If you read through Friedrich Heer’s The Medieval World: Europe 1100-1350, you discover his assessment of twelfth-century contention between different intellectual factions.* Heer writes of “the rancour [sic.] which so often accompanies theological debate and of the group egoism and vanity found sometimes in religious orders and universities” (104). See, just as you suspected, people just can’t get along when differences of opinion intervene. Being civil isn’t the normal; it’s the exception, and ours isn’t the only time when evidence for this abounds. If those involved in matters theological couldn’t get along, why should we expect those involved in matters civil and social to be any different?
The term group egoism is a synonym for group elitism. People enter into arguments from positions of bias as evidenced by what we read in editorial pages and hear in punditry. And if one belongs to a group, that group’s commonly held axioms become the basis for rancor.
I suppose most of us can’t see our own elitism. We rely on it to support our intellectual self-worth. That seems especially true of people in academia and entertainment. So that I don’t offend anyone’s sensibilities, I’ll give an example from the past.
One of the reasons that today’s vocal elitists appear to oppose “commoners” who question their principles and policies derives from an intellectual battle in Scotland between The Moderates and The Evangelicals in the eighteenth century. The self-proclaimed “enlightened” perceived arguments of their opponents as unworthy of consideration. In specific instances, where undeniable facts outweighed traditional ideas and beliefs, there was some justification in that opposition. I can think of the adherence of fundamentalists to a young Earth as an example, even though, as Sir James Hutton, the Father of Geology, said, “I can see no vestige of a beginning….” But empiricism like that of Hutton and succeeding scientists and like that of all intellectual movements, becomes quickly associated with a specific attitude: Those in-the-know believe they are "better" and "more intellectual" than others and can afford to ignore counter arguments and facts.
It was in the context of positions by the enlightened elite and the traditional evangelicals that John Witherspoon, an evangelical minister from east Lothian, wrote an anti-Moderate satire called Ecclesiastical Characteristics. The drama laid out advice that mocks the elitist position of The Moderates. As Arthur Herman reports, Witherspoon’s satirical advice to “the aspiring enlightened clergyman” on how to construct a Sunday homily contains the following dictates:
And so, example upon example today, we find anyone of faith, any “commoner,” or outsider is derided by the elite, not refuted with a counter argument tested by rigorous debate backed by principles of logic and proof, but rather by haughty condescension.***
Frankly, the whole “I’m better than you” attitude is more than a little tiring, particularly in today’s political sphere and the incessant chatter in every electronic medium. No commoner—no outsider—can ever win an argument under the principles of elitism. No one can logically question the axioms of group egoism: That humans are the sole cause of an unavoidable global climate catastrophe, that the devout are generally stupid and uninformed, and that the intellectual accomplishments of those outside the accepted “group” are laughable. There’s safety in group egoism because like-minded people accept ideas and policies while they ignore any facts or arguments that negate their thinking. Elitism is a warm fuzzy blanket that insulates. It is also an opaque blanket. No outside light penetrates.
If you are an outsider, save your breath; save your energy. You’re not going to make your point to open minds; that blanket muffles the sound anyway. It’s an unfortunate circumstance, but it’s not a new one. You can go back to the twelfth century, to the eighteenth century, or earlier to find the roots of modern elitism in the early university and church-school settings. You can go to twentieth-century accounts of elites rejecting Alfred Wegener’s notion of “continental drift” (now, seafloor spreading) or Richard P. Feynman’s explanation of quantum electrodynamics. Elites of any kind believe in their superiority and extoll their own intellectual prowess. That puts them in the mix of the most closed-minded.
Group elitism, group egoism—however we label it—is the obstacle that prevents the free exchange of ideas judged on the basis of their objective merit.
*Translated by Janet Sondheimer, The New American Library, A Mentor Book, 1961 (also, 1963).
**Herman, Arthur. How the Scots Invented the Modern World. New York. MJF Books, 2001.
***I won’t make any comment that offends here, but I will ask the reader to examine the Press’s designation of the “elite,” its treatment of those among the “elite,” and its treatment of those deemed not worthy of inclusion by virtue of their political, ideological, or religious affiliation. Note, too, that most “arguments” against “outsiders” are more derisive than logical.
The term group egoism is a synonym for group elitism. People enter into arguments from positions of bias as evidenced by what we read in editorial pages and hear in punditry. And if one belongs to a group, that group’s commonly held axioms become the basis for rancor.
I suppose most of us can’t see our own elitism. We rely on it to support our intellectual self-worth. That seems especially true of people in academia and entertainment. So that I don’t offend anyone’s sensibilities, I’ll give an example from the past.
One of the reasons that today’s vocal elitists appear to oppose “commoners” who question their principles and policies derives from an intellectual battle in Scotland between The Moderates and The Evangelicals in the eighteenth century. The self-proclaimed “enlightened” perceived arguments of their opponents as unworthy of consideration. In specific instances, where undeniable facts outweighed traditional ideas and beliefs, there was some justification in that opposition. I can think of the adherence of fundamentalists to a young Earth as an example, even though, as Sir James Hutton, the Father of Geology, said, “I can see no vestige of a beginning….” But empiricism like that of Hutton and succeeding scientists and like that of all intellectual movements, becomes quickly associated with a specific attitude: Those in-the-know believe they are "better" and "more intellectual" than others and can afford to ignore counter arguments and facts.
It was in the context of positions by the enlightened elite and the traditional evangelicals that John Witherspoon, an evangelical minister from east Lothian, wrote an anti-Moderate satire called Ecclesiastical Characteristics. The drama laid out advice that mocks the elitist position of The Moderates. As Arthur Herman reports, Witherspoon’s satirical advice to “the aspiring enlightened clergyman” on how to construct a Sunday homily contains the following dictates:
- All his subjects must be confined to social duties---as opposed to religious doctrines.
- There must be no reference to the afterlife.
- His authorities must be drawn from pagan writers, and none, or as few as possible, from Holy Scripture.
- He must be very unacceptable to the common people (195).**
And so, example upon example today, we find anyone of faith, any “commoner,” or outsider is derided by the elite, not refuted with a counter argument tested by rigorous debate backed by principles of logic and proof, but rather by haughty condescension.***
Frankly, the whole “I’m better than you” attitude is more than a little tiring, particularly in today’s political sphere and the incessant chatter in every electronic medium. No commoner—no outsider—can ever win an argument under the principles of elitism. No one can logically question the axioms of group egoism: That humans are the sole cause of an unavoidable global climate catastrophe, that the devout are generally stupid and uninformed, and that the intellectual accomplishments of those outside the accepted “group” are laughable. There’s safety in group egoism because like-minded people accept ideas and policies while they ignore any facts or arguments that negate their thinking. Elitism is a warm fuzzy blanket that insulates. It is also an opaque blanket. No outside light penetrates.
If you are an outsider, save your breath; save your energy. You’re not going to make your point to open minds; that blanket muffles the sound anyway. It’s an unfortunate circumstance, but it’s not a new one. You can go back to the twelfth century, to the eighteenth century, or earlier to find the roots of modern elitism in the early university and church-school settings. You can go to twentieth-century accounts of elites rejecting Alfred Wegener’s notion of “continental drift” (now, seafloor spreading) or Richard P. Feynman’s explanation of quantum electrodynamics. Elites of any kind believe in their superiority and extoll their own intellectual prowess. That puts them in the mix of the most closed-minded.
Group elitism, group egoism—however we label it—is the obstacle that prevents the free exchange of ideas judged on the basis of their objective merit.
*Translated by Janet Sondheimer, The New American Library, A Mentor Book, 1961 (also, 1963).
**Herman, Arthur. How the Scots Invented the Modern World. New York. MJF Books, 2001.
***I won’t make any comment that offends here, but I will ask the reader to examine the Press’s designation of the “elite,” its treatment of those among the “elite,” and its treatment of those deemed not worthy of inclusion by virtue of their political, ideological, or religious affiliation. Note, too, that most “arguments” against “outsiders” are more derisive than logical.
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