Found via Ace of Spades guest-blogger Maetenloch:
How Deep in the Elite Cultural Bubble Are You?
So Charles Murray of the AEI has a new book out, Coming Apart, where he claims that there’s now a great cultural divide separating American upper and lower classes.
AdvertisementAmerica is coming apart. For most of our nation’s history, whatever the inequality in wealth between the richest and poorest citizens, we maintained a cultural equality known nowhere else in the world—for whites, anyway.
Over the past 50 years, that common civic culture has unraveled. We have developed a new upper class with advanced educations, often obtained at elite schools, sharing tastes and preferences that set them apart from mainstream America. At the same time, we have developed a new lower class, characterized not by poverty but by withdrawal from America’s core cultural institutions.
And to see exactly how isolated you are in the upper class bubble they have a helpful quiz.
I came off as much less insular than I was afraid I would:
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Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to get a new set of spats to go with my striped pants and morning coat. I’m really falling down in the snobbery department.
I scored 13 to 16 which apparently makes me non-politically correct politically correct. Though it’s a joke, having a test that basically takes pride in being a clueless redneck seems an analogue to black kids who don’t like white science. Is that where Conservatives want to be?
I think a test like this would be better served by pointing out the benefits of enjoying Captain Future and “A Canticle For Leibowitz,” The Flintstones and “Vatel,” Led Zeppelin and Alcione and wine and Coke.
Variety is the spice and reality of life since there is no shadow without sun and no good without evil and in a vacuum the difference between heat and cold can generate power.
Maybe a question should be if I’ve ever read Jane Austin in the break room at a warehouse where my fingers bleed and face hurts from building palettes of 50 different ice creams on a palette jack at 15 below up and down long, high and massive rows of shelves.
Dead on, thanks.
I fix my own 17-year-old car, can taste a clear difference between speyside and highland scotch, can tell you the names of every Super Bowl winner, and have read most of Victor Hugo in the original (ergo, my handle).
I found this “quiz” unintentionally hilarious. Scored “between 5 and 8″, which I guess means I should have someone else change my oil.
Heh. In my younger years, some of those markers (owned a truck, stocked common domestic beer) were things I couldn’t afford. Compared to me, people who did those things were cultural elites.
I scored a 10 as well, probably because I’m a vet and once worked in a factory. Never did like the taste of beer, and haven’t been hunting or fishing in 30 years. Still, living in Marin County, it’s hard for a Jewish Vietnam Vet Republican Grateful Deadhead to be isolated from different lifestyles and contrary opinions.
Ed, I got the same score. Can you give me a good recommendation for a spat store? Maybe online?
I’m so ashamed of my lowly estate…no striped pants either…
There’s only one career path left in America: management. Our entire economy and educational system are geared toward turning people into managers. To become a manager, you need college, at least up to the MBA level. Managers are the middle class. Therefore, the middle class today necessarily consists of college-educated elitists. I think what this survey (and Obama) mistakes for the upper class is really the middle class. The middle class isn’t disappearing – it’s just mimicking the upper class, being “upper class lite,” which is what the middle class has always done.
I got the same score as you, a 10–probably because I’m a vet and once worked in a factory. I never did much like the taste a beer, can’t stand NASCAR, and haven’t been hunting or fishing in over 30 years. Still, being probably the only Jewish Republican Vietnam Vet Grateful Deadhead in Marin County, California, it’s hard to stay isolated from different lifestyles and contrary opinions.
Scored between 9 and 12. I just don’t go to movies anymore and I prefer Sam Adams beer. And there’s no way in hell I would sit through an Oprah show.
I got 10 out of 20 as well.
Spats are a nice touch, but throw in a top hat and monacle and Halloween would be a snap this year.
Not to mention a lot cheaper than paying Warren Buffet’s secretary.
That’s spelled Buffett, sorry. What do you expect from a conservative with such a low IQ who is so obviously prone to prejudice, unlike our fine Veep, what with his perfectly acceptable Indian accent standup routine. Apparently that (D) next to his name stands for de-lightful.