Opinion | Who Counts as an Elite in Trump’s America?

For these people, if you are like a barista with an English degree making $15 an hour, you’re an elite. Because I don’t know, I guess there’s Netflix producers like to make shows for you sometimes. Whereas if you are a billionaire buying pardons for your buddies, not an elite, because the cultural tastemakers supposedly look down on you. It’s a very self-aggrandizing vision of who constitutes an elite and one that allows people with actual wealth and actual power and actual influence to obscure that under cultural grievances. It’s like, I don’t know, man, to be a little real for a second, I’m a Black American. I know for a fact that there are not insignificant portions of the country that think kind of nasty things about my particular cultural background. And it’s like, all right, who cares? — I’ll just live my life —— —You’re a grown-up. It’s a big country. Be a grown-up. People will be prejudiced. Whatever, just like, I don’t know. Grow up. Don’t be. Don’t be a snow — Don’t be a snowflake. I just, I really do not understand this. I’m about to sound. I’m going to sound like the kinds of conservatives I read when I was in high school. Don’t have this victim mentality all the time. — Nice! — Let it out, Jamelle. Let it out, Jamelle. Testify, Jamelle. Testify.