Something strange is going on with elites and we all see it.
A characteristic of elites is that they must have a certain status which sets them apart or there would be nothing to define them as an elite. Status has been achieved in many traditional ways as we know, such as wealth, costume, asset ownership, religion, profession, social class, language, education and so on.
Yet in comparatively recent decades, traditional elite status has been vigorously eroded by economic growth, mass production, mass education, mass media, cheap books and a much wider access to information.
Yet in comparatively recent decades, traditional elite status has been vigorously eroded by economic growth, mass production, mass education, mass media, cheap books and a much wider access to information.
In our digital age, the erosion of elite status has become so acute that it has had some strange effects on one particular aspect of status - the role of high status gatekeeper to social and political narratives which control and circumscribe behaviour. We have seen the rise of weirdly nonsensical and clearly untrue luxury narratives which still circumscribe behaviour, but in absurdly damaging ways. More absurd than the past at any rate.
Alice and the rabbit hole provides an excellent idiom for this ridiculous state of affairs. Modern elites have become rabbit hole gatekeepers for the world of the Mad Hatter’s tea party. In this bizarrely artificial world they bolster their status with nonsense narratives which a mass audience finds difficult to digest and impossible to align with common sense.
We call this weird development ‘woke’ or ‘progressive’ or ‘politically correct’ or 'environmental' or a host of other names, but all of these shifting nonsense narratives are suited to shoring up the crumbling status of elites as opposed to non-elites.
Elite nonsense has always been with us of course, always valuable as an arcane badge of elite status. Yet in our modern world, the arcane nonsense has retreated down the progressive rabbit hole where nothing makes sense, where rational and informed people cannot follow.
Alice and the rabbit hole provides an excellent idiom for this ridiculous state of affairs. Modern elites have become rabbit hole gatekeepers for the world of the Mad Hatter’s tea party. In this bizarrely artificial world they bolster their status with nonsense narratives which a mass audience finds difficult to digest and impossible to align with common sense.
We call this weird development ‘woke’ or ‘progressive’ or ‘politically correct’ or 'environmental' or a host of other names, but all of these shifting nonsense narratives are suited to shoring up the crumbling status of elites as opposed to non-elites.
Elite nonsense has always been with us of course, always valuable as an arcane badge of elite status. Yet in our modern world, the arcane nonsense has retreated down the progressive rabbit hole where nothing makes sense, where rational and informed people cannot follow.
The Mad Hatters are having their final tea party.
6 comments:
Elites come and go. According to the theory of Cliodynamics the Old Elite descends into irrelevance and, after a period of chaos (about 10 years) a New Elite emerges. One that will hold sway for several decades, until it too becomes the Old Elite.
It's always difficult judging society from the inside, but it seems to me that we are well into the period of chaos. The Brexit Referendum on 23 June 2016 was perhaps the start but struggled mightily to be implemented against the wishes of the Old Elite. Political matters were confused for a time but seem to be forming around the New Elite with Trump II and Milei.
My best guess is that the chaos will end around June 2026. It will take some time to get used to the changeover to the new Powers That Be, but it is comforting to think that Two Tier Keir is fighting a battle already lost.
Rather than a decaying elite, I tend to see this in terms of a "circulation of elites", as the Italian Gaetano Mosca described. As dominant social forces change, those that can monopolise and control them also change. When land was important, farmers and estate-holders rose to prominence and became "upper class". Titled landowners with country houses and farming know-how set the tone. Then they were superseded by industrialists. Now the manipulators and presenters of information have risen to prominence, which explains in part why "celebs" are everywhere and their opinions are taken seriously.
One worrying aspect is that there is likely to be very little social capital emerging from the latest celebrity ideas. Diversity is likely to have some slight pay-off, in that people from neglected groups get given a chance. Net Zero stuff will have a few technological advances associated with it, but overall is clearly pernicious. We have too many people just engaging in "feel good thinking", and the problem is that they get rewarded for it.
DJ - yes something seems to be changing but as you say, it's hard to judge from the inside. As well as Two Tier Keir, most of Europe seems to be fighting a battle already lost. The next battle is the real problem though, demographics. Somehow it has to become desirable to have children.
Sam - "One worrying aspect is that there is likely to be very little social capital emerging from the latest celebrity ideas."
Yes it is worrying, there is nothing to suggest we could move on to become more grounded, value what is worth valuing and reinstate a culture with some connection to what works in the long term. Elites can't reinstate what they don't understand.
Fitzgerald: “Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me.” Hemmingway: “Yes, they have more money.” (From All the Sad Young Men, 1926.) Does very rich make elite? Overlapping Venn diagrams I’d suggest.
Thing is, what causes one elite to change to another is a new reality, but this present woke elite won't last long because it's based on ideology not reality. When their ideas clash with reality as they must, they will be gone, replaced. Trump's rise to power on another basis may hasten this process. At least it should be a lot quicker than the last time it happened - in the Soviet Union under a similarly delusional elite.
James - wealthy enough to fit in I'd say, but not necessarily rich. Aiming to become rich though. Yes a Venn diagram would show it.
Tammly - yes, ideology is the weakness, it's inflexible and its answers are not answers and Trump may well have kicked off a perceived need for better answers. Biden may have added to it in that enough people saw how absurd he was and how things must have gone badly wrong for him to be there.
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