Envy and Rice Crackers

2013-08-23

A weird morality thought:

Today [2013-08-23]at VBS, we serving kids rice crackers as snacks. The rice crackers came in two variants:, sesame (I think) seed and cheese. We gave them out arbitrarily, so some kids got one kind, some got the other, and a few got a mix. I expected this to cause trouble, but it seems the kids didn't notice. Or maybe they didn't care. Or just didn't complain about it. Or traded them around. Or something.

However, imagine that things had been different: the kids have strong preferences and are not allowed to trade. As we give the crackers out randomly, some kids will get the kind they like and some would not. The ones who don't will also see that some other kids got what they wanted. My question is as follows: Is this a bad thing because it encourages envy (a vice), or a good thing because it gives them an opportunity to develop moral fiber (or whatever its called) by overcoming envy?

Response

This triggered the following exchange:
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