I Heard it Downtown

First of all, thanks again everybody for your support during my period of homelessness. It was great to see so many people offer up their couches/digs, offer well wishes…and in the case of the Kishler family, allow me to turn their kitchen into a temporary press room at 11:30 at night (and we’re going to do it again tonight!) I’ll have you know that me and tony are now finally settled into our new digs (well, mostly settled). Ya’ll ought to stop by and say hey. Well…not all of you at once.

 

Anyways, I want to explore a term thats been thrown around an awful lot lately, without being very well defined. Perhaps you’ve heard it used to describe certain media outlets, or politicians. I’m talking about the words “Elite”, and “Elitism’.

 

I’m well aware of what Mr.Webster and Mr.Wikipedia (citation needed) have to say about their definitions, but I’m more interested in the practical, applied definition, as far as our culture is concerned. What makes something *elite*? Is there a difference between being elite and elitist?

 

I sometimes eat sushi

I drive a Japanese car,

I read the Times and the Post

And I’ve traveled quite far

I think Colbert is hilarious

And I don’t care for Lou Dobbs

Am I out of touch with my people?

Am I an elitist snob?

 

But I am so withdrawn

From the common man

When I’d rather watch football

Than PBS or C-Span?

Do I need to turn off soccer

And watch NASCAR instead

In order to recover

My “normal” street cred?

 

Do we define people as “elite” or “elitist” by their hobbies or interests? The Republicans aired a famous ad against John Kerry near the end of the 2004 election that showed him windsurfing  Who the hell windsurfs right? Only rich people who live near the water! Those damn east coasters, they’re too different from people like you and me. They don’t understand our problems. Maybe if John Kerry tried to play football, he’d related better. Or rather, if he could play football without looking stupid.

 

What about the media? The term “liberal media”, or “media elites” are thrown around so much that you’d think that the combined powers of the Washington Post and the New York Times rival that of the Illuminati, the Skull and Bones, the Freemasons, and the New England Patriots. (The Washington Post did a decently funny bit on this concept, which you can check out here

 

So forget NPR and The Sun

Its talk radio for me

They can tell it like it is

Without some fancy degree

The liberal press is arrogant

And their stories make me bored!

Give me missing white girls

And the WSJ editorial board

 

It bothers me a little bit when people talk about “the media” like its some sort of monolithic entity that moves and operates as one. I’m part of the media. In addition to writing snarky facebook notes every once in a while, I write for a real life newspaper, which has about as much in common with the Times as I do with Amy Winehouse. Given that there are so many different and varied media outlets, what makes one elite and another, I dunno, average? Is that distinction a bad thing? Is being elite a bad thing?

 

My hypothesis is we cast people as elitists when they’re smart folks who happen to disagree with us. Remember the gas tax holiday idea? Hillary Clinton proposed it, and basically every mainstream economist (the people who are paid to determine if this sort of this is a good idea) said it was a gimmick. Does Hillary try to explain her own economic reasoning, and why they’re wrong? Nope, she basically calls them elite Washington economists. They don’t drive a truck, they don’t know what its like. They went to Georgetown. They’re biased.

 

If that’s the case, its pretty disconcerting to me, because then we run the risk of glorifying the unsophisticated, or worse, the stupid. Do we need our leaders to have the exact same background we do in order to be effective? If we’re inclined to believe that, we ought to support the guy who just recently paid off his student loans, not the guy who hosted SNL twice and was in Wedding Crashers.

 

This whole thing is rambling and disorganized, but its meant more to spark discussion. What do you think it means to be elite (and/or elitist?) Are certain institutions/professions “elitist” enough that you discount them? I’m honestly not fishing for a particular answer here, I’d like to hear what you guys think.