Guest post: The secret to why Trump is not universally shunned
Originally a comment by iknklast on Come on baby, let’s do the transgressive jerk.
At his recent rallies, Trump has taken to expounding on his lack of acceptance by the “elites,” proclaiming it a badge of pride
And that is the secret to why he is not universally shunned. He is speaking to a body of people who also pride themselves on not being the “elite” – having totally changed the definition of what “elite” means to mean anyone who reads, who understands words of three or more syllables, or has an education. Or anyone that disagrees with the so-called family values brigade. Or anyone who doesn’t like Trump.
Elite should mean the hereditary rich, like it once did. When I was in school, the elite were the rich kids, not the smart kids. They were the ones whose daddy was a politician or a doctor or an oil man. They were the ones who thought people who raised pigs and sheep were filth, but people who raised horses and dogs were superior human beings. The smart kids? They were often the despised, yes, but not because they were elite. They were despised by the elite.
We still have that sort of elite – the rich, the snobbish – but somehow or other, they have convinced a lot of people that they are not elite, they are the authentic, the real, the down home people. They give themselves freedom to hate people based on arbitrary characteristics, unlike the “politically correct elite”. They have educations, but use simple words and phrases (often self-consciously, I suspect) unlike the “educated elite”. They have money, but somehow convince people without money that they are one of them, and the “educated, politically correct elite” are people who don’t care a flying fig about working people – thus turning the equation around completely. And it has been a winning strategy for them.
The group in question can vary, but lack of empathy towards an outgroup of some sort unites virtually all of the right thus I would say the new definition of elite is actually anyone with a shred of empathy. Recall that Trump managed to win the degreed white vote. Granted, there is still plenty of what we might call the Larry the Cable Guy “aww shucks we don’t need no book learnin” anti-education attitude, but this apparent anti-education stance is stowed the second some Google tech bro writes a manifesto that is hostile to women in the workplace, or a ‘scientific’ racist tries to cite things ‘proving’ black stupidity. Immediately, being degreed is presented as a clincher.
And now I am reminded of a David Cross bit:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iD9USolXVps
Yeah, Holms, that’s the irony. They want to both dismiss education and claim it for themselves. But being degreed is not the same as being intellectual, or even educated. A lot of degrees, such as MBAs and the myriad computer degrees, can be gamed to avoid any type of encounter with liberal arts education, and then jumpstarted into a lucrative career by someone who knows how to do one thing…but it is one thing that is in demand. They use long words to impress people, throwing around computer lingo and “scientific” language, but not comprehending anything like philosophy or ethics or even really science, other than the technological side. So yeah, lack of empathy because they believe in their own superiority.
And the white farmers and working class here in the Midwest? They believe that these folks are one of them, because they speak the right words (like, n***er or c**t) and hate the right people. The Venn diagram of the interests of the degreed bros and the working class midwestern whites is probably a very small overlap, but it’s enough to elect a Trump.
I think the region of overlap can be labelled ‘arsehole.’
People who have encountered even peripherally, actual top 0.1% wealthy people, and see what power they wield and how they treat others, understand who the elite are.
For large swaths of Trump voters, this is far outside their experience. To them, the “elite” are educated, members of the local professional and managerial class. People like their doctor who tells them to stop smoking and eat better, their boss who tells them they can’t have next Friday off because it’s a busy time of year, the teacher who tells them their lazy kid is failing algebra.
These are the “elite” who are the target of their provincial class resentments. So it takes the form of resentment of the educated, of those who have shown personal “disrespect” by telling them something they didn’t want to hear.
The actual character of Trump is far outside their experience, but he seems successful and he does tell them what they want to hear, so they identify with him, and don’t pick up on his implicit contempt for them in any way.