Any system of equality devised in future would not come from the common agreement of the community, which would in its right mind wish to preserve the commodity-status of its labour, but from the imposition of government. This runs in accordance with the Marxist dialectic, but not with Godwin. Nevertheless, since the abolition of the state is never possible, and anarchy only results in the re-establishment of even more tyrannical government, we must assume that equality is imposed and not implemented by full consent. The idea of shaking off what might be useful to the self and considering that whatever excess we own ought to be gifted to our struggling neighbour is against the spirit of self-preservation. Ultimately, the system of private property renders itself permanent, since in a system of equality there will inevitably come those who begin to hoard the possessions they come by. It is natural for human beings to want things for themselves.
The philosophical school of Epicureanism divided human wants and needs into natural and necessary desires (such as hunger), natural but unnecessary desires (such as sexual appetite) and unnatural and unnecessary desires (such as gluttony). The philosopher Epicurus and his followers lived in communes, relying on each other’s support to overcome their natural human tendency to indulge in the unnecessary desires, and Karl Marx later wrote his doctoral thesis in part on theory of the Epicurean commune.48 The Epicureans were viewed as pariahs by ancient Greek society, but it was Epicurus’ hope that reason would eventually sway the people of Greece to his worldview. Just how far Epicureanism could be taken, however, was soon proven to be less extensive than Epicurus himself had hoped, when the Roman philosopher and student of Epicurus, Lucretius, wrote one of the foremost works on Epicurean thought, On the Nature of Things, which contains no mention of communes whatsoever. Lucretius treats the theories of Epicurus as a kind of mindfulness, a way of living with the inevitability of disease, natural disaster and death, whilst shunning Epicurus’ more idealistic dreams of a society marked by detachment from the needs of the self and living purely for the needs of others.
It is undeniable that Epicurus was onto something, and this spirit of selflessness is embodied in religions such as Christianity. However, whilst the left interprets selflessness as distributing everything equally, it has traditionally been the place of the right to demonstrate that society can only flourish under inequality. But this does not mean that it cannot be selfless. If Epicurus was more inclined towards the former school, and was a pariah, but Lucretius more towards the latter, and was part of the great and respected thinkers of the Roman Republic, we may easily judge which school of thought inspired the more prosperous variant of political society.
If we consider how the human mind works, then we shall see that it is by nature inclined towards inequality. The mind itself is a series of thoughts emitted from conscious or subconscious waves, which may concern an event in the past, present, or potential future. How these thoughts themselves are ranked determines our character. For instance, those who concern themselves with the problems of past or future actions are often inclined towards anxiety, those who live only for the present are either at ease with themselves or incredibly self-interested, depending on how the present moment is defined in the mind of the individual. Those concerned with the lessons of the past and how they might be applied to the future are somewhat calmer as well, since they consider history to be an opportunity for learning rather than a waste of time to think about. The human mind is an unfair judge, for it ranks thoughts according to importance rather than judging them all equally. As such, the human character varies from one individual to the next, and it is near-impossible to consider how this natural difference from individual to individual is to be overcome.
Humankind is not perfect, and in order to render equality permanent, it must be all perfectly the same. Attempts to render an unequal race equal only leads to vice and the destruction of community on every level. Virtue is therefore incompatible with equality.
Chapter VI
Population
The speculations of Thomas Malthus about a human population increasing exponentially beyond the possibility for self-sustenance has been debunked in recent years, with studies showing that the human population is likely to stabilise by the year 2070.49 Nevertheless, the population of Earth has seen a huge increase over the past fifty years, with the United Nations estimating that the world population has increased from just over 2 billion in 1950 to 7.5 billion in 2017. In the worst-case scenario of continual growth, that number could reach over 10 billion in the future. This itself may lead to a decline in population on account of the increase in famine and lack of provision for the people of Earth, but assuming that the human race for the most part remains at such high numbers, the provision of equality for such a large number of people becomes a seemingly insurmountable task to perform.
The agrarian and localist values which define traditional communities to counter the detrimental effects of equality of income and property become harder to implement when a population of this size needs to be provided for. There have been many solutions offered over the years by various intellectuals to the problem of population. Marxist often suggest that the population itself would best be able to distribute its own needs among itself, and a dictatorship of the proletariat, with the proletariat’s interests in mind, would best offer medicine and food amongst itself in ways which will be self-supportive. Godwinian radicals on the other hand suggest that a ‘mind over matter’ approach, and the enduring power of ‘cheerfulness’ serves as far greater medicine in the face of disaster than panicking over the material goods which mankind will struggle to equally provide for its people. Both of these solutions are inadequate, since while ‘mind over matter’ may be useful for remaining calm in the face of hardship, it does not feed the hungry, nor does it heal the sick of the most violent infectious diseases. Equally, allowing the people of the world to distribute their own materials is a recipe for disaster, since it would lead to the same effects of envy and eventual violence that we have discussed in preceding chapters.
There is therefore little to conclude about equality in the modern world other than no matter how equal the governments of the world may endeavour to make a future society, some level of inequality will always exist, since it will be simply impossible for that government to accommodate the equality of every single individual in the world. Equality is therefore impossible in the face of such an overwhelming number of people who would require it.
Chapter VII
The Impracticability of Equality
We have considered at length how equality is impossible in a future world. Finally, then, we must consider how the means of implementing equality is just as impracticable in detail. In making the steps towards creating a society where equal income and equal property are a very real possibility, the governments of the nations have a great capacity to sow disaster in their wake. If the population is not ready for the technological age which we stand at the cusp of, the repercussions could be dire for civilisation.
The natural state of community is for individuals to rely on each other’s owned property to support one another. This does not mean common ownership, and individuals will be reluctant to give up what they feel is ‘theirs’. Possessiveness is humanity. In bringing about equality, rationality is out of the question. If people will not give up what they possess, then it must be wrenched from out of their hands, and when persuasion fails, force must be implemented. The right to safety therefore can only ever be violated by the implementers of equality, since for the purposes of redistribution of income or of property they will need to take from others that which they seek to redistribute. If this is met with opposition, then violence on the streets is possible. Those who do not flee will be arrested, their possessions seized; those who rebel will be imprisoned if not killed for their dissent; and those who do successfully flee will likely be pursued, since upon the implementation of equality, it is likely that other nations will follow suit to prevent the envy of their own populations. Fleein
g from one country into another will only yield yet more attempts to flee from the enforcers of the equal system. If they have their automata by this point, facing creatures of superior strength is possible, and the Gothic vision forewarned in Chapter II comes back to haunt us.
Even if the implementation of equality passes by without much violence, then an intellectual war will certainly rage. In an attempt to reinforce the dogma of equality, academics, intellectuals and respected public figures who need not even be of intellectual stock will be placed on public pedestals to hammer home the supposed benefits of equality almost every hour of the day. Those who question the efficacy of the equal system will be silenced and removed from positions of respect in order to prevent the disorder that it might otherwise encourage. This is the only way to ensure a smooth transition to equality, but its consequences could include the end of the virtuous political discourse. If free dissemination of opinion is what political discourse relies upon, then the implementation of equality across nations must rely upon the tyrannical suppression of opinion which questions the new discourse of equality. The freedom of society and libertarian values which allow for moral improvement will therefore be non-existent, and if society itself is unable to bring about moral improvement, the debauchery of equal society which we have previously considered is more likely to become a reality.
If something like an equality of income is to be imposed by government, then we cannot escape the question of cost. It will in one sense be necessary to raise incredibly high revenues to offer the public a basic income, but if the public are not working, a smaller number of businesses will exist. The public cannot be taxed, since it is the government who is offering them wealth in the first place, therefore it must be businesses who offer revenue in the form of taxation. But to tax businesses to such a high degree in order to pay for the income of the remainder of the population is sure to produce its own problems, since taxation would surely have to be much higher than it has been in recent years. The free-market economic system is sure to be lost and replaced with an oligopoly of businesses which are still able to operate and collude with one another in order to protect their own interests and make as large profits as possible after taxation. Such businesses will have the entire non-working population of the equal Earth to serve after such a move, and therefore be at no loss of a market for their goods. For the people of equal Earth, however, there will be much less choice, and commodities will likely be divided between different companies, leaving individuals with the choice of either using the product of a particular company or going without that product until such time as they require it.
All these implementations would require a great deal of unnatural optimism within the general population. It is not fair to assume that just because a group of individuals in government believe that the system could work, the entire population shares that same sentiment. Misery and distrust will infect communities, and the practicality of helping communities to bring an equal Earth future into realisation is called into question. Such a system would require universal cooperation, and the cynical would be left behind. The uncooperative and the cynical must therefore either be punished or left without participation in the equal state. Therefore, the implementers of equality have already created an unequal world in the process of trying to create equality.
Even Godwin, who desired equality of property as the long-term goal of mankind, warned against rushing headlong into the implementation of equality with ‘a certain rashness’. However, it is almost certain that the implementation of equality will be implemented rashly. Governments have already proven in recent years that they are unable to conduct business in a well-considered and careful way. The UK government of 2010–2015 removed certain qualifications for welfare and imposed taxes without proper consideration for the consequences,50 and a future government, captured by the excitement of implementing the new equal state, or perhaps enthusiastic at the opportunity for the oppression of vast swathes of the population, would implement equality in a matter of months rather than a great many years, and therefore require the violence which we have warned against in order to see their vision of society realised in such a short space of time.
Equality must begin somewhere, and it will inevitably begin with the abolition of the distinctions which delineate privilege and difference between individuals in society. Titles, awards and honours will be removed, as will institutions of government which appoint individuals on a hierarchical basis. No longer will the legally schooled judge try cases, but the private individual invited off the street on account of his sexuality or gender in the name of ‘equality’. This may seem a ridiculous notion for some, but if equality is to be accepted, it must must govern political institution itself. What this means of course is that, whilst not formally so, political institutions are at least informally abolished insofar as their true purpose is lost, and a form of organised anarchy takes hold of the population. Wealth will be laid aside and the government will speak of ‘liberty and equality’ as though the two have finally been joined in a singular love of man which unites the people of Earth regardless of heritage of customs. The abolition of these customs for the sake of equality, however, can only stagnate society, as the rest of our argument in this book has proven.
This vision of the future is virtueless; it is morally corrupt and socially stagnant. No longer is there any value in real virtue and real honour, since with equality set as the foremost goal of mankind, a dead humanity walks the streets. The shuffling corpses of wage slaves — slaves to their governments, who seem to many to be the benevolent hand of equal income and equal rights — are left to rot in a social system which is neither truly equal nor hierarchical. There can be only two classes of people, the proletariat and the lordship. Concepts of citizenship and duty are no longer relevant: the individual only concerns himself with collecting his next source of income, whilst the new lords of society create that income by whatever means they like, overseeing the lives of the people with a fine toothcomb, eliminating dissenters and extending their power over the entire world. Imagine staring into the empty eyes of a human race which has lost its soul and consider this: is this the future which the human race deserves? No is the answer, but the future is worse than that, for it shall surely lead to the destruction of the human race, if not literally then at least spiritually. The future on equal Earth is cold, and it is most certainly a vision of the future where a boot stamps on a human face, forever.
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We cannot say for certain that this future will become a reality, but if the means for ensuring that a technological future does not lead to the collapse of society and community are not put in place, the future seems bleak indeed. The questions of the near future involving UBI and the goal which many societies have set for themselves — equality — are problematic, and those who endorse them have much to answer for. A future society governed by reason and cooperation is possible, but not under the system that the left proposes. The identity of nations and the spiritual purpose of humanity must not be lost, even if it is the ideological agenda of those who endorse equality to destroy it.
Conclusions
So concludes our sweeping discussion of political justice. We have uncovered much about history and applied it to the present. Our conclusions from this discussion will be somewhat lengthy but composed of no more information than that which we have already discussed. Ultimately, we may say that political and civil society must walk hand in hand, with virtue in mind, if the nations of the world, but particularly the Western world, are to survive and maintain true notions of political justice. The philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer remarked that there are two sorts of writer: the writer who writes for the sake of writing, and the writer who writes because he has something to say. I sincerely hope that by guiding my reader through all these varied issues, I have properly and coherently put across what it was that I wished to say. If some in the future may agree with me, and if by some miracle even a few of the ideas presented here com
e to fruition in society, then I cannot say that my work was undertaken in vain.
Happiness as the goal of life is perhaps the most misleading philosophy ever to have been propagated among the nations of Earth. Happiness is not something to be obtained by short-term actions, but by deeds which last well beyond the plane of mortality. It would be equally misleading to say that this means that celebrity should be the goal of all, or that dying as a hero on the battlefield is the only honourable life; rather, to understand the history of our ancient ancestors is to understand the value of truth, piety and heroism. The attitude towards life and death which the ancients adopted, from the time of ancient Persia through Greece and Rome and even in the supposedly barbarian peoples of Europe who ruled during the Dark Ages, can be an inspiration to all of us who wish to participate in political society. This attitude is one of living for something greater than the moment of one’s mortal life (and life on Earth is indeed only a moment, a flash of light in the face of the eternity of the Universe); the modern world has come to view the individual as the only moral end of life, as opposed to the community of his neighbours and the community of his nation which is defined not by the assignation of passports, but by a set of cultural and historical values which are spiritually inseparable from the nation state.
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