"And you can too!" Musings on the myth of meritocracy

As Elon Musk prepares to take over Twitter -- unless, that is, he's just trying to manipulate the stock market or get more attention for himself or both, and he ends up sabotaging the deal -- many are celebrating, while many are warning that it's the end of the world, or at least of Twitter. I'm more on the "end of Twitter" side, but am not panicking because my life doesn't revolve around tweeting. It's possible that even if Musk does assume control, not much will change on Twitter despite all of the sound and fury.

For now, I find Twitter to be a (mostly) pleasant diversion, and I didn't join the stampede off of the platform when the news was first announced of Musk's potential takeover. One of my favorite writers that I follow on Twitter is Jared Yates Sexton, self-described "Hoosier, Political Analyst, Prof, Muckrake Podcast," and author of the upcoming book, The Midnight Kingdom: A History of Power, Paranoia, and the Coming Crisis (to be published in January 2023).

I'm always interested in what Sexton has to tweet, and a thread he initiated earlier today (April 30, 2022) caught my eye. It began:

Not going to lie, it’s been a great time watching all these mainstream commentators work themselves into believing Elon Musk might actually make Twitter better and then he immediately started posting troubling political takes and telling people to throw out their meds.

Sexton continued:

It’s been a good reminder that a lot of journalists and pundits the Right constantly attacks as being “Leftist” are just free-market worshipers who are as devoted to the myth of meritocracy as anybody.

For those who don’t get it, because Musk is rich it HAS to mean to these people that he’s uniquely talented and capable. They have a religious faith in the market that, despite all evidence to the contrary, cannot be shaken. The idea that privilege plays a role isn’t considered.

When considering media and politics, always remember these circles are populated by white people with money who believe they got there because they’re innately talented. That belief in the fraudulent meritocracy is necessary for their own identity and colors their worldview.

I think he's spot-on. Meritocracy is indeed largely a myth, and a uniquely American one in many ways. It is marginally less cruel than the traditional article of (bad) faith that poverty is a moral failing and that the poor deserve their horrid lives, while the wealthy are superior human beings whose superiority has been rewarded by Providence -- but it is still a myth, and cruel in its own ways. In any case Sexton is exactly right: Privilege plays a much greater role in the making of your average (or above-average) obscenely wealthy person than even many non-right-wingers care to admit. Elon Musk himself is nothing if not the product of privilege.
 
Privilege plays a big part in successful wealth hoarding, and so, for that matter, do sociopathy, ruthlessness, and an unceasing determination to game the system in ways both legal and illegal.

Nevertheless, the idea (or illusion or delusion) that every one of us is a billionaire or at least a millionaire in the making just won’t go away. As my friend Steve Salerno, author of the mostly dormant but still relevant SHAMblog, has written, “Hope springs infernal.”

Steve's context, as you know if you're at all familiar with his work, was the world of selfish-help/motivational/McSpirituality scammers, which were the primary focus of his blog in its heyday. And in case it isn't obvious, the selfish-help industry is relevant to Sexton's thread because ever since its beginnings many, many decades ago, that industry has played a major role in perpetuating the stubborn American cultural myth that untold wealth is well within the reach of the average person -- if only they're willing to work at it, have something of value to offer, and believe in themselves (and in more recent years, of course, are willing to follow the advice of whichever inspirational guru happens to be on the talk show or late-night infomercial they're watching).

It is that very illusion that spurs so many people who should know better to cheerlead for Elon Musk and his ilk.

Contemporary Scamworld hucksters aggressively push the myth of "easy" wealth, using their own success stories as an example, whether or not those stories are entirely true, or even a little bit true. As I have discussed numerous times on this Whirled over the years, the most successful selfish-help hucksters have made their fortunes by convincing folks that “I did it, and you can, too!” Thirteen years ago, I wrote a little song-in-search-of-a-tune called, "I've Gotta Find Me A Scam," and it still applies -- particularly the second verse:

They’re gonna make me a star
If I make ’em believe
That they’re more than they are
Make ’em believe that the world can be theirs
And that they’re all destined to be zillionaires.

One of this blog's favorite subjects, formerly imprisoned serial scammer Kevin Trudeau, has made much of his ill-gained gold flogging the "you can too" theme. While his primary means of picking people's pockets has been his pretense that he has seekrit information that "They" don't want you to know, he also attracted thousands, particularly in the glory daze of his mega-scam GIN (the Global Information Network) by boasting about how healthy and wealthy and successful he was. And he's far from the only one in his scammy industry to use that hook.

Elon Musk, on the other hand, doesn't need to overtly boast about his wealth under the pretext of offering your average mediocre citizen a hand up to his lofty heights. This isn't to imply that Musk doesn't flaunt his wealth and influence; of course he does -- the potential Twitter takeover being but one example, and his space-phallus fetish being another -- but he doesn't have any need to overtly boast in the crass and relatively amateurish way that lower-echelon hucksters must do in order to gain and maintain a fan base whose pockets they can pick directly.

There are other differences between your average wealthy Scamworld player and Elon Musk, of course -- not only in scale of wealth and in the way that they flaunt their wealth, but, some might argue, in the actual value they contribute to society and the world at large. After all, his defenders say, Musk's company makes electric cars, which however flawed do have a practical value, and his forays into space might arguably benefit humanity, somehow, someday. On the other hand, when it comes down to tangible product, Kevin Trudeau and even the perennially successful Tony Robbins fall short, primarily selling illusions and false hope. To quote my song without a tune again:

All I’ll be selling is hope
Worth more by far
Than the best Maui dope
Granted, the high doesn’t last quite as long
And costs a lot more. But is that so wrong?

It’s what people want, after all:
Bright shiny visions
To keep them in thrall
It’s all in the packaging, all in the hype
Oh, I can make millions by marketing tripe!

The point is that whether we’re talking about Scamworld hucksters or multi-billionaires such as Musk et al., their success often relies not chiefly on merit or on providing value, but on privilege, as Sexton noted -- and also on a heapin' helpin' of hustling and scamming. And if they're even marginally successful, in the ways that our shallow culture defines success, they will have their fan bois and girlz.

Even if the multi-billionaire or Scamworld huckster in question spews misinformation or lies or hate speech, or behaves atrociously, or in some other way makes it pretty obvious that he or she is a horrible human being, all too many average folks will continue to grovel, hoping that even if they can't succeed on their own merits, perhaps some of that magic wealth fairy dust will somehow, someday, rub off on them.

Spoiler: It won't.