Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why Our Elites Stink

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 74 posts

Re: Why Our Elites Stink

#31

Post by mjw »

wdewind wrote: post #8
ritchiea wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that he's nostalgic and full of shit but you're putting words in his mouth when you say the problem is "those who rise to power do so with the personal story that they earned it." Brooks is arguing that they DID earn it, he says the mechanisms that put people at the top tend to be honest and that people at the top work more than others. What he's saying when he's being nostalgic is that the old people at the…

Yeah, I think we agree: Brooks claims the mechanism that gets them there is meritocratic, but because they do not have the concept of being an elite (the patronizing attitude), which they do not have because they "earned it", they are worse leaders. "The problem is that today’s meritocratic elites cannot admit to themselves that they are elites."

Although I don't buy the whole article, I think this is an interesting viewpoint.

One could argue that the brand of libertarian politics often espoused in american hacker circles is pretty much the politics of this "meritocratic elite who can't admit they're an elite".

I worked hard to earn it, I deserve it, I resent the idea that society should impose on me any responsibility towards those who didn't/weren't lucky enough to. (A cognitive bias where one discounts the role of luck in one's own success is perhaps quite important to this viewpoint.)

Re: Why Our Elites Stink

#32

Post by bediger4000 »

bejar37 wrote: post #13

The interesting point that I got from this article is that the old aristocracy had a sense of responsibility to society and acknowledged the fact that they were privileged. Now that we're in a society where people tend to not think of themselves as wealthy or privileged, how does this self-ignorant meritocratic elite know that they do have a responsibility?

Is there any objective indicator (or "proxy") for this sense of responsibility? I'm thinking there isn't, but maybe someone can suggest measures that show it.

I can offer a specific counter-example: http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_dismal_science/20... Looks like someone on the inside of the CIA's coup-planning process made a killing in the stock market, as well as in Guatemala. That's not aristocracy with a sense of responsibility, it's cold hearted money grubbing.

Re: Why Our Elites Stink

#33

Post by freyr »

sp332 wrote: post #20
moron wrote: post #4

As far as whether Wall Street is working better than it used to, depends who you ask. But, really, this talk of "elites" tends to put me on edge, because a lot of times it's really about who you define as the elite. I came of age politically at the time when anybody to the left of Rush Limbaugh was an effete "latte liberal", and the word "elite" basically referred to anyone who had a college degree and saw through th…

I think "elites" are people who consider themselves elite, or more specifically, any one who thinks: 1. They can make better life choices, financial decisions etc. than "other" people, and 2. Therefore they should be in charge of other people's lives.

This definition is entirely dependent on the internal mind state of the individual. The guy behind the counter of the local 7-Eleven may think he's smarter than everyone, and may think he should be in charge, but nobody thinks of him as an elite.

I'd guess most people today consider an elite as somebody who wields influence within a political, corporate, or other type of entity that itself is highly influential within society, and who is well connected to other people of influence.

Re: Why Our Elites Stink

#34

Post by pak »

rubashov wrote: post #19
drumdance wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but they cared very much whether you were Jewish, black or female. And they still care if your parents went to school there.

On black and Jewish I'm not going to take your point as granted. I'd need an unbiased analysis.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_quota

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numerus_clausus#Numerus_clausus...

President Lowell of Harvard tried to impose a 12% quota on Jewish admits in the early 20th century, and also attempted to exclude African American students from residing in the freshman dorms. You can find similar behavior at other universities until well after WWII ended. For example, Georgetown's first black student enrolled in 1950.

Re: Why Our Elites Stink

#35

Post by js2 »

This is an old argument, and I frankly think it was better made by the man who coined meritocracy:

[snip]

The business meritocracy is in vogue. If meritocrats believe, as more and more of them are encouraged to, that their advancement comes from their own merits, they can feel they deserve whatever they can get.

They can be insufferably smug, much more so than the people who knew they had achieved advancement not on their own merit but because they were, as somebody's son or daughter, the beneficiaries of nepotism. The newcomers can actually believe they have morality on their side.

So assured have the elite become that there is almost no block on the rewards they arrogate to themselves. The old restraints of the business world have been lifted and, as the book also predicted, all manner of new ways for people to feather their own nests have been invented and exploited.

[/snap]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2001/jun/29/comment

Re: Why Our Elites Stink

#36

Post by _delirium »

rubashov wrote: post #19
drumdance wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but they cared very much whether you were Jewish, black or female. And they still care if your parents went to school there.

On black and Jewish I'm not going to take your point as granted. I'd need an unbiased analysis.

It's possible you're not American and thus unaware, but with black students in particular, it wasn't subtle discrimination, but outright bans: many universities, up until the 1960s, explicitly prohibited black students.

Re: Why Our Elites Stink

#37

Post by ubasu »

This is the NYT equivalent of blogspam. Also comes with standard patronizing rhetoric about how today's uppity nouveau riche elites cannot compare with what he knew when he was growing up (as others have also pointed out).

Re: Why Our Elites Stink

#38

Post by tubbo »

bediger4000 wrote: post #2

Weird. David Brooks in person: rather interesting. David Brooks on paper: easily dismissable. In this case, I dismiss what he says because he's making exactly zero attempt to control for exogenous variables. There's a lot more going on than just changing from a WASP-only aristocracy to a meritocracy of sorts. Vast cultural shifts have necessitated the change, and cause other things to happen as well. Just to pick a f…

Not only that, but we're talking about what the press knows. The press is a lot bigger now, because we're all a member of the press. There's more news now because there's more capability to disseminate information quickly. In the "heady days" of the 50s and 60s that David talks about, our speed of information uptake was much lower than it is today. So to tie our current problems to a meritocratic system that isn't run (well, as deeply) by a caste of elites is just completely ignorant of the fact that the average person knows more than the average person did in the 1960s.

Re: Why Our Elites Stink

#39

Post by rubashov »

pak wrote: post #34
rubashov wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On black and Jewish I'm not going to take your point as granted. I'd need an unbiased analysis.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_quota http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numerus_clausus#Numerus_clausus... President Lowell of Harvard tried to impose a 12% quota on Jewish admits in the early 20th century, and also attempted to exclude African American students from residing in the freshman dorms. You can find similar behavior at other universities until well after WWII ended. For example, Georgetown's first black st…

OK, so some colleges in the 20s and 30s discriminated against Jews and others (vast majority?) didn't. Your link goes on about Feynman and Salk going to NYU and MIT instead of their first choices. These men both easily found their way to the elite.

Re: Why Our Elites Stink

#40

Post by sp332 »

freyr wrote: post #33
sp332 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think "elites" are people who consider themselves elite, or more specifically, any one who thinks: 1. They can make better life choices, financial decisions etc. than "other" people, and 2. Therefore they should be in charge of other people's lives.

This definition is entirely dependent on the internal mind state of the individual. The guy behind the counter of the local 7-Eleven may think he's smarter than everyone, and may think he should be in charge, but nobody thinks of him as an elite. I'd guess most people today consider an elite as somebody who wields influence within a political, corporate, or other type of entity that itself is highly influential withi…

Exactly, elitism is basically empire-building on a personal level. You can of course wield influence while still being strongly meritocratic. But feeling some entitlement or ambition to control aspects of other people's lives is elitist.
Post reply on HN