Saturday, April 07, 2012

The last refuge

of inequality.

The more I look, the more I see the cultural complex of egalitarianism at work: the sense of outrage and scandal at the mere existence of any kind of inequality, regardless of reason.

But oddly, one place where a fair number of Americans take inequality for granted is travel, as long as the carrier is privately owned. Air travel is the most obvious example. First class, business class, economy class. You can see the barrier right away. Priority boarding and deplaning, nicer seats, better food, their own bathroom. Why are not people horrified by this?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

?! ... Maybe Kojèvean-Toquevillian America has attain'd "equality of conditions" or "classlessness" (no distinction between noble and base in selfings), but isn't there inequality everywhere? Kojève had more influence on the meaning of Marx and Hegel in America and Europe than most intellectuals. Isn't that inequality?

Sure, inequality in air travel, but also in types of private cars (Mercedes and Ford). Some are homeless, some vacation on Martha's Vineyard, some have excellent private medical insurance plans and some have really restricted private insurance medical insurance plans. ...

And really there's "class" in the ordinary sense lots of places, e.g. between personnel with JDs from crummy law schools and personnel with JDs from Georgetown and Yale etc. ... Charles Murray described a rather extreme inequality of class between white Fishtown and white Belmont. (I seem to recall that Allan Bloom says Belmont in "Merchant of Venice" is the only place name in Shakespeare that seems to have no real-world correlate. Bloom suggests Parnassus is meant, but maybe we should assume Utopia, Jezebel?)

P.S. I recall a news story where high-ranking members of the NDP (maybe including Bob Rae at that time) flew maybe from Toronto to Vancouver first class in Air Canada, while regular party members flew economy class. They joked amiably about this through the curtain.

P.S. Maybe John Cleese's statement of resentment egalitarianism should be revised: »I'd like to wlecome the pommy bastard to Mount Parnassus and I'd like to remind him that we don't like stuck-up sticky beaks here!«

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