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> Meritocracy implies nothing about fairness or a level playing field. Meritocracy implies the person with the best skills gets the job. This only works if you

> Meritocracy implies nothing about fairness or a level playing field. Meritocracy implies the person with the best skills gets the job. This only works if you completely disregard the entire process through which someone attains skills. If this is indeed what Meritocracy is then it's even less adequate as a system than I previously believed. > The only way to fix what you've brought up is to have all children be taken from their parents at birth and raised in an equal opportunity community akin to The Giver. Is that what you want? False dichotomy. There is no possibility of a system between totalitarian child rearing by the state and a system rigged entirely and completely for the wealthy? Spare me.

SkyBelow 7y ago
>False dichotomy. There is no possibility of a system between totalitarian child rearing by the state and a system rigged entirely and completely for the wealthy? Spare me. The claim is that any such system would still have biases. Though I would claim even The Giver is not truly equal as parents are still individuals with unique roles in society and thus what they impart on their children is still unequal. So I would make a stronger claim. That level of equality is not physically possible. We can make things more equal, but you get into the messy politics of who do we do it on behalf of (for example, why favor people living in the US over people not).
- FussyZeus 7y ago
  > The claim is that any such system would still have biases. Any system built by humans has biases, thankfully we're not discussing The Giver, we're discussing our system here in the states, one that heavily biases the wealthy to the point of punishing the impoverished, and I don't believe either of those were accidental, and I also put forth that the myth of meritocracy is put forward BY those in power to dissuade criticism of it, specifically by invoking the argument you put forward, that absolute equality is impossible. Because apparently, because we can't make everyone absolutely 100% equal in opportunity (which is debatable, but hey) we shouldn't even attempt to address the gross inequality present in our system. For example, we could provide basic income so that struggling families wouldn't need to sacrifice time with their children to provide a base level of sustaining food and housing. For another, we could make college free, since society at large benefits from an educated populace, and since dozens of other countries have and have reaped benefits as a result. This eliminates the barriers the impoverished have to education, and stops a gutless and corrupt system from signing up the poor to an impoverished life of servitude in exchange for a modicum of opportunity. Neither of these does anything really radical other than take back power from the wealthy, which is probably why wealthy interests lobby so hard against them. Because while the rich preach meritocracy, they only do so on the grounds that the merit is money. > We can make things more equal, but you get into the messy politics of who do we do it on behalf of (for example, why favor people living in the US over people not). No I'd imagine we couldn't make a system that removes the advantages given from standing NATIONS. Do you have any other ridiculous ideas you'd like to put forth?

SkyBelow 7y ago

>False dichotomy. There is no possibility of a system between totalitarian child rearing by the state and a system rigged entirely and completely for the wealthy? Spare me. The claim is that any such system would still have biases. Though I would claim even The Giver is not truly equal as parents are still individuals with unique roles in society and thus what they impart on their children is still unequal. So I would make a stronger claim. That level of equality is not physically possible. We can make things more equal, but you get into the messy politics of who do we do it on behalf of (for example, why favor people living in the US over people not).

FussyZeus 7y ago
> The claim is that any such system would still have biases. Any system built by humans has biases, thankfully we're not discussing The Giver, we're discussing our system here in the states, one that heavily biases the wealthy to the point of punishing the impoverished, and I don't believe either of those were accidental, and I also put forth that the myth of meritocracy is put forward BY those in power to dissuade criticism of it, specifically by invoking the argument you put forward, that absolute equality is impossible. Because apparently, because we can't make everyone absolutely 100% equal in opportunity (which is debatable, but hey) we shouldn't even attempt to address the gross inequality present in our system. For example, we could provide basic income so that struggling families wouldn't need to sacrifice time with their children to provide a base level of sustaining food and housing. For another, we could make college free, since society at large benefits from an educated populace, and since dozens of other countries have and have reaped benefits as a result. This eliminates the barriers the impoverished have to education, and stops a gutless and corrupt system from signing up the poor to an impoverished life of servitude in exchange for a modicum of opportunity. Neither of these does anything really radical other than take back power from the wealthy, which is probably why wealthy interests lobby so hard against them. Because while the rich preach meritocracy, they only do so on the grounds that the merit is money. > We can make things more equal, but you get into the messy politics of who do we do it on behalf of (for example, why favor people living in the US over people not). No I'd imagine we couldn't make a system that removes the advantages given from standing NATIONS. Do you have any other ridiculous ideas you'd like to put forth?