Alas, Babylon

[John Galt]

To your point about meritocracy Saz there was an interesting article last year about the Bohemian Bourgeoise and how they completely f**k america, again in the Atlantic https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/ar ... ss/619492/ (note: the best way to read anything I've found is to get an extension, such as Reader View, and then press a hotkey and bam, it's clearly outlined for you with no splash screen). I think we've discussed this here before. and from one bobo to another I agree with you that the rise of meritocracy has really f**k us over. Namely, it's not really a meritocracy. my father's father was an engineer -- a locomotive engineer (my mother's father was a chemical engineer for 3M, so they have a cute story about how my dad said "yeah my dad's an engineer too"). he hauled iron ore. before that, he was enlisted and served in the Pacific. my father's mother was highly educated, and was a high school teacher to boys older than her having skipped so many grades herself. she served in the navy as an officer during the war, and then was a teacher up on the range. raising 6 boomer kids, including my father, they all went to college. my dad thought he was going to be a grease monkey when he grew up but instead became an officer in the navy, retiring an O6. and what did he do for me? well while the overwhelming majority of my college was paid for with scholarships, the 20% left over was paid for by dear old dad and an inheritance from my grandmother. and what did this leave me? well no debt going into life for one, plus an education that helped me get my foot in the door in a giant corporation. i did then learn to code myself and changed careers and am now a lead software engineer but the basis of all of this is built on what you call the poison of meritocracy. for without the generational buildup before me would I be in the same position I am in in life? very doubtful. and yet, i will again make sure my children have everything afforded to them to make sure they too can continue on in this meritocracy where first i help to make sure the deck is favorable.

And yes this class that I am in and you are in, the Bohemian Bougoisese, largely this class has eschewed even recognizing its own power. we control media, tech, and our very culture, and we have done this by working hard and are very proud of it, but we still consider ourselves outsiders. we have lots of student debt as a whole (myself not included, as explained, but i would have had I went to law school as I considered) -- but also make the most money of everyone. when "progressives" talk about erasing student debt, it's mostly going to go to the main backers of the Democracts, the BoBos, who are in the top income quintiles and hold most of this debt. a lot of new artisanal kitchens are going to be installed as a result if the debt is cancelled. there's a cognitive dissonance in even recognizing who the people are that control everything. and so how can there even be a sense of noblesse oblige if you don't even view yourself as the nobility? Our class created the tower of babel while spraying its foundations with a solvent that dissolved its mortar