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Fairness is leveling the playground. It's not equality. By birth, you are unequal. Would you say we should have the same measures for people with physical disa

Fairness is leveling the playground. It's not equality. By birth, you are unequal. Would you say we should have the same measures for people with physical disabilities from birth and healthy athletes? No. That's why we have separate categories or measures. That is fair. And that is not treating everyone equally.

baconandeggs 6y ago
As sad as it is, I say we have to accept reality, and that means that a person with disabilities will not be able to do certain things, which does not mean he/she has nothing to do. Maybe he won't be an athlete but he can of course be a novelist. But we first have to accept the real world and get off this childish notion we are all born equal because as you pointed out, we sadly are not.
- grafporno 6y ago
  I take it you consider yourself born on the right side of "not equal", more specifically the "better" side?
  - dane-pgp 6y ago
    See also the "original position" thought experiment: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_position https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_position
- searchableguy 6y ago
  I think you missed my point. We evaluate people differently on their backgrounds already. A 10 year old will be judged and rewarded in a favorable way compared to a 30 year old programmer. My example was to highlight the bias that people already acknowledge as fair. Poverty is a handicap in similar fashion. When we acknowledge the former in age should be judged more leniently and with grater praise, we refer to the statistical odds of a 10 year old being as good as a 30 year old and other 10 year olds. That's the reality. You are refusing to accept it by removing the background of people in your hypothetical world. Fairness is not based on outcome. Someone who never had access to computers, internet, mentors, etc would be judged differently compared to someone who always did. At least I would.
ghostwriter 6y ago
The notion of everyone being equal has to do with the equality under the rule of law, and nothing else. There can be no other categories of measures in that regard precisely because you cannot perform any meaningful measures across several different dimensions of differences. For instance, would you be able to make a meaningful measure of who is underprivileged the most - an orphan billionare who is not likeable by anyone in his close circle of "friends" or a poor family of 5 who regularly get invited to family dinners in their community? What are the standards?

baconandeggs 6y ago

As sad as it is, I say we have to accept reality, and that means that a person with disabilities will not be able to do certain things, which does not mean he/she has nothing to do. Maybe he won't be an athlete but he can of course be a novelist. But we first have to accept the real world and get off this childish notion we are all born equal because as you pointed out, we sadly are not.

grafporno 6y ago
I take it you consider yourself born on the right side of "not equal", more specifically the "better" side?
- dane-pgp 6y ago
  See also the "original position" thought experiment: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_position https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_position
searchableguy 6y ago
I think you missed my point. We evaluate people differently on their backgrounds already. A 10 year old will be judged and rewarded in a favorable way compared to a 30 year old programmer. My example was to highlight the bias that people already acknowledge as fair. Poverty is a handicap in similar fashion. When we acknowledge the former in age should be judged more leniently and with grater praise, we refer to the statistical odds of a 10 year old being as good as a 30 year old and other 10 year olds. That's the reality. You are refusing to accept it by removing the background of people in your hypothetical world. Fairness is not based on outcome. Someone who never had access to computers, internet, mentors, etc would be judged differently compared to someone who always did. At least I would.

ghostwriter 6y ago

The notion of everyone being equal has to do with the equality under the rule of law, and nothing else. There can be no other categories of measures in that regard precisely because you cannot perform any meaningful measures across several different dimensions of differences. For instance, would you be able to make a meaningful measure of who is underprivileged the most - an orphan billionare who is not likeable by anyone in his close circle of "friends" or a poor family of 5 who regularly get invited to family dinners in their community? What are the standards?