[DangitBobby]

In the FA, the system that rewards them is actually the same social system that attempts to help people who are unfortunate or who are treated unfairly... The biggest problem is that these "dark personalities" will weasel their way to game any system, because any system designed by humans is fallible. Without the ability to have complete knowledge and someone to wield that knowledge altruistically (a role that can be entrusted to no human), it's an unsolvable problem.

[082349872349872]

It's easily solvable if one thinks that helping many people is clearly worth helping[1] a few[2] manipulative hooligans.

My country may be higher-trust than yours, but my impression of how our social system works is that we've found it cheaper and easier to make social aid readily available, and pay a few people who double-check on recipients for possible fraud, than to pay many people to administer red-tape as a hurdle for social aid.

In any case, the immediate problem (at least going by the leaders of the UN security council permanent members), is not dark personalities claiming victimhood soaking the system, it's dark personalities claiming victimhood running the system.

[1] Mark Twain on punishment:

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2986/old/mt5bg10.txt

> "Lord, there is one who needs to be punished, and has been overlooked. It is in the record. I have found it."

[2] I would claim that if dark personalities were not rare in one's society, one would have much bigger problems than "victimhood signalling."

[llimos]

Interesting thing about that Mark Twain quote, that he failed to spot the logical fallacy in it.

> S. No, Lord. To him there is no difference of consequence. To him they are all microbes, all infinitely little and equally inconsequential.

> L. To me there is no difference of consequence between a man & a microbe. Man looks down upon the speck at his feet called a microbe from an altitude of a thousand miles, so to speak, and regards him with indifference; I look down upon the specks called a man and a microbe from an altitude of a billion leagues, so to speak, and to me they are of a size. To me both are inconsequential. Man kills the microbes when he can?

He uses the word infinite. If the Lord is infinite, mathematically infinity divided by a very large number is identical to infinity divided by a very small number. So the microbe should get the same amount of attention from the Lord as the galaxy etc.

The argument only works if the Lord is not infinite but merely very very big

[DangitBobby]

The problem that I'm claiming is unsolvable is this:

> Why focus on the individual instead of the environment that rewards him

I agree that we shouldn't stop trying to help people just because there will always be fraud.

[doctorowfan]

To quote Cory Doctorow, "Every ecosystem has its parasites."

[euru3he3fgh]

Is it really a parasite if it meets the selected definition of a victim? Calling them parasites makes it sound like they shouldn't qualify but do. The reality is that the system says they should qualify because the designers decided on broad definitions for various reasons. I think the acknowledgement is important because the alternative just seems like a way to dismiss responsibility for their presence and the resources they take up.

[jcims]

Yes of course it's possible. Welfare/unemployment/insurance industries have been dealing with it since their inception. It's fraud.

The more subjective and unfalsifiable the criteria (e.g. chronic pain, depression) the easier it's going to be for looters to fake their way into the system. Even if it was possible, effectively gerrymandering the definition to include all and only those in need is going to be exceptionally difficult and expensive. A little bit of fraud is part of operating costs.

The problem we have with social media is that volume is the only thing that seems to count. Tribes don't generally police their own because the small hit to the overall credibility (which can be explained away as agent provocateurs) is a small price to pay for the additional 'voice'.