It stands to reason that inner cities have the most problem with brain damage from lead poisoning. Inner cities often have high percentages (in the case of Baltimore a majority) of black people.
If more black people live where more people have lead caused brain damage and this business model has sprung up to exploit them, it's a perfectly valid title for the article.
Yes, it matters. It's poor practice for a journalist to include the race, sexual orientation, religion, etc... of someone if it has nothing to do with the story.
It does have to do with the story. Part of the article discusses Freddie Gray, who is inextricably linked with the recent stories of police shooting black men. Baltimore is also quite famous for its racial problems.
It's a surreal place to visit: you can go from the shiny Inner Harbor full of white hipsters and convention-goers shopping at the flagship Under Armour store to an area that looks like it suffered a recent civil war -- roofs collapsing, infrastructure crumbling, sudden change in what stores are open and whether they have bars on the windows -- in about 20 minutes. If you're me, someone will be kind enough to tell you that someone got shot at this bus stop last week (implication: maybe you'd better turn around). Poverty and lead paint in Baltimore are deeply entwined with (though not at all synonymous with) race.
Except that the article is about brain-damaged people selling their settlements.
The whole grey area here is about the brain-damaged people not being able to correctly evaluate the value of the document they are signing.
Even if 100% of the brain-damaged people were black, that still wouldn't make it OK to include their race in the title, because the article is not about that. It's about brain-damaged people.
Now, it would be different if the article was directly about blacks, about how they were specifically selected, but it's not.
Here's an example headline to show the difference:
"An individual robbed a bank this afternoon"
VS
"A black man robbed a bank this afternoon"
The important event here is the bank robbery, not the race of the person who did it.
You could have a study that showed that 90% (or 10%...) of all bank robbery were caused by black men and THEN including the race in the title would be warranted, because that's what the study is about.
Whether it's "about that" or not you can bet the residents will perceive it that way; one note in the article you didn't mention is that these companies are generally based in Bethesda and their customers are generally in the impoverished black neighborhoods of Baltimore. The symbolism is, frankly, too obvious not to notice, even if it wasn't in the headline.
It would be unfair of me to attribute this to the person you're replying to, but I've noticed that on sites like HN and reddit there seems to be a strange desire by some people to try to make things not about race, gender or sexual preference as much as possible. It's as if they are somehow lessened or hurt by it but I'm not sure how. Perhaps a feeling of guilt and wanting to deflect it drives that behavior. But it is present in the comments of a lot of articles that bring up or imply race, gender or sexual orientation is a factor.
I recognize the tendency that you are referring to.
But in this case, it seems to me that race is more of a correlation than a causation. Yes, urban poverty is very entwined with blackness but, unlike things such as police brutality or criminal sentencing, it's not clear that a white person in the same position wouldn't be victimized in the same way.
I don't object to the inclusion of "Black" in the headline, but it did strike me as odd in the same way that an article I recently saw elsewhere did. The headline was something like "This female chemist... yada yada". The article itself was about her work and didn't particularly mention her gender or any of the inequities she may have encountered. It seemed odd not to just call her a chemist, since you wouldn't specify a 'male chemist' unless there was a reason.
In the greater cultural context it's clear why this extra information was included and it's interesting to think about what's implicitly being communicated. But since superfluously mentioning race or gender would be quite unacceptable in so many other contexts it's a little surprising to see it included in the headline.
I think in the context of institutional racism (what some snidely call the "academic definition" of racism) it's not as striking to see it in the headline. The issue of race in our country is much more complex than individuals and their interactions with each other. Both are important, but the assumption seems to be by the people doing the objecting that the only one of consequence is personal/individual racism between people.
As far as the chemist goes, I think that despite the polite societal norm to refrain from mentioning it when it's irrelevant (which shouldn't go anywhere in my opinion) in the context of a news story we should mention it more. There's a serious issue with getting women into STEM fields and surfacing it even if it's irrelevant might deter the perception by young women and girls that they should avoid those fields. But that's my ignorant opinion without any studies to back it or anything. I could be entirely wrong.
I don't know if you'll see this (does HN have a reply-notification feature?) but I really appreciated your response and (I presume, since I was at -1 when the thread settled down) the upvote that sent my comment back to "0 points"
This comment thread was really discouraging and it meant a lot to me that you were willing to just talk about a small point we have different perspectives on.
No built-in notification unfortunately but I do check for them once a day or so. I wouldn't be surprised if it actually helps decrease vitriolic slap fights since we aren't instantly notified a la reddit.
But yes, that was me that brought you back. I hate seeing calm discourse get downvoted simply because of disagreement. I actually like that I don't have that ability. Kind of refreshing. I'd like to think the karma requirement would help deter abusive voting but I see enough of it that I'm not so sure it's as effective as it could be. Better than nothing though, I suppose. But anyway, you're welcome. It's kind of funny but I felt the same way about the comments and your reply was really encouraging.
First off, this has nothing to do with semantics. The meaning of the words or the title is not the issue here, it's the inclusion of information that isn't related.
Second, the fact that I disagree with the title has nothing to do with my opinion of the story.
If you see "The cancer kill her yesterday" as a title, you won't say anything about the verb tense because that would imply you love cancer?
Well then, "guess we have to agree to disagree there".
He already said "Second, the fact that I disagree with the title has nothing to do with my opinion of the story."
Why do you keep accusing him of dismissing the importance of the story? If he takes a moment to let you know that he was outraged, then may he comment on the fact that he thinks "it's poor practice to include the race, sexual orientation, or religion" if it's not directly relevant to the story?
Ugh, sorry Frozenlock. I can't believe you attracted TWO commenters who used the increasingly common "How dare you bring up a minor point, WHEN THERE ARE GRAND INJUSTICES?!?!" tactic.
I thought the title was odd too.
Indeed. Your parent comment is a classic example of general misconceptions about how racism and racial disparity work. It's not just about feelings and intent. It's as much about systems and institutions.
The scum who are ripping off these people may not be doing it for racial reasons. But, the fact that blacks are disproportionately affected is certainly rooted in racial history.
