-existent.
>>21
Right. How do you know they're not already doing that though? It's not their fault if the politician who represents their views best is much more likely to have the same color skin as them.
Also, I just want to point out that gerrymandering based on specific issues is much worse than gerrymandering based on race or groups of people. Think of how much more power the people drawing the lines would have.
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Anonymous2011-11-05 17:37
5/19/13 Expect Us
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Anonymous2011-11-06 5:18
>>22
When arbitrary things like ethnicity are given importance it draws attention away from actual issues making it easier to corrupt the democratic process, the politicians gerrymandering based on ethnicity are doing it because they don't want to compete with politicians who focus on issues.
This is why the current system of representatives and districting needs to be scrapped and replaced with a multi-party system and a saner way of dealing with specific issues like this.