The American social scientist Charles Murray was recently here on The Agenda. Fifteen years ago, he co-wrote the controversial but seldom-read book, The Bell Curve, documenting the powerful relationship between IQ and success. His new book, Coming Apart, has once again provoked acrimonious debate about American society. Murray documents the 50-year decline of the working class, describing its plummeting rates of male employment (replaced by sleeping and TV-watching), and the co-occurring, pernicious increase in out-of-wedlock childbirth. Simultaneously, he notes the rise of the new, educated elites, married to intelligent mates, working in the brave new world of symbolic knowledge, segregated by zip code and lifestyle from the majority of the population.
As the great meritocratic sort continues, people are being stratified not only by cognitive ability, as Murray notes, but also by a less well-known but equally primary psychological trait – conscientiousness. It’s not only the smartest young citizens who are being vacuumed up the social ladder; it’s also the most orderly and industrious. Those left behind in decaying neighbourhoods are, increasingly, of two types: young, and neither bright nor hard-working; and older, stable, and diligent, but shocked by the degenerating conditions around them.
This is why the right-wing has, paradoxically, increased its power most in those states where the federal government distributes more than it takes. Facing the collapse of their American dream, the still-voting remnants of the old working class search for the culprits. Fraying at the edges, abandoning traditional mores, relying more on the socialist entitlement programs, the working class aligns itself with the political party making the loudest noise about self-reliance, civic virtue, and traditional morality. Suspicious of the new cognitive elite, they pine for a return to the days where thrift and industry provided for stable families, familiar communities, and expanding economic futures. Absent that, “they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them,” as Barack Obama noted during the 2008 Democratic primary race, unaware that his words were being recorded.
At the same time, the cognitive elite, liberal by temperament, preaches loudly about tolerance of non-traditional family arrangements, the unquestioned benefits of multiculturalism, and the irrationality of deep religious beliefs – while acting conservatively in their own lives. What do the educated and successful want for their children? Fulfilling careers, secure and happy marriages, strong core values, and well-developed social ties – precisely the factors necessary for meaningful, productive lives, among rich and poor alike. Murray asks: if this is what educated, successful people have, and want for those they love, why do they support casual criticism of society’s structures; and proclaim that all values are equal?
This is the devastating hubris of intelligence – hiding behind a thoughtless egalitarianism, wielded without caution or care. When the upper class sneezes, the lower class gets pneumonia. People to whom words come easily are tempted to forget their power. Traditions bind and support society, and should not be carelessly undermined. Such actions merely provoke a counter-action, among those they most affect. That’s why, in the U.S., the increasingly desperate and temperamentally conservative remnants of the stable working class oppose “the liberal elites” with so much force.
For The Agenda with Steve Paikin, I’m Jordan Peterson.
