What positions would a person genuinely espousing egalitarian principles hold?
They would hold that no person is "better" or more "important" than any other--not only not on the basis of such matters as race, sex and gender, but wealth, position, family background and all associated with them.
They would hold that rather than a society where a small elite is unbound but protected, and the great majority are bound but unprotected, a society must bind and protect all equally (with, I suspect, most of those who would espouse an egalitarian view wanting all to be as little bound as possible, and protected as much as possible).
They would hold that a society is to be judged by how it treats the "least" of its members, to the extent that anyone was "less" than anyone else--and the last apt to be decreasing all the time.
They would hold that fact and reason are to be respected above Authority, and that no one person or group has a monopoly on knowledge.
They would be alert to the difference between what a person may get hold of, and what they actually earn, especially in an arrangement so haphazard as "the market" at whose altar so many worship.
They would hold that those in "public service" are truly servants of the public, rather than their personal ambitions or any interests to which they might sell themselves, and be held to that obligation.
They would hold that with great power comes great responsibility, and really mean it, while understanding this to mean that the superior talent the believer in "meritocracy" so relentlessly makes much of brings greater responsibility, rather than excuses to lay claim to a bigger share of the prizes--with that responsibility extending to helping the least capable up rather than stomping on them.
They would hold that in the face of a far from unavoidable injustice shrugging that "Life's not fair" is a non sequitir and an evasion.
They would hold that swaggering is a thing to be laughed at as they would laugh at the antics of primates in a nature documentary rather than a thing to be done by humans--while equally objecting that anyone should be required to bow and scrape before another.
Looking at our politics, our media, our culture, just how often do you see anyone enjoying a "platform" of any size express, let alone abide by, any of these views? I think you are far more likely to see the culture we live in barraging us with the extreme opposite attitude on every score--and suggest that people remember that the next time someone shoots their mouth off about society having become too tolerant, too fair, too coddling, of its members.
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