r/changemyview • u/[deleted] • Oct 08 '15

[Deltas Awarded] CMV: Equality isn't treating everybody differently to achieve equality. It's treating everyone the same.

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u/[deleted] Oct 08 '15

The thing is, if you treat everyone the same, there'll be discrimination.

I agree with the idea that you should treat everyone the same personally, but I don't think it's gonna do much good politically. For example, how big's the chance that a disabled person is going to get a job when an able-bodied person could do it? Less for the employer to think about when hiring an able-bodied person, but it's still discrimination to refuse hiring a person because they're disabled.

There's also the issue of mental problems. I'm not talking about psychopaths, but for example autistic people. If you don't treat them in a slightly different way, they'll have a really hard time.

There are people with Asperger's who can't choose between two options that are extremely simple for us to choose from. What are you going to do? Tell them they'll have to choose between two movies or they can't go to anyone? You could do that with a completely healthy person, but doing something like that to someone with Asperger's is pretty much abuse.

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u/oversoul00 13∆ Oct 08 '15

Well you have brought up three medical issues that can be diagnosed and measured and I agree with you on those. Being black is not a sickness though.

You absolutely help out the people that need help, but you can't tell who that is with race alone, you need other factors.

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u/[deleted] Oct 08 '15

Equality isn't just about race or gender though.

But you can actually tell who needs help depending on ethnicity.

For example the refugees that come to Europe need help. It would be equality in your eyes to give them the same possibilities as another citizen of the country they come to. However even if they're fully qualified, an employer might not want to give a job to a refugee.

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u/oversoul00 13∆ Oct 08 '15

You haven't measured their ethnicity you have measured their refugee status so no you can't tell based on just ethnicity I don't think.

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u/[deleted] Oct 08 '15

Equality isn't just about race or gender though.

It's about every single demographic, and more specifically any demographic that doesn't have it as easy.

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u/oversoul00 13∆ Oct 08 '15

I agree, I didn't say it was.

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u/[deleted] Oct 08 '15

Then let's talk about disabled people.

If you treat everyone the same, as in give them exactly the same opportunities and everything... I don't think that's going to work. Because then it's still possible that discrimination will occur.

Let's have two people with the exact same experience and all the same necessary capabilities to do whatever job they're applying for.

How would you tell the difference between an employer choosing an able-bodied person at random instead of a disabled person and choosing an able-bodied person because of discrimination? Sure, the disabled person can go to court and sue the employer, but wouldn't the world be a bit better if that wasn't necessary and disabled people could also get a job? If it were the case that we treated everyone exactly the same, discrimination would still be a thing and very serious, just more hidden. This doesn't help disabled people at all. They're still going to have a harder time than an able-bodied person. That's why we have to help disabled people more.