The Torah is Never The Principle
When asked to justify some viewpoint, people often invoke some Torah or halacha, only to get tangled up very quickly in contradictions.
Mostly it's laziness (or shallowness) and an attempt to seize the moral high ground. It's hard to defend specific issues when you're confronted by someone who simply rejects your basic premises. How do you find out what lines of argument they would find persuasive? (Hint: ask them. Say "what exactly would you accept as proof that I'm right?" Most of the time they don't have a clue, because most people only think about why they're right, not how they might be wrong.) It's far easier to enunciate some broad, high principle like Torah or Halacha, except that it's very easy to get tangled up in contradictions.
So What Is the Principle?
Who Reaps the Rewards?
Both Reform Jews and the insane religious world argue that the reward system of society should favor those who do the most for the society. For Reform and Conservative, that's workers and intellectuals, without whom there would be no labor force to accomplish anything. Conservative Jews argue that any Third World country illustrates what labor alone can do without vision, capital and direction. Conservative Jews believe the rewards should favor those who provide the vision, direction, resources and structure to make labor productive. The insane religious world argue that they do the most by invisible means.
Who bears the Costs?
Reform Jews tend to assume that social problems stem from inequality and lack of empowerment. Their suggested approach is to redress the inequality by redistributing wealth and limiting the powerful. In the face of some social problem, their approach is to restructure society to minimize the problem or restrict actions that contribute to the problem. Conservative Jews, on the other hand, tend to assume that social problems stem from sociopaths or stupid individuals. Their approach is to protect the law abiding population while restricting the sociopaths and allowing the stupid to endure the consequences of their actions. Both groups want to place the burden on the people they consider the root of the problem.
the insane religious world want the wealth to be redistributed to themselves and by that they think all problems will disappear. And to eliminate Reform Jews and make Baali Teshuva into the worker class.
Reform Jews want to place tax and regulatory burdens on the wealthy and privileged, conservatives want to place them on criminals and the nonproductive.
Nobody Really Wants Equality or a Classless Society
Since both liberals Jews and conservative Jews favor some groups over others, it's clear that neither group really believes everyone should be equal. Both have their own hierarchy they would like to see in power. The liberal theory is that groups that have been systematically deprived of a place in American society should be empowered, while the forces that have denied them a place should be held in check. Superficially, this attitude looks a lot like favoring equality. Looking below the surface, we find a widespread sentiment that the middle class morality is inferior.
The disdain for the "middle class" on the part of liberals suggests pretty strongly that they consider the middle class drones, whose only value is to generate tax revenue for social programs to benefit the "real people" of society, who don't allow their authenticity to be sullied by deferred gratification. After all, a self-styled "civilized person" says the middle class has no values because they are "99% driven by imitation" and their expressed values are "merely oft-repeated platitudes."
Conservative Jews hold that "socially constructive" people should govern while the "nonproductive" should change their lifestyles and work their way up. In practice this means conservatives favor
The wealthy over the poor,The managerial class over the working class, Property owners over non-owners, The law-abiding versus criminals, The self-supporting over those on assistance.
Nobody Really Wants a Meritocracy
More specifically, nobody wants a meritocracy based on actual accomplishment. What both camps really want is a meritocracy of values, that is, an aristocracy in which position is dictated by attitude and conduct. Class is neither race, nor wealth, but behavior, though different socioeconomic classes have distinctive behaviors that identify their members.
The problem with meritocracy is there has to be a definition of merit. And liberals and conservatives hold radically differing views on the subject.
