The new class system

The last few months have made the disparity between social classes clearer than usual.

I am very fortunate.  I benefit greatly from the class structure.  However, I feel that the recent quarantine has made some of those benefits more evident.

The old aristocracy died with the old empires.  There are obviously still royal families, but two world wars had a dramatic effect on the social hierarchy.  Societal norms shifted.  I personally believe that many worked towards true equality during the late 20th century.  We didn't get there, but I do think that, overall, society as a whole was improved.

In the early 21st century, however, something new arose.  Several services became significantly less expensive.  The result, unfortunately, looks very much like the birth of a new social class: servants for rent.

Rather than have a driver, you have Uber and Lyft.  Rather than have a personal shopper, you have InstaCart and Amazon.  Cleaning services have come down in price to such an extent as to become palatable to most of the middle class.

We have been able to re-create many of the occupations of a Victorian household without providing the people in those occupations with housing and healthcare.  I cannot accurately compare the hourly wage of a maid in the United Kingdom in 1920 to those working for a cleaning service in the United States in 2020.  I do think it is fair to say that neither were properly compensated.

While those at the top (myself included) can safely quarantine, the other social strata need to continue to risk their health.  We call them "essential workers" but have not increased their wages.

Just as the epidemics of the 18th century would cause the land owners to take shelter on country estates, so a computer programmer orders everything he needs to be delivered to his door for months on end.

So, we have a choice.  We can watch as the aristocracy is reborn, or we can look upon the mistakes of the past and find a better way.  We can pay those we need what they deserve.  We can increase the cost of those things that really shouldn't be cheap.  We can once again look at the shining beacon of equality, which we may never reach, and take a small step towards it.

I'm going to be mean now...

.. because I'm letting emotion get the better of me.  That is not an apology.  We can not be cold and calculating.  We must have passion

And so, let me state several opinions very concisely:

• If you feel that providing for the lesser fortunate is a waste of money, you are cruel.
  
• If you feel that the current political and economic systems in the United States are fair, you are misguided.
  
• If you would hold others back so that you can advance, you are a loser.
  
• If you feel that health is a commodity, you are a fool.
  
• If you feel that any group of people is "... taking your...", you are a failure and are blaming your failure on others.  If you blame others for your failure, you will continue to be a failure.
  
• If you stand by, and watch, and do nothing, you are complicit.

I have been disgusted for so long that I can no longer be peaceable.  The counter-points no longer warrant consideration.  There is no common ground.  I no longer believe that ignorance is to blame.  I will no longer attempt to educate those who disagree.

The dismantling of social programs is barbaric and misanthropic, not misguided.  Reallocating funds from the arts to an already over-inflated military can only be the act of the hate-filled, not the insecure or those who have been lied to.  The lies are not the problem.  Those who have chosen to willfully deny facts to believe the lies are the problem.

I will now return to pursuing the avenues available to me to resist.

We are all prejudiced

I have become a little infuriated recently be some misconceptions. 

Let me state that I am a heterosexual, Caucasian, male.  This may have been obvious.  Whether or not you believe it, that means I got to play the "game of life" on easy mode.

The society we live in has a set of implicit beliefs.  You need not agree with them.  I hope that you do not.  You may even choose to deny their existence if you wish.  However, the subject and a reference to my race and sexuality has probably already caused you certain conceptions to form.

The story that our society tells about me is beneficial to me.  According to the story, I am boring, dependable, out-of-touch, rich, I lack athletic ability, I am married, I am conservative, I cheat on my wife, etc.  This story may not be the story I want to tell, but it has been useful to me.  You may not wish me to be on your pick-up basketball team, but you do wish to employ me.  Is this a horrible situation? Yes.  But pretending that the situation doesn't exist, is not a solution.  Pretending that this misconception does not benefit me; pretending that I am not a member of the privileged group in our society; to basically deny one part of the problem; is insulting to all other groups as well as insulting to me personally.

The terms we use are even indicative of the underlying problem.  We "discriminate".  Our brains separate, categorize, discern.  It was not until after the U.S. Civil War that "discrimination" took on a different meaning than "discriminating".  Is our pattern recognition faulty? Yes. Do we err? Often.  Does it seem to be an inherent process of human consciousness? Yes.

In my particular case, I have grown tired of my ethnic peers denying the opportunities they have had; believing the antiquated Social Darwinism that is still propagated.  The game is not fair.  Anyone who feeds off errant pattern recognition is not on your side.  Anyone who wishes to separate people and to categorize them is degrading them.

We are flawed.  We are also conscious.  We can know that we are flawed.  We can make ourselves better.  The first step is honesty.  It is time we stop hiding behind words.  I have my prejudices.  I can not say how or when they were formed.  I have chosen to recognize them and remove them from my psyche, but some remain and I do not know if I will ever be free of them.

The second step... Well, that involves talking.  Prejudices are shattered in the same way scientific theories are: contrary evidence.  If you get to know me, I'm no longer "a heterosexual, Caucasian, male", I'm Frank.