Qwark said:
That's only true if you count that every group of people, whether its gender religions or races and person are inherently the same and have the same hopes and dreams. In some cultures especially Asian ones which outperform us being a doctor or lawyer has a very high status. Man and woman are also inherently different (still equals of course). Aside from obvious body changes the Psych and brain of woman largely differ from males which is why women in general have more talent for teaching, life sciences, healthcare etc. So if I would state the formula it is as follows and gross oversimplification: Status + Culture + Talents + Time + Equal oppurtunities = Outcome. Which does not always have to be very comparable to an other group of people. For instance I studied Landscape and Environment Management, something a bit of a Dutch thing. As with most Spatial and Environmental studies its a field in which Dutch white males have a high representation, but that doesn't mean there is a direct inequality. Since we all have the freedom of individual choice and we choose what we like and your background, culture, religion, gender etc. are all very relevant for that choice. So if a said group of people chooses a different field of studie. Asians are overrepresented in comparison with other races in technical studies for example, probably because culture, background, expectations etc. than that doesn't mean an Asian can't follow the same studie as I did. Some might choose to do so and have the same chance as succeeding as me. Hé has an equal oppurtunity of succeeding as me. The difference is I see equality on the level of the individual as a liberal (college is free over here) and you see it for the society as the left prefers too. And if you purely look at the oppurtunities of the individual a black female has as much chance to succeed for her education as her white male co-student. Whether her environment supports her as much is another story but has few to do with equality of oppurtunitie, especially on an individual level which is how I see equality of oppurtunity. |
I think you've described very well what my problem with the liberal view is. Let's use your formula. We have two people with the same talent and equal opportunities. With your formula, the outcome for these two people may be different due to their culture or gender (these two persons aren't responsable for their gender or culture, they are given). It's not a big deal when the difference in outcome is that girls tend to work as nurses and boys tend to work as construction workers but when it's systematically harder for women or minorities to get into powerful positions we have a big problem at our hands.
Also, I should have explained my formula a little better (the formula is a bit inaccurate and to simple, i should try to come up with a formula who describes me thoughts better).
In my definition of equality of opportunity all those things like culture, gender, etc are already factored in. Obviously we can'twe can't force a certain culture on to people or give all people the same gender but we can negate the influence of these differences on certain important Outcomes ( like becoming a politician).
