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Social inequality and its effects
Social inequality and its effects
Social inequality and its effects
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Oscar Wilde’s essay “The Soul of Man Under Socialism,” despite its title, advocated not socialism but anarchism. Socialism is a form of economy where the public owns and manages the resources of society while anarchism is a political ideology where individuals govern their own selves and freely group themselves to produce social wealth. Wilde’s society would have no family, no laws, no punishments, no prisons, in short no authority over the individual. In the utopia created by Wilde, everything required or beneficial was to be manufactured by communally owned machines, while people were to be left free to choose their own occupations, cultivating leisure and pleasure, “the making of beautiful things, or reading beautiful things, or simply contemplating the world with admiration and delight” (176).
Wilde’s proposal for the joint possession of the means of production and the dissolution of private property wasn't built on the principles of selflessness or the brotherhood of man. In actuality, the main benefit of socialism (to use Wilde’s chosen term) was to be that it would alleviate everyone from the “sordid necessity of living for others”(174).
Though established in deeply compassionate principles, Wilde’s essay has nothing to do with sentimentality. Many were forced to work as “beasts of burden,”(175) because many were left on the edge of starvation due to competitive capitalism. Mankind’s lives lacked “grace of manner, or charm of speech, or civilization, or culture, or refinement in pleasures, or joy in life” (175). Charity bolstered an unethical system by reducing the unfavorable effects, using private property to mend the problems caused by the establishment of private property. Instead of glamorizing the lower class, Wild...
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...s Wilde deems it, is characterized by mankind’s inability to succumb to the “Tyranny of want,” (175) while also achieving their own creative aspirations.
In Oscar Wilde’s 1891 essay, “The Soul of Man Under Socialism,” he conveys an artistic and moral socialism, based on the concepts of change and the fulfillment of one’s own potential. It indicates the intellectual framework such that it craves a moral and beautiful life that differed from the industrial-oriented society of its time. Wilde’s argument was with the conditions that were required for a prosperous life and his beliefs that the difficulties of contemporary human life still resound today. By releasing artists from the limitations placed on society for the need of a financial income to support, socialism will make way for the individual to finally pursue one’s artistic goals due to their newfound freedom.
Socialism as defined by the parameters of the post revolution into the pre industrial period was the nearly universally marked by the race to empower the working class. Yet, within this broad definition of socialism, Karl Marx, Gracchus Babeuf, and Robert Owen differ in their views of a utopian society and how it should be formed. It was to be their difference in tradition that caused their break from it to manifest in different forms. Although they had their differences in procedure and motive, these three thinkers formed a paradigm shift that would ignite class struggle and set in motion historical revolutions into the present. Within their views of a utopian community, these men grappled with the very virtues of humanity: greed versus optimism.
Marx speaks of a life to be free from working for someone who receives far more from a group of laborer’s who are part of a lower class party. However, there is more to it. What Marx promotes is a take over of all industrial factories, or businesses. A literal revolution of the lower class, so that instead of the business owners reaping all the benefits by the “proletariat” doing all laboring earning little, they need to gain total control of businesses of production and share amongst themselves equally everything. Sounds good to the ear that there could be no more struggles for the little people who are doing all the work, making someone else rich, but Marx...
While this may have in part been true, overall this was a false portrayal of what life under Socialism was really like. In order to secure obedience, the Soviet Union “brainwashed” the younger generation and lied to the entire population about how life in the West was. Peter Sis, a man who grew up in Czechoslovakia during the Soviet Union, writes about this in a children’s book. He writes, “As long as he could remember, he had loved to draw. At first he drew shapes. Then he drew people. After drawing whatever he wanted to at home, he drew what he was told to at school. He drew tanks. He drew wars. He didn’t question what he was being told” (Sis). In this excerpt, Sis writes about his love for drawing as a child, and how as he grew up, the state took away his freedom of choice by telling him what to draw. Later on in his book he writes, “Slowly he started to question. He painted what he wanted to – in secret” (Sis). This shows that despite the image of conformity and obedience, people like Peter Sis went against the rules of the state in order to do what he loved and to have a sense of uniqueness. This need for uniqueness is established yet again in another piece of writing. It focuses on the underground black market that was rampant in the Soviet Union during Socialism. This black market sold Western goods and allowed customers to express their
Socialists suggest that social stability and cohesion is the leading method towards of social equality, and therefore prefer cooperation to competition, and favour collectivism over individualism. As socialism’s core value is equality, it is often referred to as egalitarianism. Due to the distinctive gap between social classes, the goal of socialism is to eliminate class divisions by promoting freedom for the need of material and basis personal
According to the humanities based themes, autonomy and responsibility are defined as “the individual person has the ability to make choices; with those choices comes a responsibility for the consequences of those choices.” [i] This can be related to the Communist Manifesto, which was written by Karl Marx in the 1800’s. Even deeper though, it correlates the class struggles that were apparent in Europe in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Marx knew there was a division of classes; the bourgeoisie was the wealthy upper class and they proletariats were the lower working classes of Europe. This is where the theme of autonomy and responsibility steps in and plays a role in the changes that were made in society. The proletariats recognized that they were treated unfairly, which led them to the decision of stepping up and taking a stand. Through the Communist Manifesto, they took responsibility and attained the equality they felt they deserved.
Though the rewards are pleasing to the ear, the path to obtaining the benefits of communism is a violent one. This strict governing idea was derived from Communist Manifesto, a book written by two German economists, Karl Marx and Fredrich Engels, who declare that many problems in society are caused by the unequal distribution of wealth. These two believe that “Communism deprives no man of the ability to appropriate the fruits of his labour. The only thing it deprives him of is the ability to enslave others by means of such appropriations.” To achieve the goal of happiness and prosperity for all, the lines that distinguish the differences between the rich and poor must be erased. Obviously, the rich will never voluntarily give up their goods or status; therefore the figureheads must force equality among the citizens. Communism places their citizens, whether they be the wealthy or the laborers, into working classes that specify their contribution to the government. With such balanced placement of the people, individuality is impossible for any single person to achieve.
...osed in the preface of the novel and through Lord Henry’s intellectual talks with Dorian, “Wilde’s odd preface, which reads like an aesthetics’ version of Blake’s ‘Proverbs of Hell,’ warns that ‘there is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book’” (BRC). Wilde understood and showed in the life of Dorian Gray, a necessity for a more controlled and careful attitude toward aestheticism, without which morality will inevitable be indefinable. The aestheticism expressed by Dorian results in self-absorption and intellectual deterioration. “If in the hunt of one’s desires and of the beautiful parts of life, the condition of others’ or of one’s own mind is put at risk, the pleasure gathered must sometimes be surrendered for the greater good” (Pearce). As Wilde makes known, it is only through a more controlled attitude that aestheticism and morality may finally line up.
Born from the revolutions of 1848 throughout Europe, Marxism sought to end the class struggles that were destroying the continent. The solution to the problems of all nations occurred to Marx to be Socialism, a branch that is presently known as Marxism. Under this seemingly “utopian” socioeconomic system, equality was granted to all citizens who were in essence a community of one. “. . . universal free education; arming of the people; a progressive income tax; limitations upon inheritance; state ownership of banks. . .”(Palmer 506). These rights of which constituted Marxism eventually went on to be incorporated in Leninism and modern-day socialism. At least in its beginning, the intent of Marxism and the Communist League were noble towards the goal o...
Karl Marx noted that society was highly stratified in that most of the individuals in society, those who worked the hardest, were also the ones who received the least from the benefits of their labor. In reaction to this observation, Karl Marx wrote The Communist Manifesto where he described a new society, a more perfect society, a communist society. Marx envisioned a society, in which all property is held in common, that is a society in which one individual did not receive more than another, but in which all individuals shared in the benefits of collective labor (Marx #11, p. 262). In order to accomplish such a task Marx needed to find a relationship between the individual and society that accounted for social change. For Marx such relationship was from the historical mode of production, through the exploits of wage labor, and thus the individual’s relationship to the mode of production (Marx #11, p. 256).
Historically, Wilde was a staunch—even notorious—advocate of Aestheticism: a doctrine popular throughout Europe in the late nineteenth century which held that “art exists for the sake of its beauty alone, and that it need serve no political, didactic, or other purpose” (Britannica). Indeed, David Cooper in his Companion to Aesthetics argues that the doctrine “asserts not merely that a work of art should be judged only on ...
In ‘The Important of Being Earnest’, Oscar Wilde's ridiculing representation of Victorian Society comments on the ridiculous behavior of the Victorian Society’s inability to recognise the difference between important and unimportant issues. Therefore, Oscar Wilde subverts Victorian values to mock and imply triviality and superficiality. Wilde forces the audience to rethink the importance of their life and how they act while also scrutinizing the ignorance of the characters in upper class society through mocking their morals and obsessive fascinations. Wilde's uses the inversion of what isn’t serious and what is to ridicule Victorian Society. Despite this, Wilde wanted to create something beautiful and superficial. Hence, it would be more accurate to say everything in the play is presented as superficial so perhaps there isn’t a message that needs to be taken seriously.
In this essay, I will be discussing Liberalism and Socialism, what exactly they entail, and how they were and are still used in societies today. Liberalism is defined as a political orientation that favors social progress by reform and by changing laws rather than by revolution. Socialism is defined as a political and economic theory of social organization that advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole. While the intentions of liberalist and socialist governments are the same, what makes them different is how they believe is the best ways to obtain a prosperous and peaceful nation.
Critics may charge that by abolishing private property, the communist is instead eliminating the “groundwork of all personal freedom, activity, and independence.”(235) Standing in defense of communism, Marx states that wage labor does not really create property for the laborer. In fact, it only creates capital, which Marx defines as being a kind of property that works to exploit the worker rather than benefit him or her. (235) The worker works just to increase the wage of his boss, while his wage remains stagnant. Marx states that this capital in the modern bourgeoisie society is based on class antagonism, which makes it become a social power. Communists do not want to abolish property as right, but rather want to abolish the class character associated with property. Keeping capital private will continue to give the bourgeoisie the ability to have more power over the workers of the world. (236) By making capital public, it eliminates the class antagonism that is attached to that
...ed to a bigger controversy. Instead he wrote about it and made everyone noticed the unfairness of the punitions in the prison life. The repetition in the poem is seen to show the harsh labor in the Reading Gaol. It is evident that Oscar Wilde hated the Victorian era and was against the cruelty of their morality.
In Wilde’s case, socialism has a lot to do with writing. He believes and shows is his works that people are sometimes disconnected from society. Socialism itself brings competition between people everywhere. This divides them even further. People begin to grow against each other instead of with each other. Wilde shares these thoughts with his readers in works such as his essay “The Soul of Man under Socialism.” Wilde saw cooperation as a necessity in society. This was something that was also something that must be for the sake of the economy. It was only healthy for some people to come together. This was, in Wilde’s eyes, the only way for people and industries to recognize their big flaws. This would, in the end, benefit society socially and industrially. His goal was not just to help individuals, but virtually everyone (Dellamora