Merit is derided as a concept by people who wish to discriminate to meet a goal. I view this as misguided because while people who wish to discriminate often h

Merit is derided as a concept by people who wish to discriminate to meet a goal. I view this as misguided because while people who wish to discriminate often have good intentions(theoretically discrimination simply means "recognition and understanding of the difference between one thing and another" after all) it's emblematic of the difficulties of discrimination that the most prevalent description of discrimination is "the unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people or things, especially on the grounds of race, age, or sex." I would say merit is a goal - it's never achieved as an end state and requires constant vigilance to stop entrenched powers from corrupting it.