Everett takes a stand against age discrimination in housing (1907?)
>Get up out of that so I can take one more punch at you! Sadly, Everett would need to wait for the Fair Housing Act of 1968 [https://www.hud.gov/program_offices/fair_housing_equal_opp/aboutfheo/history] for this landlord’s behavior to be federally illegal. It’s unclear what state Mr. True lives in (besides anger, obviously).
Yeah, I was hoping that maybe back then the term was meant to refer more to the “human race”, so a concern about population growth.
But some quick googling indicates the eugenics-meaning version of the term was coined around 1900. Honestly not a good look for Everett.
Well, according to that Wikipedia page, people who used the term “race suicide” believed that “desirable” people were having too few kids and “undesirable” people were having too many kids.
So Interpretation A of this cartoon is the following:
And Interpretation B is:
I’m leaning slightly towards Interpretation A because I think the Landlord is being insincere, but I could be convinced otherwise.
This comic is from the early 1900s, when they didn’t have those protections. The Federal Fair Housing Act wasn’t passed until the 60s, and it wasn’t expanded to include families with children until the 80s.
It’s possible he is defending renter’s rights here, but it’s important to remember that prior to WWII eugenics was considered a progressive cause, and it was championed by other progressive groups at the time as well, like feminist groups. The idea was that you could reduce suffering by not causing people with undesirable traits (mostly disabilities) to be born to begin with. If True was a eugenicist, it wouldn’t be out of place in the historical context of things.
Hmmm good point. But I think the eugenics of the time was also based on class, ethnicity, and personal characteristics:
In the United States, “unfit” races have historically included minorities such as immigrants and African Americans, people with mental and physical disabilities, people in poverty, institutionalized people, and/or people convicted of crimes. Eugenics sought to eliminate these people, such that their “undesirable traits and behaviors” would be effectively weeded out of the human population over time.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_suicide
Note the 1903 illustration on that page “Concerning Race Suicide”. Everybody seems to be of European descent, but the wealthier people on one side have no children but the people on the other side – who seem to be coded as lower-class recent immigrants – have many chidren. I think that is being presented as a bad thing, though everybody seems to be happy and well-fed (if a bit crowded).
adults work on endless home improvement projects, or have lots of loud argumentative sex, or play an electric drum kit until 2am.
I’d like to humbly apologize for my behavior from 2009 to 2013. I was in a house but I was definitely doing all of these. I did use headphones for my electric drum kit, though.
All sorts of discrimination can occur, it should just never be articulated or put into writing. Unless it’s just egregious, discrimination is pretty damn difficult to prove.
…but no, most discrimination is not allowed. Especially when it comes to basic things like age, race, gender, marital/family status, religion, sexual orientation.
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