On reflection, I’ve decided to join the “new elite”. I’ve never been one of life’s great joiners, but this crowd sounds right up my street and apparently I already possess many of the key qualifications.
The vilifying of a new elite with immense cultural power is the latest hustle of a certain political academic trying to sell a book, and has been gleefully picked up by the rightwing media. The new enemy shares certain traits which boil down to being graduates of top universities, city dwellers and working in the media or creative industries. But in fact there is only one qualification. Since almost all top jobs require a decent degree, the real point about the new elite is that it is largely liberal-leaning. Just as well. Otherwise, you’d have to include Boris Johnson and Michael Gove.
Unlike some critics, I do recognise the cohort described, though the criteria are so broad that a more honest taxonomy might be “someone with a good job who’s a bit of a leftie”. But the other teensy flaw with the idea is that many of them seem to be out of power, which must be terribly deflating for a sinister, powerful elite. It also seems to include people like Gary Lineker and Gareth Southgate, obviously because Leicester City and Aston Villa are the Oxbridge of football.
Anyway, I’m sure I have quite a few of the wrong views, though I worry they may not all be wrong enough to qualify. I never joined the Groucho Club, membership of which was strangely omitted from the preconditions. Also, I can’t help noticing that the new elite isn’t very effective. If it’s committed to the EU, leftie social-liberalism and globalisation, why do we appear to have Brexited and live under a Conservative government chuntering on about woke conspiracies? For a group with enormous cultural power, it’s not going well.
Perhaps this is because of the other elite: city-dwelling Oxbridge media types who are rightwing and actually run the country. There is in fact a war between the elites, with an old elite (good) pushing back on the new elite (middle-class, pushy, never played the Wall Game).
And this is where it gets very confusing, because the country has long been run by successful graduates. Some of this old elite are still running the country but they are now the new-old elite which mustn’t be blamed for things it did 25 years ago when there was no split between it and the new elite. So the new elite, which was part of the old elite but still holds the views it previously held, should more accurately be called the new-new elite — or is it the old-new elite?
It’s even more confusing when you look at someone like Rishi Sunak: private school, Oxbridge, globalist Goldman Sachs alumnus, rich as Croesus. He should be part of the new-new elite (though he never turns up to any of our brunches). But, as a Brexiter and Conservative, he is now in the new-old elite, even though most members of the new-old elite suspect he is secretly part of the new-new elite.
Also, lots of urban, Oxbridge media types work for rightwing titles, which obsess about the new-new elite that secretly runs the country but actually doesn’t. These media types apparently aren’t in the new elite as they work for powerless fringe media like the Murdoch press, the Daily Mail, Daily Telegraph, GB News and TalkTV, in fact any outlet which cannot understand “all this fuss about golliwogs”. They have jumped on the new designation with some unpleasant ad hominem attacks on individuals. And that’s another point of confusion. Is the use of Latin old elite or new? I tell you, it’s a champ de mines. Meanwhile, the new elite works for sinister (wrong) media organisations like The Guardian, the FT and Match of the Day.
I could feel comfortable in the new-new elite, though it’s not really that new and includes everyone who went to one of 24 universities and didn’t back Brexit, which is a lot of people to be an elite. If I’m going to join an elite, I would like it to be at least a little exclusive. I might in fact just be part of the not-that-effective, not-that-new, not-that-elite-elite. And where’s the fun in that?
Follow Robert on Twitter @robertshrimsley and email him at [email protected]
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