Additional thought from Troubled, by Rob Henderson.
“I watched students claim that investment banks were emblematic of capitalist oppression, and then discovered that they’d attended recruitment sessions for Goldman Sachs. Gradually, I came to believe that many of these students were broadcasting the belief that such firms were evil in order to undercut their rivals. If they managed to convince you that a certain occupation is corrupt and thus to be avoided, then that was one less competitor they had in their quest to be hired. But they didn’t see themselves this way. They viewed themselves as morally righteous and were surprisingly myopic about the virtuous image they held of themselves.”
Henderson, Rob. Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class (p. 251).
Humans are social animals. Fitting into a social group was a key to survival during all of human history, so our ability to sense our position within a group is finely tuned.
However, we also have a personal experience of life. There are things we do that make us feel good and things that make us feel bad. Part of the things that make us feel good are things that we believe will improve our social standing.
Each action we take has a dimension of value because of how it makes us feel and a dimension of value because of the message it sends to others, which can then also affect the way we feel.
A simple example of this is clothing. We want clothes that feel good to wear and serve our purposes, but our clothes also communicate many things to the people around us.
So a certain percentage of our actions are motivated by a desire to be seen a certain way by others. Our upbringing will tend to dictate how high this percentage gets.
Middle-class strivers are loud and obvious in jumping from trend to trend. Upper-class people raised in a competitive environment obsessed with status develop an intuitive ability to be where the higher status thing is before it is commonly recognized.
When it comes to careers, there are only so many options for the status-minded person. Money is foundational for status. Not earning money, but having money. If you don’t have familial wealth, then earning lots of money is the foundation for your status.
The student may sincerely believe that investment banks are evil, or it may be a luxury belief, but in this elite environment, the clearest path toward post-graduation status is through work at an investment bank. In that environment, the fear of losing status is similar to the fear of death. Working in investment banking will get them a six-figure starting salary, the right title, approving nods from parents, and the feeling of winning compared to friends.
So that is the path they take. As time goes on, and the small nagging voice that comes from not living with integrity gets louder, work begins to avoid thinking about it.
Lavish charity, drugs and alcohol, greenwashing, and louder and louder advocating for the social positions that they fear they might be hypocritical about. The fear of being accused of being a hypocrite by others is only outweighed by the fear of recognizing it for themselves
During the Me Too movement, many of the loudest public voices most wholeheartedly ready to jump on any public lynchings were then later found to have done the things they were falsely accusing others of doing.
The status-first person argues with reality instead of arguing with themselves. The integrity of others must be torn down because it reminds them of and criticizes their own lack of integrity.
They publicly adopt a “who am I to know” position, relying on the opinions of approved authorities as cover for the lack of harmony in their actions and worldview. But they are running a race against themselves, never fully able to escape.
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