Elitists believe society should be led by a select group, often wealthy and educated. The term has become pejorative, used to label politicians. While true elitists discriminate, not all members of the elite class do. The debate continues on whether leaders should come from the elite or the general population.
An elitist is a person who believes that society should be led by a select group of people. In most of the Western world, an elitist would be a person who favored those with wealth, power, education, and/or intellect over the more common “ordinary person”. Elitarian can also mean relating to elitism, and is a term that has become increasingly pejorative. When a society has members of the elite, often structured around wealth or education, many people may belong to an elite or select class, but that doesn’t necessarily make them elitist in a bad way because many people in the elite are capable enough of empathy for underprivileged people like themselves.
In recent years, the term has been used much more broadly, and people (especially politicians) who have gained access to wealth, power, or a higher education have been labeled as elitist. The fundamental implication here is that all people belonging to the upper strata of society will discriminate against other classes and will absolutely not be able to understand or take a populist view of things. It is therefore considered political death if a label of elitist is attached to a politician, as most of the people who make up the voting population are not members of elite groups.
The term elitist, with synonyms like snob or descriptions like ‘being in an ivory tower’, is therefore essentially negative. There’s no question that true elitists are disconnected from the average person and are practicing a form of discrimination. In places like the United States, where there is a racially diverse population, it has also been suggested that the term elitist is code for terms such as racist.
It is still a leap though to assume that a person of the elite classes will always prefer their own class and put their interests in that class above all else. In the 2008 presidential election, the term was used by both of the party’s main candidates to try to define their opposition as elitist. However, the “evidence” for elitism allegations included things like pointing to wealth and privilege, preferring Starbucks® latte to a regular cup of Joe, and determining that an Ivy League college education automatically leads to elitism. These were allegations with the scantiest shred of evidence given every candidate’s desire to present himself as a populist.
There is also a line of argument coming from the populace as to whether a member of the elite class is better suited to lead by nature than his or her ordeal of success. Wouldn’t a first-rate education or the acquisition of material wealth suggest some skill that might not be evidenced by someone less educated or of lower socio-economic status? This is an oft-debated question, whether it is beneficial for the population to elect leaders from the elite or to shake things up by electing those rooted in the origins of the population.
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