Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Equality is not one of life's fundamental goods, it's an unnatural state into which the envy-driven try to force us

Great Selwyn Duke essay at The American Thinker on how equality is not some virtue that an individual can cultivate:

Scour great works, such as the Bible, and you won't find talk of equality. Not one bit -- that is, unless you consider The Communist Manifesto a great work.
One thing about virtues -- which are defined as "good moral habits" -- is that their exercise doesn't require the cooperation, or compulsion, of another person. I can cultivate prudence, temperance, courage and the other virtues in myself, and I can do it all by myself. So while a virtuous society is desirable, virtue can also be a purely personal goal. And this is one time when focusing on the self needn't be selfish, for we should take the log out of our own eyes before worrying about the speck in our brother's. 
But equality is far different. Just as there can be no numerical equality without at least two numbers, there can be no human equality on an island with a population of one. And while you could increase patience through personal change, increasing equality necessitates societal change; it involves raising people up as much as they're able -- which requires their cooperation -- and insofar as they're unable, it involves bringing others down. This is where compulsion enters the equation. The point is that, unlike with virtues, increasing equality is always an endeavor of the collective.
Another quality of virtues is that, as Aristotle noted, their cultivation is necessary for a happy life. And lack of virtue in the collective can make life harder, such as when the government stifles just economic freedom (excessive regulation), suppresses truth (hate-speech laws) or imposes some other aspect of tyranny. We also want our survival needs fulfilled: enough food and water and a roof over our heads. And we'd like the opportunity to pursue proper pleasures and dreams and exercise our creative capacity. But is actual "equality" necessary for happiness?

He also makes the point that equality is not something anyone would pay to see.  Also, preoccupation with it leads to erosion of virtue:


One might now wonder why liberals don't apply their diversity tenet "Embrace differences" to what really matters. After all, if you watch golf on TV, do you want to see "equality," where everyone would have to be a duffer, or the best? Do you want "equality" in an art museum or ethereal beauty? Gifts displayed by others are to be relished, reveled in and revered. And the only thing preventing this is, again, those twin demons of envy and pride.

This is the essence of the rottenness of the great leveling project of the left.

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