New in PJ Media:
Maintaining the illusion that there is “systemic racism” in the United States, where racial discrimination has been against the law for six decades, requires constant propagandizing, but never fear: CNN is up to the job. On Wednesday, it ran a lengthy, weepy piece entitled “‘Stacked against you’: Critics say the lottery system is preying on poor communities.” Yes, that’s right: Powerball is racist now.
You might wonder how a lottery that is entirely voluntary, with no one on the entire planet being forced to buy a ticket, could possibly be “preying on poor communities” and hence be racist. Are fiendish Powerball executives scanning convenience store security cameras for white lottery ticket buyers, and making sure they win? Are they quietly disqualifying the tickets of people they suspect are black or Hispanic? Are they selling tickets only in predominantly white areas, so that black folks don’t even have a chance to win the lottery?
Actually, it’s just the opposite. CNN is claiming that marketing lottery tickets to racial minorities is racist, because they buy them, and the odds are so small that they will actually win anything that this amounts to a racist act. Got it? Apparently, the “experts” CNN invokes in this absurd article want to curtail the sale of lottery tickets in minority areas, because that will keep them from wasting their money on them. Great idea, experts! Maybe you could just commandeer the entire earnings of black and Hispanic people, and direct them how they should spend their money responsibly. Oh, wait — you plan to do that for all of us before too long, right?
In the meantime, however, the problem CNN sees is that the lottery is enticing poor people to squander their money on dreams that are almost certain not to come true. “As lottery players across the nation accept that they didn’t win the historic $2.04 billion Powerball jackpot this week,” CNN intoned, “experts are pointing to the flaws of a lottery system they say unfairly targets poor Black and brown communities.”
CNN and its “experts” have identified those flaws: people keep buying tickets even though the odds of winning are very low.
Lottery officials say the lone winning ticket holder of the largest lottery prize ever was sold in Altadena, California. The winner matched all six numbers – the odds of which were 1 in 292.2 million.
But despite the extremely low chances of anyone winning, state lotteries continue to market and sell tickets to low income communities at higher rates leading those Americans to believe it’s a quick way to build wealth, researchers say. These communities are disproportionately made up of Black and brown people. Critics say the consequence is that marginalized people will be driven into deeper debt by a system that is transferring wealth out of their communities.
There is more. Read the rest here.
BruceRobert says
This article is a great example of how the following question is NEVER asked… ‘Just what portion of the gross dysfunction in the black community are blacks responsible for?’… Never has the teleprompter readers at CNN EVER asked that question.
I’ll answer it… About 98 percent….
Keith O says
Can’t find real racism so the Clinton News Network fabricates it.
Blaming others for your poverty and the crime in your neighbourhood is the victimhood that the msm promotes.
ntesdorf says
CNN is so racist that it believes that all and only Black people are too stupid to see that lotteries are just a big low-odds scam. Nearly all people are too stupid to see this.
gravenimage says
Another Day, Another CNN Discovery of Something Racist
……………………………….
*Good grief*. I’m not a big fan of lotteries, but they are *not* racist. Besides, statistically most people in the US who buy lottery tickets are white.
Scotsman48 says
When I hear this narrative over and over again…. ”Poor communities and those of black and brown communities” as if all white and Asian communities are living high on the hog and none are at all poor.
I know black and brown people that have more money than me and a much better Smart Phone, but Im a European American and not an African American, so Im not supposed to mention that…. But I will.
James Lincoln says
So the chance of winning the jackpot is approximately one in 292 million.
The problem is, a lot of people don’t realize how infinitesimally small their chance is – mostly because they identify with the “everyday average” people who usually win:
Using round numbers, the circumference of the earth is approximately 25,000 miles at the equator. Since there are 5280 feet in a mile, the circumference is approximately 132 million feet. Twice around the equator would be approximately 264 million feet – “roughly close” to 292.
So, if it were possible to walk 1 foot at a time around the equator – twice – one of those “foots” would be roughly your chance of winning the jackpot.