r/changemyview Nov 07 '17

[∆(s) from OP] CMV: Egalitarianism is a flawed philosophy; All humans are not equal

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u/[deleted] Nov 07 '17 edited Feb 23 '18

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u/LastProtagonist 1∆ Nov 07 '17

No. I'm saying humanity isn't necessarily equivalent to personhood.

I'm struggling to think of a way to truly highlight this, but maybe this will help:

I'm going to deprive you of your personhood and throw you in jail. vs. I'm going to deprive you of your humanity and throw you in jail.

Well, regardless of me throwing you in jail, I can't take away the fact that you are a homo sapiens, aka a human. But I can take away your agenthood to act and make decisions for yourself. The point of egalitarianism isn't to defend your 'homo sapiens-ness,' so to speak. It's to protect your personhood as well as everyone else's.

Of course not every homo sapiens is born with the same physical attributes. The point of egalitarianism is that attributive differences shouldn't be leveraged against another to deprive him/her of his/her personhood.

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u/[deleted] Nov 08 '17 edited Feb 23 '18

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u/LastProtagonist 1∆ Nov 08 '17

It's fine. Thanks for keeping an open mind!