He claims it is a universal now—but I don’t see the claim that it was a historical universal.
He attempts to provide an ev-psych explanation, which makes no sense unless it’s a historical universal or near universal.
Also, your response does not explain the distinction I’m asking about—I mostly understood the general context of why you were attempting a distinction, but I’m still confused by the disconnect you seem to be drawing between object level expressions like “I’m poor, you caused it, grr” and abstract concern with inequality.
It’s not “I’m poor, you caused it, grr”, it’s “I don’t have enough food/money/free time [to live the lifestyle I’m accustomed to], you’re causing it, grr”. The peasant doesn’t have a problem with the lord having more and better food than he does any more than he has a problem with birds being able to fly and him not. The problem is that he’s not getting the amount of food he feels he’s entitled to.
He attempts to provide an ev-psych explanation, which makes no sense unless it’s a historical universal or near universal.
It’s not “I’m poor, you caused it, grr”, it’s “I don’t have enough food/money/free time [to live the lifestyle I’m accustomed to], you’re causing it, grr”. The peasant doesn’t have a problem with the lord having more and better food than he does any more than he has a problem with birds being able to fly and him not. The problem is that he’s not getting the amount of food he feels he’s entitled to.
“accustomed to” and “entitled to” don’t really have the same meaning when the existence of an anti-inequality motive is at issue.
But I agree that there is a disconnect between the ev-psych invocation and the lack of any other claim of universality.
My point is that this distinction is extremely modern.
Do you have an accessible cite explaining this point?