The Need for a Justification
Inequality exists. Some people have more than others, and some suffer unduly. Both problems will remain with mankind until the end of the age. Their existence compels a response.
Secular society has a response for both. Inequalities of wealth are solved via wealth redistribution. And undeserved sufferings are purportedly solved via access to healthcare. Both proposed solutions fail to alleviate the problems they should solve. The bureaucracies created to define and apply solutions pervert both efforts because the bureaucracy benefits from its failures to solve the problems it was entrusted with solving. Moreover, social problems expand to surpass their remedies, like a fat woman eating enormous helpings of low-calorie food. So, sincere remedies to the issue of inequality will always be transient.
Therefore, the right approach to solving the problem of inequality is not to fix it but to redeem it. Redemption means accepting the problem’s existence and extracting something valuable from it. The treasure extracted from the problem justifies it.
Christianity can redeem the problem. Yet redemption has not been forthcoming, although it is obvious to me. Therefore, I will present it like a messenger returning halfway through the battle. Some may fault me for providing it too long after the need emerged, but I am not a messenger. Redemption was never my responsibility, and I offer it solely from my prerogative—an altruism that sleeps more quickly than it wakes.
My Inadequacy
I should also say this: I am not a priest. I am not a monk. I am not a bishop. I am not a deacon. Nor am I a nun. I do not possess authority within any Christian church, although I am Orthodox. I am not the authority on the topic, but Orthodox clergymen are. And if my statements contradict those made by a monastic, priest, bishop, or saint, or if they violate a formal position of the Orthodox Church, then I am wrong and they are right.
I write this position because the political right needs it. Christendom requires the explanation to be present in an accessible form relevant to the Magenta Pill.
And I am in a position to provide it.
So I will.
The Magenta Pill is the name for my philosophy. Its work product is the guild system. The aim is to cement creativity as a right wing virtue.
Two Types of Inequality Being Justified
Inequality exists in many forms across roughly a dozen decomposition layers, and numerous models exist to describe it. Their numerosity undermines their effectiveness because the many models turn one another into noise. And the high decomposition levels, although attractive to the autists who invent them, destroy their value for the layperson. Yet laymen are those whose support must be secured, and simple models with practical value are more valuable. Moreover, simple models are also better because models are tools, and tools are supposed to be helpful.
The Fortune Model of Inequality
So, I present this model: the Fortune Model of Inequality. It divides all inequalities into fortune and misfortune. Both are juxtaposed against an arbitrary baseline.
Inequalities of Fortune
Inequalities of fortune benefit their recipients. These are the inequalities enjoyed by rich kids, tall men, and women with excellent faces. The people who possess them have an unearned privilege over those who do not. The inequalities need justification because their enjoyers are the beneficiaries of a random process that discriminates independently of character and competence.
Secular society has two responses to fortune. They are reprehensible. In cases where the fortune can be seized and redistributed, they do so. In instances where redistribution is impossible, they either lie or condemn. In the former case, they pretend fortune is otherwise to more easily cope with the fact that others have more than them. In the latter, they demonize and discriminate against beneficiaries of fortune to level the playing field, i.e., to knock others down to their level.
Thus, secular responses cater to the pettiness, resentment, malice, dishonesty, and avarice of their proponents. A better alternative is needed.
Inequalities of Misfortune
Inequalities of misfortune hinder their recipients. These are the inequalities suffered by the impoverished, maimed, and children whose parents never loved them. The people who suffer from them face an uphill battle; others do not. The inequalities need justification because their sufferers are the victims of a random process that discriminates independently of character and competence.
Secular society has two responses to misfortune. They are similar to those mentioned above.
Two responses exist in cases where the misfortune can be overcome; one is a general response, and the other is specific. The general response consists of activists lobbying on behalf of those who suffer. Their ostensible aim is to remedy systemic issues which produced the misfortune. The specific response is charity directed toward suffering groups. Both fail in their aims because sincere efforts to help the aggrieved are always overshadowed by Machiavellians who subvert the group for their aggrandizement. These people rely on their cause for legitimacy and are vested in ensuring their movement never abolishes itself. Thus, they aggravate the problems they were meant to solve.
In cases where the misfortune is insurmountable, the sufferer is lied to incessantly to protect their feelings. The lies usually reduce the importance of the misfortune, and the recipient may or may not believe them. If they believe the lie, they develop unrealistic expectations, which turn them cynical when the reality of their situation crashes into their dreams. If they do not believe the lie, they become cynical more quickly, albeit to a lesser extent, because they realize their compatriots are gaslighters.
Thus, the secular responses produce cynicism, elevate sociopaths, and pervert the good intentions of the few sincere people attempting to help. A better alternative is needed.
Redeeming Fortune
Vision redeems fortune. People who benefit from inequalities of fortune can redeem their unearned advantage by leveraging it to perform great works. In the parlance of the right, this means to become worthy of the gift. The attainment of these works requires imagination and a sense of grandeur capable of directing the fortune toward an exalted aim. An excellent contemporary example is Elon Musk, who leverages his wealth and influence to enable space travel. Historical examples include the patronage of the Medici family, which financed the Italian Renaissance, and that of the Church of England, which financed the vicars responsible for many of the scientific discoveries made during the 19th century.
A Christian Redemption
A Christian worldview supports this. Jesus confirms its wisdom in the Parable of the Talents, from which we receive the heuristic:
From everyone to whom much was given, much will be expected. From the one who was entrusted with much, much more will be asked.
This heuristic and its correlates scaffold the Christian view that vision redeems inequalities of fortune. The originating parable shows that those to whom much is given may receive greater rewards for the wise use of their talents. Moreover, it justifies contempt for those who fail to use their means for even paltry ends. Furthermore, although the parable uses money as an example of fortune, the message is generalizable across domains. So, a responsibility for leveraging excellent means to achieve great ends can be expected from those without financial gifts. Thus, the much expected from the fortunate may assume many forms, and the beneficiaries of fortune may leverage their agency in selecting them.
A Secular Redemption
A secular worldview also accommodates it. Humans believe in reciprocity and fairness without socialization, although both definitions may be socially conditioned. So, humans have a natural tendency to dislike people who are more fortunate than themselves and feel the urge to level the playing field. The urge usually manifests as a desire to cut down the tall poppy or force it to share.
The first desire is malevolent because it ruins one person while failing to aid anyone else. The second is both technically unfeasible and sociopathic because the people who lack fortune are often more malevolent than the people who possess it. So, the value movement from the haves to the have-nots is usually from the decent to the indecent.
However, the imposition of vision and responsibility drives the development of invigorating works that enhance the aesthetics and technical means of life without condemning the fortunate to the malice and mediocrity of the unfortunate.
Redeeming Misfortune
Participation redeems misfortune.
The great challenge an unfortunate person must face is overcoming the resentment they feel because of their misfortune. This resentment drives them to cut down the tall poppy and ensure no crab can emerge from the bucket. Its existence is the reason why the poor and downtrodden are more malevolent than their well-to-do counterparts. And their malice often ruins themselves and others — like a person keeping a mouthful of poison ready to spit on their betters and slowly swallowing it over time.
Yet participation in the vision pursued by those luckier than themselves redeems the inequality borne by the unfortunate ones. It allows them to overcome their resentment and proves their triumph. The overcoming occurs as the subject discovers his dignified role within the community dedicated to the vision. Thus, he encounters his sense of belonging. The proof emerges as the unfortunate fulfills his role with greater vigor, and the products of his labor bolster his people.
So participation redeems misfortune by allowing the victim to overcome resentment and become an integral part of the whole. Thus, he and his people are enriched.
The Christian Redemption
A Christian worldview supports this. Jesus confirms it during his interaction with the blind man, whose vision He restored. The scene answers the question of suffering in the opening paragraph of John 9.
As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. 2And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” 3Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. 4We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming, when no one can work. 5As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” 6Having said these things, he spit on the ground and made mud with the saliva. Then he anointed the man's eyes with the mud 7and said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which means Sent). So he went and washed and came back seeing.
The answer to suffering is to allow the works of god to appear in the sufferer. Three meanings relevant to the proposed redemption arise from this view. The first is to regard the sufferer as the recipient of good works from those around him — an end satisfied by integration into their community. The second is to produce a spiritual change within the sufferer — an end attained when he overcomes his resentment for the world. And the third is for the sufferer to be the source of more outstanding works — an end achieved by their nascent vigor within their community. Thus, through communal participation, the sufferer of misfortune becomes a conduit through which lesser benevolences are transformed into greater ones.
The Secular Redemption
A secular worldview likewise permits the redemption of misfortune through participation. Without divine providence, meaning can be acquired through collective endeavors. For the sufferer, active engagement in a shared vision yields three rewards. First, it offers a pathway to overcome resentment by channeling negative emotions into constructive efforts. Second, it satisfies the need for belonging, as the individual finds a dignified role within the whole. Third, it amplifies the influence of the sufferer because their participation enjoys network effects, which allow them to wield more significant impact than they might have otherwise enjoyed.
These individual transformations, in turn, confer three benefits upon the community. The first is that they bolster members’ character by testing them with the task of alleviating the unsharable burdens of another. Second, the community protects itself from the antisocial behaviors the resentful sufferers would inflict upon it by integrating them. Third, the communal pursuit of a lofty vision is bolstered by the work products of those who have overcome misfortune, thereby enhancing the potential for achieving shared goals.
Thus, even without invoking spiritual doctrines, participation serves as a secular means to redeem misfortune. It allows the sufferer to extract value from their hardships and to contribute significantly to the community. In this way, both the individual and the society are elevated, justifying the existence of inequality by transforming it into a catalyst for collective advancement.
The Emergent Ethos
The redemptions allow us to produce statements consistent with both worldviews. They are the foundation of a synthetic ethos that allows cooperation between both.
They are:
Possession demands greatness. A responsibility always accompanies a gain.
Dispossession demands altruism. Loss’s demon is resentment and must be slain.
Moreover, a few virtues and vices emerge from this redemptive model.
Virtues emerging from fortune’s beneficiaries include imagination, leadership, and initiative. The attendant vices are waste, pettiness, and sterility.
Virtues emerging from misfortune’s victims include discipline, gregariousness, and productivity. Its attendant vices are decadence, malice, and indolence.
When adopted, this ethos serves both Christian and secular interests while answering the question of inequalities and what to do with them in a way that serves communal well-being and elevates the individuals within it.
Heuristics for Both
Now, I will present heuristics for remembering both redemptions. They are helpful because humans suffer from a learning disability wherein they believe something more strongly if it is spoken to them in the form of a rhyme. This weird faith in rhymes is the source of many social problems, but it can be leveraged for good as well as evil. So, I will provide three rhymes for each redemption and their synthesis.
Rhymes for Fortune’s Redemption
Make bold that which you hold.
Use your height to make things right.
What you hoard will be ignored.
Rhymes for Misfortune’s Redemption
What you lack, do not attack.
Rise above to earn their love.
Be a part — that’s where you’ll start.
Rhymes for the Synthesis
What one owns, forward loans. What one lacks, one backs.
From gain and pain, we all remain.
Give what you can. Help where you stand.
With these nine heuristics, you should discover something valuable to guide you during your weaker moments. If not, then others will gain instead. So, I encourage you to remember at least one and insert it into conversation where appropriate. They are original, i.e., they come from me, and I’m a lot wittier than the average person, so you can sound clever in conversation if you say one and act like you came up with it.
It’s cool.
Final Thoughts
Inequality is an enduring aspect of the human condition. Attempts to eradicate it have failed. They will always fail. The failures exacerbate the very issues they aim to solve. Instead of striving for an unattainable uniformity, we should focus on redeeming the existing inequalities by channeling them toward collective betterment.
The call for those blessed with fortune is to harness their advantages for grand visions that uplift society. Doing so justifies their advantage and contributes to the greater good. For those burdened by misfortune, participation in these shared visions offers a path to overcome resentment and find purpose within a community. Their contributions enrich the collective endeavor, turning personal adversity into a source of strength.
This dual approach fosters an ethos that transcends divisions, uniting individuals under common goals that benefit all. By embracing the responsibilities that come with our respective circumstances, we can transform inequality from a source of discord into a catalyst for advancement. In this way, we move toward a society wherein those with the most may work in tandem with those having the least in favor of a shared pursuit of greatness.
This has been Gene of the Space Guild.
End transmission.
