Comment by BipolarElsa
9 years ago
This article is utter rubbish. Anyone who possesses an elite education will never suffer in their life. They're in the upper-echelon of society. I have no pity for them and they are not at a disadvantage.
Go ahead an ask anyone accepted into Yale if they'd trade it off for the same major at po-dunk State U.
What do you think their response will be?
Don't be daft. This is trash.
I think you're confusing "these are the cons of going to an elite university" with "there are more cons than pros of going to an elite university."
It's quite possible to be mostly satisfied with something and still have good reasons to be dissatisfied, and it's perfectly reasonable to write about those reasons. I doubt Deresiewicz would say that "po-dunk State U" is better.
When I was on the Harvard tour, the guide was an Ivy League groupie -- she had applied and failed to get into Harvard, went to a good "backup school", (I think Case Western) and finally transferred into Harvard in her sophomore year -- without transferring any credits.
It made an impression on me. I checked out the 2nd tier of school and found a bunch of white bread people from Jersey looking forward to a career in ibanking or medicine.
I ended up in a good state school with real people and no debt. I lost the opportunity to work at McKinsey or whatever, but I consider that a plus.
I hope you don't mind if I challenge you on your very last sentence. Why do you consider losing the opportunity a plus?
Not at all. At that time in my life, I would have been attracted to that kind of gig, and having been a customer working with those kinds of firms, I wouldn't have liked it.
Fundamentally, the best thing hat I learned about in college was myself. Surrounding myself with type-As on some track would have stifled that. Honestly, I'm really happy with how life has turned out this far!
Anyone who never suffers in their life and is not aware of the total randomness of their own birth, is damaged in a way I would NOT want to swap with. One would have to have none to not realize how much infinitely more worth the personality one can become potentially is than even full control of all of the Earth's resources and command over all people could be. It's like the difference between making someone orgasm, and screaming at them, why can't they see how sexy one is and why aren't they aroused, especially since it was so expensive to get a room at this hotel.
Mind you, I think personal greatness is completely unrelated to social class. I'm not saying "elite education means you have issues", I don't think it's a zero-sum game at all. But having grown up in a town teeming with millionaires, I have to laugh at the idea that many rich aren't positively hunted by their own defects. Yes, they can buy an island, but they can't sit still on it, they cannot be with themselves, they cannot reflect on themselves. They are captured, driven, mad, and get hysterical when they are recognized and pitied. So they have to keep company that has the same fears, like an unspoken pact. It's like drug addicts hanging out with drug addicts instead of the people who would ask them wtf they are doing with their life.
They can't read many great minds and even get half of what they say; sure, neither do many poor people, but that's more because they don't have the time or the language is too bloated for them, not because there is some inherent vampire/garlic type incompatibility. If you discuss the exact same subjects with a "normal" person in normal words, they in my experience are less likely to throw up all sorts of deflections, while other people realize this stuff is fit to dissolve the lies their lives are and get scared.
Fear is not strength, and powerful people have many options, but when those options don't include letting go of power they are basically slaves as well. The highest echelons of power are impersonal and systematic, only entropy and madness gain from them, no human person; and it takes personal strength to sail in such an environment and not end up as a bundle of sticks held together by delusions. It takes fierce motherfuckers, which is the opposite of people who can't answer a straight question, as many people in the "upper echelons" demonstrate. Pester me not with their pocket calculator stuff :P
>Yes, they can buy an island, but they can't sit still on it
I would LOVE to have that problem. That's a manufactured 1st-world, bourgeois nuisance. Boo friggin' hoo. Millions of struggling working class families would give anything to have that kind of problem, and frankly it's a little bit insulting to their plight.
But that's just my opinion.
People seem to exaggerate the difference between Elite schools and State schools. The key difference between elite schools and other schools is entrenchment. Basically, how "sold" are students into society? At Yale, students hold a conformist, yet liberal attitude. They tend to take things much more seriously: grades, exams, clubs, events, etc. You'll find more expression at Yale than you will at a State school, but that expression tends to be low dimensional. Most people are worried about the same stuff -- it's just that they are all worried. That's what Yale is like. It's not that those students are smarter, it's just that they are more invested into the system, and they have been for longer.
That's pretty much 90% of the difference I notice between Yalies and State school students.
"Anyone who possesses an elite education will never suffer in their life"
This is not fair to say. Many, if not most ivy leagues go onto have relatively normal lives.
I have a friend in Vermont who went to Yale. She is a 'marketing manager'. I don't even think she could pay for her education unless her (doctor) father did.
I took a tour of Stanford, the girl went to Dartmouth. I don't think the people giving recruiting tours of Stanford earn all that much.
Surely, it opens a lot of doors, and there are probably industries in which it can give one a cosy path, but it's not the 'guarantee' of anything.