Wednesday, September 26, 2007

Equal or not?

Hi all, I would like to pose a question to you-

Equality is one of the values that we as both human beings and Americans hold most dear. It is one of the basic principles that this country was founded on. Still another value that we hold dear is individuality, and our ability to express ourselves and be unique. I think that is fair to assume that humanity has not reached the level of equality that many wish to. S0 despite our considerable effort towards reaching equality, we all still treasure our individuality. Someone can be an incredible musician, and terrible at math, and it can be vise-versa as well. Thus I ask you this does equality rely on our abilities? Also then no matter what personal talents, or virtues someone else has, do we treat them as equal? How do we then define equality without contradicting ourselves and pointing out that persons qualities that make him or her an individual. I guess my final question is are we to treat everyone equal regardless of their talents or faults, even is it defies what we think of as "ethical, or moral."

Have a great nite;)

4 comments:

Mr. Pseudonym said...

Equality in reality has very little to do with one's talents. Equality is the promise that there is some way of raising your status. In the US, we still don't have equality because there are people who cannot go beyond their means to gain status, and there are those who can no longer gain status because they were born with it. Both of those illegitimize the "equality" we have in the US. A state with true equality doesn't mean everyone is exactly equal, it means that they are judged based upon their acheivements, as opposed to their class, color, or creed.

Anna said...

I see equality solely as the way one human being looks upon and regards one another. Equality can't rely on one's abilities, as it is impossible to equalize human talents on a scale. We can still be equal in one another's eyes while at the same time maintain our individuality and unique talents. It seems to me that we can only say that equality has been reached when we can look past the barrier of our neighbors' abilities and achievements.

ethan_is_ninja said...

I believe that the definition of equality is equal perfection among everyone. For example, the goal of Communism was to make everyone equal. While it sounded good in writing, it failed miserably when applied. It is true that we as a collective people can be equal in terms of law and justice (i.e school integration, emancipation etc) but we cannot all be truly equal

katrina337 said...

I agree with Wolf on this subject. I don't think equality means we need to even be seen as equal, I just think it means we need to be judged on the same basis. There are people we like and dislike, which could be seen as putting one person on a higher status than another, at least in our minds. That can't be taken away. It's much more effective to say that everyone is being judged on x factor, and from there we can view the person however we want.