Fairness And Disneyworld

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Fairness And Disneyworld

By Brooks A. Mick, M.D.
Oct. 8, 2006

I have been having an interesting e-mail discussion about government, wars, peace, and other current topics. The subject of fairness came up. Indeed, the word "fair" was popping up in nearly every e-mail.

"If this is all we see then this can shape our perception of who and how these people think and feel. This is not a fair and balanced perception. However, I believe that a better barometer is to ask them what they want and see if there is a way we can find a win-win for all involved. There is no reason to fight for the reason to fight. We were fairly peaceful during the Clinton years and why? Not because he was idle, but because he spoke to ALL of the parties and kept a step ahead without invading an innocent nation and ripping them to pieces."

And: "The key here is peace and balanced and fair trade. Not what we have now. NAFTA, CAFTA, etc. are not fair trade, they are free trade for other nations to the detriment of us. Palestine may truly want to live in peace. How do you know exactly what they want?"

And: "Nothing about these people is simple Brooks. They did not happen to agree with how Israel came about and I cannot honestly blame them for that. How would you like it if someone came to your property and said I am going to take this portion and there will be nothing you can do? Not fair and if we want respect around the world we need to be fair and equitable for all parties involved. I do not want to blast Israel off the map, but what other country, just for religious purposes, has their own entire country? None."

And: "Brooks, free trade helps everyone to the detriment of us. What we need is fair trade. The economy is in the toilet and so should this administration be."

And: "Brooks, I would say that fair means without prejudice. An impartial rendering of circumstances and a complete picture of how the decisions made will affect all involved and then some. It is not a trumped up concept that the liberals created just because and it does not apply only to dictators unless you want to lump the pathetic decisions of this administration under that heading too. They actually believe what they are doing is fair and for the betterment? NOT on your life. They are doing this for control of that oil rich region of the world and nothing more."

Much of the above, if not all, was in the context of decrying the EEEVVVILLL Republicans, especially the REALLY ROTTEN HORRIBLE George W. Bush.

I pointed out that NAFTA and GATT, for examples, were Clinton policies which he pushed through despite much Democratic opposition, and that "free trade" is a reasonably definable concept while "fair trade" is not. The question about "fairness" comes down to "fair to whom, and who gets to decide?" Fairness, especially the attempt to LEGISLATE fairness, always ends up establishing someone as the arbiter--the more-or-less ARBITRARY arbiter. Governmental programs established to promote fairness are just the imposition of someone's OPINION upon other people who may well not agree on the definition of what's fair.

Way back in 1982, Jack Rawlins wrote "In a world where fairness is prescribed by law and enforced by the courts, the law becomes meddlesome, dangerously subjective, infinitely convoluted and picky, the courts become hopelessly overburdened, and the people become habitually litigious." Seems to me that Mr. Rawlins was right on and the situation has only worsened.

Mr. Rawlins, apparently a very bright man, also said "Our governmental programs designed to insure fairness are finally little more than a national disaffection with human judgment and an embracing of calculation in its place." Humanity is submerged in a sea of legislated numbers. Some of those numbers include quotas, a la affirmative action. Certainly one goal of affirmative action was fairness, but is awarding a position in college or a job on the basis of racial quotas fair to the person who is denied the position or job even though their test scores were higher--probably because they studied and worked harder? Where is the fairness in that?

Fairness, in the end, ends up being legislated preferences given to some and denied to others. It may seem "fair," as it is based on cold calculations, just clean numbers on a spreadsheet. What is lacking is HUMANITY. Human judgment is lacking. Human interaction is lacking.

One might as well pass a law that everyone should be nice.

By the way, the economy is NOT "in the toilet." Interest rates have stopped rising, housing sales didn't slow as much as predicted overall, unemployment numbers are near historic lows, corporate profits (aside from Ford and GM) are doing well, the stock market is at its all-time high. One should note that the stock market is classified as a "leading indicator," meaning it is somewhat predictive of what the economy will do. By that measurement, you ain't seen nothin' yet from the economy.

I think it is clear that George W. Bush is a sorcerer, able to cloud men's minds. And women's minds, too. Bush-hatred is so strong that it forces reality out of consciousness and a distorted mythology is put in its place. Good economies are thought bad, spying on terrorists is thought to be domestic surveillance, tracking terrorist money through the Grand Cayman banks is thought to be nosing about in Aunt Minnie's Mastercard account, and the equivalent of college pranks are thought to be torture on the level of Saddam's plastic shredders and al Qaeda's sawing off heads.

Is it possible for people whose view of reality is so distorted by hatred to correctly decide such a nebulous concept as "fair?" I don't think so. Those folks are living in a fantasy world. “Disneyworld’s the place they oughta be. Load ‘em up a truck, and move ‘em to Dis-a-ney.”—Jed Clampett

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About the author Brooks A. Mick: Physician, still practicing medicine but retired from the US Army. Write just for the fun of it, but working on novel in the vein of Tom Clancy's politico-military genre.

Email: brooks15@cox.net

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