Dangerous Musings About Equality (part 2)

In part 1 of this series, I began talking about the idea of equality, about the belief that people should be treated as equals without regard to race, gender, socio-economic standing, or other differentiating qualities–especially in the church. I mused that there really is not a strong emphasis on equality in the Scripture, but rather a mandate not to show favoritism in the church, and a mandate to prefer others above ourselves rather than treat them as equals. I referred to this as moving past equality into the celebration of uniqueness. And I suggested that “equality” is a mathematical term that we inadvertently use to draw comparisons on the value of people, and that this is why we need to move past it.

Okay, so we should be doing more than just practicing equality; we should be celebrating one another. So what’s the big deal? Why split hairs over terminology?

Glad you asked. 🙂

As I said, the idea of equality has to do with comparison. You cannot declare two or more things equal without comparing them. Gender equality means seeing men and women as equal; racial equality means seeing white, black, yellow and red as equal; and so on. The problem is that equality alone carries a sort of negative twist to it. Keeping things equal doesn’t just mean we place equal value on everyone or everything; it also means that no one entity can rise above the rest, lest the equilibrium be breached. No standouts. This is why we tend to use phrases like “leveling the playing field” when talking about equality. When we focus on equality as the goal, we are not just lifting up the downtrodden; we are by extension downsizing the ones who excel. We might not intend this, but it does happen.

There are two inherent dangers I see to promoting equality as a virtue:

FIRST–the Scripture as I interpret it does not promote the tearing down of one person or people to make room for another. The only times you see people being brought down this way is when God is dealing pride and sin, or when those people are voluntarily humbling themselves. Never do you see it happen for the express purpose of leveling the field. When equality becomes a virtue in and of itself, it can inadvertently promote oppressing one in the name of liberating another.

SECOND–and this is important–because equality is a matter of comparison…when we promote equality as its own virtue, we inadvertently run the risk of enabling people toward a greater sin…

…the sin of envy.

Jealousy runs rampant in our culture today, and the church is not immune to it. People who are considered “privileged” because of their economic status, their gifts, their intelligence, their beauty, their gender or their race are often thought of as the “enemy” by those who do not have what they have–whether or not they deserve that enmity. I refer to this dynamic as “reverse prejudice.” The “have nots” are always at odds with the “haves.” Of course, this is fueled by the favoritism and elite status we give to certain people because of the comparative nature of our culture–which, as I said, is also wrong. But as the saying goes, “Two wrongs don’t make a right.” Jealousy and envy are never justified in Scripture, for any reason–no matter how oppressed we feel, and no matter how privleged someone else appears. One sin does not make up for another. And left to itself, I believe when we make equality the standard, it can actually create a subtle justification for envy in the hearts of people.

So the danger I see in making equality an end unto itself is that because of its comparative nature, we are enabling the very comparison that fuels the favoritism, envy, and oppression we should be avoiding. In other words–it backfires upon itself. To break this pattern, we must have more than just equality; we need the uplifting love and celebration of uniqueness that the Scripture promotes.

I suppose I’m particularly sensitive to this issue because my creative gifts, and those of my family, have often made us the target of jealousy. In a rather odd way, I can relate to those in my culture who suffer from prejudice. There are few things worse than being hated, torn down or oppressed over something that is part of who you are. There have been in many situations where I’ve felt like I could not be who I really am around certain people, for fear of evoking their jealousy. So when I hear people talk of equality as if it were a Biblical virtue, I get a bit apprehensive, because I can easily see how something intended to free the oppressed could turn around and cause a whole different group of people to suffer oppression. When you are “leveling the field”, someone always benefits at someone else’s loss. It’s simple mathematics.

Saying this, I recognize that part of the problem is that certain groups of people in our culture–the white, the males, the beautiful, the talented, etc.–have been given a certain amount of prestige above others. I recognize that this is favoritism that can promote injustice, and that the desire for equality is an attempt to rectify that injustice. But the root issue of this problem is not addressed when you try to cure favoritism with equality–because both are based on comparison. We are looking at this through the wrong lens, and determining a cure with the wrong criteria. We don’t need to replace one form of comparison for another; we need to do away with the myth of comparison altogether.

I know this is going long, but let me offer one other example, one having to do with race. I have often heard the word “colorblindness” tossed around as a cure for racism. We need to be “colorblind”, to see black, white, yellow and red as equals. Dare I say this?–I’ve always had a problem with this. Not because I think one race is better than other…but because God made the color of our skin, and I have never believed the solution to racism is to ignore something God created good. I grew up in a multi-cultural environment in the Bay Area of California, and I was proud to count Latinos, African-Americans, Filipinos, Chinese, and Portuguese among my friends. I loved that these people were different than I was; I didn’t want to pretend we were all the same.

A world where everyone is the same is a very boring world, indeed. And that’s the foundational problem I have with the myth of equality.

So instead of equality…I propose something better. Equality seeks to make everything the same. But what if we stop worrying about that, and start embracing and celebrating our differences and our unique gifts, without trying to assess the value, or compare the value of one with another? What if we recognized that God has created and gifted each one of us uniquely, and honored that? What if instead of drawing value comparisons by gender, we recognized and honored the unique qualities God has given to women as distinct from men, and vice versa–without trying to determine which one is “better?” What if instead of drawing value comparisons by race, we delighted in the unique gifts God has given to the different ethnic groups, and allowed ourselves to be enriched by them? What kind of culture could we make if we did this?

Equality is a statement of assigned value. Everyone is not “equal”; everyone is priceless. In this respect, equality becomes irrelevant when it comes to humans. When you try to apply the mathematics of equality to priceless human beings, something is going to get lost in the translation, and someone is going to suffer as a result. And so I think it is much better to move past the comparisons, stop trying to measure the intangibles, and celebrate our uniqueness and diversity as a reflection of the infinitely creative God who (thankfully) did not make us all the same.

And when you think about it…this is how He sees all of us, isn’t it? Not “equal” beings–unique beings.

Priceless beings.