<p>It is the international essay prompt in the January 28 test, and the following is what I really wrote in the real test without changing a single word. I only want to see whether the score given is really that objective regardless of the tastes and criteria of different readers.</p>
<p>ESSAY PROMPT
We almost always tend to treat people on the basis of what they have done: the star athlete is recognized and rewarded with a college scholarship, while the lawbreaker is prosecuted and punished. But our past deeds provide only a partial measure of our real worth as human beings. We should be treated according to what we are capable of accomplishing, regardless of what we may or may not have actually done.</p>
<p>ASSIGNMENT:
Should people be treated according to what they are capable of achieving instead of what they have actually done? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.</p>
<p>Every societal structure in the history of humankind 'discriminates', in the economic term, winners and losers of resource allocation. For instance, the medieval society allocates resources and power according to lineage ancestry for then the classes were immobile. For modern capitalist society, the ubiquitous social form prevailing in the contemporary world, it depends on wealth, and ultimately, ability. The superiority of societal structure depends on resource allocation criteria, one of which is to whether allocate resources to people capable of doing something or to people potentially capable of accomplishing something. My answer is indubitably the former. </p>
<p>The exemplary example is already omniscient around us - the market economy. The currency of power, money, that people are in hold of are earned by perspiration and personal effort. It reflects what people have actually done. The Hong Kong industrialist Li Ka Shing was an entrepreneur who worked in the field of textile industry in the 1960s. By incessant working and clairvoyant vision, he successfully became the richest man in Asia. Obviously, he is driven by the incentive mechanism of market economy in order to earn the currency of power. And this incentive system encourages people to work for fame and success. In a social system that measures success by what one is capable of doing is tantamount to ruling out the factor of laborious work. It discourages people to showcase their real potentials and impedes the progress of productivity and advance of civilization.</p>
<p>The antithetical example that I would like to cite is the totalitarian communist DPRK regime. The rulers, the Kim's clan, crown themselves as the supreme leaders, the brain of the state by claiming the superiority of the leaders in their genes. They indoctrinate the people of DPRK that they are the unchallenged, supreme deity, by creating myths of the leaders that they are capable of doing something that mortals are incapable of doing. Like, writing nearly thousand operas in three years. The emphasis of someone is capable of doing something is an act to deify him, a maneuver to consolidate the regime. It also discourages the people to work laboriously to fill the gap between them and 'heaven-born' geniuses. Hence, people ought to be treated according to what they have actually done to eradicate 'lineage stereotypes' and provide incentives for social progress. </p>
<p>What's the score you will give if you're the marker?</p>