Taken from a very insightful piece on Zerohedge, authored by Brandon Smith. “Leftists in particular have always had a problem with competition and it stems from the Marxist roots of their philosophy. There is this notion among lefties that the world is supposed to be “equal”. Now, there are different types of equality, and I think the majority of Americans agree with the idea of equal opportunity. Meaning, (at least in the West) we think every person regardless of their circumstances should be given the CHANCE to PROVE they can work hard and succeed. People should not be stopped from pursuing that chance merely because of who they are.

However, leftists and Marxists think that equality of opportunity is not enough. They think that there should also be equality of outcome.

This one delusion sits at the core of all Marxist thinking.

Equality of outcome is impossible because not all people are born equal. Some people are, frankly, born superior to others. Some people are born smarter. Some people are born stronger, taller and faster. Some people are born with innate musical or artistic talent. Some people are born with innate mathematical understanding. Some people are born extroverted and are good at making friends. Some people are born introverted and are better at self reflection and awareness. Some people are born to be basketball players and some are born to be engineers.

The psychological reality of mankind is that we are not born as blank slates; we are born with inherent qualities and the seeds of unique individual talents. Marxists suffer from a complete mental disconnect with this concept. If they were to admit that people are born with individual qualities and advantages and are not blank slates, then the foundation of their philosophy falls apart. They rationalize their social engineering agenda under the premise that all people need to be “molded” into equal units. They think people must be reeducated to reject bad beliefs and bad habits they were taught as blank slate children and learn to accept that everyone starts life out exactly the same. Therefore, the majority of people who succeed are those that were given an unfair advantage, and success should be treated with disdain and suspicion.

But if people have inherent psychological characteristics and inherent advantages, then their personalities and qualities cannot be reformed. Those “bad beliefs and habits” might actually be completely natural and necessary. You might be able to hold them back through force or fear, but you can’t change the core of who they are. If our biological and genetic imperatives prevail, Marxists become obsolete and useless.

The secret is to discover what your innate strengths are in life and take advantage of them to succeed. If you do not have innate talent, then you must at least have an innate ability to work hard. If you don’t have the ability and drive to work hard to become good at a thing, then you don’t deserve to get recognition for that thing. You are not entitled to feel like a winner merely because you exist. It’s really as simple as that.

The try-hard meme is basically the equivalent of excellence-shaming; you are supposed to feel ashamed of being better than others at a certain task or talent. I’m not sure where this hatred for competition comes from, but I suspect it has something to do with leftists and their early childhoods. Many of them are “late bloomers” who did not have many experiences winning, or they were never pushed by their parents to mature and excel. They grew to despise the idea that winning and success are so elevated in our society, while at the same time they still crave that feeling of being the best at something.

So, they adopt the Marxist creed, which tells them that yes, they are losers, but it’s not because they are lazy and they suck; no, they are losers because they are victims of a society that is holding them back from their true potential. Marxism tells them that the people who succeed were actually given special treatment because of their class or the color of their skin. The winners are actually very bad people who don’t deserve success. If only the system was forced to be more fair, then THEY would be the winners. Thus, in order for losers to “win”, they must join a mob of other losers and gain power through collective control. The successful people must be given an extreme handicap by the mob to “level the playing field”.

I think the Marxist ideal is leading these kids down a path of brutal delusion, because they are never going to achieve the Utopian society that they seek. The world will never be “fair”, and the idea that you can force such conditions upon a culture without serious consequences is childish and mentally unstable. Make no mistake, we are entering an era in which the facade propping up limp-wristed and weak people is falling away. When it comes to economic strife, crisis and survival, there is no appeal to equality. You’re in the jungle, baby, and if you have no merit, you’re gonna die.

The people willing to work hard and the people who seek to self improve are going to do well. The people that want a trophy just for participating are not going to make it.

By extension, trying to socially engineer our country to cater to the lowest common denominator would grind all progress to a standstill and make the crisis even worse. If “trying hard” becomes something to be ashamed of, or something that is punished, then there is no more incentive to improve or innovate or go beyond that which has already been accomplished. Our evolution ceases, and humanity stagnates.

While human competition has its ugly moments in history, at the very least it must be encouraged among individuals. It must continue to be rewarded. For if we start rewarding mediocrity it will be the exact opposite of the biological drives that keep us alive. It will lead to self destruction of the entire species.”