Liberal stereotype / Keir Starmer and the myth of the metropolitan elite |
We are meant to be living in the age of the ‘liberal metropolitan elite’. Professor Matt Goodwin and David Goodhart tell us that selection by merit has created a new ruling class of the cognitively gifted. This class, worldly and urbane, finds its natural home in the cosmopolitan entrepot of London. Unlike previous Establishments, we are told, the liberal metropolitan elite look with contempt on those less gifted than they are, those who live in the provinces and hold to traditional ways of life.
Hence, the extended scuffle that has broken out between the two, with populism being a revolt of the provinces against the liberal metropolis. This idea is now more or less taken for granted. Most of the authors, academics, and even politicians who criticise the status quo still insist on flattering Britain’s rulers as society’s natural elite, the cream of the crop.
What actually marks Britain’s urban liberals out is their relative weakness
What actually marks Britain’s urban liberals out is their relative weakness
The Starmer saga should bury this idea forever. Keir Starmer, spokesman of the metropolitan elite, named the football comic Roy of the Rovers as his favourite book and has no discernible interests other than team sports. Much of his first week in office was spent watching football on TV. He blames most social problems on technology: on ‘the auto-play, the never-ending scrolling’. Liberal elites are meant to be flexible and postmodern in their outlook but Starmer’s whole view of the world rests on objective morality – human rights – the sort of just-so moral fables that one might find in Roy of the Rovers. His main line of attack........