This year we are marking the 200th anniversary of the 1798 Rising and, by extension, the arrival in a physical form of the trinity of aspirations which drove the French Revolution: liberty, equality and fraternity. It is not surprising that only two of these words have precise synonyms in English: freedom and brotherhood. There is no word of English origin for the absurd thing called equality, possibly because the linguistic forebears of the English language capering about in their woad in their Frisian homelands could not conceive of the idiotic abstraction that is "equality".
Equality cannot sit in the same bed as freedom. They are antithetical concepts, as mutually exclusive as fire and vacuum, as light and dark. Freedom consists of the expression of inequality. We express our freedom in art, athletics, scholarship, craftsmanship, strength, musicality - triumphing in inequality, celebrating it, rewarding it, electing it. Inequality defines the human condition. It is what makes us the triumph of creation, and why we have conquered the world, for no other species is so varied in its intellectual, physical and social skills as is mankind; yet we nonetheless persist in the brainless pursuit of this thing called "equality".
Core value
Not surprisingly, the meaning we give to the word "equality" is quite new. In its Latin root, aequalis meant "level", "even" - precisely the same as the modern German word for equality, gleich, which can also mean "same". Level, even, same: we know these meanings do not carry the same philosophical weight as that mighty concept "equality", which still, despite the vast misery it has caused throughout its wretched history, remains a core value in western European life. A politician who stands up and declared that he is against equality is a politician who is doomed. Two centuries of bloodshed, social engineering and eruptions of political madness have followed since the term "equality" became a formal political aspiration; and it is as meaningful and as millennial a demand as "free bread for all" or "sunshine all the year round".
In the name of that brainless dogma we call equality, we now hear that Oxford is to alter its examination system because "written examinations, or at least the questions asked in them, are unfavourable to women". Never mind for the moment that examinations are the best preparation for most of the professional challenges we face, it was only weeks ago that feminists were preening themselves on the superior results that girls were getting compared with boys at higher secondary level. That was seen as proof that the female mind was superior to the male mind; when evidence appears which supports a contrary thesis, the source of that evidence is assumed to be tainted.
Nonsensical pursuit
This is rubbish, but predictably so. The nonsensical pursuit of this chimera of equality necessarily requires people to adjust the rule-book, to shift weights on scales, to change definitions and even alter the term equality as meaning, as Alice said, merely what I want it to mean. As well seek for the Holy Grail or the Philosopher's Stone: each has as much meaning as "equality", which like a mirage alters its appearance according to the angle from which you view it.
The truth is that all human assessments measure inequality. Oxford selects and encourages the unequally gifted; I employ the better builder over the lesser one; the more skilful barrister earns more than does the mediocre. Society is powered by inequality; yet everywhere we hear the witless catch-cry about abolishing inequality.
"Equality" changes with the ages. In the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, egalitarians concentrated on class inequalities, and when they got hold of states they were able to implement their egalitarianisms by means of the firing squad, the guillotine and the gulag. One thing they did not achieve was equality.
In this age of politically triumphant feminism, when "equal" tests prove the intellectual superiority of women, women and the tests themselves are applauded; when similar tests prove the intellectual superiority of men, the tests themselves are seen to be at fault. If this was just a question of who wins First Class Honours, I really wouldn't mind - the actual tests which follow in life sort out the wheat from the chaff.
But it is not as simple as that. All over the Western world, in Ireland as elsewhere, unequal or idiotic rules are being introduced in order to make women "equal". Women soldiers are expected to pass less rigorous tests to qualify for the same positions as men. Young men and women, seething with the hormones of late adolescence and early adulthood, are expected to serve on the quarterdeck of the same warship, and do what comes naturally only on pain of court-martial.
And most idiotically of all, in Ireland and elsewhere, women may qualify as fire-fighters without being required to lift anything like the human deadweight that their fellow firemen are, as if burning buildings select their victims with a strict eye on the egalitarian requirements of firewomen.
The criteria for the performance of social services are being manipulated according to the modern egalitarian agenda, not to the benefit of those who receive those services - let us say, the victims of fires - but to improve the employment opportunities of those who would not otherwise be suitable to perform those duties: women who want to be fire-fighters but are not strong enough for the task. Find me the feminist, please, who wants to prove the validity of her theories of equality by dying in a third-floor fire, along with the firewoman who is too weak to lift her.
It is not just in the matters of the sexes that we have this problem. The term "equality" achieves its most elusive form in dealing with divided societies such as Northern Ireland, where it means precisely what those who utter it want it to mean, and no more. The word has the value of a whore's promise. Beware when you hear the word "equality". It means you are about to hear an outpouring of cant.