RE: No One Actually Wants an Equal Society
March 7, 2017 at 1:24 am
(This post was last modified: March 7, 2017 at 1:41 am by InquiringMind.)
(March 6, 2017 at 5:00 am)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote: Yeah, I agree with other posters that the OP confuses 'equal' with 'identical'.
Sure, everyone would like to have a stroke of luck now and then, but the overwhelming majority of people who enjoy special privileges weren't born into a privileged class, but work their arse off to get where they are (I exempt clerics, criminals, and career politicians).
Most people probably aren't so much looking for that lotto win (although I doubt many would turn it down) as they are looking for a level playing field.
Boru
The best predictor of a person's wealth is how rich their parents were. The most reliable way to be rich is to have rich parents.
I still maintain that most people don't want a level playing field; they would prefer a field that's tilted in their favor. And last I checked, gambling - including the lottery and Las Vegas - is very popular.
(March 6, 2017 at 9:08 am)c172 Wrote:(March 6, 2017 at 4:37 am)InquiringMind Wrote: I don't think that people even want equality of opportunity. I think most people would overwhelmingly prefer to be born into privilege. Why do you think that Disney princess movies and the British monarchy are so wildly popular? Why do so many people dream of winning the lottery? Because people want privilege, not equality. Especially if those privileges came from a windfall, like being born into royalty or winning the lottery.
No one wants an equal society. People would much prefer to have special privileges.
I would love to have been born into having several million dollars so I could have my airpark home with the 3 bedrooms and the Chevy Silverado in the carpark and the HondaJet and Cessna 172 in the hangar. Yes, that involves some level of privilege. But I don't not want you all to have those same things or the money with which to make it happen if that's what you want.
I just want it for my own enjoyment, not to flaunt.
Privilege is necessarily comparative. It can't exist in a vacuum. The only way to have privilege is to have some desirable outcome that others don't have. Privilege is always a zero sum game. You can't say, "I want to be rich, but I don't want others to have less money than me." Being rich means having more money than other people. Privilege is zero sum.
(March 6, 2017 at 5:28 am)paulpablo Wrote: It wouldn't really matter how much people want the kind of equality you're talking about, people aren't born equal.
The discussion of whether equality of opportunity is even possible is a different discussion. I don't think it's possible, because of genetic differences and differences in good or bad luck. But as I've said, I don't think that people even want equality of opportunity. I think that people want at least equality, meaning that they will accept equality or special privileges, but not special oppression.
Embracing equality of opportunity means that you'd have to give up whatever privileges you do have if other people don't have them, and few people are going to do that.
(March 6, 2017 at 4:46 am)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: Well, the lottery is exactly equality of opportunity. Rich or poor, you draws your numbers and you come up empty.
You come at it from the angle of the favored, but in my experience, the disfavored don't want a handout, they just want an honest chance in a rigged system.
No, the lottery is not equality of opportunity, because rich people can buy many more lottery tickets that poor people.
The disfavored claim they want equality, but I claim that the disfavored would grant themselves special privileges if given the opportunity. History shows this over and over: the oppressed, after they become powerful, become the oppressors.
