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140 reviews for:
A Discourse Upon the Origin and the Foundation of the Inequality Among Mankind
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
3.52 AVERAGE
140 reviews for:
A Discourse Upon the Origin and the Foundation of the Inequality Among Mankind
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
3.52 AVERAGE
I highly recommend reading this! I certainly did not find myself agreeing with everything that Rousseau wrote but I found it a really compelling, well-written and 'enlightening' piece about mankind's accelerated perversion after leaving the state of nature and entering the state of society.
A few reviewers have criticised this discourse for being overly reliant on rhetoric and while I do see the validity in that, I think one should take into account that there was little, if any, scientific research on the origins of mankind (Darwin was not around yet) so much of what Rousseau could say about the state of nature could only be guesswork (which is actually pretty accurate).
The other criticism is that Rousseau is too idealistic about the 'state of nature', a concept some are even sceptical of. In my opinion, Rousseau does not paint an idealistic picture of the state of nature, nor does he promote a return to it; instead, he seeks to highlight the depravities of the modern age and contrast that with the purity of our ancestors. How is that false? Also, the state of nature most certainly exists, at least as Rousseau described it -- pre-language, pre-society, when humans lived as individual hunters and were only motivated by primordial, carnal needs like food and reproduction. We were animals once and that is a scientific fact anyways, no?
My main complaint with the discourse is that the main idea of inequality is not defined at the very start and it can also be pretty challenging to spot Rousseau's thesis. Taking the title at face value, I expected the work to be on modern inequalities of his time like socioeconomic inequality (in France, there were the 3 estates) and slavery. However, the philosophical discourse takes the shape of an anthropological exploration, without the scientific evidence that we have today. At times, the ideas that he raises also remind me of Homo Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari (the one that comes to mind is the 'progress trap'). In spite of, or because of that, I was all the more engrossed and impressed by the work -- much of his analysis and evaluation actually made sense to a 21st-century reader! And where anthropological works tend to be inadequate, Rousseau's Discourse attempts to shed light on the fundamental changes in human nature, or in his words, "to strip man naked".
To do that, Rousseau visits the state of nature in Part 1. Personally, my conception of the state of nature was more or less aligned with the Hobbesian view that life was "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short", in other words, something we should be glad we have escaped from. But Rousseau offers a different interpretation of the state of nature, an arguably more nuanced one.
For Rousseau, the state of nature is characterised by an interest in self-preservation and the lack of social attachments. Indeed, this mirrors Hobbes' view that life was solitary, in that our ancestors had no family nor romantic relationships; in fact, relationships were simply meant for progeniture. All we did was hunt, forage, hide from predators, mate with fellow 'humans' and hide from other stronger 'humans'. This theme of solitude would be one of Rousseau's main arguments against modernity; when people had little to no attachment to others, they had no dependence on anyone else, and that gave them freedom.
Read the following excerpt:
"I should be glad to have explained to me, what kind of misery a free being, whose heart is at ease and whose body is in health, can possibly suffer. I would ask also, whether a social or a natural life is most likely to become insupportable to those who enjoy it. We see around us hardly a creature in civil society, who does not lament his existence: we even see many deprive themselves of as much of it as they can... In instinct alone, he had all he required for living in the state of nature; and with a developed understanding he has only just enough to support life in society."
So were our ancestors really more miserable than us? To be honest, this is a question that I have been thinking about every now and then as of late. Yes, we have seen so much Progress in our creations and inventions, and in our thought. But are we really better off than we were in the past? Perhaps if we consider the material side of life, security and physical health and what not, then I think we certainly are in the brightest epoch ever. Yet, have we considered the proliferation of mental illnesses as a sign of something fundamentally wrong with the modern psyche? It is also interesting to note how novel diseases only started plaguing the human race once we settled into agricultural civilisations, and famines and scarcity became a problem to be reckoned with. With Progress, we have also invented problems for ourselves, some of which we may never be able to solve. Alas, Rousseau does not recommend a return to the state of nature -- that's impossible.
Before I go on about the transition from the state of nature to the state of society, I'd like to note down the two inequalities that Rousseau identifies in mankind. Firstly, there is natural inequality, which is simply the difference in strength, intellect, etc. and secondly, there is moral inequality, which is the inequality in privileges (wealth, political power) as set out by conventions.
In the state of nature, according to Rousseau, there is hardly any inequality. If you're weaker than another human being, you'd just hide in a tree or find another place to be (if I'm not wrong); after all, all humans were interested in self-preservation and there was frankly nothing to get from killing another human being unless you were a cannibal. I think this is something that isn't very contentious.
So when did inequality start increasing? When we entered the state of society.
But when did we enter the state of society? When our faculties developed to the extent that we started claiming parts of the earth as private property. In Rousseau's opinion, the progress of inequality followed three stages: 1) the establishment of laws and the right of property, 2) the institution of the magistracy, and 3) the conversion of legitimate into arbitrary power. With the first, there emerged the distinction between rich and poor; powerful and weak; master and slave.
I'll try to outline the progression as simply as I can, and I hope I haven't misunderstood too much.
When the first ambitious human claimed his property, there followed inequity. In the interest of self-preservation, others followed suit, and this was when natural inequality accentuated the differences in their ability to claim and defend their property. This would then become a self-perpetuating cycle, where natural inequalities are worsened by institutional inequality with the establishment of codes of conduct (the law) to protect private property.
The institution of the magistracy signified the endowment of a select group of humans with the power to enforce laws in order to protect property. This is the origin of the state. Whereas social contract theorists argue that the state was birthed as a result of a compromise between the now-out-of-the-state-of-nature humans and their leaders in which they exchanged some of their freedoms for security, Rousseau provides an interesting counter-argument. He asserts that the state was conceived of by the rich as a means to exploit the poor to defend their property. After all, would those without property require security?
Now, I think both arguments can coexist. While Locke's social contract proves more compelling in explaining the formation and sustaining of feudal societies, Rousseau's view arguably makes more sense for the time before the first political community existed and before everyone owned property. Hmm.
On to the final stage of inequality, the conversion of legitimate authority to arbitrary power. I'm not entirely sure what Rousseau meant by this but if I remember correctly, this final stage concerned the consolidation of political power in family dynasties or the elites. Hence, rather than being instituted by the people to protect their interests, government became arbitrary and tyrannical. I guess he was thinking of absolute monarchies when he wrote this.
Hence, with these three stages of inequality, mankind exists the largely equal state of nature to the dramatically unequal state of society. According to Rousseau, the state of society is one where humans begin to depend on others, forming various relationships (social, economic, political), and we begin to compare ourselves to others. This is where one of his more abstract and less germane ideas comes into play -- the idea that vanity increases our vulnerability to pain.
When one accumulates property, luxury becomes a necessity, for both the rich and those who aspire to become rich. This materialist yearning makes is such that it is more cruel to be deprived of our possessions that we are pleased to possess them, hence increasing our vulnerability to pain. While I don't know how this is relevant to inequality, I really liked the following quote:
"... the rich are so sensitive in every part of their goods."
Indeed, the well-to-do are the ones who need the state, the military, the police more than anyone else because inherently, it simply does not make sense for them to own things that ultimately do not truly belong to them. Absolute monarchs lose political power when their political power is seized by force; it is perfectly legitimate for that which was not theirs to begin with to be taken away from them. And I guess this fear must exist for the rich. Even though they do have legitimate claims to ownership, there is little moral support for the existence of their wealth when there are quarters of the world starving.
Which brings me to Rousseau's point that moral inequality clashes with natural right whenever it is not proportionate with physical inequality.
"It is contrary to the law of nature that children should command old men, fools wise men, and that the privileged few should gorge themselves with superfluities while the starving multitudes are in want of the bare necessities of life." (Cool how this prefigures Marxist ideas)
Being a radical, Rousseau also writes that the rich are only happy with their wealth because the dispossessed, the destitute, the poor exist. Without that contrast in society, what can anyone even make of their wealth and status? Personally, I do not think rich people are all sadistic but there must certainly be some truth in Rousseau's damning critique of the accruement of wealth. If we had no one else to compare ourselves with, would we still feel so great about owning so much property? And if there was no measure of poverty or wealth, would we still feel the compulsion to earn more, buy more? That I'm inclined to refute those statements and argue for the fundamental human desire to be in possession of more, more, more, seems to suggest that greed is something fundamentally human. And greed probably was not a thing in the state of nature, perhaps because we were only interested in self-preservation.
To conclude, Rousseau's Discourse on the Origins of Inequality brings us back, philosophically, to the state of nature (when man was equal) to our current state of nature (one that is rife with inequalities) and provides theories for the emergence and worsening of inequalities as well as a welcome critique of economic elites, then and now.
A few reviewers have criticised this discourse for being overly reliant on rhetoric and while I do see the validity in that, I think one should take into account that there was little, if any, scientific research on the origins of mankind (Darwin was not around yet) so much of what Rousseau could say about the state of nature could only be guesswork (which is actually pretty accurate).
The other criticism is that Rousseau is too idealistic about the 'state of nature', a concept some are even sceptical of. In my opinion, Rousseau does not paint an idealistic picture of the state of nature, nor does he promote a return to it; instead, he seeks to highlight the depravities of the modern age and contrast that with the purity of our ancestors. How is that false? Also, the state of nature most certainly exists, at least as Rousseau described it -- pre-language, pre-society, when humans lived as individual hunters and were only motivated by primordial, carnal needs like food and reproduction. We were animals once and that is a scientific fact anyways, no?
My main complaint with the discourse is that the main idea of inequality is not defined at the very start and it can also be pretty challenging to spot Rousseau's thesis. Taking the title at face value, I expected the work to be on modern inequalities of his time like socioeconomic inequality (in France, there were the 3 estates) and slavery. However, the philosophical discourse takes the shape of an anthropological exploration, without the scientific evidence that we have today. At times, the ideas that he raises also remind me of Homo Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari (the one that comes to mind is the 'progress trap'). In spite of, or because of that, I was all the more engrossed and impressed by the work -- much of his analysis and evaluation actually made sense to a 21st-century reader! And where anthropological works tend to be inadequate, Rousseau's Discourse attempts to shed light on the fundamental changes in human nature, or in his words, "to strip man naked".
To do that, Rousseau visits the state of nature in Part 1. Personally, my conception of the state of nature was more or less aligned with the Hobbesian view that life was "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short", in other words, something we should be glad we have escaped from. But Rousseau offers a different interpretation of the state of nature, an arguably more nuanced one.
For Rousseau, the state of nature is characterised by an interest in self-preservation and the lack of social attachments. Indeed, this mirrors Hobbes' view that life was solitary, in that our ancestors had no family nor romantic relationships; in fact, relationships were simply meant for progeniture. All we did was hunt, forage, hide from predators, mate with fellow 'humans' and hide from other stronger 'humans'. This theme of solitude would be one of Rousseau's main arguments against modernity; when people had little to no attachment to others, they had no dependence on anyone else, and that gave them freedom.
Read the following excerpt:
"I should be glad to have explained to me, what kind of misery a free being, whose heart is at ease and whose body is in health, can possibly suffer. I would ask also, whether a social or a natural life is most likely to become insupportable to those who enjoy it. We see around us hardly a creature in civil society, who does not lament his existence: we even see many deprive themselves of as much of it as they can... In instinct alone, he had all he required for living in the state of nature; and with a developed understanding he has only just enough to support life in society."
So were our ancestors really more miserable than us? To be honest, this is a question that I have been thinking about every now and then as of late. Yes, we have seen so much Progress in our creations and inventions, and in our thought. But are we really better off than we were in the past? Perhaps if we consider the material side of life, security and physical health and what not, then I think we certainly are in the brightest epoch ever. Yet, have we considered the proliferation of mental illnesses as a sign of something fundamentally wrong with the modern psyche? It is also interesting to note how novel diseases only started plaguing the human race once we settled into agricultural civilisations, and famines and scarcity became a problem to be reckoned with. With Progress, we have also invented problems for ourselves, some of which we may never be able to solve. Alas, Rousseau does not recommend a return to the state of nature -- that's impossible.
Before I go on about the transition from the state of nature to the state of society, I'd like to note down the two inequalities that Rousseau identifies in mankind. Firstly, there is natural inequality, which is simply the difference in strength, intellect, etc. and secondly, there is moral inequality, which is the inequality in privileges (wealth, political power) as set out by conventions.
In the state of nature, according to Rousseau, there is hardly any inequality. If you're weaker than another human being, you'd just hide in a tree or find another place to be (if I'm not wrong); after all, all humans were interested in self-preservation and there was frankly nothing to get from killing another human being unless you were a cannibal. I think this is something that isn't very contentious.
So when did inequality start increasing? When we entered the state of society.
But when did we enter the state of society? When our faculties developed to the extent that we started claiming parts of the earth as private property. In Rousseau's opinion, the progress of inequality followed three stages: 1) the establishment of laws and the right of property, 2) the institution of the magistracy, and 3) the conversion of legitimate into arbitrary power. With the first, there emerged the distinction between rich and poor; powerful and weak; master and slave.
I'll try to outline the progression as simply as I can, and I hope I haven't misunderstood too much.
When the first ambitious human claimed his property, there followed inequity. In the interest of self-preservation, others followed suit, and this was when natural inequality accentuated the differences in their ability to claim and defend their property. This would then become a self-perpetuating cycle, where natural inequalities are worsened by institutional inequality with the establishment of codes of conduct (the law) to protect private property.
The institution of the magistracy signified the endowment of a select group of humans with the power to enforce laws in order to protect property. This is the origin of the state. Whereas social contract theorists argue that the state was birthed as a result of a compromise between the now-out-of-the-state-of-nature humans and their leaders in which they exchanged some of their freedoms for security, Rousseau provides an interesting counter-argument. He asserts that the state was conceived of by the rich as a means to exploit the poor to defend their property. After all, would those without property require security?
Now, I think both arguments can coexist. While Locke's social contract proves more compelling in explaining the formation and sustaining of feudal societies, Rousseau's view arguably makes more sense for the time before the first political community existed and before everyone owned property. Hmm.
On to the final stage of inequality, the conversion of legitimate authority to arbitrary power. I'm not entirely sure what Rousseau meant by this but if I remember correctly, this final stage concerned the consolidation of political power in family dynasties or the elites. Hence, rather than being instituted by the people to protect their interests, government became arbitrary and tyrannical. I guess he was thinking of absolute monarchies when he wrote this.
Hence, with these three stages of inequality, mankind exists the largely equal state of nature to the dramatically unequal state of society. According to Rousseau, the state of society is one where humans begin to depend on others, forming various relationships (social, economic, political), and we begin to compare ourselves to others. This is where one of his more abstract and less germane ideas comes into play -- the idea that vanity increases our vulnerability to pain.
When one accumulates property, luxury becomes a necessity, for both the rich and those who aspire to become rich. This materialist yearning makes is such that it is more cruel to be deprived of our possessions that we are pleased to possess them, hence increasing our vulnerability to pain. While I don't know how this is relevant to inequality, I really liked the following quote:
"... the rich are so sensitive in every part of their goods."
Indeed, the well-to-do are the ones who need the state, the military, the police more than anyone else because inherently, it simply does not make sense for them to own things that ultimately do not truly belong to them. Absolute monarchs lose political power when their political power is seized by force; it is perfectly legitimate for that which was not theirs to begin with to be taken away from them. And I guess this fear must exist for the rich. Even though they do have legitimate claims to ownership, there is little moral support for the existence of their wealth when there are quarters of the world starving.
Which brings me to Rousseau's point that moral inequality clashes with natural right whenever it is not proportionate with physical inequality.
"It is contrary to the law of nature that children should command old men, fools wise men, and that the privileged few should gorge themselves with superfluities while the starving multitudes are in want of the bare necessities of life." (Cool how this prefigures Marxist ideas)
Being a radical, Rousseau also writes that the rich are only happy with their wealth because the dispossessed, the destitute, the poor exist. Without that contrast in society, what can anyone even make of their wealth and status? Personally, I do not think rich people are all sadistic but there must certainly be some truth in Rousseau's damning critique of the accruement of wealth. If we had no one else to compare ourselves with, would we still feel so great about owning so much property? And if there was no measure of poverty or wealth, would we still feel the compulsion to earn more, buy more? That I'm inclined to refute those statements and argue for the fundamental human desire to be in possession of more, more, more, seems to suggest that greed is something fundamentally human. And greed probably was not a thing in the state of nature, perhaps because we were only interested in self-preservation.
To conclude, Rousseau's Discourse on the Origins of Inequality brings us back, philosophically, to the state of nature (when man was equal) to our current state of nature (one that is rife with inequalities) and provides theories for the emergence and worsening of inequalities as well as a welcome critique of economic elites, then and now.
How did people start to use words to express abstract ideas such as love, reason, freedom, death, or life?
informative
fast-paced
The first man who, having fenced in a piece of land, said 'This is mine', and found people naïve enough to believe him, that man was the true founder of civil society. From how many crimes, wars, and murders, from how many horrors and misfortunes might not any one have saved mankind, by pulling up the stakes, or filling up the ditch, and crying to his fellows: Beware of listening to this impostor; you are undone if you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us all, and the earth itself to nobody.
Alright, let’s see what we have here... I had a great time reading The Body Politic, it was a fantastic warm- up if you want to commit to Rousseau’s other major titles. It’s safe to say I had pretty high expectations on this one.
FIRST PART
Rousseau takes us back to where it all began: the nature in its most raw, most naked, most unscathed state. Simply put, the state of nature provided savage man his sustenance and shelter the same way it shaped him into a robust being (as a result of natural stresses). It made him almost indestructible. Necessity obliged savage man to use his body for many purposes. Ergo, savage man was above all the other animals because, aside from his instincts, he had freedom. So long as his needs (sandwich, sex, sleep) were met, savage man was happy. His desires never go beyond his physical needs. Savage man wasn’t whiny like you. All savage man wanted was to survive and that’s all there is to it. Savage man 1 couldn’t care less if savage man 2 can carry five more stones than him, savage man 1 knew the bounds of his abilities. Both savage men knew they were naturally built differently, unequally; and they were okay with that.
Language. It is quite puzzling to ponder about how language came into existence. This is exactly what sets man apart from other animals. How long must’ve been spent to, out of abstract nothingness, create numbers, speech patterns, tenses of verbs, and all forms of reasoning?
Compassion. Thomas Hobbes, yes that guy who wrote a book with a badass cover, enjoined us to do away with the thinking that because savage man has no idea of goodness, he ought to be wicked. Savage man won’t square up with you so long as you let him mind his own business. This natural feeling of compassion preserves all species.
Love. Savages did not have the standards civilized men have in choosing who to love. They did not even know what love is, or at least the kind of love as we know it now. They only follow the character nature implanted on them- anyone can answer their urges. Men in state of nature were fortunate enough to be confined only to what is physical in love. No strings attached.
“It is easy to conceive how much less the difference between man and man must be in a state of nature than in a state of society, and how greatly the natural inequality of mankind must be increased by the inequalities of social institutions.”
Give civilized man and savage man a weapon, the former would obviously have the upper hand. Leave civilized man and savage man naked in the forest, the latter would thrive (the former would be a bitch and tap out). Contrary to all the badassery that is savage man, industry reduced civilized man to a tamed creature; harmless, vulnerable, and possibly driven by self-serving interests. It all went downhill as soon as civilized man invented property and decided to gatekeep them. Power became the yardstick to possessing property. “[This is exacerbated by the] usurpations by the rich, robbery by the poor, and the unbridled passions of both, suppressed the cries of natural compassion and the still feeble voice of justice, and filled men with avarice, ambition and vice.” This gave rise to the rich and poor divide. This is when inequality becomes not okay.
Some eloquently articulate bastard managed to convince people they need an institution to promulgate rules of justice and peace, to keep things jUst and faIr and EqUal, and to keep the people from turning their backs against each other. Sadly, people back then were dumb enough to believe said bastard. In an attempt to fix this unnatural inequality, civilized man created government. The thing is, the government sounds good and noble until you realize how much infested it is with, well, the rich. The government is then nothing but a mere tool to pacify the poor from their gravamen, to keep things tolerable for them. All of a sudden, the rich and the poor are the strong and the weak. But hey, don’t lose hope, we can fix this! We can depose the oppressors, we can abandon the government that forsook us, renounce the social contract that enslaved us, we can altogether start over, except we don’t. We incessantly, and almost obsessively, keep on fixing a ‘system’ that would never work, at least not for civilized men.
The first man to barricade a piece of land as his own was not the founder of civil society, he was an asshole. As John Locke said, “There can be no injury when there is no property.” From here, men’s wants superseded their needs. Language flourished in an unprecedented manner. Man found a way of settling (or making parties believe they are settling) conflicts harmlessly and fairly. The habit of living together created not only affection, but also compassion. Man started to define ideas of beauty and merit, which soon gave rise to feelings of preference and standards. Love became less about physical urges and more about moral commitment. With this strong emotion arose jealousy, the culprit for one the major crimes in historical and even contemporary society. Property was created, family was born, society started, and the first step to political inequality was taken.
The progress of inequality started at the creation of laws and right of property which then authorized the creation of the rich/poor divide. This is followed by the institution of magistracy which turned the rich powerful and the poor weak. The final nail in the coffin is the conversion of legitimate into arbitrary power which give the powerful the title ‘master’ and the weak ‘slave.’
From the start, we know that inequality is naturally inevitable for man. This inequality, as much as we want to, cannot be abolished. Any inequality beyond the natural inequality justifies just how greed and corruption pervaded man. Inequality, then, is wrong when it exceeds the natural inequality. Marxist thought would counter this with the fact that because of our natural inequalities, it would also be sensible to believe that an inequality or two (that exceeds natural inequality) would have to exist. BUT no one is 29,000-square-foot Seattle estate, a Texas ranch, a Washington DC mansion, and two neighboring Beverly Hills homes more naturally talented than anyone else (I’m looking at you Jeff Bezos); no one is so dumb and weak that he deserves to get exploited 24/7 for mere substandard living.
<
“… savages, most of whom have been found in this state, seems to prove that men were meant to remain in it, that it is the real youth of the world, and that all subsequent advances have been apparently so many steps towards the perfection of the individual, but in reality towards the decrepitude of the species.”
- Jean Jacques Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality
FIRST PART
Rousseau takes us back to where it all began: the nature in its most raw, most naked, most unscathed state. Simply put, the state of nature provided savage man his sustenance and shelter the same way it shaped him into a robust being (as a result of natural stresses). It made him almost indestructible. Necessity obliged savage man to use his body for many purposes. Ergo, savage man was above all the other animals because, aside from his instincts, he had freedom. So long as his needs (sandwich, sex, sleep) were met, savage man was happy. His desires never go beyond his physical needs. Savage man wasn’t whiny like you. All savage man wanted was to survive and that’s all there is to it. Savage man 1 couldn’t care less if savage man 2 can carry five more stones than him, savage man 1 knew the bounds of his abilities. Both savage men knew they were naturally built differently, unequally; and they were okay with that.
Language. It is quite puzzling to ponder about how language came into existence. This is exactly what sets man apart from other animals. How long must’ve been spent to, out of abstract nothingness, create numbers, speech patterns, tenses of verbs, and all forms of reasoning?
Compassion. Thomas Hobbes, yes that guy who wrote a book with a badass cover, enjoined us to do away with the thinking that because savage man has no idea of goodness, he ought to be wicked. Savage man won’t square up with you so long as you let him mind his own business. This natural feeling of compassion preserves all species.
Love. Savages did not have the standards civilized men have in choosing who to love. They did not even know what love is, or at least the kind of love as we know it now. They only follow the character nature implanted on them- anyone can answer their urges. Men in state of nature were fortunate enough to be confined only to what is physical in love. No strings attached.
“It is easy to conceive how much less the difference between man and man must be in a state of nature than in a state of society, and how greatly the natural inequality of mankind must be increased by the inequalities of social institutions.”
Give civilized man and savage man a weapon, the former would obviously have the upper hand. Leave civilized man and savage man naked in the forest, the latter would thrive (the former would be a bitch and tap out). Contrary to all the badassery that is savage man, industry reduced civilized man to a tamed creature; harmless, vulnerable, and possibly driven by self-serving interests. It all went downhill as soon as civilized man invented property and decided to gatekeep them. Power became the yardstick to possessing property. “[This is exacerbated by the] usurpations by the rich, robbery by the poor, and the unbridled passions of both, suppressed the cries of natural compassion and the still feeble voice of justice, and filled men with avarice, ambition and vice.” This gave rise to the rich and poor divide. This is when inequality becomes not okay.
Some eloquently articulate bastard managed to convince people they need an institution to promulgate rules of justice and peace, to keep things jUst and faIr and EqUal, and to keep the people from turning their backs against each other. Sadly, people back then were dumb enough to believe said bastard. In an attempt to fix this unnatural inequality, civilized man created government. The thing is, the government sounds good and noble until you realize how much infested it is with, well, the rich. The government is then nothing but a mere tool to pacify the poor from their gravamen, to keep things tolerable for them. All of a sudden, the rich and the poor are the strong and the weak. But hey, don’t lose hope, we can fix this! We can depose the oppressors, we can abandon the government that forsook us, renounce the social contract that enslaved us, we can altogether start over, except we don’t. We incessantly, and almost obsessively, keep on fixing a ‘system’ that would never work, at least not for civilized men.
The first man to barricade a piece of land as his own was not the founder of civil society, he was an asshole. As John Locke said, “There can be no injury when there is no property.” From here, men’s wants superseded their needs. Language flourished in an unprecedented manner. Man found a way of settling (or making parties believe they are settling) conflicts harmlessly and fairly. The habit of living together created not only affection, but also compassion. Man started to define ideas of beauty and merit, which soon gave rise to feelings of preference and standards. Love became less about physical urges and more about moral commitment. With this strong emotion arose jealousy, the culprit for one the major crimes in historical and even contemporary society. Property was created, family was born, society started, and the first step to political inequality was taken.
The progress of inequality started at the creation of laws and right of property which then authorized the creation of the rich/poor divide. This is followed by the institution of magistracy which turned the rich powerful and the poor weak. The final nail in the coffin is the conversion of legitimate into arbitrary power which give the powerful the title ‘master’ and the weak ‘slave.’
From the start, we know that inequality is naturally inevitable for man. This inequality, as much as we want to, cannot be abolished. Any inequality beyond the natural inequality justifies just how greed and corruption pervaded man. Inequality, then, is wrong when it exceeds the natural inequality. Marxist thought would counter this with the fact that because of our natural inequalities, it would also be sensible to believe that an inequality or two (that exceeds natural inequality) would have to exist. BUT no one is 29,000-square-foot Seattle estate, a Texas ranch, a Washington DC mansion, and two neighboring Beverly Hills homes more naturally talented than anyone else (I’m looking at you Jeff Bezos); no one is so dumb and weak that he deserves to get exploited 24/7 for mere substandard living.
<
“… savages, most of whom have been found in this state, seems to prove that men were meant to remain in it, that it is the real youth of the world, and that all subsequent advances have been apparently so many steps towards the perfection of the individual, but in reality towards the decrepitude of the species.”
- Jean Jacques Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality
Although Rousseau presented a lot of good points and a cohesive argument, I did not like this essay very much.
I for sure did not fully process this book at all, i shall come back to it another time (and preferably in french lol)
DNF'd on: February 3rd, 2021
DNF'd on: Page 31 (16%)
Sorry to Jean-Jacques Rousseau, but I just didn't have the time to finish this one. It had less to do with the quality of Rousseau's ideas and more to do with a hectic week and I probably will never get to this one. I guess I was just never meant to know about french philosophy.
DNF'd on: Page 31 (16%)
Sorry to Jean-Jacques Rousseau, but I just didn't have the time to finish this one. It had less to do with the quality of Rousseau's ideas and more to do with a hectic week and I probably will never get to this one. I guess I was just never meant to know about french philosophy.
2 stars is giving him the benefit of the doubt, maybe there was something insightful or important in between all the weird outdated anthropology. abandoned after about 50 pages.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Racism