It is entirely possible that Vonnegut was a socialist and that he worried about the logical end of an obsession with "equality". He may have believed that soci

It is entirely possible that Vonnegut was a socialist and that he worried about the logical end of an obsession with "equality". He may have believed that socialism applied entirely and only to economic matters. After all, Marx wrote that socialism would unleash human potential: "while in communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes". (There is a better quote for this, which I cannot recall/find.). So Vonnegut may have thought that envy and a resentment of excellence were entirely apart from socialism. Now, I myself detest socialism, in part because I believe it establish a stupid, reductionist and overbroad "equality" as a goal in its own right and unleashes many forces to tear down excellence, freedom and accomplishment in its pursuit. I expect if this consequence of socialism were better understood we'd have far fewer socialists. But this is by no means obvious, and of course there will be many socialists who don't agree.