I am currently writing a paper on equality for a local publication in nashville. I thought i had a pretty good idea of what the premise was, but ive run into a few stumps and was wondering what the rest of the community thinks about the following problem. The paper is about the unrealistic ideal of equality. Major reasons for this thinking are that equality is not natural and never has been: some are more naturally talented than others at music, math, etc... but the fundamental flaw that i cannot seem to wrap my head around is that should we not strive t make things as equal as possible. Of course welfare is a terrible attempt at doing this, but where does the pursuit of justice end, and equality begin. For instance, compensatory justice is merely a means by which we restore what is rightfully mine when you have wronged me; in essence, we are equalizing the situation. Or perhaps justice is merely a means f relatice equality. I might have more than you do but when you steal from me, and you are forced to return the stolen goods then we are equalizing back to the original situation. I have been pushing the idea that natural rights are the closest we will ever get to equality (God or "nature" has created us equal, at least in most respects, and everything after that is the culmination of man's efforts to improve his condition), but there are certain elements of battling the idea that we should strive for equality as much as possible even if we cannot fully realize it. What are you guys' thoughts?
Why is equality to be desired?
should we not strive t make things as equal as possible.
What do you mean by this? Progressive taxing? In free market everyone has a chance to try to become rich and I think that's quite fair. I don't see any reason why we should give money to people who have done nothing to deserve it.
I suggest you to read some Rothbard, he have wrote couple essays on egalitarianism.
I think you all are missing my point. I am not advocating equality. I have read much Rothbard, and i don't believe that we should be progressively taxing, or taxing at all for that matter. I guess the only equality we should strive for is equality of authority, but not socioeconomic equality.
The knee jerk anti-leftism here is hilarious.
The simple fact of the matter is, you either believe in some kind of equality (as you said, equality of authority, or equality under the law, or equality of oppurtunity) or you're a tyrant who feels the game is only to be played by some.
If egalitariansim is a revolt against nature, so is Rothbard's NAP. Short, sweet, and simple.
In States a fresh law is looked upon as a remedy for evil. Instead of themselves altering what is bad, people begin by demanding a law to alter it. ... In short, a law everywhere and for everything!
~Peter Kropotkin
Your knee jerk anti-anti-leftism is so humorous it makes anti-leftism seen like paint drying on a wall
Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid
Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring
Epicurus ibn Kalhoun:The simple fact of the matter is, you either believe in some kind of equality (as you said, equality of authority, or equality under the law, or equality of oppurtunity) or you're a tyrant who feels the game is only to be played by some. If egalitariansim is a revolt against nature, so is Rothbard's NAP. Short, sweet, and simple.
THat's sort of the the quandry now., isn't it. The OP notices that some kind of egaliitarianism is necessary for a free and functioning society. But she's trying to weight that with her (contradictory) Rothbardian beliefs.
So the question people who love freedom must ask themselves is, how much equality is necessary? Equality of hte law? Economic equality? Physical/mental equality?
damn, you people are awfully quick to accuse as soon as possible. The reason i posted in the first place was because I didn't know the answer to something and was pulling from the free market of ideas to get one. I wasn't attacking any sort of libertarian ideal. I merely stating logical and moral quandaries that were not mixing with each other, and i wanted clarification. I guess i have it now, but next time, make sure to read the context of the points before you people accuse; it makes you sound like a bunch of republicans or democrats. We are better than this.
THe problem you're getting is not only from libertarians, but from Kalhoun who is not one...I think. I'm not sure what Kalhous is, but maybe some kind of pragmatist socialist. Not too sure on that one.
I consider myself merely a conscious being. Im not a big fan of labels, tho sometimes it is unavoidable.
For argument's sake, Im a libertarian socialist that's not terribly upset with social democracy.
One point that's probably worth making is that when people worry about inequality they are usually more concerned with the absolute level of wealth possesed by the poor than how well off they are relative to the rich, at least after you tease it out of them. If (socioeconomic) equality itself is the ideal then you have to ask in what sense would society be better if the poor got poorer but the gap between them and the rich closed slightly? Also, in what sense would it be a bad thing if everyone got wealthier but some got a proportionately huger increase in wealth than others?
In both these scenarios the answer is clearly "none" but the ideal of equality says otherwise, hence the ideal needs at least some tweaking to make it work. You can obviously be in favour of reducing poverty, you could even take that to be the highest political ideal, without subscribing to ideas about equality. In fact, if egalitarian measures would reduce wealth you could make a very good case that egalitarians are actually anti-poor. This applies to equality of opportunity just as much as equality of outcome.
Another point, made by Nozick in Anarchy, State and Utopia, is that even if we include envy as a type of harm (a dubious premise in it's own right) this still doesn't necessarily lead to egalitarianism. The only sense of accomplishment that people feel is over achieving success at something they might have realistically not succeeded at. No one marvels at their ability to speak or use abstract reasoning, despite these being rare gifts in the animal kingdom, because they are almost guaranteed to have these abilities simply by virtue of being human. Same goes for people in first world countries not constantly being thankful they own a colour TV despite this putting them among the richest people in history. If you live in a first world country owning a colour TV is the rule, not the exception. If everyone was made to be equal we would eliminate envy but only because there would be less for anyone to be fulfilled about. If we allow for the chance to freely attempt and fail then we open the door to both inequality and fulfillment.
The kind of legal equality favoured by libertarians (and it is a kind of equality, there's no arguing that) is exempt from these argument because, unlike wealth, rights are much more zero-sum. If you gain a right to prevent people from freely speaking then other people must lose the right to speak freely and vice a versa. Therefore if we want to help those with the fewest rights then we need to take some rights away from the people above them. Same for equality in a more general kind of moral dignity.
Hope that helps!
http://0welcometo1984.wordpress.com
Epicurus ibn Kalhoun: THat's sort of the the quandry now., isn't it. The OP notices that some kind of egaliitarianism is necessary for a free and functioning society. But she's trying to weight that with her (contradictory) Rothbardian beliefs. So the question people who love freedom must ask themselves is, how much equality is necessary? Equality of hte law? Economic equality? Physical/mental equality?
But aren't these forms of equality incommensurable enough to make talking about more or less equality next to meaningless?