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[–] 247 points 1 year ago (64 children)

What that actually looked like:

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  • [–] 100 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Also worth pointing out, WHY the test is so bad... 1. obviously not even well educated people today can agree on the meaning of a good portion of the questions.

    but the biggest thing is, not everyone had to take them... IE the key point intention was "if a parent or grandparent has ever voted, you can skip this test". which is such a blatant giving away that they don't care of an individuals knowledge, they aren't actually worried if they can read, they were just keeping first generation voters from voting... at a time when in particular a specific subset of american's were in position to be first generation voters.

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  • [–] 149 points 1 year ago* (44 children)

    A perfectly designed test - ambiguous enough that anyone subjected to it can be failed.

    I still don't know what #11 is "supposed" to be.

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  • [–] 41 points 1 year ago (8 children)

    I think it's supposed to say "Cross out the digit necessary", so one digit, in which case cross out the 1 because there's enough 0's that crossing out one 0 isn't enough.

    It's 10 that has me confused. Is it asking for the last letter of the first word that starts with 'L' in that sentence? It doesn't actually specify.

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  • [–] 33 points 1 year ago (6 children)

    Can anyone explain #1 to me? What are you supposed to circle? It says "the number or the letter". There's 1 number and the entire sentence is literally letters...

    It's like when the waiter asks "Soup or salad?" and you say "Yes".

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  • [–] 26 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Circle? It clearly says draw a line around whatever you decided wrongly to indicate. Lines don't curve and aren't boxes, so good luck.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)
  • [–] 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    You got enough answers but here's how you deny someone the right to vote: the question really means you need to make the number 1000000 exact as that is the number "below" the question. Not fewer, physically below.

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  • [–] 7 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Oh good, now we have three completely different answers

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  • [–] 0 points 1 year ago

    Four. You need to make the number below (less than) one million, so cross out zeros until it's 100,000.
    ”0000000” isn't a properly formatted number.

    It's a fun game finding the ways you can tell someone whatever they said is wrong.

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  • [–] 16 points 1 year ago (6 children)

    And 13 is unclear if it's strictly 'more than' or 'more than or equal'

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  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)
  • [–] 7 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    You need to cross out enough zeros so that it makes a million. Pretty sure

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  • [–] 13 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    I mean purely pedantic, I have no idea the original test writers... but based on how I read the words

    The number (one singular number needs to be crossed out)

    Below one million, IE number < 1,000,000

    So my conclusion

    10000000000 < 1,000,000

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  • What's interesting about the literacy tests is how much they have in common with IQ tests!

    For example, a friend of mine remembers his childhood testing. For part of it a child is handed a set of cards and told to put them in order.

    They have pictures of a set of blocks being assembled into a structure and the sun moves in an arc in the background.

    Following the order implied by the sun is, apparently, wrong.

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  • [–] 7 points 1 year ago* (5 children)

    You cross out all of the 0s after the 1 and first 5 0s, so that the number is 100,000

    Or you cross out just the 1

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    Six zeroes, right? Five zeroes makes one hundred thousand. Six makes a million. Or am I missing something?

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  • [–] 7 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    You need to make it under one million

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  • [–] 20 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    This is an example of the gotcha this test did, you can read the question two different ways. Making the number below the question one million, or making the number itself below one million.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago (5 children)
  • [–] 12 points 1 year ago (6 children)

    This is like the kryptonite of autistic people... and black voters whenever they had this...

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  • [+] -8 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    Um fuck you? Being autistic doesn't mean we can't circle a letter or understand a sentence. Hell, this shit is incredibly literal minded and is easy as hell for us. Maybe you're the one with trouble.....

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  • You don't understand the test if you think it's all literal and "about circling the letter."

    You would, in fact, get failed by the white eugenicists giving it to you the moment they figured out you were autistic.

    One of the reasons they would know is that you think there are objectively correct answers to all of the questions and that most of them are not traps to allow a biased test giver to fail you and pass someone else that gave the same answer.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago

    The point is they are not literal in any sense. Most of these questions can be interpreted at least 2 or more ways. I can't even wrap my head around what question 1 even wants. It's like word salad if you really read it carefully and literally.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago*

    This test is clearly intended to be deceptive. For example, with Q1 should I circle the number '1' or 'a'? With Q4 how do you draw a line around something? 11 is clearly a trick question designed to put pressure on people.

    I'm autistic and whilst I could confidently argue an answer for these questions, I'm pretty sure someone would disagree with the reasoning I use, and a single failure means I fail the test

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (6 children)

    I did my best. Do I get to vote?

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  • [–] 16 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 child)

    Nope. The answer to number ten is 'a'.

    Assuming you went with "last", but that starts with 'l', not 'L'. Each other question also specifies "one this line" where relevant, but not this one. The first word starting with 'L' is "Louisiana".

    The trick of the test is that it's subjective to the person grading it. I could have also told you that the line drawing one (12) was wrong by just saying it's not the correct way to do it. Or that 11 was wrong because you didn't make the number below one million, it's equal to one million. Or if you crossed off one more zero I'd say you could have gotten fewer by crossing off the 1 at the start. Or that a long string of zeros isn't a properly formatted number.

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  • [–] 202 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    If voting needed an exam, they would use that exam to stop certain demographics from voting. And no, I'm not talking about the ignorant.

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  • [–] 44 points 1 year ago (18 children)

    This is a bad idea. You would just be creating another layer of gerrymandering.

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  • [–] 7 points 1 year ago (16 children)

    I won't call out of or the drawer for bad idea. The idea is fine. There's just zero ways to ever implement it. It's nice to dream though

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  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    Ehh... I think it's fundamentally problematic. Why should only a subset of the adult population be allowed to vote on laws that affect everyone?

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    If there were a practical way to do it, a way to ensure that only those who were well informed on a topic could have a say in it wouldn't be an issue. The only barrier to voting would be your desire to inform yourself.

    Unfortunately there isn't, because just about every word in the above sentences can be twisted by someone with illintent.
    The concept isn't fundamentally flawed, it's just blocked by insurmountable obstacles.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Thank you for getting what I was trying to say. Spot on, I don't think the idea is wrong. It would be nice if there was a test to say "hey are you able to vote on these topics, have you researched, are you voting with your brain or with emotions?" - which is why I say the idea is fine. There isn't though. There isn't a single way to do that fairly or equitably.

    Thank god the commenters immediately jumped down my throat to tell me what I already knew.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago

    Exactly. The problem with having to meet certain criteria for being able to vote is who gets to set that criteria. We would end up with β€œblack people have to guess the number of bubbles in this bar of soap” all over again.

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  • In most places, citizens below a certain age can't vote, yet laws affect them as well. By extension, one could probably argue that some people "don't know what's best for them" and experts/educated people are better suited to make the laws.

    (However, creating such a test would obviously be impossible in practice, and would result in a conflict of interest, leading to discrimination, as muusemuuse points out.)

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Uhh, no the idea is most certainly not "fine"

    It's only fine if you don't think about it at all beyond the surface level presentation.

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  • [–] -1 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    The concept that only the educated should vote is essentially the entire advantage of living in a republic. If the test was actually fairly made it would be fine, the real problem is it would be used to limit specific demographics from voting while not actually ensuring only the educated can vote

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  • [–] -1 points 1 year ago (4 children)
  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (2 children)
  • [+] 0 points 1 year ago (2 children)
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  • [–] 39 points 1 year ago

    They used to do that in the US during the Jim Crow era. It went predictably.

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