The secret of the elites

“The secret of the elites is that they’re not all that smart so they need the deck stacked to continue the illusion that they are elite at all.”

– Rob Peffer

He’s absolutely right. That’s why the fake elite devotes 100 percent of their collective effort to trying to maintain the illusion and keep the deck stacked. It’s also why nationalism and populism terrify them. They know their power and influence could be broken literally overnight by a sufficiently angry populace.

This is no longer about ideology. All the idearrhea about “liberal” and “conservative” and “communism” and “objectivism” is a veil to obscure the realities of the stacked deck. It’s about lawless rule by a small, mostly foreign and self-appointed fake elite. They all have imposter syndrome because they are all imposters.

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This is true. And also elites must have a hierarchy within themselves and must have ways of controlling their own. Power, money, sex are obvious carrots. Slavery, murder, Satanism are less obvious parts of the system. The Satanism does not have to be sincere or it could be. Doesn’t matter; its purpose lies in being a/the hierarchical system that has come to be.

A top elite might argue:

It has ever been thus. We are in control and the people closest to us whom we control lust after power, wealth and the free exercise of their passions. We control them by controlling their passions and desires. Human beings are weak and sinful and those who seek power are almost all corrupted beyond salvation in this life. So we use them.

You cannot change any of this. Destroy us and a similar hierarchy will replace us. Human societies will always be run by the most ruthless, the most lustful, the most daring and immoral.

How can we not seek to control the world? Why would we stop at the borders of any nation? No, power flows naturally to seize everything it can. Nothing can stop this. If you like, you can say it’s God’s Will or Satan’s. It doesn’t matter what you call it or precisely how you control it. It has ever been thus.

The Theravada Buddhist take on this is we can only find ultimate freedom on our own. The Mahayana Buddhist take is the same but also includes proactive moral actions in this world.

UPDATE: My own synthesis of all of the above is both kinds of Buddhism plus it’s better to have a well defined polity that votes in its own interest (typically a nation state with borders). And it’s better to have media that reports honestly. And that those who “Do their best to speak the truth” not be silenced. All of this requires laws based on a constitution and fair courts.

Working to achieve or preserve a viable American system more or less in line with our traditional form of governance is a proactive moral act fit for Buddhists as well as other rational and spiritual systems of understanding human life.

So my answer to the top elite who I imagine above is: “Yes, but you can do better and we other people can and will do out best to make that happen.” I might add that in Buddhism there is the important concept of the powerful Bodhisattva who may appear cruel yet by their actions prompts others to seek release from the confines of this largely ignorant realm.