A Traitor To My Class

Violate the hypocrisy of the unspoken pact to denounce privilege and wealth while championing social justice, and risk banishment. The Democrats are officially the party of unprincipled elites.

The term “class traitor” as in “she’s a traitor to her class” is generally used in socialist discourse to refer to a person of the working class who works against their class interest, in favor of the bourgeoisie - or in today’s lingo: the elites. It might be used to refer to a worker who crosses a picket line, for instance.

Of late, I’ve been thinking I was targeted as a traitor to mine, the elite. It’s an inversion of the most common usage, but equally applicable I believe.

I don’t think this was conscious, mind you. But I do believe it happened, turning inside out the traditional usage of the term.

Let me explain.

In pushing back on public school closures while my peers - other executives at Levi’s - were sending their children to in-person private school, I risked exposing the hypocrisy of their “wokeness.” While they publicly took social justice stances championing those without means, in private they availed themselves of every possible advantage their class status conferred.

It’s not as if people don’t know they do this. No one thinks that the CEO of a major corporation sends his daughter to (gasp!) public schools. But these executives work overtime to keep their elitism from view, to maintain their “of the people” social justice warrior charade.

In today’s world, wealth and privilege are not honorable. They are shameful therefore must be concealed in favor of a more humble altruistic pose. But make no mistake, the greed is still there.

It used to be that it was assumed (because it was true) that business leaders were mostly Republicans. They liked money. They liked being rich. They arranged their lives to achieve it, without shame or apology. But now, an inversion has occurred.

From 2012 to 2020, the Democratic Party has seen their support amongst working class voters take a nosedive. In fact, the Democrats advantage with non-white working class voters tanked by 18 points. While at the same time, their appeal to white college-educated voters was boosted by 16 points. In a recent New York Times poll, Democrats have a 15 point deficit amongst working class voters.

Now it can be said that the Dems are the party of the elites. And that they have left the working class behind with their attention focused away from the very things the working class say they care about: crime, inflation and the economy overall. In fact, the Democrats go so far as to accuse anyone who raises inflation or crime as an issue as a racist and a liar.

When I wrote a proposal to my peers at Levi’s, including my boss - the CEO - advocating that we take a stance on opening public schools in the fall of 2020, in support of our statements about fighting for equality of opportunity, I was told:

“There’s also a lot of potential negatives if we speak up strongly, starting with the numerous execs who have kids in private schools in the city.”

Translation: we privileged executives will look like hypocrites for sending our kids to private schools while remaining silent on the issue of prolonged public school closures. So best not to say anything at all. Maybe no one will notice.

But sometimes the quiet part gets said out loud. Like when Sam Bankman-Fried spoke of “wokeness” to Vox reporter Kelsey Piper : “[it’s] a dumb game we woke westerners play where we say all the right shiboleths so everyone likes us.”

He wasn’t supposed to do that. He was supposed to keep the unspoken pact to remain silent about the way the game is played. But he didn’t. And so she published Bankman-Fried’s direct messages revealing the lie.

Revealing the lie is also what I did when I pushed back on closed public schools, impacting the most disadvantaged children.

I knew the secrets of the C-suiters. I knew they didn’t mean the we just want to save the world things they said. I knew they were also willing to take from those with less, so that they could have more. I knew that 15% of the Levi’s workforce was laid off to bolster the stock price for massive payouts to shareholders and executives, such as the $40+ million dollar cash out of stock by the CEO.

And so, when I was offered $1 million dollars to keep my mouth shut, it was beyond their imagination that I would not accept the money. Who does that? Who passes up $1 million dollars on principle? Certainly no one of the elite class who has spent their entire life chasing riches. No one who they’d ever encountered. Money talks. Principles are something you pretend to have, as Bankman-Fried so plainly said.

While I remain of “the elite” based on upbringing, education and savings amassed over the years - I’ve never tried to pretend anything otherwise - I stand firm in believing in equality of opportunity and the value of a free and equal education, among many other values I thought the Democrats believed in.

I have not trespassed my own values. But those most vociferous about their stated values apparently never really believed in them at all.

In the end, these “values” were merely a pose to distract from their true intentions and their true principles - which were always selfishly rooted in amassing as much financial and reputational wealth for themselves as possible.