Achieving Equity – November, 2007 and February, 2008

I was thinking about equity one evening last November as I was washing the last of the winter lettuce from our small garden. Thinking about talented, beautiful women who call themselves actors. My mother was an actress. That’s what she called herself. And she was. A talented, beautiful actress. Now that they are likely to wear a great deal less than my mother ever wore on stage (or film or videotape), they are actors.

From what I have been allowed to see that’s not accurate. Which is OK, but I wonder if it’s the best way to go. Oh, I understand the idea – talent is not gender-specific. Males, females, and other genders should all be subject to the same criteria when it comes to performing arts (or anything else, of course).

But where is the right to glory in the differences? If I am seeing the movie – not to mention TV – screens clearly, someone certainly wants us to glory in the differences. So what does our speech seek to hide? When did the quest for equity – fair treatment without regard for irrelevant differences – become a quest for uniformity – treatment of all persons as though they were exactly the same without regard for skill, interest, personality, biology, preference, intelligence, talent, training…

Does all this political correctness really help us accomplish anything other than learn to pronounce and perhaps even spell increasingly longer words?

Don't get me wrong; I think we must bend over backwards to give people a chance to prove themselves if they have historically been deprived of the chance to even try. But that's a search for equity, not uniformity.

I know two Letties. One is a classic beauty. She has the style, spirit, and grace of a queen. The other Lettie is imminently huggable. Comfortable and unruffled are adjectives that fit her well. Both Letties project a clear sense of who they are. They are equal in their value as friends. In all other things, they are very different. And I think they deserve to be treated differently. I can ask plain-dealing Lettie for her opinion if I really want the unvarnished truth. I can ask smart Lettie if I have a question requiring brain power.

Of course, this dissimilar-but-equitable treatment rashly assumes that I’m able to figure out which one really has which characteristic. (Or that either Lettie will straighten me out if I’m not smart enough to get it right – which, luckily, she will.)

But my point is that they should be treated differently; they’re different people. But they shouldn’t be treated inequitably. From each other or anyone else. Beautiful Lettie shouldn’t get better job opportunities because she is better looking or worse health care because she is African American. Comfortable Lettie shouldn’t get better job opportunities because she is less imposing or worse health care because she is less assertive. And so on.

So here we are, shortly after celebrating the life and works of Martin Luther King, Jr. The lettuce is long gone (but not, fortunately, the Letties), and I’m again thinking about equity. But speaking (or writing) of my thought processes leads me to think about them. How can I tell when I’m not assuming a difference that doesn’t exist? Being human assures that I’m never unbiased. For instance, if I’d be inclined to ask the thinner, more physically fit Lettie for advice on diet and exercise, what am I – the overweight and under-muscled I who knows quite a bit about nutrition and physical activity – assuming about knowledge and behavior? I’m interpreting the data available according to my preconceived notions, which I know to be erroneous.

And I’m not alone in that. Although…
“…scientists have repeatedly reported that whites have larger brains than blacks. [Stephen Jay] Gould shows that when the preserved brain is measured before the race of its former owner is revealed, this difference disappears completely…What is important about [Gould’s] essay is not that it reveals what we already know to be true about the existence of racism and sexism, but that it shows how any claim that something is ‘scientifically demonstrated’ should be treated with the same skepticism that we invoke when there is any reason to think that the investigator has something to gain, either ideologically or professionally, as we do when financial gain is involved…” (excerpted from The Triumph of Stephen Jay Gould by Richard C. Lewontin, Volume 55, Number 2 · February 14, 2008.)

But don’t we all have something to gain, either ideologically or professionally, whenever we state an opinion? Especially if it’s supported by science? I certainly do. I want you to believe me and be over- (rather than under-) whelmed by the incisiveness of my thinking and the scientificity of my method. And oblivious to my biases.

So how do we achieve equity?

I don’t know. But I’m pretty sure we don’t get there by pretending we’re all carbon copies of one another. It should be OK for us to delight in the differences. They keep us from getting bored. It should be OK for us to call persons with evident feminine traits – and talent – actresses.

What should not be OK is using the differences to justify inequities.

After all, one of the actors’ unions is Equity.

P.S. According to my mother, you could join Actors’ Equity only if you were cast in an Equity show. And you couldn’t be cast in an Equity show unless you were already a member of Equity. You couldn’t get Equity unless you already had Equity. It’s probably still that way. It is everywhere else.