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All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.
-- George Orwell, Animal Farm
-- George Orwell, Animal Farm
By now, everyone's heard about the indictments of some 50 odd relatively well-off folks who conspiratorially chicaned to obtain their kids' admission to various universities: the "Varsity Blues" investigation/indictments.
I think the matter highlights multiple dimensions of dissoluteness in the American cultural ethos. Some of them are immutable and others eradicable.
- Privilege
Blanche : You wouldn't be able to do these awful things to me if I weren't still in this chair.
Jane : But you *are*, Blanche! You *are* in that chair!
-- Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, Whatever Happened to Baby Jane
"Varsity Blues" has wrought recriminations about the exercise of privilege. Frankly, much, but not all, such grousing strikes me as little but "white sepulchers'" inner "green monsters" emerging.
The US has always capitalism's, an unrepentant competitive system of resource allocation, HQ. In the wake of "Varsity Blues," I've heard folks who routinely defend capitalism suddenly take exception with folks' doing what capitalism bids one to do: deploy one's resources for one's success. (Sure it's folks doing so for their kids, but parent construes securing his/her kids' future comfort/profit as notably as distinct from the things that makes the parent successful, if only as a parent? I suspect few to none.) Similarly, I've observed folks on this matter finding an otherwise nonexistent ethical "center." Folks reprove these deceitful parents' behavior, yet they'll forbear their favorite politicians' turpitude and brazen exploitation of resource advantage lacunae.
Although much complaining has focused on wealthier folks' ability to use their wealth to abet their kids education, as I see the matter, it seems pretty much the same thing minorities have been griping about vis-a-vis structural advantages whites have long enjoyed at minorities' expense. "Varsity Blues" has merely manifest the same inequities and abuses among what amounts to two "classes" of white folks: the rich ones and the rest. But make no mistakes, the same behaviors and privileges are what white folks have long enjoyed relative to minorities, the only substantive difference being that one didn't have to a particularly wealthy white person to have privilege that minorities simply didn't; however, access to that privilege has been every bit as inaccessible to minorities as is the privilege of donating $250K+ to secure a college seat is to "everyday" white folks. The scale differs, but the ill and the harm it produces are the same.
"Varsity Blues" has made palpable to white folks the pain minorities have endured for centuries. - Meritocracy vs. Money
We like to think that our culture is based on merit. In many ways, and certainly for white folks, it mostly is. We may not like that money can buy things, but the fact is money's only real use is to buy things, so that's exactly what folks who have lots of it will do with it.
Do you think a college is any different than a department store when it comes to providing perqs to people who spend great sums there? Anyone who'd answer "yes" doesn't understand what it means for an organization to function in a capitalistically competitive environment. I mean, really. If you donate a wing, endow a chair, replace a locker room, establish a scholarship, etc., do you really think that it's asking too much for, in return, the school to admit your kid(s)? I don't. Now, were one to pull a stunt on the sly as did the "Varsity Blues" parents, well, that's a different matter for in that instance folks (and their kids) are presented as something they're not: accomplished enough to have earned their admission just like everyone else. - Bribery
Folks describe "Varsity Blues" scheme as bribery, but it should not be lost on anyone that no bribery charged were levied. One need only look at what bribery entails. In the US, it's simply impossible to bribe a non-government official. That's intentional. The folks who write laws don't like the notion of bribing public officials, but they have no issue with the same behavior in the private sector. Favors and the private sector go hand-in-hand. I think that's impossible to extirpate or attenuate.
Money can't buy happiness, but it can make you awfully comfortable while you're being miserable.
-- Clare Boothe Luce
-- Clare Boothe Luce