Talk:Egalitarianism
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The author is seriously confusing two very separate doctrines of egalitarianism in addition to making a hasty generalization about broad agreement in the following paragraph.
“[M]ost Marxists now agree that communism can only be achieved if the coercive powers of redistribution needed during the transitional period are vested in a democratic body whose powers are limited by various checks and balances, in order to prevent abuse. In other words, they argue that political egalitarianism is indispensable to material egalitarianism. Meanwhile, other defenders of material egalitarianism have rejected Marxist communism in favor of such views as Libertarian socialism, which does not advocate the transitional use of the state as a means of redistribution.”
Marxists are Socialists historically and should not be confused with Communists. Communism is a variety of egalitarianism which was originally advocated by Lenin and his Bolsheviks and later became codified after the formation of the Communist International and the formation of the Soviet state.
Although Marxism and Democratic Socialism were influential in much of Lenin’s early thinking there were historical rifts which kept these men at ideological and philosophical odds. Moreover, Lenin strove to expand the ideological gap between what were essentially popular social doctrines of Western Europe (Marxism and Democratic Socialism) and his own attitudes; Marxism, and more importantly the popular Democratic Socialism of that time, did not offer a practical or egalitarian solution to the people of then Czarist Russia in Lenin’s mind. Lenin, searching for a specific solution which might close the nationalistic and institutionalized disparities in Czarist Russia between the landless peasant class and the aristocratic Kulaks executed the October Revolution and later the Decree on Land.
The most notable difference between Marxism as theory and Communism as history are the people seeking egalitarian distribution of property and wealth. Marxism is very specific when it predicts that the working class of any industrialized, capitalistic nation will be responsible for the overthrow and replacement of a plutocratic minority resulting in an egalitarian distribution of wealth and possession.
Since Czarist Russia had very little industrialization prior to the formation of the Soviet state and was generally protectionist in what foreign economic policy it had the definition provided by Marx and his followers is not appropriate. Moreover, those who participated in this attempt at social transformation from dictatorial monarchy to progressive communism were not industrial workers (then afforded marginally more social, political and physical wealth than the average Russian peasant), but agrarian people living without possession.
It’s possibly most important to note that Lenin, after the formation of the Communist International and the Russian Communist Party further refined his political philosophy by subtlety altering the words he used to describe the Russian Communist movement. The expansionistic and often corrupt outcome of what started as a Communist (Bolshevik) revolt intent on creating an egalitarian society based on redistribution of property through means provided in Lenin’s (non-Marxist) doctrine became Soviet in practice. The practices of former Soviet states cannot be considered Marxist by any stretch of the imagination and generally fail the definition of Communism as defined by Lenin.
The conclusion of this article is muddled by the definition of “Marxist communism.” How can “defenders of material egalitarianism” reject anything in favor of “Libritarian socialism” when the predicate for this choice does not exists? Would Marxists be at all interested in the historical consequences of what was in practice a Communist revolt which later became a dictatorial régime hindered by its own inherent corruption and abuse? Why?
Much of the information presented later in the article tends to run toward the American-centric and nationalistic and should be revised as well, but this collection of fallacy is all I have time for today.
[edit] Definitely biased and a little off
--82.211.210.191 20:19, 24 May 2006 (UTC):
This article certainly seems biased against material egalitarianism. I must admit I have not read the entire article and discussion, but just one of the first lines strikes me:
Material egalitarianism stresses equality with respect to material possessions and therefore inevitably a disregard for property rights.
Is it just me or is the conclusion very biased? As far as I can see it, a community's wealth could be easily shared amongst its people, while still regarding for property rights. What you can't have is a free trade, where individuals earn wealth from others. A property right regarding material egalitarianistic society that I could think of is in a nomadic tribe: each person has their personal, life essential properties like clothes, waterflask etc. but the total material wealth of the tribe is shared.
- Might I point out that the following in the first paragraphy of this entry appears to be heavy on the weasel words and it is unreferenced:
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- In actual practice, one may be considered an egalitarian in most areas listed above, even if not subscribing to equality in every possible area of individual difference. For example, one might support equal rights in race matters but not in gender issues, or vice versa.
GeeOh (talk) 06:25, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Please sign your contributions
Ladies and gentlemen, whatever you have to say, please --Peter Knutsen 16:45, 23 October 2005 (UTC)sign your pieces (and do it in such a way that it is --Peter Knutsen 16:45, 23 October 2005 (UTC)clear where each piece begins and ends). You "sign" by typing two dashes and four tildes, or by clickling on the "sign" button above the edit window ("your signature with timestamp"), which automatically inserts the required characters. It is impossible to follow debates like this when it is not clear where one person's text ends and the next person's text begins!! Secondly, anonymous opinions are, as a pretty damn good rule of thumb, taken much less seriously than signed opinions (even if you don't have to sign under your real name, as I do). --Peter Knutsen 16:45, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
[edit] roffle
So Lenin invented (or "originated", rather) Communism? I'll have to remember that next time I read Das Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei.
I'm a Librarian Socialist myself. =snort=
--Cheburashka 04:53, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
So is just about every other nerd on the interwebs. I myself am a pro-capitalist communistParp555 (talk) 23:36, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
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“human rights, which promote… legal egalitarianism...”
No. Not if legal egalitarianism means equal under the law. Anatole France commented that equality under law means the rich as well as the poor are forbidden to sleep under bridges. A Chinese activist recently made the same comment about new laws: the beggar has the same property rights in his stick as the rich man in his BMW. In short, human rights are being ignored.
That list of egalitarianisms is not really coherent. It is haphazardly overlapping. For example does gender egalitarianism mean legal, moral, political, or material equality? The same question applies to “luck” and “racial” and would apply to “animal” and “inter-galactic”.
“Because "all men are created equal", each person is to be treated equally under the law. Originally this statement excluded women, slaves and other groups…”
No. Technically “men” does exclude women but that was the language of the time; if you’d asked them the framers would have said that of course women were included. I don’t see where the statement excludes slaves or any other group.
Overall there is a confusion of practice and theory in the article which seems to have prompted the long and inaccurate anonymous contribution above. Maybe get the theory sorted then look at the practice - or put the practice in a history entry. No doubt Marxism and communism are important but there seems to be an unwarranted emphasis on them. The anti-Soviet propaganda is in the wrong place, too. This emphasis may be because “egalitarianism”, on its own and without further qualification, means the left’s equality of outcome.
On the theory it seems to me all the listed items could be subsumed under one of:
- equality of opportunity which is the neoliberal preference
- equality of outcome which is the preference of the left
- political equality which is the preference of the powerless
- equality under the law, (also equal treatment of equal people which might be a different thing) which is the preference of traditional conservatives
It would be solid theory to show why and how the first two are head to head, and how the last is the pragmatic resolution of that conflict.
- Pepper 150.203.227.130 06:54, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
[edit] NPOV tag
I tagged the article because there is a pervasive slant to the article, favoring material redistribution. The article states that Marxism could only be achieved if there where no one with special powers to redistribute. But what it doesn't mention is that in order to get material egalitarianism, you give up equal liberty. Liberty and material equality are mutually exclusive. Unless you believe that those that have more, did not earn it. And that is wher the slant is. -- Dullfig 21:33, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Re: Changes and Revision
The article, as it was, had been tagged as needing Wikifying, plus Dullfig's correct NPOV tag. The changes were a serious attempt to address both issues. New material was added, citations provided, and the disproportionately large Marxism section deleted. Perhaps some of it is salvageable--if so, please consider reworking it and making it concise.
Several of the Christianity articles include this in their */See Also/* since Christian Egalitarianism has become somewhat of a hot topic. The introductory revisions attempt to show that the topic is philosophically inclusive and even speaks to this fairly new application of egalitarianism.Afaprof01 04:18, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Nonegalitarian POV
"Nonegalitarian thought and conduct often leads to injustice, resulting in such things as abuse of power, taking from others freedom, dignity, resources, and even life itself."
What relevance does the above have to the definition of nonegalitarian? It only expresses one POV of nonegalitarianism, characterizing it as unjust and basically wrong. Anyone object to removing it? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Matt Gerber (talk • contribs) 19:38, 22 March 2007 (UTC).
[edit] Biblical egalatarian view ?
The comments below the quote of Galatians 3:28 is biased. There are other possible interpretations and applications of this scripture. This scripture may be interpreted as Christ viewing everyone on an equal moral ground, having nothing to do with church duties or authority, or whether or not a wife should be submissive to her husband. Wikipedia is supposed to have unbiased entries, not to convince others that your religious belief's are the correct one. Even if you were to try to prove equality of men and women with other scriptures, you could not say that that is what was meant also by Galatians (spurious correlation). Scientific fact is considered as such by what is called "peer review"; general agreement among educated people in the field. If you wish to express religious Ideas that are widely disagreed with and therefore subject to interpretation, then it does not belong on Wikipedia; expressed as though it is fact.
- This is clearly stated as being the interpretation of "Christian egalitarians." It now acknowledges your point that there are other possible interpretations and applications of this scripture. Thanks for pointing out the need for clarification re: Gal. 3:28. Afaprof01 21:21, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
Why is there no mention of the Christian discrimination of gays? The article professes that the christian egalitarian view holds all to be equal, this is obviously not so
[edit] hunter-gatherer egalitarianism
I added this as I thought it provided a non-modern example (although the research was conducted on modern groups). I'm not sure if it would be more appropriate in a subfield of egalitarianism,, but I thought it would be interesting contribution. Saxonwhittle 14:27, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Nonegalitarianism
the line "nonegalitarian thought and conduct often lead to injustice, resulting in such things as abuse of power, taking from others freedom, dignity, resources and even life itself." All without citation is clearly a strong POV. Clearly the previous lines about what constitute nonegalitarianism are basicly correct (that some people for whatever reason should be treated preferentially) though they really ought to have citations. But just stating as one of only two or three sentences on the subject that the view of nonegalitarianism thought and conduct often lead to injustice is a obvious POV. Nonegalitarianism conduct might lead to injustice, but it doesn't have to in theory. For example treating a person differently because their homeless, a drunk or drug addict or uneducated is clearly nonegalitarian in conduct. But is it injustice?, it might very well be but that doesn't mean it is. And its clearly not depriving a person of freedom, resources or even life iself to just treat a person differently without actually doing something to them. It may be depriving the person of dignity to do so, but that depends on the person him/her self. If a person does not feel there dignity was affected than it wasn't, dignity doesn't physically exist, so its all based upon personal percepttion. But even if you can say that all nonegalitarianism action does at length deprive people of this or that, it doesn't follow that nonegalitarianism thoght leads to any of the things mentioned. Regardless, without citations its a obvious POV. Colin 8 21:34, 8 April 2007 (UTC)
[edit] WikiProject class rating
This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as stub, and the rating on other projects was brought up to Stub class. BetacommandBot 03:57, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Merger proposal
I think that Equality of treatment should be merged with this article, as it is essentially the same thing. Do people agree? Tkn20 (talk) 18:07, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
…I enjoy reading, it was very interesting,Egalitarianism sounds of roman era 'itarian'what is the shortest simpelist way to describe something "Expression" Gathers' a-little Inventation Towards A Reason In Amongst Needs In Social Movement well my opinion and the only thing posibly out of Place could be Social for the words which start with S are a Particular event concerning something of ismD.G.DeL-Dorchester Mass3:00p.m.e.s.t.David George DeLancey (talk) 20:00, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
- "Equality of treatment" has never had references; I'm redirecting it to this article. -Yamara ✉ 06:55, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Why did Jesus consider Gentiles to be DOGS if there is Egalitarianism in Christianity?
I do think sometimes that Wikipedia is a Christian Missionary free encyclopedia to evangelize the mass, my I remind you that,The gift of god Jesus Christ say in Matthew 15:22-28 "I was sent [ONLY] to the lost of the house of Israel." .......It is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs
Is This Egalitarian statement? Calling Gentile Dogs not even Human?
The Sad Part Here Is That Jesus Agreed To help This Poor Women ONLY After She Agreed To Accept This Insult From The Mouth of Jesus.
She said: Yes, Lord: but even the dogs take the bits of food that fall to the flood from under their masters' table.
This Poor Women, At The Hands of Jesus, Had to Crawl and Accept This Insult before He Decided To Help Her.
Let Us see what Paul says
{Now I want you to realize that the head of every “Man” is “Christ”, and the head of the “Woman” is “Man”, and the head of “Christ” is “God”. [1 Cor 11:3]} where is the Egalitarianism ?
I am also left wondering as to whether the Bible even makes any explicit promises to its female adherents.
I am unaware of any, and raisethis in light of for example the following Biblical statements:
“ A man …. is the image and glory of God, but the woman is the glory of man. ….. Neither was man created for (the sake of) woman, but woman for man”. {1 Corinthians 11:7-9}
The Bible further emphatically states (contrary to your passionate wishes) that a total of:
“ … 144,000 men … who did not defile themselves with women” will ultimately be with Jesus. (All of whom being exclusively from the 12 tribes of Israel). {Revelations 7:5-8, 14:4}
This is in line with Matthew 19:28 which again clearly indicates that in the Hereafter (as on earth (Matthew 10:5-7; 15:24, 26)), Jesus’s role is exclusively associated with the 12 tribes of Israel.
I am unaware of any Biblical passage which specifically promises “any of the gentiles”, whether males or females (even those ‘undefiled by women’), “that they will actually enter Paradise”.
This comparative Biblical silence on these crucial issues is ‘spiritually deflating’, and strongly indicates that there is actually “no reward in waiting” for gentiles who adhere to the Israelite’s exclusive covenant (viz. the Bible Isaac and his Blood line alone GEN 17:19)).
There is NO Egalitarianism in Christianity,Please correct me if I am wrong by providing Biblical proof which explicitly states otherwise.
81.153.68.112 (talk) 17:27, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
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[edit] Mention of John Rawls
I find the description of Rawls' theory as "anti-egalitarian" in the section on opposing views to be a complete mis-characterization. Yes, he did argue "that those who have least, should benefit most from changes in policy." It was part of his "difference principle" involved in the process of transforming an unjust and unequal society into an egalitarian society. A basic overview of his theory can be found at this website set up by a professor at Western Kentucky University, Dr. Jan Garrett: http://www.wku.edu/~jan.garrett/ethics/matrawls.htm#ebl Lewisbricktop (talk) 04:01, 14 March 2008 (UTC)Lewisbricktop 23:03, 13 March 2008
