Equality, Discrimination and Equal Opportunities

I realise that these are popular buzz words these days; however, during my recent studies, I have come to realise that many people are not very sure what they exactly mean and what sort of impact they (are supposed to) have.

What is your opinion?

Do you consider all the legislation is needed? Are we making make a mountain out of a mole hill? Are the awareness campaigns helping or making these worse?

Play nicely.

(And, no: This is not part of my course work; you will not be doing my homework for me by responding! :p)

Of course it depends on country to country.

Equality refers to equality before the law and equality of rights (which is the same as equality before the law but I guess people may not realize that), not equality of outcome.

Discrimination is a complicated term. There should not be discrimination when it comes to civil rights, which I suspect is related to equality beofre the law. But when there are certain criteria for a job, physical capability requirements for say a policeman or a firefighter, that is legal and proper discrimination. I am not knowledable enough to articulate a distinction between moral and immoral discrimination, but i think with the example I gave that one can intuit it.

Equal opportuninities is certainly an even more nubulous notion and probably within the realm of constant debate. What exactly is an equal opportunity? Certainly providing education for the general masses is providing the foundation of equal opportunity. But if a rich kid has money and can start his own business with daddy's money and a poor kid can't, was the poor kid denied an equal opportunity? To some degree yes (but he could probably get a loan). The level of equal opportunity is within the bounds of a society's values.

Equality means that the advantages of the best barrister, legal team, legal fighting fund, boundless time and energy to pursue justice, rich and powerful connections, and membership of the dominant racial and religious profiles should not confer too much advantage before the law.

Restricting Discrimination means law to punish actions those that disadvantage people because they belong to selected minority or underprivileged group. Law enforcement, of course, depends upon Equality, as defined above.

Equal Opportunities means good will in the rich and powerful, in the absence of laws, to favour those suffering Discrimination, as defined above.

Is 'all the legislation is needed'? No, if the rich and powerful provide Equal Opportunities to all. No, if existing legislation has little impact on Restricting Discrimination, or if Equality before the law is token.

As with most words of this ilk, connotation and context determine the important aspects of their contemporary meanings.

Equality: hey, it's a good thing. We all want a fair shake at life's material and immaterial offerings. When we think we have this fair shake, we call that feeling "equality".

Discrimination: this sucks. It means we don't feel like we have a fair shake at life's material or immaterial offerings. And what sucks even more is that it's not our fault. Something in the cultural/political structure of our society is putting up an antiquated or otherwise illegitimate blockade to our advancement.

Equal Opportunity: this is both good and sucky. It means that we all have a fair chance, but if we don't get what we want, well, it ain't our cultural/political structure that stopped us. We were either too dumb, too lazy, or too unlucky to get it. "Rain falls on the just and unjust alike" sort of thing.

Now, I have go post some nice, socially acceptable words somewhere else on this forum because the gosh darn discrimination here against honest curses is an attack against my sense of equality, but at least I'm consoled by the sense that this forum is guided by a bevy of equal opportunity in that what sucks for me, sucketh also for others. ;)

IMPORTANT NOTE: the sentiments above are meant to illustrate and amuse and do not necessarily reflect those of the author, lest he be discriminated against in his future efforts on this forum. :)

Virgil> If things like good education or health care depends on income, can we expect people have "equal rights/opportunities"?

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Originally Posted by Gladys

Is 'all the legislation is needed'? No, if the rich and powerful provide Equal Opportunities to all. No, if existing legislation has little impact on Restricting Discrimination, or if Equality before the law is token.

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What would you recommend?

A scenario... If you are getting out of your way to make a "gay" or "Muslim" member of your team or class at home, isn't this discrimination? You are still singling them out by trying not to discriminate against them, treating them differently?

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Originally Posted by Scheherazade

Virgil> If things like good education or health care depends on income, can we expect people have "equal rights/opportunities"?What would you recommend?

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Equal rights is the same as equality, which means equality before the law. That has nothing to do with income. Those deal with how society and more importantly government deals with you.

As to equal opportunity, there is no utopia. It is impossible to have pure equal opportunity. Even in a pure communist society, people have advantages as to who knows who and where you live and who takes a liking to you. You can almost translate those kinds of advantages into a moneyed/class equivilence. One can certainly have a government that spends as much as possible on ensuring equal opportunities, but then that would violate another concept that you haven't mentioned, justice. To spend greater amounts of money on attempting to ensure what is impossible to ensure and has a point of deminishing returns seems ridiculous. And at what point to you kill incentives to strive to improve yourself by giving things out for nothing? To satisfy lavish spending you have to do something that I feel is unjust, and that is take money from people who have legally earned it, saved it, and have their own desires and dreams. That to me is not justice. So like I said in my first comment, equal opportunity is part of a society's debate and a legislative process. What is the proper balance of what i call a safety net of support that allows for a reasonable amount of equal opportunity and maintains a sense of justice for people to keep what they earn? That's for governments and through your voting to figure out. Some of the governemts have around a 50/50 split between what you earn and what the government takes through all sorts of various ways to tax you. Some even take more than that. I find even as much as 50/50 immoral. I don't believe the government has a moral right to take more than a third of what one earns. But that's just me. Remember you don't have the free choice in the matter, and the government does it with the threat of jail if you refuse, and that means that they are confiscating your earnings and savings at the point of a gun. That to me is not liberty. And there's another concept for you to add. Justice as I mentioned above and liberty. We can reduce this down to how does society balance justice, liberty, and equal opportunity.

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Originally Posted by Scheherazade

What would you recommend?

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That's easy. Redraft Equality and Discrimination legislation to minimise the influence of power and money on the legal process. The only problem I foresee is persuading the rich and powerful to legislate to limit their own influence.

Virgil> I cannot say I agree with you on your claim that these things have nothing to do with money. Even equality in front of law... Very simple example that if you are well-off and get to hire a good lawyer for yourself, the outcome of your interaction with law might be different.

(I don't mean to say that law is written differently for rich and poor but how it is put into place).

Gladys> Won't those who are doing the redrafting have power over others than?

I am a little surprised with the turn this thread has taken actually... because there is a lot more than rich/poor difference than to equal opportunities and equal rights.

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Originally Posted by Scheherazade

Gladys> Won't those who are doing the redrafting have power over others than?

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Those redrafting, allies of a segment of the rich and powerful, will have as much 'power over others' as they choose to give themselves.

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Originally Posted by Scheherazade

...there is a lot more than rich/poor difference than to equal opportunities and equal rights.

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While revolution, church, mass media and celebrities may from time to time have effects contrary to draconian law, enacted by agents of the rich and powerful - as with voices dissenting to the genocide of Tasmanian aborigines in 19th century Australia - these effects rarely amount to much, even in the long term.

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Originally Posted by Scheherazade

Virgil> I cannot say I agree with you on your claim that these things have nothing to do with money. Even equality in front of law... Very simple example that if you are well-off and get to hire a good lawyer for yourself, the outcome of your interaction with law might be different.

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You are asking for life to be perfect, and it can never be. Sure the odds are a rich person may be able to get a better lawyer (and i'm not exactly sure how one defines a better lawyer), but rich people go to jail too. There are some high profile cases where a rich person has gotten off but I think on balance the disparity is not huge. Most of the rich people who get off are actually celebrities, and there you can question whether their celebrity status got them off (since it gives them a different aura before a jury) rather than their riches. Bernie Madoff (not sure if I spelled that right) with all the billions didn't get off. I think that's somewhat over blown. Plus it goes for judicial review in the US. Not sure how it works elsewhere.

So what would you do? I've actually questioned whether the jury system is best. Most legal people here claim it is, but a professional judge is less likely to be persuaded by a good lawyer. Who knows. I'm sure there are ramifications to a Judge as jury. What would you suggest?

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Originally Posted by Scheherazade

I am a little surprised with the turn this thread has taken actually...

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Progress in social equity stems from a critical mass of radical individuals acting in pursuit of their own self interest.

For instance, such individuals frequently seek to improve the lot of relatives or friends. Eventually this snowball of pressure for greater social equity impacts on public opinion, politicians and existing legislation.

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Originally Posted by Scheherazade

I realise that these are popular buzz words these days; however, during my recent studies, I have come to realise that many people are not very sure what they exactly mean and what sort of impact they (are supposed to) have.

What is your opinion?

Do you consider all the legislation is needed? Are we making make a mountain out of a mole hill? Are the awareness campaigns helping or making these worse?

Play nicely.

(And, no: This is not part of my course work; you will not be doing my homework for me by responding! :p)

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These are fragile catchwords and mostly pronounced by politicians. The theory of evolution holds that life is full of struggles and those who can struggle or compete or rival can survive and those who cannot will be extinct in point of fact for there is no space for the weak.

Equality and equal opportunities are the rhetoric slogans of rulers, sweetened diction and they make profuse use of them in order to entice the common man but these politicians are really arrogant.

I never beleive that people in power will give you anything our of benevolence at all.