The previous standards, a decade old, defined good citizenship as "a belief in justice, truth, equality and responsibility for the common good." The new standards talk about respect for others, personal responsibility, and the importance of voting and of "holding public officials to their word.

I think both are useful, but incomplete. Good citizenship, to my mind, requires all of the above.

I think both are useful, but incomplete. Good citizenship, to my mind, requires all of the above.

How?

Respect for others and personal responsibility aren't compatible with equality and the common good.

That might or might not be true. Equality can mean equality before the law and equality of opportunity, not necessarily equality of outcome. Similarly, it says responsibility for the common good. That can mean personal responsibility towards your fellow man; it doesn't have to mean an organized attempt to boost the common good at the expense of the individual. Ideally, if people take enough personal responsibility for the common good, any attempt to organize the common good would be superfluous.

How?

Respect for others and personal responsibility aren't compatible with equality and the common good.

I think the fact that they chose to rewrite it lends itself to my interpretation.

How?

Respect for others and personal responsibility aren't compatible with equality and the common good.

Not true. These are very much compatible.

Equality, as it has been understood in America for roughly fifty years, is the antithesis of personal responsibility. Personal responsibility means exactly what it says: being responsible for your own actions and decisions. As not all actions and decisions have equal merit, not all outcomes will be equal. Some outcomes will be outright poor, but if we are to have respect for others and personal responsibility, we won't take from one person, and give to another to achieve equality and protect people for the personal responsibility they must assume for their choices. Adding to that, the notion of the common good completely undermines any notion of personal responsibility as it assumes that we are all responsible for everyone's failures and also for everyone's successes, functionally freeing them from the consequences of their own actions, which is the definition of personal responsibility.

No, I disagree. Equality is not the antithesis of personal responsibility. In fact, equality is necessary for personal responsibility. You can't be responsible for your lot in life if someone actively prevents you from reaching your potential. Respect for others goes hand in hand with this. You cannot have equality if people do not respect other people's rights and freedoms. Respect for others also goes with personal responsibility. If you have respect for others, you will not want nor demand that they address your personal problems.

Respect for others supports the common good, as it is necessary for equality and a healthy ecomony/society.

Personal responsibility supports the common good, as it promotes fewer entitlement programs and wards of the state.

Your logic is flawed. First of all, equality and freedom are antonyms.

Secondly, you are applying two different standards to two different groups: those who pay taxes, and those who don't. While insisting that good citizenship involves personal responsibility, while in the same breath saying that it is in the interests of the common good (of the citizens I have to believe) to provide entitlement programs... for those who aren't taking personal responsibility.

No they aren't. You're trying to domstrate this. You can't use the conclusion you're trying to reach as a reason for itself or why he's wrong.

He said no such thing.

Equality means sameness, upholding it as a virtue is to place not being different from anyone else on a pedestal.

Really? I mean you really believe this?

Hell, I'm the commie-pinko liberal left on these forums and I think you're smoking crack...

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Equality in a political sense means that everyone is treated the same legally and has the same opportunities to make something (or not) out of their lives.