Elitism seems to be the natural state of mankind. For millennia we have believed that certain people are endowed with special dispensations.. divine privileges to lead & rule over the lessor humans. Physical might used to be an indicator of human superiority, & is still highly regarded. Egyptian Pharaohs were considered to be gods, as were the Roman emperors. The concept of 'divine right of Kings' was widely believed for thousands of years in Europe & in most of the world. Chinese Emperors & even African tribal lords were seen as being empowered with special privilege by the gods, or were gods themselves. But then came the Reformation. Martin Luther & others reasoned against the concepts of special human privilege by the clergy. They had no power to absolve sin, or to declare someone pardoned or grant 'indulgences' for a price. Salvation came through faith, alone, & had nothing to do with any human hierarchy or pontifications. There was an alliance between the religious leaders & the aristocracy, & most clergy were part of the elite. But as reformation thought burned through Europe, the lofty view of the clergy came down, & along with them their secular enablers. What were kings but mortal men? They lived & died like anyone else, & were mere humans. As the Reformation morphed into the Enlightenment, and the 'Age of Reason' took hold, the logical consequences of this line of thinking brought the idea of the Equality of Man. There was nothing special about the nobility. Kings were mere men. The aristocracy were just elitists who lived off the labors of the working man. The commoner labored in poverty to keep the royal classes in opulence. They began to evaluate the purpose of human governance. Locke, Rousseau & many others reasoned that man was endowed with Natural Rights to life, liberty, & property. Locke said that govt had no other purpose than the preservation of property. Montesquieu reasoned that govt should be split into separate powers of the legislative, judicial, & executive branches. Jefferson, Franklin, & Paine stirred them all together & the American Experiment was born. But even then, there were some differences. Hobbes believed man was stupid & brutish, & needed a strong central govt to keep him in line. Many believed in 'manifest destiny', or the duty of the white race to control & manage the rest of the world. But this was in opposition with the basic idea of human equality, & caused a conflict. Eventually, slavery was outlawed by the people where enlightenment thought was dominant. Even in the wilds of America, a great civil war was fought to settle this issue. The idea of the dignity & equality of Man, had become mainstream. Monarchies were relinquishing power, & representative governments were replacing them, either peacefully or by force. The foundation of this view was in that of a Creator. Man was endowed by his creator with unalienable rights, as Jefferson put it in the declaration of independence. But even for the Deists & naturalists of the time, 'Nature' or 'Nature's God' also worked as the source of these natural rights. 3 of the most significant philosophical leaders in the American theater were Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, & Thomas Paine, all deists. They did not believe in Christianity or the Bible, but still saw the divine empowerment of the individual with basic, equal rights, granted by Natural Law. But the enlightenment did not usher in an era of peace & utopia. The French revolution was a disaster, with mob rule & bloodshed seeming to confirm Hobbes's analysis: "During the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that conditions called war; and such a war, as if of every man, against every man. To this war of every man against every man, this also in consequent; that nothing can be unjust. The notions of right and wrong, justice and injustice have there no place. Where there is no common power, there is no law, where no law, no injustice. Force, and fraud, are in war the cardinal virtues. No arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death: and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short." ~Thomas Hobbes The American thinkers concluded that their experiment in self rule could only succeed if the people were moral. "Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." ~Benjamin Franklin "We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion . . . Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." ~John Adams But the correlation between a 'moral & religious people' & the equality of man are clear. Without morality & a sense of a higher 'Law', only force matters. Force is not equal, but favors the ruthless & amoral. So the view of man as equal & having inherent rights is incumbent upon a moral & religious people. To the enlightenment thinkers, force was something for a moral people to own & control, to secure their rights, not to be used for despotism & exploiting your fellow man. But as the enlightenment era drew to a close, new thought was beginning, rooted in the works of Karl Marx & Charles Darwin. These were anti-enlightenment concepts, based on a naturalistic view of man & nature, & moved man back to a more elitist view. They undermined the significance of religion & morality, declaring religion to be the opiate of the people, not a force for social good. Man was not a created being, in the image of God, but a mere brute.. an animal evolved from lower forms with no moral law or purpose other than survival. Both of these concepts laid the foundation for the Russian revolution, based on Marxism, & the rise of the Nazis, based on the evolution of the Master Race. The equality of man took a big hit in this time, as powerful elitists pushed their own agenda, empowered by their acquired force. Even in the American Experiment, progressives were gaining power, based on the elitist view. They were duty bound by the cosmos to manage & control the huddled masses, & of course should be provided for lavishly for their administration. Eugenicists like Margaret Sanger & other progressives hailed the virtues of elitist central power. They would engineer society & end all injustice. FDR compiled his 'second bill of rights', which is a collectivist, central power agenda, not one of individual freedom & Natural Law. Progressives need an elite of superior intellect & zoo like management skills to control the workers, which is what they have worked tirelessly toward for decades. And here we are, in the death throes of the enlightenment, with the dignity & equality of Man slowly dying. Natural Law gives way to imperial decree, & we are plodding a steady return to elitist rule. We are in a convoluted blend of enlightenment nostalgia; Higher Truth & morality, & the conflicting conclusion of a world without God, purpose, or higher law. And with the death of Natural Law, so goes the concept of the equality of Man. Social engineers might give lip service to it, for propaganda purposes, but it is not inherent in the basic world view. They are elitists, & view the inferior beings with contempt. It is a short ride to genocide from this collectivist village. They worship only power, as there is nothing higher than that to the naturalist elites. They view the principles of the enlightenment as charmingly quaint, but completely irrelevant in their brave new world of elitist control. The achievements we have made in women's suffrage, abolition, worker's rights, & due process will all give way to imperial rule by a New King. So is that it? Will the values from centuries of progress toward self rule, human equality, & natural law give way to another ruling elite? This time, they don't claim Divine Ordination, but are appointed by the god of power & evolved superiority, to rule over the pathetic lower races of men. Will we revert back to the dark ages? Will we surrender what has taken millennia of blood, sweat & tears to arrive at, only to see it tossed aside for a lie?
Safety nets(SS/Medicare/unemployment/welfare) are causing our decline back into serfdom. Americans are not motivated to self reliance and personal wealth building and are having more of our incomes confiscated in order to perpetuate this decline.
The world has changed. You can't just go out on your 40 acres and grow the food you need for your family anymore. There's not enough land for that to happen for everyone. Self reliance in the way that it used to work(you used your land to provide the things you needed) has given way to cities full of people with no land to farm, meaning that farming must take place elsewhere being done by different people. In addition to this change, we've also given rise to the mega corporations, ones that have the resources to control the landscape and the competition. The world is not the same as it was when people could be self reliant. Developed nations have moved past that point. We are reliant on each other and the economy to provide what we need now. The go-it-alone approach is no longer a feasible solution for most people, and especially for those who don't own farmland. And none of that has anything to do with social security or medicare or unemployment.
The implication from the replies is that liberalism is an anti-equality view. It puts *some* people into a helpless category, unable to hack it in the real world, & they are handicapped, perhaps for generations, for their inability. Instead of Human Equality building ideals, like the right to life, liberty, & property.. basic tenets of Natural Law, the collectivists preach INEQUALITY, based on the inferiority of some to compete in the world. They need to be supported, or they will die. The ironic thing is that most of these progressive leftists are committed evolutionists, who believe in survival of the fittest. They do NOT believe that man has any inherent worth to God or gods, or is created in any divine image. Man is an accident of nature, & has just evolved to where he is today. Only survival traits are virtuous.. negative traits that are detrimental to survival should be allowed to 'thin the herd'. So in essence, there is no 'human equality' in collectivist, naturalistic thought. There are the superior survivors, & there are the inferior leeches on humanity. So why do they promote a concept so obviously contrary to their core beliefs?
They have everything to do with it. Under personal liberty Americans owned their wealth. Today, Americans are broke and dependent on government programs. This is the few controlling the many through resources. We are seeing little difference between the royalty(government), nobles(rich) and the serfs(typical broke dependent on these programs).
The OP skipped over a couple of major players here. The industrial revolution and consumerism, both of which were driving factors in the loss of the rights of men. These were not forced on anyone, it was societies themselves that craved for it. So the problems outlined on the OP were not external, they were internal.
I see the industrial revolution as feeding the monster of elitism. ..and another factor is population. In the small population of the early US, with the limited power of a centralized govt, the principles of the enlightenment could flourish. Individualism embraced Natural Law. Freedom was easy to sustain, with so few people to mitigate any collective encroachments. Of course, dealing with humanity, ALL of our problems are internal. The problems of elitism & despotism are internal. If the people allow it, even under some delusion, it is an internal problem. IMO, the industrial revolution & the accompanying ease of living that it brought, which spawned consumerism, were bit players.. they were not major factors in the rise of elitism & the decline of Human Equality. Those are ideological concepts, & have their root in ideology. Darwinism & Marxism were MUCH more of a factor, though it can be argued effectively that Marxism is a result of industrialization. However, Marxism only grew in areas predisposed to elitism, where an aristocracy was already accepted. Marxism only swaps the figures from the monarchy approved aristocracy, to the intelligentsia. You still have a ruling elite lording it over the common, working man. Elitism is antithetical to human equality. Whether it is a 'divine right of kings', or the 'highly evolved intelligentsia', both of them promote a caste system of inequality. The driving force in the quest for human equality was the enlightenment. THAT was the impetus for abolitionism, in both Europe & the Americas. THAT was the source for the decline of monarchies, & the rise of democratic rule. The growth of industrialism fed upon the monarchical, elitist systems that were already in place, especially in Europe. Marxism was a reaction to that system, which had no foothold in the US, & explains why Marxism has never become mainstream in America, except with the academic intelligentsia, who already embrace elitism. Marxism, Darwinism, & the ideologies rooted in those theories of humanity are diametrically opposed to the human equality principles from the enlightenment & the reformation. Marxism gives lip service to human equality, but never delivers. It offers illusion, but always delivers despotic elitism. I also see elitism as the default human condition. Humans are not comfortable with the uncertainties of equality & liberty, & prefer a visible representative of superhuman ability, even if it is an illusion. The brief era of the enlightenment & the age of reason were anomalies in human history, not regular occurrences. I am curious as to your reasonings & basis for your view that industrialization led to the 'loss of the rights of men'. There were at times correlations of timing, but the causal factors are unclear. Can you elaborate on what you see as the causal factors in this?
The elites have a stranglehold on the world with their domination of power and resources, thus enabling the 1% to rule the 99%. However, the 99% are starting to realize just how unsustainable and unfair the situation has become. Dissent and discontent must rise and fester without caving in to token appeasement until there is a majority demanding the kind of concessions that will greatly reduce inequality. Up until recently, the assumption has been that the majority won't rebel and will continue to accept mediocrity because they have become accustomed to it and lack alternatives. However, the prospect of increasing momentum towards mass awareness of the need for change has supposedly become a real concern of the ruling elites, and there is speculation that they must orchestrate disruptive schemes before the mass consciousness reaches a tipping point, else their loss of control might be irreversible.
I beg to differ I've been 'farming' and living more or less self-sufficiently for years, and am on a quarter acre with a house and several outbuildings (henhouse, woodshed, etc). We're also off grid for water and power. Anyone with a square metre of sunny space can grow enough food for one person. It can even be in an apartment - in pots. These are choices many of us can make, but most don't.
You're right, they are rattled. As more and more of us in the west refuse to line the pockets of fat cats (by not buying what we're told to buy), they're having to create shopping addicts in places previously immune. Eventually these people will realise they've been duped and turned into consuming slaves, and the fatsos will come up with something new. It's on us to stay a step ahead of the game.
Since the equality of man is a concept that seems to be under fire, i thought reviving this thread, might inspire discussion for this crucial topic. Are all humans equal? Why? Under the law, or inherently? If we are evolved accidents of nature, at different stages of evolution, why would we be equal? Are the races an indicator of position, on the evolutionary scale? Why would 'white privilege!', be wrong, or why would any racial or cosmetic distinctions be wrong? What makes racism, or other prejudicial judgments of other people, wrong?
Now the big shots want to drive every resident out of the countryside into within designated boundaries of cities/suburbs under the guise of controlled sustainability. UN Agenda 2030 looks ominous, but they have worded it to seem beneficial and innocuous. A vast number of countries have already ratified it. If the authorities succeed in implementing it on the intended scale, I think the rest of us are doomed as disposable guinea pigs subject to their firm control. It's a Hillary/Rockefeller type nightmare come true.
Entirely equal in principle, under law, and inherently, although there are legitimate distinctions of hierarchy even in the noncorporeal realms that reflect degrees of attaining development of quality consciousness. In nature there is little to guarantee equality due to materialism, possession of property, feeding areas, breeding rights, hedonism, and competition for limited resources. We are all one species and all in the same boat.
So the question is: Will the values from centuries of progress toward self rule, human equality, & natural law give way to another ruling elite? I don't propose to know the answer - but I do believe the answer can be found in this book. https://www.amazon.com/Naked-Ape-Zo...keywords=desmond+morris&qid=1599192751&sr=8-1
Nonsense. The Bible explicitly teaches the "divine right of kings" and so did the Reformers, including Luther.
yeh there was and still is a lot of that going around. Under this theory of political legitimacy the subjects of the crown are considered to have actively (rather than merely passively) turned over the metaphysical selection of the king's soul – which will inhabit the body and rule them – over to God. In this way, the "divine right" originates as a metaphysical act of humility or submission towards God. The divine right has been a key element for legitimizing many absolute monarchies. Consequentially, it asserts that a monarch is not accountable to an earthly authority (such as a parliament) because their right to rule is derived from divine authority. The monarch is thus not subject to the will of his people, of the aristocracy, or of any other estate of the realm. It implies that only divine authority can judge an unjust monarch and that any attempt to depose, dethrone or restrict their powers runs contrary to God's will and may constitute a sacrilegious act. I dont see anything about Luther promoting the divine right of anything corporeal, citation please? Luther's main ideal 1. Salvation by faith alone. Luther's main ideal 2. The bible is the only authority. Luther's main ideal 3. The priesthood of all believers. Salvation by faith alone. Faith in god was the only way of salvation. The bible is the only authority. ... The priesthood of all believers. Keep in mind that beliefs creates religion, and religion creates culture and culture creates laws presumably based upon the religion of the culture, but they ALL shortly after establishment fall victims to the cancer of corruption. Any government that enforces morals is a religious establishment.
He goes into it a little in his commentary on Romans (I think) and when he wrote his letter justifying violent suppression of the peasant's revolt (for sure). Luther wrote a lot more than just those bullet points you listed.
Your revisionist beliefs about the reformation are false. That is progressive propaganda, to build phony narratives against their ideological enemies. One of the key points from the reformers, which was amplified into the Enlightenment, was the equality of man. The priesthood of Believers, NOT a special ruling class, was a foundational element in bringing humanity out of the dark ages. Progressive indoctrinees wish to drive us back into the dark ages, with their elitist views, and pretense of Superior Intelligence. They promoting Evolved Elitism, and a Messiah Worship, celebrity elevating view of their High Priests in academia and other pseudo science institutions. Their anti American, marxist foundations destroy the equality of man, as a foundational principle. They exclude God, and worship a collectivist fantasy, where a huge Central Government, run by the most evolved intelligentsia, rules with Absolute Authority. Your assertions have no basis, and are unsourced caricatures, that fly in the face of reality. Other than that, they are fine beliefs. Too bad they only lead to oppression.
Fake response. Luther and the other Reformers supported the divine right of kings. We've had this debate before. I've provided sources. You've never responded to them or provided sources of your own. Yet they still supported the divine right of kings . . . so does the Bible. Both of them do/did so explicitly. More fake responses. I've repeatedly criticized Marxism and collectivism. I'm to the right of you on economics. I've provided the basis for my assertions. Read the works of Luther. Read Romans. They disprove your point. Meanwhile, you have steadfastly refused to provide any sources of your own. I'm criticizing the oppression that your Bible and the Reformation supported. Your response is to shove your head in the sand and refuse to address the facts. Seems to be a pattern, frankly.
@usfan Equal in what way? We are equal in some ways and not in others. "Stages of evolution" is a myth created by those who don't understand evolution. No, there is no biological/scientifically informed way of arguing that races are "indicators of position." No one who even vaguely understands evolution can make that claim.
