6 ms·

By "skirting around" do you mean "blatantly flouting"? Because that's the truth of it.. Uber, Lyft, et al are just central dispatch for gypsy cabs. I don't see

by gharbad 11y ago

By "skirting around" do you mean "blatantly flouting"? Because that's the truth of it.. Uber, Lyft, et al are just central dispatch for gypsy cabs. I don't see any reason they shouldn't get massive fines or seized vehicles in all locales they operate.

goldenkey 11y ago
Central dispatch for gypsy cabs? Are you trying to make a cogent argument? because all I see is a nasty insult. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem
- amalcon 11y ago
  "Gypsy cab" is a slang term for an unlicensed taxi, and no longer has anything to do with the Romani people. It's not a term I personally use (outside a descriptive context like this), but it doesn't seem intended as an insult.
  - fennecfoxen 11y ago
    Maybe not, but wouldn't it be better to avoid antiquated ethnic slurs like "Gypsy cab" in favor of cool neutral terms like "unlicensed"?
    - jo909 11y ago
      One of the (I guess intended) effects of using an aniquated slang word is to illustrate that this is not a new problem, but that this very same problem exists for so long that it got its own well known insulting term a long time ago.
    - amalcon 11y ago
      It's true, which is why I don't generally use the term myself. I was just trying to clarify the point.
PhantomGremlin 11y ago
Uber, Lyft, et al are just central dispatch for gypsy cabs. Ignore any flak you get about this. It is the best one-sentence description I've ever read about Uber.
fennecfoxen 11y ago
> Uber, Lyft, et al are just central dispatch for gypsy cabs. True fact: Every single Uber and Lyft vehicle which I've ridden in, in New York City, has a Taxi and Limo Commission plate on it in the T123456C format. The so-called "gypsy cab"+ market consists of the vehicles without those plates. (+complete with casual old-fashioned ethnic slur)
- PhantomGremlin 11y ago
  casual old-fashioned ethnic slur It's not a slur. Why does everything need to be so PC these days? The term may have originated in NYC, home of much colorful language. Here's a Village Voice article that provides a lot of background and that quotes illegal cab drivers referring to themselves that way: once a gypsy, always a gypsy http://www.villagevoice.com/news/how-some-illegal-taxi-drivers-are-fighting-back-against-the-green-cab-program-6669026 http://www.villagevoice.com/news/how-some-illegal-taxi-drive...
  - mfoy_ 11y ago
    >referring to themselves that way Apply this logic to any other ethnic slur and see how well it works out for you.
    - PhantomGremlin 11y ago
      First, the drivers aren't even Romani. Second, the NY Times has used the phrase, quite often. Granted, with a quick Google I couldn't find a more recent NYT reference than 2008, so maybe they changed their mind. Pulitzer Prize winning columnist William Safire, perhaps best known as a long-time syndicated political columnist for the New York Times and the author of "On Language" in the New York Times Magazine, a column on popular etymology, new or unusual usages, and other language-related topics[1], explains in the NY Times: Just because some people take offense at a word, however, does not automatically banish the word from the English language. ... it is hypersensitive to take it as a slur http://www.nytimes.com/1986/02/23/magazine/on-language-gypping-the-pharisaic-tribe.html http://www.nytimes.com/1986/02/23/magazine/on-language-gyppi... Here the NY Times mentions that a politician was a former driver: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/16/nyregion/16rivera.html http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/16/nyregion/16rivera.html [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_safire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_safire
morganvachon 11y ago
Based on your racist and derogatory statements, I have to wonder if you're involved in the taxi industry. The fact is, taxi lobbies are just protection rackets. I don't like Uber at all due to the way they treat their customers and drivers, but ridesharing is the future and the taxi mob is desperate to stop them from growing. If that means paying off the local law enforcement and city officials to illegally and unconstitutionally seize law abiding citizens' vehicles (including regular folks dropping off or picking up family and friends, which boggles the mind), they will do it.
- fennecfoxen 11y ago
  The problem is that even if you can't own a person wholesale anymore in this country, you can own the right to be the sole provider of one type of service to that person, and charge them exorbitant rates. To the taxi lobby, the citizens of New York are not free men, but their property as customers. Uber and the like are therefore dirty thieves, abolitionist usurpers. The taxi lobby will also say that it's all for your own safety, even as unlicensed taxi drivers in licensed cabs proliferate. (fun story: I've had colleagues whose luggage was held hostage while driven to an ATM because the driver didn't want card payment because he wasn't driving the cab legally. good luck pursuing recourse for that.)
  - LordKano 11y ago
    Your colleagues should/could have played the game. Just sit there, in the cab. Either he takes the payment that they offer or they get to leave. As long as they're sitting in the cab, it's not making any money. Force him to decide to either take their payment or write off the loss from the ride because he can't get any other fares while they're occupying the seat. What's he going to do? Call the police and tell on himself?
- talmand 11y ago
  Wait, I don't understand. Because this person used a term that you describe as a racist and derogatory term, you are claiming the entire taxi industry is racist? As I asked elsewhere, how is this term racist and derogatory?
TheCoelacanth 11y ago
Uber and Lyft are licensed livery cabs in NYC. Livery cabs are not allowed to accept street hails, but are allowed to be ordered for pick up in other ways (such as through a phone call). The only way that they would be illegal is if you believe that ordering through a phone app is more similar to street hailing than it is to ordering through a phone call, but I think that is a huge stretch.

by gharbad 11y ago

goldenkey 11y ago

Central dispatch for gypsy cabs? Are you trying to make a cogent argument? because all I see is a nasty insult. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

amalcon 11y ago
"Gypsy cab" is a slang term for an unlicensed taxi, and no longer has anything to do with the Romani people. It's not a term I personally use (outside a descriptive context like this), but it doesn't seem intended as an insult.
- fennecfoxen 11y ago
  Maybe not, but wouldn't it be better to avoid antiquated ethnic slurs like "Gypsy cab" in favor of cool neutral terms like "unlicensed"?
  - jo909 11y ago
    One of the (I guess intended) effects of using an aniquated slang word is to illustrate that this is not a new problem, but that this very same problem exists for so long that it got its own well known insulting term a long time ago.
  - amalcon 11y ago
    It's true, which is why I don't generally use the term myself. I was just trying to clarify the point.

PhantomGremlin 11y ago

Uber, Lyft, et al are just central dispatch for gypsy cabs. Ignore any flak you get about this. It is the best one-sentence description I've ever read about Uber.

fennecfoxen 11y ago

> Uber, Lyft, et al are just central dispatch for gypsy cabs. True fact: Every single Uber and Lyft vehicle which I've ridden in, in New York City, has a Taxi and Limo Commission plate on it in the T123456C format. The so-called "gypsy cab"+ market consists of the vehicles without those plates. (+complete with casual old-fashioned ethnic slur)

PhantomGremlin 11y ago
casual old-fashioned ethnic slur It's not a slur. Why does everything need to be so PC these days? The term may have originated in NYC, home of much colorful language. Here's a Village Voice article that provides a lot of background and that quotes illegal cab drivers referring to themselves that way: once a gypsy, always a gypsy http://www.villagevoice.com/news/how-some-illegal-taxi-drivers-are-fighting-back-against-the-green-cab-program-6669026 http://www.villagevoice.com/news/how-some-illegal-taxi-drive...
- mfoy_ 11y ago
  >referring to themselves that way Apply this logic to any other ethnic slur and see how well it works out for you.
  - PhantomGremlin 11y ago
    First, the drivers aren't even Romani. Second, the NY Times has used the phrase, quite often. Granted, with a quick Google I couldn't find a more recent NYT reference than 2008, so maybe they changed their mind. Pulitzer Prize winning columnist William Safire, perhaps best known as a long-time syndicated political columnist for the New York Times and the author of "On Language" in the New York Times Magazine, a column on popular etymology, new or unusual usages, and other language-related topics[1], explains in the NY Times: Just because some people take offense at a word, however, does not automatically banish the word from the English language. ... it is hypersensitive to take it as a slur http://www.nytimes.com/1986/02/23/magazine/on-language-gypping-the-pharisaic-tribe.html http://www.nytimes.com/1986/02/23/magazine/on-language-gyppi... Here the NY Times mentions that a politician was a former driver: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/16/nyregion/16rivera.html http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/16/nyregion/16rivera.html [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_safire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_safire

morganvachon 11y ago

Based on your racist and derogatory statements, I have to wonder if you're involved in the taxi industry. The fact is, taxi lobbies are just protection rackets. I don't like Uber at all due to the way they treat their customers and drivers, but ridesharing is the future and the taxi mob is desperate to stop them from growing. If that means paying off the local law enforcement and city officials to illegally and unconstitutionally seize law abiding citizens' vehicles (including regular folks dropping off or picking up family and friends, which boggles the mind), they will do it.

fennecfoxen 11y ago
The problem is that even if you can't own a person wholesale anymore in this country, you can own the right to be the sole provider of one type of service to that person, and charge them exorbitant rates. To the taxi lobby, the citizens of New York are not free men, but their property as customers. Uber and the like are therefore dirty thieves, abolitionist usurpers. The taxi lobby will also say that it's all for your own safety, even as unlicensed taxi drivers in licensed cabs proliferate. (fun story: I've had colleagues whose luggage was held hostage while driven to an ATM because the driver didn't want card payment because he wasn't driving the cab legally. good luck pursuing recourse for that.)
- LordKano 11y ago
  Your colleagues should/could have played the game. Just sit there, in the cab. Either he takes the payment that they offer or they get to leave. As long as they're sitting in the cab, it's not making any money. Force him to decide to either take their payment or write off the loss from the ride because he can't get any other fares while they're occupying the seat. What's he going to do? Call the police and tell on himself?
talmand 11y ago
Wait, I don't understand. Because this person used a term that you describe as a racist and derogatory term, you are claiming the entire taxi industry is racist? As I asked elsewhere, how is this term racist and derogatory?

TheCoelacanth 11y ago

Uber and Lyft are licensed livery cabs in NYC. Livery cabs are not allowed to accept street hails, but are allowed to be ordered for pick up in other ways (such as through a phone call). The only way that they would be illegal is if you believe that ordering through a phone app is more similar to street hailing than it is to ordering through a phone call, but I think that is a huge stretch.