Given a quote like this, I think the best/most obvious interpretation is to read the quote in its famous historical and political context. Divorced from that context and read literally, it is obviously false. To the extent people are parroting those words to invoke a literal interpretation, that is obviously wrong. That being said, I think that in most cases where the term is used with even the slightest thought and consideration, it is steeped in at least a bit of the political flavor of the original and is used as a statement about how people interact with each other, government, and/or society.
My answer to your original question (“I don’t understand the problem with “all men are created equal.”) boils down to the fact that it is often quoted outside of its original context, causing it to be (as you say) obviously wrong.
When it is instead quoted with due consideration for its original context, properly steeped in the proper political flavor, and as a statement about how people interact, I agree with you that it stops being obviously wrong, and becomes much less problematic.
I think the majority of real-world uses are in the former category. I could be wrong.
Huh. It seems unlikely that different circles accounts for all of the difference; more likely one or both of us is suffering from selective data neglect. I’ll have to pay more attention to this as it comes up in the future.
Given a quote like this, I think the best/most obvious interpretation is to read the quote in its famous historical and political context. Divorced from that context and read literally, it is obviously false. To the extent people are parroting those words to invoke a literal interpretation, that is obviously wrong. That being said, I think that in most cases where the term is used with even the slightest thought and consideration, it is steeped in at least a bit of the political flavor of the original and is used as a statement about how people interact with each other, government, and/or society.
Fair enough.
My answer to your original question (“I don’t understand the problem with “all men are created equal.”) boils down to the fact that it is often quoted outside of its original context, causing it to be (as you say) obviously wrong.
When it is instead quoted with due consideration for its original context, properly steeped in the proper political flavor, and as a statement about how people interact, I agree with you that it stops being obviously wrong, and becomes much less problematic.
I think the majority of real-world uses are in the former category. I could be wrong.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard it used the former way, though perhaps we run in different circles.
Huh. It seems unlikely that different circles accounts for all of the difference; more likely one or both of us is suffering from selective data neglect. I’ll have to pay more attention to this as it comes up in the future.