I guess it would bother me if 1+1=3. It ain’t though.
I think a better example is something like e.g. your parents give your sibling far better gifts than you, since you can’t really escape that dynamic as a child.
As an adult it’s like, alright, so my workplace is crap, let me use one of the 40+ years of my adult life to find another one.
I am British, someone working at Facebook in the US earns double or triple what I used to as a software dev for roughly the same work. Does it bother me? I guess? But my first thought isn’t to be upset or something, it’s more like “do I want to live in the US, if so, google immigration lawyers then”, if not, accept and move on.
Ah, you're British. I see. Well good to know you're not bothered by inequality living in one of the most equal societies in world history.
As mentioned below: not caring about specific instances of inequality is not the same as not caring about inequality. I also don't care about the fact some people have private jets or fancy cars. That's not really what people are talking about, though obviously they're symbolic of the bigger picture.
Effectively the problem is that wealth is an inherent feedback loop that naturally creates Pareto distributions instead of normal distributions. People don't have to be 'unfair' for this phenomenon to occur.
Agreed with your broader point. In practice no one's individual emotional response is relevant: runaway wealth inequality is bad because it yields bad outcomes for society.
Capitalism works to the extent that it does because money becomes a signal for what people want, which very obviously fails if overwhelming proportions of money controlled by very few people.
"If my aunt had a d_ck, she'd be my uncle."
Of course, that doesn't quite land the same in 2024, our finally learning of all the travails our trans brothers and sisters face in this world filled with such mean, ignorant mofos.
They might not care about specific instances of inequality, but the distinction is important because, for example, other people experience different instances and clearly OP’s “caringness” is highly modulated by their information. Who’s to say they just actually have no fucking clue how bad inequality can be (in either direction), then it’s no surprise at all it doesn’t bother them.
To make it more explicit: it doesn’t bother me either that people have jets or fancy cars. I cannot draw from that observation that “inequality doesn’t bother me.” And you certainly can’t draw from that the suggestion that certain forms or intensities of inequality don’t yield bad outcomes in society totally aside from GP’s personal emotional state.
(Made famous in the UK by Gina D'Acampo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-RfHC91Ewc)
If you go play soccer and other people’s goals are worth 3 points while yours are worth 1?
I’m doubtful.