To the editor:
Last week Rick Sirvint said it was “utopian” (ie: unachievable) for everyone to expect excellent and affordable health care, a well-paying job, that every child could reach “his potential,” equal pay for women doing equal work as men, and income equality. This worldview encapsulates the hubris of privilege as Mr. Sirvint leaves unsaid just who it is who must suffer these inequalities (surely not himself and his family).
Here I will step up and accept that role, because if not me, than who?. According to Mr. Sirvint’s worldview, I must choose between excellent health care that leaves me bankrupt or “affordable health care” of dubious quality. I must accept being paid less than Mr. Sirvint for equal work. I must accept a poor-paying job and that my children will not reach their full potential (perhaps like the kids in Flint?). I must accept that it’s unreasonable (utopian) to address the growing income inequality in this country.
Mr. Sirvint goes further to say addressing these inequalities would result in a “horrible country.” Again, the hubris of privilege.
Mr. Sirvint invokes 17th-century writings of Englishman John Locke to support his view. I find our own Thomas Paine to be much more enlightened, even as he’s a hero of conservatives and libertarians. Paine believed that land was a community resource and in exchange for the exclusive use of such through private property rights, the owner owed the community “rent” that would help to support universal old-age pensions, disability pensions, and a guaranteed basic income for all citizens. (See “Agrarian Justice” 1797).
Social justice is central to civilization and society. It can be tricky to balance, but it should never dismissed as “utopian.”
Tricia Saenger
Temple