WHY ELITES TEND LEFT
"One's initial surprise at finding that intelligent people tend to be socialists diminishes when one realises that, of course, intelligent people will tend to overvalue intelligence, and to suppose that we owe all the advantages and opportunities that our civilisation offers to deliberate design rather than to following traditional rules...This leads one to be favourably disposed to the central economic planning and control that lie at the heart of socialism." - F.A. Hayek
Or perhaps another way of putting it: Marxism is the opium of the intellectuals
By J. J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.)
Elite psychology generally
Why is a man as privileged as former U.S. Presidential candidate John Kerry on the Left of politics? Why are people who are rich, well-organized, well-paid and successful in life often Left-leaning? Surely they should be thankful for the system that gave them their success instead of wanting to tear it down? The answer is really quite simple. If your life had made you feel superior to most people wouldn't you want to be treated in a superior way too? More importantly, wouldn't you feel that your inferiors should be got out of your way and told what to do? Wouldn't you feel that they should be herded onto public transport and thus leave the roads free for you to drive where you want without being held up by traffic jams? That is EXACTLY how elite Leftists think. Only they cannot say that out loud of course. To say it out loud would not only be obnoxious but it would also achieve nothing. So our elites are smarter than that. They know they have to cloak their oppression in the mantle of a claim that "It's all for your own good". And knowing how rich, clever and well-organized they themselves are, they are confident that they will be able to escape the limits and confines that they put on other people. Even high taxes are no worry to them when they already have most things that money can buy. So regulate, regulate, regulate is their cry. And regulating and controlling others is what Leftists have always got 1,001 reasons for -- with the most extreme form of control being exercised in Communist regimes.
http://jonjayray.com/elitism.html
