NorthOfNorth wrote on Jul 9
th, 2011 at 10:29am:
The question makes sense and is poignant to anyone anywhere who sees nothing but inequality.
The privileged in any society are happy to promote the idea of equality to the unprivileged masses where it helps to preserve their privileged status. Did Thomas Jefferson believe when he wrote the 'magnificent' Declaration of Independence that he and his 'founding father' peers were equal to the slaves on his plantation? Where was this 'equality' he spoke of 'self-evident'?
Poor old Thomas Jefferson.
'Are we all equal ?'Yes and no.
No.
We are not all equal.
We all have differing capacities and talents, depending largely upon the luck of who our parents were [genes], and where we were born [1st world thru to 3rd world].
Yes.
The rain and sun fall on us all equally.
Q.
But should we be engaged in a struggle to make all mankind 'equal' ?
Should we all be dedicated to 'egalitarianism' ???
IMO, no.
Dictionary;
egalitarian = = believing in or based on the principle that all people are equal and deserve equal rights and opportunities.If i did believe in egalitarianism i would be seeking to burst open the gates of all of our prisons.
I would be seeking to disarm our defence forces.
To disband our [oppressive] police services.
And to close our law courts.
Because in an egalitarian society, we would
clearly have no need for such institutions, and services.
But, the consequences of assuming that we could be 'equal' and have equal rights, and seeking to give all persons equal rights, in a society such as ours, imo, would never work.
It would never be practical.
Why not ?
Because we all
innately seem to grow up into individuals who have differing capacities and talents.
And because 'p!sssing into the wind' always seemed to me, to be a very silly thing to try to do.
And, trying to artificially transform and treat an innately dumb kid, into, and as though they were an innately smart kid [and to then give them both exactly the same reward, for the consequences of each of their individual efforts], would also seem to me to be a very silly thing to do.
e.g.
As a resident of Sydney, would you like to have the construction of your SydHarb bridge overseen by qualified engineers [as it was] ?
OR, in the interests of giving every idiot an even break, would you like to have your SydHarb bridge constructed by nincompoops ?
[Yes, its a real word.]
Dictionary;
nincompoop /"nINk@mpu;p/
· n. a stupid person.