How long do you think someone who dropped out after fifth grade keeps their report cards around anyway?
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Yes. Another literal question. You just bisect a straight line with a curved line. What is complicated about that?
look - I understand that the intent of the test was to intimidate and prevent black voters from reaching the polls. If you want to go all dramatic and historically outraged over that, fine - I have no problem with it. I commented on the test being characterized as âimpossibleâ when itâs obviously not. Could the responses be purposely misinterpreted and abused? Certainly. Can you get word-jerked into a socially-offended frenzy? Apparently.
I think âsocially-offended frenzyâ, " historically outraged," etc. are unfair characterizations. I think people are just frustrated with you because youâre being incredibly obtuse.
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The test is impossible for blacks and other âundesirablesâ because they cannot pass it NO MATTER WHAT ANSWERS THEY GIVE. How do you not understand this?
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I commented on the test being characterized as âimpossibleâ when itâs obviously not. Could the responses be purposely misinterpreted and abused? Certainly.
This is contradictory. If it was possible to answer the questions correctly, it would be impossible to misinterpret or abuse the responses. I know youâre think youâre being smart or logical or something, but if you canât see that these questions have grammatical errors, typos and ambiguities which make a correct answer impossible, itâs because youâre less intelligent than the other commenters, not more.
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While I might disagree as to some of you conclusions, just two corrections - first, classification of persons by race had been going on since Colonial times, when slaves were first named on slave rolls rather than the regular census. They were already classified by race. But even earlier, people of mixed or uncertain ethnicity were listed as âMelungeonâ. They might be partially African, partially, Native American, Middle Eastern, or any other race not considered to be quite âwhiteâ enough.
The characterization of Southern people as Democrats wouldnât have applied very well prior to the 1860âs. Much of that membership came solely as a response to the platforms of Republican candidates - Lincoln being the real standout example. Interestingly, now, when you look at the two-party demographics, you find the Republicans primarily in the more rural areas. The Democrats are primarily located in the larger cities. So, it makes no particular sense to characterize Republicans as strictly âcorporate-mindedâ.
Looks like she does understand that, to me.
I didnât find this page of the test impossible to understand at all. It reminds me of many tests I took in school and passed, back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth. That does not preclude it being used (particularly, the time limit) to reduce voting turnout, especially by people who werenât tested in this fashion in school.
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Yes, I get that it offends you that the questions donât make sense to you. Iâll even agree that the wording could certainly be improved. I called no one stupid or unintelligent, nor did I intend that. You did that, yourself.
I was referring to the one-drop rule, codified in VA and later overturned, that dropped the number of categories down to two, rather than keeping the rather arbitrary earlier categorizations (that included âmulattoâ and âoctaroonâ as I recall).
Edit: which reminds me of the âPocohontas Exceptionâ, a bleakly hilarious part of Virginia racism - under the law, American Indians were âblackâ, but the founding families of VA (in a tradition reminiscent of ancient Greek claims of descent from Hercules) all claimed descent from Pocohontas. So their law said you were âcoloredâ if you were descended from any Native American other than Pocohontas!
Both major parties are currently corporate-funded and controlled. Their voters donât make much difference any more.
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The questions actually demonstrate the illiteracy of whoever put together the test since many of them are simply grammatically incorrect.
âIn the space below, draw three circles one inside (engulfed by) the other.â
That question (or prompt I suppose) actually makes no sense.
Again, the problem is not that (some of) the questions donât make sense to me. Itâs that they donât make sense. If you think they do, itâs because you arenât familiar enough with logic problems to notice the missing assumptions.
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Or you arenât familiar enough with the pedagogical language used for the test. Itâs all pretty clear to me, honestly.
If you were taught in a school that used this kind of testing (as only whites were) it would be no problem. Otherwise, youâd never get it done in the time limit.
âspell backwards, forwardsâ â ambiguous
âIn the space below, draw three circles one inside (engulfed by) the other.â â nonsensical
Are you really going to make me go through each question to demonstrate that some of these actually are nonsense or at the very least unclear?
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Whatâs with all the partisan posturing here? IMO, if you are a democrat or republican, you are probably part of the problem. At the very least, you self identify with the party causing the problem.
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Agreed about those parties, definitely!
There was also the infamous rule in TN concerning mandatory racial classification. The danger there was precisely the same as before - once you or your parents were classified, you were pretty much screwed. I think what a lot of people fail to see, but which the records themselves will demonstrate, is that there was a heckuva lot more going on than the Underground Railroad. Racism didnât just drive people north. It also drove them further south, because, once youâd managed to get out of whichever state or colony had classified you, you were whoever and whatever you said you were again. Iâve seen some rather amazing examples of this, over and over. If VA said you were mulatto or melungeon, you would move on to (most likely) the nearest other place you could go and be unknown. From VA, that usually meant the Carolinas. (South Carolina, notably, had free mulatto citizens who had been free to inherit from their white fathers, and in turn owned black slaves themselves. Locally, it was no problem. The pressure came from other states later on.) But in terms of being documented, once a generation went by without any notice, you were pretty much home free.
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âDraw five circles that one common inter-locking partâ is clear to you? Please, enlighten me. If your answer includes assuming that the word âhaveâ is missing from the question, youâre answering your own question and not the one on the test. The question in the test can not be answered.
My children receive tests every day in school that sport incorrect grammar. They are still expected to answer them, and are still graded on their responses.
I did not go to a Socratically perfect school.
I canât help but notice your objection has changed from âthese questions are clearâ to âsometimes you just have to deal with unclear questions.â
Incidentally, youâre wrong. If my kid got a test with incorrect grammar Iâd point out the teacherâs error and suggest they try again.
SAT tests often have ambiguous or incorrect answers to questions and they will inevitably give credit for such questions when the problem is demonstrated to them.
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This is a really good example. I suppose, hypothetically, someone might have done enough questions in school to know what they meant. But depending on where the quotation marks are meant to be, I could easily argue the answer was meant to be âsdrawrofâ or âbackwardsâ, and since there is no key that means I could fail anyone I wanted.
I have seen some poorly written and even deliberately confusing tests in school, too. This exceeds all of them, and with a much stricter passing criterion. That anyone should defend it is either a sign that people have gotten used to infinitely stupider tests than when I took them, or that some people are willing to defend anything. And really, accepting the former is a special case of the latter.
Yeah, no. Racism can be found in both to some extent, but it is very far from equally distributed. Cowicide already posted a link showing how the parties differ on racial issues.
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Itâs not incorrect grammar, itâs an incomplete sentence. The missing word could be âshareâ or âlackâ. There is no way of knowing which itâs supposed to be. Therefore there is no way of knowing what the correct answer should be. Therefore itâs impossible to pass the test, except by luck.
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