Redistributive Justice

I will now rebut PRO's case. In the previous round, I stood by Aristotle's definition of justice. I still do; however, I do challenge PRO's comparison between Situation A and B seen here:"For example, in Situation A a child has spent the whole day weeding the garden and is rewarded by her parents with the evening off. In Situation B a child has spent the whole day weeding the garden but receives no reward from her parents. Situation A is just and Situation B is unjust." The difference between Situation A and B is not inherently unjust. For example, if one child was weeding as a punishment and the other was weeding either for a neutral reason (such as a chore) or a positive reason (such as altruism), then both situations are still just. Though the example is only there to illustrate justice - as, since it does not deal with redistribution, it does not relate to the resolution outside of defining justice - I felt it important to clarify that the difference is not in and of itself unjust. This also removes my opponent's practical basis for linking justice and fairness. "I would just add one simple qualifier regarding fairness. It is okay to treat the winner of a race differently than the loser insofar as we give one a prize and the other earns nothing; yet, it would be unfair to treat the children who weed the garden differently because they have done the exact same thing, and so should get the reward." I feel this paragraph is worth exploring. In the race, both have done the exact same thing, have they not? Both have run the race. Yet one of them is treated differently than the other. In one situation, both children do the same work, and my opponent says both should be rewarded, yet in the race both also did the same work by running and finishing the race, yet only one was rewarded - the faster one. The one who was born swifter, trained harder, or just got luckier. My opponent later says that we cannot reward by desert (thereby excluding both the born swifter and got luckier reasons), yet it is nigh impossible to separate which factors led to one person finishing first. This is a contradiction in my opponent's case.Now let's move on to my opponent's contentions. Rebuttal to Contention 1Under his first contention, my opponent asserts that:"This is the principle that undeserved inequalities call for redress; and since inequalities of birth and natural endowment are undeserved, these inequalities are to be somehow compensated for." This comprises a large part of my opponent's argument, and it one directly at odds with my contention regarding the right to property. I should clarify that when I say property, I am not merely referring to land or housing. The body itself is the property of its owner. A person who does not control his or her body and mind is a slave; there is no other term. To say that one does not deserve the naturally given gifts of their own body is to strip them of that ownership. This is why the right to property is so essential to liberty. Additionally, the notion that they are undeserved is, at this point unproven, and it is up to my opponent to prove otherwise. He has not yet done so. Because of this, the second half of his contention also falls apart. Since nothing demonstrates the qualities are undeserved, there is no ground for redress. "The array of assets dealt by fortune is neither just nor unjust. ‘These are simply natural facts. What is just and unjust is the way that institutions deal with these facts.’ There is no reason to let assets and the benefits that flow from them lie where they fall. This would be simply to incorporate and affirm the arbitrariness of nature."As I demonstrated earlier, enforcing a redistribution of resources would itself be an injustice because it violates the right to property. While my opponent and I may agree that the method by which institutions 'deal with these facts' in unjust, my opponent would seek to employ an unjust 'solution.' It would seem paradoxical to suggest that justice can be achieved through injustice (indeed, it takes us into an ends justify the means conversation, which does not relate to the debate). Rebuttal to Contention 2 "The precept which seems intuitively to come closest to rewarding moral dessert is that of distribution according to effort. Once again, however, it seems clear that the effort a person is willing to make is influenced by his natural abilities and skills and the alternatives open to him. The better endowed are more likely, other things equal, to" achieve more greatly. They have resources and natural talents that others lack, and can use them to garner an unfair advantage over others."Effort or achievement? If we look back at my opponent's example about the race, both may put in extreme effort, but one still wins and one still loses. One comes away with everything; the other slouches away with nothing. My opponent's own example counters his case. Rewarding based on effort is a pretty picture, but it will always lose out to rewarding based on achievement. If two people each write a book but only one of them gets published, it doesn't matter that they both expended effort; the one that didn't get published didn't get the monetary rewards. He or she may have received other rewards, such as personal satisfaction and perhaps even admiration from friends and family, but they are unlikely to be anything quantifiable. Is it unjust for one person to be published and the other not? No, not necessarily. Would it not be unjust to lavish the same praise and fame on the unpublished author as the published one? Would it not be unjust to rob the published author of some of his/her fortune and give it to the unpublished author because the published one somehow didn't deserve the fruits of his/her efforts? Simply put, the inequalities nature renders among all people are there for use. Just because A is born with a worse singing voice than B does not mean A is inferior in all aspects. A might be a better runner, for example. And C might not be gifted for singing or running but might have a creative mind. There are a myriad of possibilities and opportunities for people to pursue that for which they are naturally gifted or inclined. There is no need to level the inequalities between two people when each can simply pursue a different field from the other. My opponent is treating natural talent as if it were an arbitrary standard that makes one man superior to another in all aspects and thus needs rectification. In reality, however, this is not the case. Rebuttal to Contention 3 Contention 3 is not a contention so much as a trio of examples. The Falling Tree:"My house was hit several years ago by a tree which collapsed during a hurricane. It was on public land and healthy, so we could not remove it, nor did we (or anyone else) see a need to remove it. Yet, the damaged cause by its fall cost us hundred of dollars. Our insurance company deemed it to be an "act of God;" in other words, an occurrence that was random and not anyone's fault. Is it not just of us to demand compensation for this misfortune, if the disaster truly was undeserved?" This is a disingenuous example regarding the redistribution of resources. If a contract was made wherein insurance was purchased for the house (storm or accident insurance), then the company has an obligation to fulfill that contract and pay for all or part of the damages. If no such contract existed, the company is under no obligation to provide monetary support. PRO is not entitled to the money of others simply because of a misfortune on his part; do not the people at the company also suffer misfortunes? Under this logic, we would all be financially responsible for one another when undeserved disasters occur. The Tale of Two Cities "Juba is a hard worker--persevering through famine and civil war to provide meager sustenance for his impoverished family. Hamptons is an entitled jerk who enjoys fast cars, sleazy women, and all the luxuries money can buy, without putting in a single ounce of effort to earn that money. By virtue of where he was born, and who he was born to, Hamptons is far better off than Juba. That is unfair and unequal; that simply because Juba is born to a poorer family in a still poorer country , he is relegated a worse life, despite the fact that he worked much harder in comparison." Is the scenario described above unequal? Yes. Is it unfair? Arguably yes. But is it fair to take resources from Hamptons and give them to Juba? No. Is it just? No. In doing so, we are punishing Hamptons because he was born somewhere and rewarding Juba because he was born elsewhere. This neither relates to effort, as my opponent previously argued, nor achievement. The Librarian and the Singer I think I've actually addressed part of this example already. The singing voice belongs to the girl by nature; it is her property, and she is free to exercise it as she wills. And of course, the first girl is just an absolutely awful human being and the second is described so as to maximize sympathy. Because if both girls were decent people, the emotional impact of the perceived 'injustice' just fades away, regardless of the two girls would be in the real world. However, nothing in this example necessitates a need for a redistribution of resources. The girl who became a librarian made her own choices. She obviously had an interest in the field, or she wouldn't have studied library sciences. She knew the risks and consequences of that decision and willfully chose to pursue it anyway. Just because she might have worked harder does not mean she is automatically entitled to more. To fall back on one of the oldest sayings, life isn't fair. Conclusion Ultimately, the examples and arguments presented by my opponent fail to necessitate a redistribution of resources, nor do they explain how it would solve the perceived problems. Instead, redistribution only creates more problems by violating individual rights and creating a system of dependence.