The Peripatetic Philosopher shares:

Demographic Profile

 THE WORLD IN DISORDER

 AN EXCHANGE BETWEEN TWO READERS – CARL AND SIMON

James R. Fisher, Jr., Ph.D.

© September 17, 2014

“They who say all men are equal speak an undoubted truth, if they mean that all have an equal right to liberty to their property, and to their protection of the laws.  But they are mistaken if they think men are equal in their station and employments, since they are not so by their talents.”

Voltaire (1694-1778), author of Candide (1759)

WE ARE NOT ALL THE SAME!

This may seem self-evident, but many act as if we are all the same.  No two individuals look alike, so it shouldn’t surprise us that no two individuals think or act alike, much less are equally endowed with the same ability.  Yet, we can become frustrated to the point of anger when people don’t comprehend things as quickly as we do, or behave as we think they should. 

Carl and Simon are two readers who regularly react to the postings of my missives.  They however display a different take on what I have to say, which is not only quite all right, but to be applauded.  Thinking gets us in touch with who and what we are, and in a way, introduces us to ourselves.

While everyone seemingly agrees that death and taxes are certainties, why are so many of us less comfortable with differing belief systems or such matters as the rich and the poor, the gifted and the common, the ambitious and the lazy, the fortunate and the luckless?   

Could it be that we fail to accept ourselves as we are, and therefore have a problem accepting others as we find them?  Do we not see that equal opportunity is not the same as equality?  We have a right to equal opportunity, but we don't have the same talent, as Voltaire reminds us. 

We are all different, unique, and should be happy that we are.  Diversity of interests and talent makes for a dynamic and energetic society.  We are bound to differ widely in skills, abilities, energy, passion, commitment, and drive.  It is the nature of being human.  Then there are those who “seize the day,” and others who wait for the day to seize them.  Admittedly, some are born into special circumstances that gives them a considerable edge.  It happens!

*     *     *

On PBS television, Ken Burns presented a documentary on the Roosevelts, profiling the lives of Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Eleanor Roosevelt.  They came out of a patrician class as did Great Britain’s Queen Elizabeth and her husband Prince Philip of Greece, as they were both great-great-grandchildren of Queen Victoria. 

Intermarrying within the aristocracy has been common.  Then we have the gentrified Sir Winston Churchill with an American born mother.   Cousins Theodore Roosevelt and Franklin Delano Roosevelt rose to the Presidency of the United States, while another cousin, Eleanor Roosevelt, became the wife of FDR, and the First Lady. 

Perhaps less grand but nonetheless notable, we have the father and son, George Herman Walker Bush and George Walker Bush rise to be President of the United States. 

Theodore Roosevelt took a passive pastoral nation to hegemony prominence in the early 20^th century, while the Bush family bridged the 20^th century with early 21^st century with their presidencies.  So, while we Americans claim to be a classless society, blue bloods commonly rise to the top in America’s leadership roles.   

Ken Burns’ video history of the Roosevelt family is not a hagiography, but a balanced view of the family’s heroics and flaws, frailties and vanities, which mirror our own national psyche. 

For example, Theodore Roosevelt was compulsive to the point of madness with blind ambition. His real and imagined deficiencies coupled with his obvious assets finds his bust atop Mount Rushmore, along with George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln.

Franklin Roosevelt, on the other hand, was a party animal. This prompted Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes to say “He has a second-class intellect, but a first-class temperament.” As it turned out, that is what the nation needed in World War Two.

His wife, First Lady Eleanor, was stable, mature, balanced and effectively engaged in social and cultural issues.  She was also insecure and suspicious of her husband’s many flirtations.  Quietly, she did amazing things for the poor and disadvantaged as well as military veterans and their families during the war while her husband, the president, took the bows.  That said she was a notable asset to his four successive reelections to the presidency.   

The Roosevelt’s were born to wealth, status and privilege.  They turned their attention to the service of the nation.  We have not often seen their kind, nor their kind of leadership. Some would argue that FDR, with his comprehensive economic “New Deal” policy during The Great Depression, may have spawned our eventual national codependency on the Federal Government, rather than sponsoring our collective initiative to socioeconomic independence.     

Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected as president for the first time when I was born.  I grew up captivated by his personality and his homespun warmth listening to his “fire side chats” on the radio.  His picture was on the wall of our modest working class home along with Pope Pius XII, two equally patrician men of the times. 

The president and the pope were groomed from birth for command.  It was not necessary for them to define that role or assume that commitment.  In contrast, our age is obsessively self-conscious of who leads and who is meant to follow.  The consequence of this is palpably evident in the political gridlock of the United States Congress.  In everyday life, it is simply manifest chaos. 

We once took charge and defined the times.  Now we wait for events to define ours.

For the past quarter century, I have been pondering this matter, looking back to see ahead, noting how often we repeat the same chronic problems and embrace the same tired solutions.  These observations have been reduced to missives.  Many respond to them sharing their views.   

Such is the case of Carl and Simon.  They have taken the time to think through what I have said and react to it based on their own values, beliefs and experience.  I applaud them for it as I learn from them.  In that sense, this process is a way of introducing us to ourselves.

In “Meet Your New Best Friend” (2014), I write:

We are all authors of our own footprints in the sand, heroes of the novels inscribed in our hearts.  Everyone’s life, without exception, is sacred, unique, scripted high drama, playing out before an audience of one, with but one actor on stage.  The sooner we realize this, the more quickly we overcome the bondage of loneliness and find true friendship with ourselves.

Theodore Roosevelt struggled with this proposition of identity all his life, while his cousin, Franklin, never gave it much thought until he was cut down with polio in his thirties.  

Life is always crying out to get our attention whatever our nature or the particularity of our birth.    

CARL RESPONDS:

You are right, I am not angry.  I find the ignorance of human nature interesting.  I have learned many things from students and, hopefully, them from me. 

While studying art, the concepts that were used to teach drawing came from a book “The Natural Way to Draw.” I used that method in my drawing classes. 

What I found was that just as everyone can learn to write, everyone can also learn to draw if they make the effort.  However, just as it does not mean everyone who learns to write will become a great writer, so it is also true that everyone who learns to draw does not achieve the same level of success. 

After I got my MA degree in art education, I started teaching art classes to 7th graders.  One of the ideas pushed in the art education classes was that the teacher should put all the students' works on the bulletin board no matter the quality. 

After the first two weeks, students started asking why certain pieces were on the bulletin board because they thought they were not very good.  After that lesson from my students, I only put “A” work on the bulletin board.  After that, students would work hard to get their work on the board. Interesting, huh?

For anyone who would disagree with that, I would respond that in sports as in everything else, everyone is not equal.  Inequality, in that sense, is inevitable. 

We can all learn something up to a point if we work hard, but everyone will not achieve the same level of quality. 

That is the same in all parts of life including economics.  If people are given things without effort, they will never work to achieve more.  That is what I have learned, and that is how I teach.

SIMON RESPONDS:

These "welfare" discussions are so tedious. Less than 10% of the federal budget is allocated to the poor.

There are actually people who are living in cardboard boxes. Yes, there are other forms of welfare that are not included in my ten percent. That would be Social Security, Medicare (not Medicaid), and corporate subsidies.

Still, 10% is less than half the defense budget. It is also less than half of what the federal government pays in pensions.

That's the crux of my argument. "Taking from the rich" is not "giving to the poor." There's a bit of (well, maybe a lot of) narrow-mindedness that informs most of these arguments.

We tend to blame systems for things we don't like. It's not my fault seems to be the mantra favored by the have nots as well as the haves. In the end, every war, every disturbance, can be traced back to two things - money and religion. Money usually takes the lead and religion follows on as an excuse.

The reality is most of us work hard to get what we have. Others, through laziness or bad luck are trumped by the aggressors who experience good fortune and become the statistical outliers.

When those with good fortune are asked to pay a bit more in taxes to improve the infrastructure that allowed them to become rich, it's only fair, don’t you think?  

DR. FISHER COMMENTS:

If readers feel Carl and Simon seem to be talking past each other, it may be because they are commenting on the most sensitive subject of equality and inequality from their own experience and perspective.  

When we wax with candor, our own personal biography surfaces and reveals what truly moves us to get up in the morning and “seize the day.”  It is such disclosure that is good for the soul. 

It doesn’t follow that anyone is right or necessarily wrong but it does show how hard it is for us to be on the same page discussing the same issues.  Imagine the magnitude of this problem when we bring in the mix of different languages and cultural values. 

The world is in disorder for reason.  Peoples across the globe are being forced into this electronic age without the necessary cultural, economic or educational foundation.  We see people on America’s streets with iPhones and other electronic gadgets who cannot afford their rent.  

We are moving to global interdependence and are exercised because people in the fast food service industry make less than $10 an hour, when more than 2 billion souls across the globe don’t make $10 a month.  

Change starts with conversation.  Expressing our views, voicing our concerns and articulating beliefs openly provides a small window of opportunity to promote common understanding that eventually will benefit us all.