I read an article in the Straits Times recently where a writer formerly from an elite school system talked about the uneasy relationship between meritocracy and elitism, and how students from elite schools often suffered from a disconnect from reality, the inability to relate to people from non-elite backgrounds.
The article is here, and I would add, it is exceptionally well-written, highlighting in cogent arguments the extent to which an education in elite institutions shelters students within from the realities of the world outside them.
http://www.asiaone.com/News/Education/Story/A1Story20100405-208438.html
This is an oft-cited debate, on the perils of intellectual snobbery, and how it breeds a generation fixated on personal achievement to the detriment of their ability to empathise with the common man.
I think first of all, it is important to realise that the snobbish intellectual elite are in fact, a minority, even within those who have grown up in intellectual systems that "breed" elites. I am a product of that system, and I do not measure my self-worth solely by grades. However, in a throwback to my educational upbringing, I have to admit that I can be cynical when I joke about people who are not as academically oriented.
But I am slowly learning that just as there are many ways to skin a cat, there are also many ways to live a life. Rather than condemn the intellectual elite for being uncaring, or simply narrow-minded and closeted, I choose not to classify such people by such simplistic measures, because people are often at once both ambiguous and fixed in their beliefs, and even at their cores they are often deeply divided.
They may not understand me, but I have to understand them, so I can reach out to them, as it is sometimes part of my job, and being naturally curious, always part of my nature.
The common thread that underpins the intellectual elite is a deep sense of insecurity. They are deeply afraid of failure, because they have never known what failure is. While they do spectacularly well in the fields that they have been born to lead, they do rubbish elsewhere, and as a result they do not even deem fit to venture out, because within their own kind they have already found a comfort zone to be in. They seek security in their personal lives and jobs, because they are deeply insecure, having measured their self-worth all their life against hurdles set by other elites, and having driven satisfaction from the fact that they have cleared every single one.
The ones that do not clear the hurdles fall by the wayside, unable to complete the run, but they soon realise that the crowd cheers for everyone, not just the ones that win and complete the race. But before they do, they lie crushed by their failures, as all their life they have only learnt how to look forward, and not at the world around them. However, when they do look around them, they realise how much more there is to life, and how much they have missed out.
It is a long and painful process though, because for people who have never known what failure is and how to deal with it, the first thing one has to learn is humility. One has to come to terms with the fact that one has become what one used to despise, and that the peers one has known all their lives have left them behind. One has to learn a new language, and a new value system, to survive in a world that was once alien.
When I tell my friends now that I no longer keep in contact much with the peers I once knew, not many will understand why that is so. Not many will understand that it is not because I choose not to, but rather, it is because I am no longer relevant in their lives. It is a club that only accepts purebreds, and perhaps, it is for the better that I am no longer in that privileged league.
Now, I am at the bridge that straddles two worlds. A citizen of both, but belonging to neither. I may not be the smartest, and I may not be the most empathetic, but I can strive to be the best of both.