"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others." The mindset of much of the world nowadays, indeed. It's interesting that "Animal Farm" was written against communism, in support of capitalism, and yet capitalism is as guilty of the above statement as much as communism is. The only difference is that in capitalism, we're open about it. And we couldn't care less.
We call it by different names now. We call it the survival of the fittest. We call it the will to power. Sometimes in a fit of mock humility we even invoke God's name and call ourselves blessed. But the essence of it is the same: we rank people according to their ability. In this one big rat race, all that matters anymore is rank.
Sure, I understand. Some human beings are better than others. They score higher on IQ tests, they get better grades in school, they make more money, they are more successful. Sure. That's the way things are. Human beings are not equal. Some are born innately more successful. Others work harder. Communism ignored this and that's why the system failed.
But what pisses me off is that people throw human worth into the equation. Sure, some people are more successful than others, but successful people are not worth more than the common man. All human lives are of equal value. That has been forgotten in the competition to succeed. We think that by being better than other people, the value of our lives become greater than the lives of others.
In the 1930s, the people of the Western World took the doctrine of the survival of the fittest to heart. They believed that the value of a person was based on how smart he was, and how much he contributed to society. Those who did not "make the grade" were refused immigration, barred from having children, and in some cases even neutered. The measure of the individual was the measure of his performance on an IQ test. This movement was called the eugenics movement.
And in the 1940s, the eugenics movement led directly or indirectly to the massacre of 6 million Jews, Gypsies, and other individuals in the Jewish Holocaust by the Nazis.
After the war, the eugenics movement was recognized as immoral and ethically unsound, and was consequently banned. The world had learned its lesson.
We seem to be forgetting what we have learned, unfortunately. Again we seem to be succumbing to social and political policies that rank individuals based on their intelligence and "contribution to society". Sometimes we call it meritocracy. Sometimes we call it "getting what we deserve". I call it the failure of humanity to rise above petty competition and recognize that we are ALL truly of equal value.
The other famous maxim from Animal Farm is Boxer the horse's anthem, "I Will Work Harder!". Hard work is a good thing, but if competition is all there is, then we might as well all end up just like Boxer:
I will work harder, indeed. But I no longer want to beat the dead horse. Sorry, Boxer.
3 comments:
hmmn touching on eugenics. I was talking about it with someone the other day and she was going on about how it's an evil idea, and how the Nazi's used it as an excuse to killl millions of people and all that.
It got me thinkin..When you look for a spouse, you look for someone who is appealing to you. our ideal spouse is usually someone who is attractive, intelligent, funny, etc.
my question is, is finding a mate who fits all these criteria a form of eugenics? And if it is, is it evil?
Well, in my opinion anyway, the evil of eugenics was that it placed people into different categories of worth and FORCED those of "lower value" into non-reproduction.
In choosing a mate, sure, you categorize people somewhat, but you (usually) don't impose your will upon them. Also, the eye of the beholder principle applies, thus everyone has the potential to be attractive in some way. Unlike eugenics, in which people are ranked according to some arbitrary common standard.
human everytime think of equality, hope one day everyone is equal, communism wan that, they thought the only way is destroy difference in human, destroy it is one way(shortcut), but can we??? i think the only way to have equality in human is embrace difference....rather than destroy difference which father of komunis wan to do ....u know, just like he wan body made out of protein only rather than so many shit element...then carbohidrat will be more important than fat, and fat more important than sodium in our body...everything is important leh...just quantity we need concern
i just think communism apply in wrong way....just like chinese goverment last time based on Conficious, who said rather than persaingan, we work together peeacefully ...persaingan might cause fight....but without persaingan human become weak....hand get short maybe...and then chinese called as Pesakit orang timur for hundred years...tat whys beijing olympics is so important for them to break their hundred years curse
The fact is we are same but aslo can said not same, common and got difference....complexity...
Now u see Malaysia goverment stupid one, divide ppl so easy, smart go science , dumb go art...so easy they categorize people...just like Michael Owen play as defender and Puyol is defender play as striker...stupid man....sperm cell go become brain cell...got future MALAYSIA
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