Over the past 13 years a number of on-line review platforms like Google Maps, TripAdvisor, and Yelp have been launched that enable individuals to make decisions about restaurants to patronize.
Although the results produced by these relatively convenient user-generated content websites and apps reduce readers costs of acquiring information, and can warn them about really bad dining establishments (not to mention accommodations, mechanics, florists, etc.), the results and interpretation of them often favors mediocre places rising to the top.
How so? Other than an ability to navigate the websites or apps, most people who post the reviews don’t have any formally recognized expertise about culinary practices, food preparation and cuisines, but are still free to pontificate about things they know little or nothing about. They can include reviewers who have an axe to grind, like being upset that they never got a reservation. Reviews may also be fake, generated by the establishments themselves, etc.
Moreover, informing readers that the food was tasty, or that the waiter or waitress was rude, tells the reader very little about the quality of the food served by these potential targets of consumption.
User generated content websites, more specifically the reviews they produce, are built upon the “wisdom of crowds.” On the surface this process appears to be fair, but we also know that crowds don’t always make good decisions or ones that are genuinely in their best interests. In fact, in matters of taste, crowds can be quite foolish. And there is what is referred to as the lowest common denominator effect.
Making it to the top of the an on-line review platform list often means that restaurants, etc. were able to satisfy the average reviewer. The result is that popular and middle of the road places get elevated and niche and unusual establishments get crowded out.
More specifically, restaurants that want to provide food that is authentic (i.e., fidelity to a recipe or cuisine), creative, and/or interesting often garner fewer and more negative reviews. Because of this trend many truly exceptional restaurants may be ignored or down listed by these on-line review websites.
For example, I’ve lived in Washington DC for close to three decades and consider myself relatively knowledgeable about most of the “top” restaurants here. But my own personal list of favorite restaurants don’t come close to matching those generated the aggregated rankings present on Google Maps, TripAdvisor, or Yelp.
How then do patrons solve the dilemma of finding a good restaurant?
To begin with they need to be more skeptical of on-line reviews. Don’t just read the first few reviews of a restaurant. Critically interpret both the good and bad reviews. Look for nuance and bias.
Another solution is to seek out alternative sources of information. Although we can ask friends and family for recommendations, there is no guarantee that their tastes and opinions will match ours
We can also consult travel guides, professional restaurant critics, and we can pop our heads into these places and take chances. We can also triangulate this information to make better situations.
Unquestionably, consulting different sources of information can be quite resource intensive. If all you want is a mediocre place to eat and sleep then I say go for it. But if you want something different and perhaps authentic then you need to put in the work.
Photo credit:
Tom Driggers
“Sweet or Unsweet?”
https://jeffreyianross.com/wp-content/uploads/29881913133_db87c6c083_o-scaled.jpg24202560Jeffrey Ian Rosshttps://jeffreyianross.com/wp-content/uploads/jeffrey-ian-ross-logo-04.pngJeffrey Ian Ross2023-04-20 16:32:292023-04-28 10:56:20On-line reviewer platforms, restaurants, and the privileging of mediocrity
Big cities suffer from numerous problems. One intractable and long-standing challenge has been a failure to provide residents, commuters, and tourists with adequate places to go to the bathroom.
From mothers with children in tow, to the burgeoning homeless population, this state of affairs presents an intractable inconvenience.
For example, few urban public transportation systems have public bathrooms located at their stops, stations, and major terminals.
Nonresidents, needing to go to use a restroom, are often forced to find a commercial location, like a restaurant, a fast food place, retail establishment, or a gas station to do their duty.
But even these locations pose their own set of problems. Sometimes the facilities are only available to customers, and/or you need a code. Often the bathrooms are out of order, and occasionally they’re disgustingly dirty making the user wonder if the experience would have been better if they would have held it in longer in order to find a more suitable place to relieve themselves. Meanwhile many establishments deny service to their bathrooms to homeless and mentally ill people who sometimes use these venues as places to wash up, or temporarily camp out in. That’s why so many people end up resorting to doing their business in a nearby back alley or behind a bush. This practice may be so normative, in some neighborhoods, that it is part of the street culture.
Additionally, go to selected parts of almost any big city in the world, especially during the hot summer months, and you’re likely to pass by areas where the smell of urine is prominent and almost overpowering.
Feces (whether they are human or animal) and urine attract flies, other insects and rodents that feed off of them. A pest control professional once told me shit is to rodents as steak is to humans.
Parts of the city where there are high levels of urine and feces are undesirable to live, work and pass through. Though difficult to prove, this situation is bound to have an economic effect on property values and the viability of businesses to thrive.
Live long enough in an area (or work close by) and you’ll learn the places where you can use a free public bathroom. And there are probably a handful of apps that one can use but if you’re homeless, the likelihood of you owning a smart phone to access that app is probably pretty low.
In many respects states, in particular their highway systems, have done a better job than municipalities and county governments, providing restroom facilities for motorists and their passengers who just gotta go. Some even have fast food restaurants located inside the structure, and others don’t.
Moving on, there are probably five major strategies that municipal governments can take to increase the provision of well-maintained and secure public restrooms.
First, while cities are developing new policies, practices and legislation in this area, they should install more portable toilets in public areas.
Second, if financially viable, municipalities should consider installing either portable or low cost/low maintenance toilets in abandoned buildings and structures.
Third, urban governments should take advantage of innovative designs that some cities around the world have adopted for self-cleaning and low maintenance public toilets.
Fourth, more taxpayer money needs to be allocated to this problem. This will require re prioritizing annual budgets devoted to this urban challenge either through a single line item in an annual budget or greater scrutiny of the subagencies that provide this kind of service. Part of this initiative should include insuring that urban parks that fall above a certain size have a well maintained and secure public bathroom.
Finally, similar to the approach adopted by the federal government, with the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act, cities should mandate that all newly constructed office buildings should have a well maintained and secure public bathroom on their first floor, that does not require going through a security gate just to use. This could include a tax break or other incentive to force property developers to comply.
These are just a handful of solutions to a long standing problem that is not simply an inconvenience but has social and economic implications too.
Photo credit:
Photographer: Jesse Steele
Title: Public Restrooms
https://jeffreyianross.com/wp-content/uploads/13662094583_e63c90db03_o-scaled.jpg15332560Jeffrey Ian Rosshttps://jeffreyianross.com/wp-content/uploads/jeffrey-ian-ross-logo-04.pngJeffrey Ian Ross2023-04-13 07:29:202024-01-07 13:00:57Cities must prioritize the provision of accessible, well-maintained, and secure public restrooms
I periodically ask myself what are the top 10 books, movies, songs, pieces of visual art, television series, etc. that have influenced me and why? This exercise forces me to reexamine these items more closely, critically answer why I thought they were important, and why they may be better or worse than other creative works on my lists.
After considerable reflection, one of my top books is Ted Robert Gurr’s, Why Men Rebel (1970). His seminal scholarship (and other publications that he authored, co-authored, edited or co-edited) motivated me to reach out to him as I was completing my bachelors degree, express an interest in doing a masters under his guidance, and for Gurr to recruit me as his first graduate student at University of Colorado Boulder, where he relocated to in the mid-1980s.
During my graduate career, not only did I complete my masters thesis and doctoral dissertation under Gurr’s direction, co-author with him, but benefited from Gurr’s mentorship too.
Turning to the book, Why Men Rebel, was important during its day (garnering the American Political Science Association Woodrow Wilson best book of the year award), but as testament to its importance today, and as of this writing Why Men Rebel has 11,523 citations on Google scholar.
In short, Why Men Rebel attempts to answer a very simple question, one that has become increasing important to ask over that past five decades.
The book consists of ten chapters beginning with a chapter titled “Explanations of political violence” and ending with one on “Causes and Processes of Political Violence.” At the time this was one of the most comprehensive books. After an extensive review of competing explanations, drawing most from the social sciences, Gurr settles on the concept of relative deprivation (as the most important reason why individuals and collectivities engage in political violence against the state.
He begins by arguing that that frustration-anger-aggression undergirds most political violence, but not everyone who experiences this state of affairs automatically engages in violence. Moreover, frustration-aggression (for short) must be coupled with a feeling of relative-deprivation (i.e., a perception that compared to others who are similar to you and your group, your lot in life is less than satisfactory). Gurr then introduces the reader to the importance not just of different contexts, but how important elements of violence and the processes that lead up to it like scope, intensity, and duration commingle and effect the pattern of violence.
This background information is necessary to understand why some types of political violence (e.g., insurrections, oppositional political terrorism, coups d’etat) are more frequent in some countries or societies, during different periods, than others. And why in other contexts all that we may see and experience are things like acts of resistance, political protests, etc.
Undoubtedly, and in hindsight the book has a handful of drawbacks and criticisms.
To begin with the book is half a century old. And thus a considerable amount of scholarship (e.g., biological) has been conducted since that time, some of which has competed with Gurr’s explanations why people decide to engage in political violence against the state.
Others have, in my opinion, wrongly inferred that the title of the book meant that Gurr’s explanation was directed towards men, or that he was somehow gender blind. Moreover, those expecting a page turner will not find it here. On the other hand, the book is methodical, sometimes boring, but this is to be expected with this kind of careful scholarly analysis.
Overall the advantages outweigh the drawbacks. To begin with Why Men Rebel is one of a handful of comprehensive explanations in an increasingly crowded scholarly field. Gurr’s approach was also truly interdisciplinary. Per Gurr’s style, he reviewed a considerable amount of social science scholarship that dealt with this subject, pointed out its merits and shortcomings, and then outlined a series of hypotheses amenable to empirical testing. Unlike many scholars who produce similar kinds of work, and to his credit, not content to leave his work as a a book treatment, Gurr subsequently invested considerable resources testing the numerous propositions statistically and modified his perspective when the evidence was not compelling.
Why Men Rebel is worth reading not simply as a parsimonious explanation for political violence, but as a model of comprehensive social science scholarship.
https://jeffreyianross.com/wp-content/uploads/Screen-Shot-2023-04-04-at-9.42.10-AM.png646578Jeffrey Ian Rosshttps://jeffreyianross.com/wp-content/uploads/jeffrey-ian-ross-logo-04.pngJeffrey Ian Ross2023-04-06 14:02:352023-04-06 15:52:59On the importance of Ted Robert Gurr’s WHY MEN REBEL
On-line reviewer platforms, restaurants, and the privileging of mediocrity
/by Jeffrey Ian RossOver the past 13 years a number of on-line review platforms like Google Maps, TripAdvisor, and Yelp have been launched that enable individuals to make decisions about restaurants to patronize.
Although the results produced by these relatively convenient user-generated content websites and apps reduce readers costs of acquiring information, and can warn them about really bad dining establishments (not to mention accommodations, mechanics, florists, etc.), the results and interpretation of them often favors mediocre places rising to the top.
How so? Other than an ability to navigate the websites or apps, most people who post the reviews don’t have any formally recognized expertise about culinary practices, food preparation and cuisines, but are still free to pontificate about things they know little or nothing about. They can include reviewers who have an axe to grind, like being upset that they never got a reservation. Reviews may also be fake, generated by the establishments themselves, etc.
Moreover, informing readers that the food was tasty, or that the waiter or waitress was rude, tells the reader very little about the quality of the food served by these potential targets of consumption.
User generated content websites, more specifically the reviews they produce, are built upon the “wisdom of crowds.” On the surface this process appears to be fair, but we also know that crowds don’t always make good decisions or ones that are genuinely in their best interests. In fact, in matters of taste, crowds can be quite foolish. And there is what is referred to as the lowest common denominator effect.
Making it to the top of the an on-line review platform list often means that restaurants, etc. were able to satisfy the average reviewer. The result is that popular and middle of the road places get elevated and niche and unusual establishments get crowded out.
More specifically, restaurants that want to provide food that is authentic (i.e., fidelity to a recipe or cuisine), creative, and/or interesting often garner fewer and more negative reviews. Because of this trend many truly exceptional restaurants may be ignored or down listed by these on-line review websites.
For example, I’ve lived in Washington DC for close to three decades and consider myself relatively knowledgeable about most of the “top” restaurants here. But my own personal list of favorite restaurants don’t come close to matching those generated the aggregated rankings present on Google Maps, TripAdvisor, or Yelp.
How then do patrons solve the dilemma of finding a good restaurant?
To begin with they need to be more skeptical of on-line reviews. Don’t just read the first few reviews of a restaurant. Critically interpret both the good and bad reviews. Look for nuance and bias.
Another solution is to seek out alternative sources of information. Although we can ask friends and family for recommendations, there is no guarantee that their tastes and opinions will match ours
We can also consult travel guides, professional restaurant critics, and we can pop our heads into these places and take chances. We can also triangulate this information to make better situations.
Unquestionably, consulting different sources of information can be quite resource intensive. If all you want is a mediocre place to eat and sleep then I say go for it. But if you want something different and perhaps authentic then you need to put in the work.
Photo credit:
Tom Driggers
“Sweet or Unsweet?”
Cities must prioritize the provision of accessible, well-maintained, and secure public restrooms
/by Jeffrey Ian RossBig cities suffer from numerous problems. One intractable and long-standing challenge has been a failure to provide residents, commuters, and tourists with adequate places to go to the bathroom.
From mothers with children in tow, to the burgeoning homeless population, this state of affairs presents an intractable inconvenience.
For example, few urban public transportation systems have public bathrooms located at their stops, stations, and major terminals.
Nonresidents, needing to go to use a restroom, are often forced to find a commercial location, like a restaurant, a fast food place, retail establishment, or a gas station to do their duty.
But even these locations pose their own set of problems. Sometimes the facilities are only available to customers, and/or you need a code. Often the bathrooms are out of order, and occasionally they’re disgustingly dirty making the user wonder if the experience would have been better if they would have held it in longer in order to find a more suitable place to relieve themselves. Meanwhile many establishments deny service to their bathrooms to homeless and mentally ill people who sometimes use these venues as places to wash up, or temporarily camp out in. That’s why so many people end up resorting to doing their business in a nearby back alley or behind a bush. This practice may be so normative, in some neighborhoods, that it is part of the street culture.
Additionally, go to selected parts of almost any big city in the world, especially during the hot summer months, and you’re likely to pass by areas where the smell of urine is prominent and almost overpowering.
Feces (whether they are human or animal) and urine attract flies, other insects and rodents that feed off of them. A pest control professional once told me shit is to rodents as steak is to humans.
Parts of the city where there are high levels of urine and feces are undesirable to live, work and pass through. Though difficult to prove, this situation is bound to have an economic effect on property values and the viability of businesses to thrive.
Live long enough in an area (or work close by) and you’ll learn the places where you can use a free public bathroom. And there are probably a handful of apps that one can use but if you’re homeless, the likelihood of you owning a smart phone to access that app is probably pretty low.
In many respects states, in particular their highway systems, have done a better job than municipalities and county governments, providing restroom facilities for motorists and their passengers who just gotta go. Some even have fast food restaurants located inside the structure, and others don’t.
Moving on, there are probably five major strategies that municipal governments can take to increase the provision of well-maintained and secure public restrooms.
First, while cities are developing new policies, practices and legislation in this area, they should install more portable toilets in public areas.
Second, if financially viable, municipalities should consider installing either portable or low cost/low maintenance toilets in abandoned buildings and structures.
Third, urban governments should take advantage of innovative designs that some cities around the world have adopted for self-cleaning and low maintenance public toilets.
Fourth, more taxpayer money needs to be allocated to this problem. This will require re prioritizing annual budgets devoted to this urban challenge either through a single line item in an annual budget or greater scrutiny of the subagencies that provide this kind of service. Part of this initiative should include insuring that urban parks that fall above a certain size have a well maintained and secure public bathroom.
Finally, similar to the approach adopted by the federal government, with the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act, cities should mandate that all newly constructed office buildings should have a well maintained and secure public bathroom on their first floor, that does not require going through a security gate just to use. This could include a tax break or other incentive to force property developers to comply.
These are just a handful of solutions to a long standing problem that is not simply an inconvenience but has social and economic implications too.
Photo credit:
Photographer: Jesse Steele
Title: Public Restrooms
On the importance of Ted Robert Gurr’s WHY MEN REBEL
/by Jeffrey Ian RossI periodically ask myself what are the top 10 books, movies, songs, pieces of visual art, television series, etc. that have influenced me and why? This exercise forces me to reexamine these items more closely, critically answer why I thought they were important, and why they may be better or worse than other creative works on my lists.
More specifically. a number of books have significantly shaped my scholarship, including not only what I’ve chosen to study, but how I conduct research on that topic.
After considerable reflection, one of my top books is Ted Robert Gurr’s, Why Men Rebel (1970). His seminal scholarship (and other publications that he authored, co-authored, edited or co-edited) motivated me to reach out to him as I was completing my bachelors degree, express an interest in doing a masters under his guidance, and for Gurr to recruit me as his first graduate student at University of Colorado Boulder, where he relocated to in the mid-1980s.
During my graduate career, not only did I complete my masters thesis and doctoral dissertation under Gurr’s direction, co-author with him, but benefited from Gurr’s mentorship too.
Turning to the book, Why Men Rebel, was important during its day (garnering the American Political Science Association Woodrow Wilson best book of the year award), but as testament to its importance today, and as of this writing Why Men Rebel has 11,523 citations on Google scholar.
In short, Why Men Rebel attempts to answer a very simple question, one that has become increasing important to ask over that past five decades.
The book consists of ten chapters beginning with a chapter titled “Explanations of political violence” and ending with one on “Causes and Processes of Political Violence.” At the time this was one of the most comprehensive books. After an extensive review of competing explanations, drawing most from the social sciences, Gurr settles on the concept of relative deprivation (as the most important reason why individuals and collectivities engage in political violence against the state.
He begins by arguing that that frustration-anger-aggression undergirds most political violence, but not everyone who experiences this state of affairs automatically engages in violence. Moreover, frustration-aggression (for short) must be coupled with a feeling of relative-deprivation (i.e., a perception that compared to others who are similar to you and your group, your lot in life is less than satisfactory). Gurr then introduces the reader to the importance not just of different contexts, but how important elements of violence and the processes that lead up to it like scope, intensity, and duration commingle and effect the pattern of violence.
This background information is necessary to understand why some types of political violence (e.g., insurrections, oppositional political terrorism, coups d’etat) are more frequent in some countries or societies, during different periods, than others. And why in other contexts all that we may see and experience are things like acts of resistance, political protests, etc.
Undoubtedly, and in hindsight the book has a handful of drawbacks and criticisms.
To begin with the book is half a century old. And thus a considerable amount of scholarship (e.g., biological) has been conducted since that time, some of which has competed with Gurr’s explanations why people decide to engage in political violence against the state.
Others have, in my opinion, wrongly inferred that the title of the book meant that Gurr’s explanation was directed towards men, or that he was somehow gender blind. Moreover, those expecting a page turner will not find it here. On the other hand, the book is methodical, sometimes boring, but this is to be expected with this kind of careful scholarly analysis.
Overall the advantages outweigh the drawbacks. To begin with Why Men Rebel is one of a handful of comprehensive explanations in an increasingly crowded scholarly field. Gurr’s approach was also truly interdisciplinary. Per Gurr’s style, he reviewed a considerable amount of social science scholarship that dealt with this subject, pointed out its merits and shortcomings, and then outlined a series of hypotheses amenable to empirical testing. Unlike many scholars who produce similar kinds of work, and to his credit, not content to leave his work as a a book treatment, Gurr subsequently invested considerable resources testing the numerous propositions statistically and modified his perspective when the evidence was not compelling.
Why Men Rebel is worth reading not simply as a parsimonious explanation for political violence, but as a model of comprehensive social science scholarship.