As per my last post, as I read the New York Times yesterday, I caught something which gets at the essence of conservative and liberal (using those terms in their contemporary, not classical context) attitudes toward discrimination:
. . . the Obama administration is planning a major revival of high-impact civil rights enforcement against policies, in areas ranging from housing to hiring, where statistics show that minorities fare disproportionately poorly. President George W. Bush’s appointees had discouraged such tactics, preferring to focus on individual cases in which there is evidence of intentional discrimination.
Emphasis added.
Regardless of what one feels about the state adjudicating discrimination in the private sector, if the government is going to get involved, shouldn’t it limit that involvement to sanctioning (or otherwise punishing) those who single out individuals from protected classes?
The contemporary conservative wants to want evidence of bias before pursuing a case of discrimination, the liberal proceeds when he finds inequality of results. Now you see why I bristle at gay activists demanding equality, particularly when they claim their goal is “full equality” (whatever that is). As the Times article shows, under a liberal (in the contemporary context) Administration, we’re not talking about equal rights, but about equal outcomes.
And that means less freedom and increased government intervention in the decisions of private associations and enterprises.
Hardly a surprise, but disappointing nonetheless.
From each in excess of his ability, to each according to our needs. – Motto of the 44th president.
I’m reading this differently and more pessimistically, specifically that in cases of alleged discrimination the accused is required to disprove a negative (guilty until proved innocent) based upon evidence of perception and not on concrete action. When perception (or hunch, or wish, or bias) is the basis of a case pursued by the force of government, your logical extreme is ethnic cleansing.
“As the Times article shows, under a liberal (in the contemporary context) Administration, we’re not talking about equal rights, but about equal outcomes.”
Given that we are endowed with varying levels of talents and intelligence at birth, social policy can go one of two ways: Treat everyone the same. The result is that society reflects the unequal distribution of natural endowments, and you have successful and less-successful citizens. That is the conservative position.
Or, social policy can treat people unequally to produce equal outcomes. That is the socialist position, and the result is that everyone is poor together.
The hilarious part about the Obama Party is how they blab on and on and on about “equality”, but then insist that people like Sarah Palin are “inferior” because they didn’t go to Harvard.
Liberalism is really nothing more than playing on jealousy at the lowest and most disgusting levels. Rather than be honest and say that they were outworked, liberals insist that anyone who succeeds must be stealing it from others. In their weird worldview, a high school dropout who spends their entire day on the couch watching Springer reruns should be making the same amount of money as a doctor who works ten-hour days.
Geez, NDT, you’ve obviously failed to notice that Sarah Palin is both WHITE and CONSERVATIVE. Ivy League or not, it goes without saying that she’s both privileged AND inferior (though the rest of us are so dense we need to be reminded of this, early and as often as possible).
I’m sure Obama and the gang will be more than happy to let some affirmative action doc take care of their families…
Humm…it never ceases to amaze me that when Discrimination and Prejudice are cited by the government it always refers to individuals who are of African-American descent whose perception defines reality. I feel I have been discriminated against…therefore, it must be real.
A sane track and field judge would verify beforehand that all runners in a footrace had to run the same distance and started at the same time. Leftist judges would only stand at the finish line and declare that there must have been cheating because not everyone crossed at the same time.