Do We Need To Discriminate?
Once a society ceases to have stable identities, it is bereft of roles and hence of any organic structure to hold itself together.
‘Do we need discrimination?’ is a question that might sound rhetorical, perhaps even ironical to some. ‘What is there to discuss?’ says the voice of justice in us. ‘Isn’t this the defining realization of the era that discrimination is a vice we should be rid of?’ We want to be free of prejudiced exclusion, constraints etc. Yet I’ve become rather convinced over time that many of the terms we employ can be much more multi-faceted than we normally give them credit for, and ‘discrimination’ feels no exception. Failing to delve into the deeper meaning of a notion, however, comes with a danger of discarding not only the limiting, but also the part that could aid us.
‘Discrimination’ is a loan from Latin where the verb ‘discriminare’ means, first and foremost, ‘to distinguish, to make a distinction between things’ – a meaning which is still there in contemporary English. The word has thus expressed a human ability – as well as a need – to distinguish between different objects and phenomena, so as to better orient oneself in the world. The need has been both practical – for separating edible from inedible, hot from cold, safe from threatening – as well as purposeful for setting fairer goals, both individually and communally.
Its deplorable meaning of unfair exclusion manifests itself only once we start abusing the ability and base ourselves on distinction where we should rather prioritise unity. It manifests itself when we use it not for an improved understanding of the world, or our orientation in it, but in pursuit of taking advantage of others. The same goes for presuming a greater right to various benefits than others, be it then based on one’s status of birth or some other relative criteria. In other words, it manifests once we start denying our shared humanity, or a shared act of life.
A pair of extremes
What needs to be understood, however, is that extremes are possible in both directions and all extremes will eventually constitute oppression. The extreme of restricting others’ freedom and birthright in favour of one’s own privileged distinction, be it in the shape of slavery or political imprisonments, religious or racial denigration, is well known to us from history. We seem to have learnt, or at least reconsidered that such attitudes will bring harm not only to those they’ve been employed on, but on the ones employing them as well, for it ruptures the overall social cohesion.
However, as the initial meaning of the word shows, it is an equal extreme to think that there aren’t any distinctions in the world or amongst people whatsoever, and that all can be reduced to our unity. This would, first of all, turn identity into a rather arbitrary notion - for we are all then “just the same” - and yet gives rise to voices that view any kind of nationalism as segregation and any appeal for traditionalism, be it in the context of marriage, family, environment etc, as intolerance towards the ‘new and progressive’. At the same time, it explains why some of the so-called equity movements, in overthrowing the former unjust way of distinctions, factually seek to perpetuate the same phenomenon in a different form, with redistributed privileges and exclusions. It won’t be hard to find examples of claiming pride over beautiful black skin colour, but God forbid one were to think the same of the white-skinned, or of views regarding a trans-person a symbol of tolerant and fulfilled society, while placing the oppressor image on a hard-working traditionalist family father, etc. Availing vast resources to highlighting a small number of minorities, the line between recognition and propaganda has become rather dim. And the saddest part of it is that we seem to have lost our faith in man’s natural goodness (in presuming guilt ever more often than innocence).
It feels inevitable that once we begin to determine one’s rights and moral dignity by criteria like race, gender, persuasion or sexual preferences and find, in whatever way or form, that some of them should give one preference over the others, we have already abandoned the ground our unity as people and a society should stand upon. Denying the unfathomable subtlety of ourselves and all life, we will then try to replace our spiritual essence by a mechanical, material structure. We will allow the law to take the place of our innate sense of fellowship, and the designated morality of a temporal social norm to outweigh the overarching dynamic reality around us. However, such a strategy is looking for an answer in a wrong category.
The yardstick of nature
Without desiring to take an overly naturalistic stance here, I cannot deny to have found nature a useful yardstick in searching for a line of balance. Laws of nature have been in function for millenia and shown themselves (to use the modern word) sustainable. Nature was there before us and is way larger than us, and even if man has occassionally tried to overcome its laws by setting rivers run backward or growing southern crops at northern latitudes – both well-known examples of the Soviet era – he has never really succeeded. Once we enthrone ourselves as rulers and creators of what we see and start inventing laws contrary to nature’s accords, we are more than likely to end up in a state of chaos.
Several of the West’s current ‘progressive ideas’ will falter in this view, be they the licence to shift one’s gender on the go, or the strive for absolute equality, or a denial of any worth in a structure of hierarchy. What is nature’s absolute equality? Are hippos equal to lions, midgets to beetles, clover to roses, finches to storks? What is the democracy of a flock of geese or a pack of roedeer? The notion manifests itself here not in equal possessions, uniformity of roles or a ban to see oneself as different from others. It manifests itself in a realization that one is part of a larger whole and has a concurrent right to take from nature what one needs to fulfil it. The overall balance is never perverted by such action.
There is a verse in India’s theistic literature, in “Shri Ishopanishad”, that makes a similar claim. It says, “Everything animate or inanimate that is within the universe is controlled and owned by the Lord. One should therefore accept only those things necessary for himself, which are set aside as his quota, and one should not accept other things, knowing well to whom they belong.” In this view, inequality is brought about by a desire to take more than one needs, and it should be this understanding that can serve as a basis for a real ideology of equity. Someone’s self-realization, be it for personal or social fulfilment, might aim for more than others, and he or she might thus require proportionately more to achieve them. Yet what we don’t see in nature is a single owner amassing singular wealth, and even less so without a commitment to one’s community. And yet the reality of our seemingly equality-loving, liberal society is that the overriding majority of posessions being owned by a spectacularly small minority of people. In the 21st century, colonialism – the usurpation of roots, or identity – is realized through corporate power.
Absolute equality or identity cancellation?
Speaking recently at National Review Institute Ideas Summit in Washington D.C., author Douglas Murray proposed this view as a social basis of equality: “Nobody should be held back from whatever it is that they can attain by tint of their virtues and achievements simply by some characteristic over which they have no say [i.e. their sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation etc]. Nothing should hold you back if you have the capability to fulfil your goals.” As thought by Murray in the context of American society, but probably valid in much of the Western world, it is hard to imagine any sizable opposition to such a proposition – any considerable crowd that would say no, we want certain people to be curtailed in their self-realization, on the above grounds, regardless of their skill and merit. If so – and I think there is all the reason to believe so – it feels fair to acknowledge that legislations hatched-up in a proclaimed pursuit of faster equality or equity are, to a degree or another, led by an ideological interest rather than a practical need.
No one is going to feel offended by distinguishing a chicken from a rooster, a sheep from a ram, a cow from a bull. No one will say that such a vision of nature is insufficiently inclusive. To the contrary, it is by such markers that we will be able to know how to interact with others and treat them in the way that is appropriate to the case.
It feels that in the seemingly noble fight for everyone’s painstakingly ‘free’ self-determination, a number of traditional notions and ideas are now hijacked. (And isn’t appropriation of language perhaps another form of cultural colonialism?) For what is there to replace ‘gender’, ‘marriage’, ‘family’ for those who wish to use them in their traditional meaning? What is left of the self-determination right of those who wish to distinguish the union of a man and a woman from other forms of familial union – not as a matter of evaluation, but in mere distinguishing of those. What tool is left there for those who wish to see people’s physical, natal sex as a way to orient themselves in the world? Or what is left of the metaphysical ties of a womanly, or manly relations with the nature and the environment?
Identity, or that which we identify ourselves with – from Latin ‘idem’, ‘the same’ – can really be formed only as a consequence of unforced, inner growth and development. Once a society ceases to have stable identities, it is bereft of roles and hence of any organic structure to really hold it together. Instead of desired inclusivity, it may easily end up with a single-faced, pruned reality that despite its coloured banners and slogans will recognize only those differences and minorities that suit its ideological purpose. The only remaining way to avoid chaos in this situation is to submit all to a state of extreme regulation. Yet chaos will follow sooner or later even then, since overregulation is never a natural condition.
In today’s West, one is left with a growing sense of a mix-up between two notions – exclusion and differentiation, discriminating against something and discriminating between something. Of course, it is unkind to belittle someone for being obese, but this doesn’t alter the fact that obesity isn’t a healthy condition that increases the risk of multiple complications. Of course, one should never be derided for one’s sexual disposition either – yet that doesn’t alter the fact that two people of the same sex cannot conceive a child between them. And to say it means nothing feels like another attempt at making rivers run backward.
Erase people’s roots (and what else are roots if not identity) and soon you’ll be able to push them in any direction – even toward accepting material welfare as liberty, or some vague ideological slogan as virtue. And this, I believe, is something we should surely avoid – unless we accept the opposite as the actual agenda.