There is a widely accepted perception that college students are
elitists and intellectual supremacists.
On Monday, to prove or disprove this perception, I walked around
UCLA and asked various groups of students: Do you think you are
part of the masses?
Of the 81 people I asked, 86 percent answered they did. The
remaining 14 percent ““ consisting mainly of self-important
oafs and actual geniuses ““ responded that they did not
consider themselves part of the masses. This was precisely the
reassurance I was seeking.
Further reflection ushers in further reassurance. Universities
are full of professors and programs promoting concern for the
masses outside of campus walls.
But public facades belie private realities. The reality is, for
many centuries, the university has been the fortress of elitists
who hate and patronize the masses.
To confirm this, I ran a parallel survey in which I asked the
same question (Do you think you are part of the masses?) to 100
individuals who were not in groups. In this poll, which virtually
eliminated the influence of peer pressure, a whopping 93 percent of
students said they were not part of the masses.
I will be the first to note that these polls were wholly
unscientific. I chose my victims very unscientifically, granting
unfair preference to North Campus students and people who smiled.
My tone must have been unscientifically biased. And even my
presence must have provoked some people to change their
responses.
But half-baked as these polls were, they seemed to confirm the
popular conception that academia is the hotbed of snobby
intellectuals and know-all elitists who scorn the masses.
Professors and students pretend they are “down with the
people.” But, in private, and in their actions, they
demonstrate that they are not. They think they are better than the
common man in some way ““ in intelligence, ability or social
standing.
Certainly, professors and programs claim to welcome the masses.
Faculty speak of empowering the masses while outreach programs
claim to bring the community to the colleges. Yet we must ask: Is
it not a bit condescending to tell the masses what is best for
them? And doesn’t trying to “help the masses”
mean the masses need help?
At the university, we read about and analyze the production of
the automobile, the evolution of technology and the rise and fall
of nations. Yet it is the masses that actually made the automobile,
created technology, and built nations. At the university, we
hypothesize and philosophize about agriculture and industry. But
the masses perfected agriculture and invented industry.
So as outside the masses as college students might believe
themselves to be, they certainly are not above them.
The knowledge contained in every Midwestern farmer, Virginian
fisherman, Wyoming villager and New York industrialist is
infinitely more important than the philosophic discourses of your
typical Jean Jacques Rousseau. And though this author wrote in his
Social Contract that the masses were a “stupid, pusillanimous
invalid,” he forgot that it is the masses that made his very
existence ““ political, social, physical existence ““
possible.
The key point here is that a profound fear and distrust of the
masses can easily be confused with a strong affection for them. By
claiming to champion the masses, academic elitists actually
patronize the masses.
Academia’s elitist model has long been the launching pad
of tyrannical and totalitarian governments that believe, as Ralph
Nader once claimed, “the consumer must at times be protected
from his own indiscretion and vanity””“ in short, from
his own stupidity.
It is this elitist mentality that has drafted government policy
that subjugates individual rights to phony collective
interests.
The real-life implications of this mentality are disastrous. By
belittling the masses, governments and universities shun the most
important political player of all ““ the people. For however
ingenious and innovative a dozen MIT professors are, their
knowledge is miniscule compared with the collective, accumulated
wisdom ““ not just of books, but of situations, experiences
and markets ““ of the millions of people that are the
masses.
I certainly cannot criticize the people who lead a life devoted
to philosophy and history ““ I hope to carve a career in these
fields. But unlike the academic elitists of yesterday and today, I
am happy to admit it is the masses that define civilizations, form
politics, and ensure human progress. The masses give me purpose and
meaning. The masses are the present and will be the future of human
flourishing.
Nations governed by brilliant professors, intellectuals and
philosophers always fail. Nations ruled by the masses always
flourish. The USSR failed; the United States flourished.
No person and no government should take this lesson for
granted.
Hovannisian is a first-year history and philosophy student.
E-mail him at ghovannisian@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to
viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.