That sounds pretty coldhearted, but how many hundreds of billions is it worth to keep things going the way they are today? “Inclusion” in all things is a worthy goal. The current pandemic epitomizes the difficulties, the lose-lose conundrum, trying to balance the needs of the few against the needs of the many. The solution? A generation (or two) ago, before this doctrine became standard procedure, classes of 35 students were not problematic, because disabled and disruptive students went to special classes and schools. When an instructor has to spend the majority of their time engaged in remedial instruction or fruitless attempts at discipline, the learning process is compromised. On the one hand, it is laudable to mix K-12 students up so that disadvantaged, disabled, and disruptive students are in the same classroom with their more fortunate counterparts, but it is also the reason large class sizes are so problematic.
Imagine how much of America’s wealth is transferred to private plaintiff attorneys, nonprofit pressure groups, corporate monopolies and public bureaucrats, in the fight to protect rights and guarantee the same opportunities to everyone? The costs add up.Ī huge example comes in the realm of public education, where students are “ mainstreamed” into classrooms without regard for their individual abilities or behaviors. One of the biggest problems with putting the needs of the few in front of the needs of the many is that it doesn’t just happen. In principle, they’re right.īut when it goes too far-and it has-what are the consequences? Christian compassion would make the obvious case that the few matter as much as the many, and it is the obligation of the many to help them.Ĭontemporary leftist ideology would consider the many to be privileged, the few to be victims of “othering.” And regardless of ideology or religion, American culture, and most Americans, consider it their duty to help the less fortunate. Why? Because we have decided the needs of the few outweigh the needs of the many.īefore providing examples of this, and they are countless, one must acknowledge the moral arguments in favor of allowing the needs of the few to outweigh the needs of the many. Increasingly, we are paralyzing ourselves, losing individual freedoms, and squandering our prosperity as a nation in the pursuit of impossible perfection. Fair enough.īut the response to COVID-19, should it be an overreaction, highlights a trend in American society that has grown over the past several decades into an overwhelming problem.
It is a poorly understood, highly contagious disease that afflicts people in unpredictable ways, with possible recurrences even in people who have recovered, and so far there is no effective therapy and no vaccine. There is plenty of logic and data supporting the argument that COVID-19 poses a threat sufficiently dire to justify everything that’s being done. It would go more like this: “The needs of the few outweigh the needs of the many.” Spock, “ Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan ,” (1982)įor anyone who has questioned whether or not the COVID-19 pandemic constitutes a severe enough threat to justify a soft version of martial law and a possible economic depression, Spock’s classic claim might be inverted. “Logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”
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