Equality Does Not Exist

In the last couple of years, equality has been the center of debates and discussion in politics, society, the workplace or just within our personal conversations. Gender equality especially, has definitely been one of the major topic within the equality discussion. However, equality does not exist because there is so much more to it.

Equality – " The state of being equal, especially in status, rights, or opportunities."

Equal – "being the same in quantity, size, degree or value."

I understand and idealism of wanting to be treated equally, regardless of gender, race, sexual orientation, religious background etc., However, equality is never that simple and the only way that we will truly be equal is if everyone in the world is born looking the same way, same race, same size, same religion, background, upbringing, and the list goes on.

I was out Friday night with my husband and a couple of friends at a bar and the topic of being a gentlemen came up. Then I realized that the whole equality discussion is doing nothing but making things difficult for everyone.

The world is not designed to be equal, hence we have different genders, race, cultures, traditions, languages, so on and so forth. Using workplace equality as an example, yes I agree that women and men should be given equal opportunities in society and the workplace, and at the moment that can be improved. But saying that, what we are doing by making gender equality the center stage of the workplace equality discussion is forcing people to make decisions on promotions and opportunities based on gender and not on individuals actual ability to take on certain responsibilities or role.

To start with, men and women have different goals in life. Some women wants to focus on climbing the career ladder while some men wish they could be a stay home dad. The same works the other way round and that already explains the fact that equality does not exist. Or to make things even simpler, men can't become pregnant if you want to talk about being equal.

Then we have the equality discussion based on family backgrounds, the privileged versus the not. This came up recently in the news about how children who attend private schools often end up doing better and have better opportunities then those who goes to public schools. As much as you would like to argue that it's not true, the statistics are there to show. Even if we put aside the difference in education in public and private schools, unless you earn yourself a scholarship, we all know it costs a fortune to enroll in private schools and children who do, are often from well to do families, probably with parents who have good connections in society which will inevitably affect the future of their child.

This reminds me of my husband's "hate" for "old money" or how some people are named lords or why anyone should be treated any differently (a.k.a. the Royal Family) just because of their family names. Yes I agree that it is annoying that some people do get special treatment because of their names, but at the same time, how many of us can say with a clear conscience that you will not be tempted to abuse a little bit of that power if you had it?

The idea of equality is the ideal world that we all want, where everyone is treated the same. However, deep down we all know that this world is not design to be equal, there are so many layers to how things work and so many things that affects individuals ideals, needs and wants in life that oppose the idea of equality. We can debate about equality for all we want, but one thing for sure, we can never deny human nature.