Kevin Dichosa

Harrison Bergeron

People always want equality. Do they always get it? Not really.
Equality has always been a great factor in the society everywhere
around the world but some people don’t get it all the time. But if
everybody achieves equality, it will only bring chaos to the society.
Let’s take for example “Harrison Bergeron” by Kurt Vonnegut, people
achieved equality but everybody is prevented on doing what they want
if it will cause even just a little inequality around them. We all want
equality in our own society; we all want to be free to do everything
that we want, but how can we achieve equality if we also want to be
free?

“No matter how a people strive for it, all the conditions of life
can never be perfectly equal” stated by Alexis Tocqueville, a French
political thinker and the author of “Democracy in America”. He states
that no matter how someone fights or dies for equality, he/she won’t
achieve perfect equality. It’s true, we can never achieve it. In order to
achieve perfect equality, there always has to be a ruling power to
preserve the equality. This ruling power will take measures to make
sure that nobody can be different and everyone will be the same
because that is the only way there can be a pure equality in the
system. In this case, and in any other case, they would take harsh
measures to keep the people in line and make certain that nobody
becomes any different than they’re supposed to; nobody can become
too smart, too stupid, too athletic, etc.

The main point we are trying to get to is that as long as that

power remains, inequality remains.
 We all have experienced inequalities in life, some of us are born
into households with much power, some of us excel in different areas,
and however this attribute of life creates a constant struggle in all
people to become more powerful. Alexis de Tocqueville states “There
is indeed a manly and legitimate passion for equality which rouses in
all men a desire to be strong and respected.”, In this he states that all
people have a powerful want to become more powerful, however many
of us also fight for inequalities. For example, a weak man may not
want the near impossible task of building himself up to reach the levels
of the powerful, so instead he may choose to lower the gap and create
equality. Tocqueville states “But freedom is not the chief and continual
object of their desires, it is equality for which they feel an eternal
love”. In this he compares the want of power to the want of equality,
where he states that man would rather be equal than to take the
massive task of gaining power or losing everything.

The freedoms we expect and the equalities we want create an

imbalance that is very difficult to balance. The constant struggle to
build ourselves creates inequalities; this freedom to do this is the key
in all societies. To have an equal playing ground, where each person
has certain equalities is also important to give us all an opportunity to
succeed.