What’s in a word? ‘Equality’. ‘Equity’. It’s the sort of thing that Channel 4 newsreaders find impossible to understand. Surely they’re the same thing, aren’t they? And even if they aren’t then what kind of pedant would keep trying to point it out? What difference does it make anyway?
Well, quite a lot. Potentially the difference between your home burning down and it not burning down.
In the past couple of weeks residents of some of the most ‘progressive’ neighbourhoods in America have had, in real time, an unfortunate crash course on the difference between these two words and are now raising questions on which has been prioritised. The wildfires that have destroyed the Palisades and other upmarket areas of Los Angeles seem to have been caused by many things. Locals report repeated sightings of arsonists, though the authorities seem to have taken a forgiving approach to the odd homeless – sorry, ‘unhoused’ – person walking around with a blowtorch. The winds have certainly whipped matters along. But the real story of the disaster, which has already caused billions of dollars worth of damage, is the response to the fires. Or rather the non-response, specifically from the people whose job is meant to be putting out fires.
Continue reading the entire piece here at The Spectator (paywall)
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Douglas Murray is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and contributing editor of City Journal.
Photo by PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images