Larry said, “What in the devil's this got to do with the race between this country and the Russkies?”
Sam said patiently, “Voss and the Movement he leads contend that a social-label system winds up with incompetents running the country in all fields. Often incompetent scientists are in charge of our research; incompetent doctors, in charge of our health; incompetent politicians run our government; incompetent teachers, laden with social-labels, teach our youth. Our young people are going to college to secure a degree, not an education. It's the label that counts, not the reality.
“Voss contends that it's getting progressively worse. That we're sinking into an equivalent of a ritual-taboo, tribal social-like situation. This is the system the low-level human being wants, yearns for and seeks. A situation in which no one's judgment is of any use. Then his lack of judgment is no handicap.
“According to members of the Movement, today the tribesman type [pg 041] is seeking to reduce civilization back to ritual-taboo tribalism wherein no one man's judgment is of any value. The union wants advancement based on seniority, not on ability and judgment. The persons with whom you associate socially judge you by the amount of money you possess, the family from which you come, the degrees you hold, by social-labels—not by your proven abilities. Down with judgment! is the cry.”
“It sounds awfully weird to me,” Larry grumbled in deprecation.
Sam shrugged. “There's a lot of sense in it. What the Movement wants is to develop a socio-economic system in which judgment produces a maximum advantage.”
Larry said, “What gets me is that you talk as though half the country was all caught up in debating this Movement. But I haven't even heard of it, neither has my department chief, nor any of my colleagues, so far as I know. Why isn't anything about it in the papers or on the TriD?”
Sam said mildly, “As a matter of fact, I took in Mort Lenny's show the other night and he made some cracks about it. But it's not the sort of thing that's even meant to become popular with the man in the street. To put it bluntly, Voss and his people aren't particularly keen about the present conception of the democratic ideal. According to him, true democracy can only be exercised by peers and society today isn't composed of peers. If you have one hundred people, twenty of them competent, intelligent persons, eighty of them untrained, incompetent and less than intelligent, then it's ridiculous to have the eighty dictate to the twenty.”
Larry looked accusingly at his long-time friend. “You know, Sam, you sound as though you approve of all this.”
Sam said patiently, “I listen to it all, Larry my boy. I think Voss makes a lot of sense. There's only one drawback.”