A Convenient Solution to the Issue of Bothersome Chores
Suppose that on a particularly fine evening you find yourself lounging atop a sofa and sipping a vodka martini. Your glass is running low and you shall soon require another, and perhaps two or three more as the night drifts on. However, the waiter dawdles behind the bar, taking leisurely puffs from a fat cigarette, and takes no notice of your empty glass. Even if he did, he would surely jab his palm out rapaciously, his tongue salivating at the thought of your generously opened pocketbook.
What if there were another solution? Suppose a most dapper gentleman, finely dressed and meticulously mannered, stands before you, ready to attend to your every need. No sooner than you drain one glass than it's whisked away, the table elegantly wiped down with a silk cloth, and another cocktail placed before you. And better yet, the gentleman requires no payment of any kind! His only delight is in satisfying your plethora of whimsical desires. Clearly, any sensible person would hire not only this man, but a dozen others like him.
But alas, it so happens that each of the dozen new hires are of Cape Verdean descent. Dear God! This is the height of racial discrimination! Quickly now, let us hire another gang of helpers, and ensure to select them such that the racial composition matches that of broader society. In doing so, we have not only corrected our mistake, but have become something of a champion for the cause of racial diversity.
However, before we celebrate we must address a less significant, but yet bothersome issue. That is, the oppression of a group of people in relieving them of their freedom, and the fruits of their labour. Alas, our conscience demands we pay our helpers a small token wage, and allow them to live wherever and however they choose.
Consider that the city centre, which contains the office buildings, coffee shops, and restaurants which employ many, will have one of the highest housing costs. Thus, our helpers have no option but to reside in an area quite remote from their employment, perhaps a two or three hour commute each way, and likely within a tin-roofed shack with several roommates. They shall go without the occasional fine meal or glass of champagne, and a single medical bill shall burden them with the perpetual weight of unending debt. And most notably, the poorly funded schools guarantee that their children shall not receive an adequate education, and thus in adulthood, be guaranteed to tread the same path as their parents.
Sadly, our humane generosity has yielded a troubling result. Clearly we have been far too stingy, and the only righteous option is to provide the same wage for all men regardless of occupation -- the same for common labourers as for practitioners of enlightened vocations.
Consider the tasks performed by a common labourer: using a cloth to wipe down a table or fetching a tankard and filling it with ale. The outcome -- a clean table or tankard of ale -- while tangible, is relatively mundane and ordinary. Now consider an everyday task for a practitioner of bank management: buying and selling complex derivatives of equities or bonds, at slightly differing prices, hundreds of times throughout the day. Although seeming to have no tangible outcome, the resulting profits are used to purchase many goods and trinkets, and a single sale of a luxury handbag provides a hefty sum, which itself then provides for one hundred clean tables or tankards of ale.
Alas, we enjoy the idea of financial equality, but the resulting situation cannot be justified mathematically. It is plain that we cannot make further progress without ridding ourselves of that cumbersome sense of pity which we feel for our fellow man.
Suppose a close friend, relative, or coworker was set upon by a pack of bandits and rendered half-dead by the roadside. Surely we should feel great sorrow, and immediately rush to their aid. But imagine the victim were now a foreigner. Someone of an altogether different culture, language, and physiognomy -- of values which are completely upside-down to our own, and perhaps even detestable to us. Would we now have the same reaction? Clearly not, for we see that the supposed 'victim' is not of the same fashion as ourselves, and might so well be a member of an alien species. Therefore, such foreigners are undeserving of the empathy of cultured citizens.
Eureka! Why bother treating others humanely when we can simply remove our empathy for them entirely? Now there can be no objection to our original proposal.
Henceforth, we shall house a small army of helpers beneath our floorboards. Let us choose their vocation and schedule for them, and provide daily errands and orders. This is for their own good. Without our magnanimous and humane oversight they would surely be hopeless -- without task or order, living only as cattle grazing on the generosity of society. Only we, whom at birth are chosen and set apart by God Himself, hold within our minds the capacity to turn the machinations which power the facilities of civilization and progress, of culture and innovation. We create. They obey.