To my knowledge, which is two bushels short of two and a half bushels, no Old Timey Greek Philosopher concerned himself or herself with 'fairness.'
That they never expected their gods to be fair is quite apparent from the stories that survive, so my appreciation of their lack of appreciation for fairness can easily be appr... seen.
"But that's not FAIR!" is a lament all of us have grown up with. It does no good to wonder how and when this fetish began. Sure, I can understand how as a society we enjoy helping the downtrodden, because you can never tell when you've going to be a downtrodden. And I don't even mind making it a tenet of our culture that the 'advantaged' should in some way be yoked with the 'disadvantaged' to the benefit of the 'disadvantaged.' A majority of us have decided/been brainwashed into agreeing that this is fair.
How many times have you heard the exclamation, "That's not Fair!" and vocally or internally responded, "Hey, no one said life was fair?"
So am I correct in my confusion: Life is well known not to be fair, but I live in a society that desires to smooth out all of life's bumps. Is it really a virtue that there are people who say, "Life isn't fair but we're working on it." Who is the 'we' and who gets to say if what their doing is 'fair'?
Now can you see why I can't sleep nights?
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6 comments:
Fairness is fairly uncommon, but the hopes for it spring up every once in awhile.
Then there are those of us who hope to move to Hoboken...if hopes of selling our houses are fair enough. For fair market value, that is.
I haven't met a God yet who plays fair, so why are we trying to be better than the Gods?
Maybe there are gods who are fair? Maybe there are religionists who think that god, in order to be fair, will make it up to them in heaven? That would be a way out, philosophically.
I believe that's the whole point of the camel through the eye of the needle thing: that the needy will get their reward in heaven. Rich people are then only too happy to pay for churches to be built so that this "be happy with your nothing" message can be spread as far and wide as possible.
"Fairness" is one of those concepts like religion that we invent to help us sleep at night. So don't worry, Bert, in a world where some people believe a magician with oratory skills and a hearty supply of parlor tricks will save the world, a misguided belief in fairness really isn't so bad.
This is the same concept as the mysterious "THEY". Who are "THEY" and what do "THEY" want with us? Because frankly I'm sick of THEM. You know what I mean... "they say it's a matter of time before..."
WHO??? WHO ARE THESE "THEY" people and how can I join their club because it seems pretty elite and powerful.
'THEY' say a lot of stuff yet seem too cowardly to show themselves.
Hmmmm...
Funny you bring this up as yesterday LK and I were talking about how fast very small children grab onto the concept of unfairness. "That's not fair" is a very common exclamation and at least in my own kids it isn't something I consciously taught them.
How do you measure fairness? What seems fair to me sometimes doesn't seem fair to others.
I need more caffeine to think this out any further. Seriously....
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