Is meritocracy enough?

Commenting in the thread, “The effect of women in politics,” Mary Jackson agrees that there are significant differences between men and women, and that “men are in general more suited to leadership roles,” but says we should judge each person as an individual. By this reasoning, if there is an especially strong, powerful, and aggressive female, we should allow her into the army. The problem is that as soon as one woman is allowed into the army, many aspects of the institution must be changed in order to adapt it to the presence of that one woman, for example, sleeping quarters, toilet facilities, haircut regulations, and such changes must inevitably lead the institution in a more female-inclusive direction until eventually we end up where we are today. That is why individual meritocracy, while it has its place, cannot be the ruling principle of society. Categories such as male and female, adult and child, native and foreigner, Christian and Muslim, matter in and of themselves. This is the traditionalist insight that challenges liberalism.

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Terry Morris writes:

You wrote:

“The problem is that as soon as one woman is allowed into the army, many aspects of the institution must be changed in order to adapt it to the presence of that one woman, for example, sleeping quarters, toilet facilities, haircut regulations, and such changes must inevitably lead the institution in a more female-inclusive direction until eventually we end up where we are today.”

I agree with everything you say and imply here with one minor exception. While I definitely do not believe this was your intent, your statement reads as though you’re saying that where we are today is as bad as it’s going to get. Of course this is not at all true. It’s bad enough, where we are today, but it’ll only get worse and God knows where we’ll end up eventually if we continue to hold to this false doctrine that individual meritocracy is the ruling principle for our society.

I believe, in opposition to Mary, that individual meritocracy as a universal ruling principle for society is a liberal principle. So when she says she’s not a liberal but a meritocrat, I fail to see the difference. If there is a difference, it is that she’s not a dyed-in-the-wool leftist liberal who believes in every false doctrine propagated by the left.

LA replies:

I agree that meritocracy is liberalism. After all, what was the basis of opening America’s borders to all countries on an equal basis in 1965, but that we should judge people based on their “individual merit”? Meaning that we should only look at the immigrant as an individual, without considering his culture, religion, nation, race. Meaning we should cease caring whether we remained a European, white-majority country.

In any case, right-liberal formulation of “individual worth” was really a front for a left-liberal policy as most of the immigrants were let in on the basis of family connections. Not only are right-liberal ideas not good in themselves; they instantly lead to left-liberalism.

Tim W. writes:

Putting women in the military in anything other than support positions far away from the action is detrimental. Men simply fight better when teamed with male comrades. The presence of females is not only sexually distracting, but the men will worry about her and lose focus trying to protect her.

Women tug on our heartstrings. Recall the incident a few months ago where the British sailors were taken hostage by Iran. Everyone was especially worried about the lone female sailor? Would she be raped? Was she frightened? The Iranians took advantage of this weakness and put her out front and center, knowing that the West would be more likely to appease them on behalf of a woman.

Yes, once every five hundred years or so a female capable of being a great soldier may appear, but should such a rarity be the basis for our policy decisions? I think not.

Sage McLaughlin:

The bottom line is that public institutions, in order to be truly effective, have to take account of what is generally the case, rather than structuring their procedures to account for the rare exception (e.g., swearing on the Bible, and not going out of our way to keep a copy of the Tao Te Ching in every courtroom). Asking the Navy to formulate its procedures on the assumption that the exception is as likely as the rule is obviously deleterious to its mission.

Right-liberals often claim that the best way forward is to establish procedures for selection that are blind to things like sex, but they ignore the effect of institutional entropy in a world dominated by left-liberalism. For example, how many of them have given up on the idea of uniform standards altogether, especially in basic training? Right liberals are very adept at finding areas where it is no longer politically feasible to carry on the good fight, but they seem less willing to acknowledge hard political realities in advance. Thus they push constantly for unrealistically pure neutrality in our public institutions, while thinking they can somehow hold off the effects of left liberalism. One can easily anticipate the day soon when right liberals tell us it is no longer politically feasible to oppose women serving in direct combat roles, without their ever asking what role their own commitment to a quixotic political ideal contributed to that result.

Sage M. continues:

Sorry to follow up so soon, but this issue sort of gets me going. I would add to Tim’s points, which have been made often enough, that it’s extremely difficult to demarcate “the front” in an occupation effort, and that “support roles” can be said to take place on the decks of aircraft carriers, or in the hulls of nuclear submarines on months-long patrols (if an attack sub is not on the front, then nothing is). In truth, unless the proportion and even the absolute number of women serving in the military is drastically reduced, women will continue to be taken prisoner and killed in combat situations.

And we’ll continue to hear our public leaders and media types extol the sacrifice of our “men and women” risking their lives overseas, while ostensibly supporting policies to keep women “out of direct combat roles.” The whole thing is a grotesque charade, and it is to our everlasting shame that we knowingly put our women in harm’s way, while officially denying that this is what we are doing. All these Army and Marine promotional ads showing supposedly gruff women decked out in fatigues, wearing flak jackets and carrying rifles, trying oh-so-ostentatiously to look like tough hombres, make me embarrassed for us all. Reading about the female naval officer who openly wept on the stand during the Zacharias Moussaoui trial, while he laughed and shook his head at the spectacle of an American sailor sobbing in front of the enemy, is emblematic of what’s going on here.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at December 01, 2007 02:15 AM | Send