:: Life in the Lost Lane ::

Life in the Lost Lane
A collective of English Gentlemen

Monday, December 16

Chimp:
You can choose your job, your friends, the love of your life an even the tomatoes you eat. You cannot choose your family. Various attempts have been made to free the youth from the bondage of the family.
Have these attempts been successful? I think not.
The notion of liberal democracy and in particular free market ideals are centred around meritocracy. The best, brightest and most able in positions that reflect their abilities.
Does the family help, or hinder the equality of opportunity?
Do we offer all people in society an fair break?
Do we extend privileges to all those in society, in particular those who due to accidents of birth, need these opportunities the most?
Are the elite groups in society rightly benefiting from access to contacts, the family reputation, to the best education etc? Some would say yes, but I'm not so sure. Should the success of the parents pass on to the children - a wider spectrum of potential in their lives - pay back for parental adherence to the rules of the game, in fact being a winner in their lives.
What is the ideal solution?
Logically, one may say that the forced separation of family and child at birth ensure all children gain access to the same breaks.
Equality is close at hand.
New problems emerge.
How can we force the separation of mother and child, when research has repeatedly shown that the bond formed between child and primary care giver is so vital to typical infantile development? Surely the rewards of good parenting are the point that we, as human animals give birth and reproduce to well rounded, socially adept offspring. At the hard-wired genetic level, we want to see our genes live on and be successful. Children are our vehicle for this and without our bond, we de-humanise the very thing which makes use human - our ancestral genetic code.

This is of course to ignore the minefield of who, and for what motive could we separate and bring up these thousands of babies every year away from the family unit? Thankfully, history has already explored these avenues. Eastern Europe and the USSR, along with many of the other 'totalitarian' states have tried to square this particular circle, all have failed.
At this point one sees the family as a global institution, world wide homogenous unit, with few telling national, regional or local variations.
It seems to be the way as animals we want to do it. So who are we, chimps with over developed cerebral cortices, to challenge it?

Let genetics and societal evolution make the best of equality, opportunity, exclusivity, fairness and elite formation; until then, pass the tomatoes.

posted by E! @ 1:40 PM

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