Does "one per family" make sense in this context?
Let's say there is a hobby/activity/club (hereafter "Hobby"). It is primarily skewed towards older people, particularly retired men. Many in Hobby are dismayed by this, and want to promote Hobby especially among the younger generations.
There is a party/gathering of sorts to promote Hobby twice a year. One man donates $1000 for door prizes, which is used to buy raffle prizes worth $10 - $250. The raffle entries are FREE, believe it or not. Each person gets 1 free raffle ticket. So is the food free, but I digress.
Obviously who wins those prizes will be based on luck. But perhaps the organizer sees one or two people that have come to the last 4 gatherings and still haven't won anything. He decides to make the prizes "one per family" to free up more prizes for these others.
But how is it fair to disqualify people based on what blood flows through their veins? Why not just say "No prizes for Catholics, or dirty Micks, Sp*cs, N***ers, etc." Wouldn't that also create an arbitrary class of disqualified persons, thus freeing up prizes for others? Wouldn't that be equally unfair?
Or, to be more accurate, the sign would read, "Only the first n***er can win a prize." Again, unfair, because it means every participant in the event does NOT have an equal chance to win a prize in the raffle. Some are more equal than others.
NOTE: No one, thus far, has brought along their family of 8 to get 8 entries in the raffle to "game" the system. In fact, virtually everyone attending comes *by themselves* even those with living spouses and/or children under 18 still living at home. Usually only one spouse is into this Hobby. And most kids not interested in the Hobby would likely be bored at the gatherings in question. But again, those who DID come would almost be forced into an introduction to said Hobby -- which the promoters clearly want, or they wouldn't be throwing these events and donating these raffle prizes.
Personally, I have only brought my two oldest children to the gatherings -- let's just say the ones who are literally card-carrying members of said Hobby. And we show up at the beginning, actually "do the Hobby" while we're there, etc.
Last event, only 34 showed up and we were almost 1/10th of that. And surprise, surprise, we were slightly lucky and carried away (2) prizes. The average, statistically, would have been (1) prize. But we were also incredibly UN-lucky at the last "Badges, Bikes and Tykes" event giving away free bicycles. This event claims a 1 in 3 chance of winning a bicycle. Plenty of families with 2-3 children wheeled off 2 or 3 bikes, while our (9) entries netted ONE bike, plus a little 2-year-old's $15 bike, which I barely count. Statistically, we should have won (3) bikes if we had average luck. Instead we won 1.2 bikes. Let's just say the former example was ABOVE average, while the latter example was BELOW average. Luck works like that.
What am I missing? Am I just biased because I have the only big family in this area, and/or a bit resentful because this rule seems aimed squarely at me? Wouldn't a black man be upset if he saw a sign, "No N***ers allowed"? I sure would be!