Monday, May 9, 2016

Equality is the Root of All Evil

Equality, at least the way it is defined by the Left, is the root of all evil.

The Left defines equality differently than most people, and certainly differently than anyone else in history.

I would define equality as equal rights and opportunities.   That is, all people, regardless of gender, skills, IQ, or looks, are equal in the eyes of the law and have equal opportunities.

The Left defines equality as 'everyone is the same'.

This has a profound effect on how the Left perceives the world and the prescriptions they put forward to change things for the better.

If everyone is equal, i.e., the same, then why do we have unequal outcomes?  The Left, mindful that we are all exactly the same, cannot explain these differences with internal factors.  Therefore the differences must be external.    The only thing that keeps Africa poor is colonialism.  The plight of minorities is grounded in racism, the disparities for women are due entirely to sexism, etc.  

In reality, there are any number of real world factors that can help explain the horrific conditions in sub-Saharan Africa.  Culture, IQ, the lack of the Rule of Law, lack of Property Rights, etc. all go a long way towards understanding what's wrong in this part of the world.  But since all of these undermine the idea that we are all equal, they are discounted entirely.  So we are left with the external forces.  And that, typically, is the fault of racist White Men.

Much of what is wrong with Leftism (and there is a lot!) can be traced to this basic error in thinking. 

Equality does not mean equal.

Equality of rights and equality of opportunity are at the core of the concept of Equality. 

Once you abandon equal opportunity in favor of equal outcomes, you have to start using the power of the state to make things equal.  You have to point guns at the people who have achieved better outcomes and force them to fork over the filthy lucre to those that have less.

People don't generally like having stuff taken away from them.  So you have to shoot a few to get the others to fall in line.  

And this is why communist governments kill millions of their own people -- they are forcing equal outcomes based on a wrong headed definition of Equality. 

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