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Study finds evidence for racial discrimination by voter ID proponents

F

fskimospy

Elite Member
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...r-discriminatory-intent-behind-voter-id-laws/

Long story short, researchers conducted a randomized study of legislators that either supported or opposed voter ID laws. Importantly, this all occurred in states where there was no photo ID requirement.

The letter in effect said: "I don't have a photo ID, can I vote?" Because no state had such a requirement, the answer in every case could simply have been "Yes". The only difference between the letters was one half had a white sounding name and the other had a Hispanic sounding name. Legislators who supported voter ID laws had a much larger gap in response rate between the Hispanic sounding name and the white sounding name.

While this doesn't have to mean that those who support voter ID laws are doing so specifically to discriminate against Hispanics, it is strong evidence that those who support voter ID laws discriminate against Hispanics in other voting related contexts.
 
This study should show why your study is flawed:
Researchers found that a 'name pronunciation effect' played a major role in how people were perceived by colleagues and friends.

The team of American and Australian scientists concluded that the easier a person's name was to say, the better their success was in the workplace and the quicker they were promoted.

Their study, published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, also found a simple name improved people's ability to make new friends.

Dr Simon Laham, from Melbourne University, who led the study, said people with simple names were generally judged more positively.

“The effect is not due merely to the length of a name or how foreign-sounding or unusual it is, but rather how easy it is to pronounce," he said.
Click to expand...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/...y-to-say-name-will-help-you-get-promoted.html

Seems to me that Jacob Smith is simpler than and easier to pronounce than Santiago Rodriguez.:colbert:
 
That's a pretty loose connection to "racial bias." It isn't racism to recognize that a greater percentage of Hispanic persons are illegal immigrants than persons of other nationalities. The obvious explanation is that legislators were hesitant to respond to a person when there is a higher chance that person isn't allowed to vote for a reason other than the question raised.

The study would have been much more useful if they had used a mix of anglo, black (to the extent they are distinguishable), Asian and Hispanic names. Further, they should use some letters that provide an explanation for why the person doesn't have a license and some that don't.
 
Is that racism or is recognizing the fact that most illegal immigrants are from south of the border?

Not that it matters, the answer shouldn't have been "Yes" to anyone. It should have been "Yes, provided you meet all legal criteria to vote."

The letter didn't seem to indicate that the writer was at least 18 years old either.
 
Cozarkian said:
That's a pretty loose connection to "racial bias." It isn't racism to recognize that a greater percentage of Hispanic persons are illegal immigrants than persons of other nationalities. The obvious explanation is that legislators were hesitant to respond to a person when there is a higher chance that person isn't allowed to vote for a reason other than the question raised.

The study would have been much more useful if they had used a mix of anglo, black (to the extent they are distinguishable), Asian and Hispanic names. Further, they should use some letters that provide an explanation for why the person doesn't have a license and some that don't.
Click to expand...

You think responding less to people of a certain race is a "loose connection to racial bias"? That's pretty hard to swallow.

The question was extraordinarily simple: "Do I need a photo ID to vote?" Thinking that they might not be able to vote for another reason has zero bearing on the answer to that question. In fact, declining to answer a constituent's legitimate question based on their name because you think they might not be able to vote for an unrelated reason is basically the definition of racial bias.
 
BoberFett said:
Is that racism or is recognizing the fact that most illegal immigrants are from south of the border?

Not that it matters, the answer shouldn't have been "Yes" to anyone. It should have been "Yes, provided you meet all legal criteria to vote."

The letter didn't seem to indicate that the writer was at least 18 years old either.
Click to expand...

This is incorrect. There are numerous requirements to vote, but the question was not "list all the requirements to vote", it was "do I need to meet this specific requirement to vote"?
 
Call it racism if you want, but the question "I don't have a photo ID, can I vote?" implies someone pretty unsure of their own eligibility to vote. Why would the answer simply be "Yes" to that inquiry?

Add in a name that sounds foreign and the "guaranteed yes" answer goes down even more.

Notice there's no one responding "No," to the question, just not giving an answer. If the information being given isn't complete,.why would a yes answer be assumed as a guarantee? A more correct response would be "I can't tell you. Are you old enough? Are you a legal citizen? Are you registered to vote? Are you a convicted felon?" Etc. Etc.

In any area with an influx of illegal aliens from south of the border, why would the most responsible answer to "I don't have a photo ID, can I vote?" be an automatic yes given a Hispanic sounding name?

Notice that even those anti voter ID answered less frequently to the Hispanic sounding name as well.
 
eskimospy said:
nehalem256 said:
This study should show why your study is flawed:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/s...-promoted.html

Seems to me that Jacob Smith is simpler than and easier to pronounce than Santiago Rodriguez.
Click to expand...
Neither one of them needed to be pronounced to respond "yes" to an email.

Dumbass.
Click to expand...
Furthermore, in order for Nehalem's claim to in any way undermine the results of your OP, it would have to successfully explain why having trouble pronouncing Hispanic names disproportionately affects those in favor of Voter ID laws.

So his post is double-Dumbass.
 
Zaap said:
Call it racism if you want, but the question "I don't have a photo ID, can I vote?" implies someone pretty unsure of their own eligibility to vote. Why would the answer simply be "Yes" to that inquiry?

Add in a name that sounds foreign and the "guaranteed yes" answer goes down even more.

Notice there's no one responding "No," to the question, just not giving an answer. If the information being given isn't complete,.why would a yes answer be assumed as a guarantee? A more correct response would be "I can't tell you. Are you old enough? Are you a legal citizen? Are you registered to vote? Are you a convicted felon?" Etc. Etc.

In any area with an influx of illegal aliens from south of the border, why would the most responsible answer to "I don't have a photo ID, can I vote?" be an automatic yes given a Hispanic sounding name?

Notice that even those anti voter ID answered less frequently to the Hispanic sounding name as well.
Click to expand...

Even if you guys want to say that they couldn't have said 'yes' (which is pretty dubious in my mind), simply choosing to not respond to your constituents' legitimate question is unacceptable. That they did so that much less frequently to people of hispanic sounding names is inexcusable.

As for both doing so, this is correct (and shitty!). Still, the gap for one set of legislators was 6.9% while the gap for the other set was 17.5%.
 
eskimospy said:
Neither one of them needed to be pronounced to respond "yes" to an email.

Dumbass.
Click to expand...

Right, because I am sure they were given one word responses 🙄

Probably more like

Dear person with an easy to pronounce and type name,

Thank you for writing to non-racist legislature X. There are multiple other forms of ID you can use instead of a driver's license.

sincerely,

non-racist legislature X

eskimospy said:
Even if you guys want to say that they couldn't have said 'yes' (which is pretty dubious in my mind), simply choosing to not respond to your constituents' legitimate question is unacceptable. That they did so that much less frequently to people of hispanic sounding names is inexcusable.

As for both doing so, this is correct (and shitty!). Still, the gap for one set of legislators was 6.9% while the gap for the other set was 17.5%.
Click to expand...

Or perhaps if you have such an easy to answer question you should look it up yourself instead of pestering your legislature so they can focus on more important matters.
 
eskimospy said:
This is incorrect. There are numerous requirements to vote, but the question was not "list all the requirements to vote", it was "do I need to meet this specific requirement to vote"?
Click to expand...

Your pompous attitude gets tiring, especially when you're wrong.

"Hello (Representative/Senator NAME),
My name is (voter NAME) and I have heard a lot in the news lately about identification being required at the polls. I do not have a driver’s license. Can I still vote in November? Thank you for your help.
Sincerely,
(voter NAME)"
Click to expand...

There can be any number of reasons that a person would not have a driver's license that could in fact preclude them from voting. Are you from another state? Go vote there. Are you 14? Vote in four years.

A Yes or No response is not sufficient for any response to this email regardless of what nationality the name resembles.
 
Yeah, yeah we know. Everything is racism because that was the desired conclusion from the start.

Basically you're saying don't give a correct answer (there's not enough info in the setup to give a correct answer, just a guess. We know the "label what we disagree with as racism!" agenda says a yes is the always the correct response, but actually it isn't since as gone over, there are other factors to voter eligibility than the question asked. Anyone answering a for-certain yes is guessing, and being irresponsible since they could for all they know be sending someone to the polls with incorrect info as to what makes them eligible to vote.

Also,.what exactly is the setup here? Maybe I missed it, but I'd like to see details. Who exactly were these inquiries sent to, in what timeframe, and how many?

Was just one email sent to each legislator, more than one, or several? If more than one, why wouldn't *anyone* suspect some sort of setup and stop responding? How many emails all asking the same thing would it take to make anyone (staffer or otherwise) realize this is bullshit?

Or if just one was sent to each legislator, then how in.what way? It says in the article half were emails sent in Spanish. So again, introducing a element into the mix that's guaranteed to lessen the likelihood of "Yes" being the correct response. What percentage of the emails sent in Spanish were answered vs English?

Theres so many variables for maniplulating an outcome someone wants for this bullshit, that that's pretty much all it is.

I know, I know. Its racism to point that out, or ask for relevant details. Everything is racism.
 
Zaap said:
Call it racism if you want, but the question "I don't have a photo ID, can I vote?" implies someone pretty unsure of their own eligibility to vote. Why would the answer simply be "Yes" to that inquiry?

Add in a name that sounds foreign and the "guaranteed yes" answer goes down even more.

Notice there's no one responding "No," to the question, just not giving an answer. If the information being given isn't complete,.why would a yes answer be assumed as a guarantee? A more correct response would be "I can't tell you. Are you old enough? Are you a legal citizen? Are you registered to vote? Are you a convicted felon?" Etc. Etc.

In any area with an influx of illegal aliens from south of the border, why would the most responsible answer to "I don't have a photo ID, can I vote?" be an automatic yes given a Hispanic sounding name?

Notice that even those anti voter ID answered less frequently to the Hispanic sounding name as well.
Click to expand...
All of the factors you mention would be considerations for both voter-ID advocates and voter-ID opponents. But the fact remains that voter-ID advocates responded less than voter-ID opponents. So "uncertainty" about voting rules by the "constituent" caused advocates to respond less than opponents and/or a foreign-sounding name caused advocates to respond less than opponents. Also, the legislators were free to respond however they wanted, with a "No" or with a more complete response. They could have written a more complete response that said "No, but . . . . " The fact remains that voter-ID advocates responded much less than voter-ID opponents.

Furthermore, noting that there was a "delta" (7%) between the response-rate to the Anglo-sounding name and Hispanic-sounding name means only that there was also some racism on the "against-ID" side, but not as much as on the "for-ID" side (17%).

It's called "racism" because it IS racism."
 
shira said:
All of the factors you mention would be considerations for both voter-ID advocates and voter-ID opponents. But the fact remains that voter-ID advocates responded less than voter-ID opponents. So "uncertainty" about voting rules by the "constituent" caused advocates to respond less than opponents and/or a foreign-sounding name caused advocates to respond less than opponents. Also, the legislators were free to respond however they wanted, with a "No" or with a more complete response. They could have written a more complete response that said "No, but . . . . " The fact remains that voter-ID advocates responded much less than voter-ID opponents.

Furthermore, noting that there was a "delta" (7%) between the response-rate to the Anglo-sounding name and Hispanic-sounding name means only that there was also some racism on the "against-ID" side, but not as much as on the "for-ID" side (17%).

It's called "racism" because it IS racism."
Click to expand...

Maybe that's because voter ID opponents are more likely to say yes to anyone, regardless of race or legality?

This experiment was designed to bait "racists". I wonder what the results would be if another set of emails were sent attempting to bait the voter ID opponents into giving a solid yes when there is a subtle indicator that the person is not allowed to vote that requires more information than a Yes/No would provide.

"I recently moved to [state] from overseas and I'm wondering if I'm eligible to vote?"

No information as to whether they're a citizen, naturalized, or illegal. See what the responses are then.

I would have said the letter should state "I died recently but still want to vote" but that might have been going overboard... 😛


Edit: I'm also curious about the raw data and result classification. I find it highly unlikely that any response was a simple Yes/No. Categorization into Yes/No could easily be biased toward making an "Only if you meet all other requirements" into either a Yes or No depending on how it's worded.
 
Last edited:
BoberFett said:
Your pompous attitude gets tiring, especially when you're wrong.



There can be any number of reasons that a person would not have a driver's license that could in fact preclude them from voting. Are you from another state? Go vote there. Are you 14? Vote in four years.

A Yes or No response is not sufficient for any response to this email regardless of what nationality the name resembles.
Click to expand...

Nothing limited the legislator to a one-word response. ANY response would have been counted.

The researchers then measured the lawmakers' response rates to these e-mails. Crucially, in each state in the study, legislators really could have simply responded with a "yes" -- drivers' licenses were not required in any of the states in order to vote.
Click to expand...

The phrase "Could have simply responded with a 'yes'" was included in the story to indicate just how simple it was to reply to the email. It's not a statement of a "required" response. Yet, given the same stimulus as ID-opponents, ID-proponents responded far less to the "Hispanic" than to the "Anglo." You're being willfully obtuse if you don't "get" the point.
 
shira said:
Nothing limited the legislator to a one-word response. ANY response would have been counted.



The phrase "Could have simply responded with a 'yes'" was included in the story to indicate just how simple it was to reply to the email. It's not a statement of a "required" response. Yet, given the same stimulus as ID-opponents, ID-proponents responded far less to the "Hispanic" than to the "Anglo." You're being willfully obtuse if you don't "get" the point.
Click to expand...

Could have replied with "Yes", sure, but that's irresponsible.

Again, I think anyone that replies "Yes" and tells someone they're eligible to vote with no other information is just as wrong as those who say "No" without asking for more information.

Is this showing us that Republicans are more likely to be racists or that Democrats are more likely to encourage voter fraud?
 
eskimospy said:
You think responding less to people of a certain race is a "loose connection to racial bias"? That's pretty hard to swallow.
Click to expand...

Allow me to clarify. I agree there was racial bias in responding to the letter. However, there is a loose-connection to showing that the voter ID laws are motivated by racial-bias.

To make that showing, you have to examine the potential explanations for the racially-biased responses. The article is suggesting the bias results from racial bigotry, i.e., a dislike for Hispanics based solely on the fact they are Hispanic and that people who support voter ID laws are racist.

However, there is a more likely explanation for the racial bias in responses. It is a fact that Hispanics are more likely to be illegal immigrants. Thus, the racial bias can be explained by a desire not to tell illegal immigrants to vote. If correct, this would suggest supporters of voter ID laws intend to discriminate based on immigration status, i.e., potential voter fraud. That doesn't mean they hate Hispanics, it just means they don't think illegal immigrants should vote.

A third explanation is that legislators respond more to constituents they anticipate are supporters. A legislator that supports voter ID laws might believe Hispanics are less likely to vote for him/her, so is less inclined to respond to Hispanic constituents. That might be unethical for other reasons, but it doesn't provide any evidence the legislator is racist.

Let's say for example, that a Democrat legislator believes the Hispanic constituents in his community are underprivileged. As a result, the legislator is more likely to respond to questions from Hispanics, because he/she wants to help them and believes they can't as easily access other sources. Such racial bias in responding to constituents wouldn't be evidence that the legislator hates non-Hispanics or hates rich-people.
 
BoberFett said:
Could have replied with "Yes", sure, but that's irresponsible.

Again, I think anyone that replies "Yes" and tells someone they're eligible to vote with no other information is just as wrong as those who say "No" without asking for more information.

Is this showing us that Republicans are more likely to be racists or that Democrats are more likely to encourage voter fraud?
Click to expand...

How does this theoretical "aversion" to one-word emails (or to making a "Yes, but . . ." reply) explain why the response rate to the "Anglo" constituents was almost twice as high? The ONLY difference between the emails was the name of the "constituent."

Clearly the pro-ID legislators were making assumptions about the "constituent" based on ONLY the name. That was the ONLY difference in the two kinds of "stimuli."
 
shira said:
How does this theoretical "aversion" to one-word emails (or to making a "Yes, but . . ." reply) explain why the response rate to the "Anglo" constituents was almost twice as high? The ONLY difference between the emails was the name of the "constituent."

Clearly the pro-ID legislators were making assumptions about the "constituent" based on ONLY the name. That was the ONLY difference in the two kinds of "stimuli."
Click to expand...

I would assume the simplest answer is that white people vote Republican whereas Hispanic people don't.

Seems like common sense to help the people that are likely to vote for you to vote.

In fact its pretty much the exact same reason why Democrats get butt hurt over minorities not having ID to vote whereas Republicans don't.

So essentially this study tells absolutely nothing.
 
Cozarkian said:
Allow me to clarify. I agree there was racial bias in responding to the letter. However, there is a loose-connection to showing that the voter ID laws are motivated by racial-bias.

To make that showing, you have to examine the potential explanations for the racially-biased responses. The article is suggesting the bias results from racial bigotry, i.e., a dislike for Hispanics based solely on the fact they are Hispanic and that people who support voter ID laws are racist.

However, there is a more likely explanation for the racial bias in responses. It is a fact that Hispanics are more likely to be illegal immigrants. Thus, the racial bias can be explained by a desire not to tell illegal immigrants to vote. If correct, this would suggest supporters of voter ID laws intend to discriminate based on immigration status, i.e., potential voter fraud. That doesn't mean they hate Hispanics, it just means they don't think illegal immigrants should vote.

A third explanation is that legislators respond more to constituents they anticipate are supporters. A legislator that supports voter ID laws might believe Hispanics are less likely to vote for him/her, so is less inclined to respond to Hispanic constituents. That might be unethical for other reasons, but it doesn't provide any evidence the legislator is racist.

Let's say for example, that a Democrat legislator believes the Hispanic constituents in his community are underprivileged. As a result, the legislator is more likely to respond to questions from Hispanics, because he/she wants to help them and believes they can't as easily access other sources. Such racial bias in responding to constituents wouldn't be evidence that the legislator hates non-Hispanics or hates rich-people.
Click to expand...

So what you are saying is that people think Hispanics are more likely to be illegal aliens, therefore they should not notify them whether or not they are eligible to vote, regardless of their immigrant status.

That's pretty insanely racist.
 
nehalem256 said:
I would assume the simplest answer is that white people vote Republican whereas Hispanic people don't.

Seems like common sense to help the people that are likely to vote for you to vote.

In fact its pretty much the exact same reason why Democrats get butt hurt over minorities not having ID to vote whereas Republicans don't.

So essentially this study tells absolutely nothing.
Click to expand...

Oh so your argument is that the pro voter ID legislators are unethical instead of racist.

Good argument, dumbass.
 
And by the way can I say just how hilarious it is that several people have made the argument of:

"They aren't racist, it's just that they thought Hispanics are illegal immigrants".

This is beyond self parody.
 
With 10's of Millions of illegal invaders in your country that are Hispanic, that's a pretty good attitude to have actually. This is turning into Thread Backfire territory...
 
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