Paul Fiery
2 min readNov 3, 2021

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Your position is well stated. Two "howevers:"

What you've written here represents what you think, but it's not what "the left" is saying. The loudest voices on the left are in favor of unequal government policy enforcing actual equality of result. Ibram X Kendi is a far louder voice than yours, and advocates explicitly for such a mechanism, an overlord tribunal to evaluate outcomes and adjust conditions so the outcomes are equalized. I've read his work; this is what he says. It's not an ill-motivated mischaracterization.

It's always interesting what is not said. Let's assume an equal beginning for a set of individuals that meets your standards of equality of opportunity. What do those individuals need to do if they are to prosper? The virtues required are those the left never highlights except to denounce them. Self-control. Focus. Timeliness. Logic. Effort. Etc. With the left, the emphasis is never on what an individual can do for themselves to advance their conditions and create the outcome they desire. And yet, it is individual action that is by far the best "equalizer" of outcomes, as is demonstrated by the many inspiring histories of individuals who rose against the odds and achieved their goals in life.

I do see a third "however," which is the question of how true equality of opportunity is to be achieved. Does everything return to the state upon a person's death? Even this wouldn't do it, because lifetimes are randomly staggered. We don't all start at the same time.

I strongly agree with you about things governments have done to favor white people and disadvantage black people in the past. I think this is exactly why government should just get out of the business of trying to correct outcomes. Anyone who genuinely wants to help people who have been set back this way should find such people and directly and individually help them. This whole business of setting oneself up as a kind of savior and presuming to achieve it not by giving of one's own time and money but by inducing government to do it is a moral perversion that is much better at creating terrible "unintended" consequences. Want to help? Find someone in need and help them.

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Paul Fiery

Observing. Gathering and curating ideas. Getting ready.