Meritocracy has become a leading social ideal. Politicians across the ideological spectrum continually return to the theme that the rewards of life—money, power, jobs, university admission—should be distributed according to skill and effort.
I see the value in the argument. We assign far too much credit to skill that was actually luck and circumstance. The author doesn’t provide an alternative though. Even with this flaw I’m inclined to believe striving towards a meritocracy is still the best course of action until a better option comes along.
When you’re starving you don’t refuse food because it isn’t your favorite, you eat it and try to find better food next meal. The author didn’t give us better food, just pointed out we aren’t eating what we want.
Why would the author have to provide an alternative?
There are many alternatives, the author simply pointed out that contrary to popular belief, “meritocracy” isn’t any better than most of those.
Your argument is similar to the one about capitalism. The failure to understand that there are many alternatives is on your side and it is not the author’s job to point that out.
Because all data points prove that axiom wrong - if any alternative would’ve been agreed as “better” than it would be established.
So yes: we do need to reiterate advantages of alternatives when criticizing the status quo - because we’re the ones wanting others to invest energy (for their own good but how far did this get us in the past?).
The author of course doesn’t have to provide anything. I support OPs point though that the message would be stronger if giving actual examples.
Not if (as the article rightly points out) it helps upholding and justifying current elite power with the illusion of merit. It is exactly this naive thinking that the “best” system automatically wins, when in reality our world works nothing like that.
So what would you propose as an alternative? Should we go back to nepotism? I feel like a flawed implementation of meritocracy is better than openly accepting nepotism again.
What makes you think our current system isn’t mostly based on nepotism? What exactly do you want to go “back” to?
And even if you are lucky to be based in a slightly more meritocratic society, you argument is similar to someone saying “Should we go back to monarchism? I feel like a flawed implementation of capitalism is better than openly accepting monarchy again.” Which is a false dichotomy.
And no, I am not going to spoon-feed you viable alternatives, because apparently you are still stuck in the TINA mindset, which you first need to discard.
I see the value in the argument. We assign far too much credit to skill that was actually luck and circumstance. The author doesn’t provide an alternative though. Even with this flaw I’m inclined to believe striving towards a meritocracy is still the best course of action until a better option comes along.
When you’re starving you don’t refuse food because it isn’t your favorite, you eat it and try to find better food next meal. The author didn’t give us better food, just pointed out we aren’t eating what we want.
Why would the author have to provide an alternative?
There are many alternatives, the author simply pointed out that contrary to popular belief, “meritocracy” isn’t any better than most of those.
Your argument is similar to the one about capitalism. The failure to understand that there are many alternatives is on your side and it is not the author’s job to point that out.
Because all data points prove that axiom wrong - if any alternative would’ve been agreed as “better” than it would be established.
So yes: we do need to reiterate advantages of alternatives when criticizing the status quo - because we’re the ones wanting others to invest energy (for their own good but how far did this get us in the past?).
The author of course doesn’t have to provide anything. I support OPs point though that the message would be stronger if giving actual examples.
Not if (as the article rightly points out) it helps upholding and justifying current elite power with the illusion of merit. It is exactly this naive thinking that the “best” system automatically wins, when in reality our world works nothing like that.
So what would you propose as an alternative? Should we go back to nepotism? I feel like a flawed implementation of meritocracy is better than openly accepting nepotism again.
What makes you think our current system isn’t mostly based on nepotism? What exactly do you want to go “back” to?
And even if you are lucky to be based in a slightly more meritocratic society, you argument is similar to someone saying “Should we go back to monarchism? I feel like a flawed implementation of capitalism is better than openly accepting monarchy again.” Which is a false dichotomy.
And no, I am not going to spoon-feed you viable alternatives, because apparently you are still stuck in the TINA mindset, which you first need to discard.