William Leisek

Project 1/Video Analysis

The video I selected is a TED talk that discusses the discrepancies
between what we believe to be in existence, what we want to be in
existence, and what is actually in existence. The presenter began his speech
with an idea from the American philosopher John Rawls, who described an
original position from which to speculate on the creation of society. In
Rawls idea, a group of individuals decides how to best craft a human society
but they must be willing to enter that society, that is, become a member,
from any place. So, if we were to enter current US society (if, God forbid, we
had agreed to create such a society), each individual would be willing to
enter at any pointas a wealthy CEO, as construction worker, as a
disenfranchised transient. The idea of the original position is to eliminate
the prejudice and inequality already present in a society. Essentially, if you
were creating a society which you were to be randomly placed somewhere
in, wouldnt it behoove you to create as just and as equal a society as
possible? Constructing an unequal society would be irrational for all of the
participants involved.
With this idea in mind, the speaker presented some data on what
people perceived to be the distribution of wealth in the US, from the top 20%
to the bottom 20% (5 categories). I wont list all of the specific data, but the
survey revealed that people perceived the top 20% having just over half the
wealth, with the other half divided in an uneven taper to about 2% for the
bottom 20%. In actuality, the top 20% have over 80% of the wealth, while

the bottom 40% combined have 0.3%. The speaker termed this the
knowledge gap. In the same survey, individuals were asked what the
distribution should be. Amazingly, survey participants did not believe that
the wealth should be distributed completely evenlythey believed the
following allotments were just, from the bottom 20% to the top 20%: 10.5%,
14.1%, 21.5%, 22%, and 31.9%. That is, the survey participants distributed
the wealth in the same lopsided fashion as what is in existence, only in less
degree. The speaker termed this the desirability gap.
What do these discrepancies reveal about our society? From the
perspective of August Comte, I think they show just how powerful a social
static can be. It is likely a large number of statics that contributed to the
wealth distribution that people believed to be ideal/just. I will not attempt to
discern just what those statics are because the task is too large for this
assignment. Nonetheless, it is worth mentioning that the prevailing theme of
the video I selectedthat we do not desire true equality, even when given
the free choice to do sois best explained by Comtes social static idea.
Emile Durkheim would probably have a similar view of the TED talk. For
Durkheim, the wealth distribution skew (which, again, prevailed even in what
surveyed people believed to be fair) is a product of a host of social facts,
and is also a fact itself. Perhaps the fact that wealth has been unequally
distributed for much of recorded time (and certainly in recent Western
history) has been so ingrained that individuals operate around that fact.
That is, the fact of socioeconomic inequality is just another factor in any

given Western individuals daily mode of operation. This is the only

explanation that I can think of that explains the seemingly odd result of the
data in the TED talk. Much like a servant who has served the whims of his
crowned master and, upon sudden emancipation from his servitude, takes up
his chains again out of mere habit, the survey participants appear to reflect
what is ingrained in their daily mode of operation. That mode being that
stratification exists, as a fact. Additionally, Durkheim might stress that this
collective mode of operation reinforces it for every individual. Durkheim
might also have an opinion about the knowledge and desirability gaps
mentioned in the video, if only that most of the surveyed participants seem
equally misinformed and equally unwilling to live in a completely equal
society. In the lens of functionalism, the survey participants are propagating
ignorance and inequality by reinforcing their existence.
For Marx, the survey results are simply explained by conflict theory.
Entrenched institutions and beliefs, together with history, are so deeply
ingrained into most individuals minds that stratification has become
standard. In such a world, it is no surprise that those individuals, when asked
to redistribute societal wealth by sketching from a blank slate, draw a fair
society in similar proportion to the extant and unequal society. Again, it is
variety of factors that lead to this occurrence, but for Marx it is merely
another example of how power and resources are withheld from many and
allotted to a few.

This video is a strong example of the three sociological perspectives.

Ultimately, I believe the conflict theory is most prevalent, though I do think
that the notion of functionalism serves to explain why an unequal society is
viewed as fair to the surveyed individuals. The theme of the video is
inequalityactual inequality, perceived inequality, and desired inequality.
Thats rightas I understand it, the surveyed individuals consciously chose
to redistribute wealth unequally. This is the struggle for resources and power.
The agent of this desired inequality, however, is subtlerit involves the false
propagation of the belief that the unequal distribution is fair or natural, and
this might be an example of functionalism. Additionally, symbolic interaction
may also play a role in the propagation of this beliefon a micro scale, daily
interactions with others and the media (if we consider it to be another
person that most individuals interact with daily) doubtlessly reinforce
stratification.