Victoria Coren Mitchell Quotes

On the evidence we have, the meritocratic ideal ends up being just as undemocratic as the old emphasis on inheritance and tradition, and it forges an elite that has an aristocracy's vices (privilege, insularity, arrogance) without the sense of duty, self-restraint and noblesse oblige that WASPs at their best displayed.

But the truth is the meritocracy is a lie. Those born into wealth and privilege will always be able to game the system for their own benefit and their children's own benefit.

Of all classes the rich are the most noticed and the least studied.

There is also an artificial aristocracy founded on wealth and birth, without either virtue or talents;... The artificial aristocracy is a mischievous ingredient in government, and provision should be made to prevent its ascendancy.

A meritocracy increases inequality --- by its very nature, it has to.

I went home every night wondering how to get in the Burnley team. It was, 'You've been brought up nicely, had everything handed to you.' Is that what people think just because I went to private school and played instruments?

There's always been a nasty strain of class prejudice ingrained in the condemnation of football's 'undeserving rich,' as if the working class is uniquely susceptible to being corrupted by money, and as if they deserve their wealth less than those born to it.

I have a class prejudice - against the upper class, which is foolish.

May not the complaint, that common people are above their station, often take its rise in the fact of uncommon people being below theirs?

And if we don't have a test, what we may end up doing is going back to what this country has done before. We could use social class and we still do, but in the 50s, it was, do you have the right last name and are your parents in privileged positions?

Labor, under their current leadership, want to be the Downtown Abbey party when it comes to educational opportunity. They think working class children should stick to the station in life they were born into - they should be happy to be recognized for being good with their hands and not presume to get above themselves.

Is class snobbery a social reality in the United States? Absolutely, and the kind that's codified by meritocracy is probably more toxic than the old-fashioned kind based on bloodlines.

I want nothing to do with privilege.

The Tea Party people say they're angry about socialism, but maybe they're really angry about capitalism. If there's a sense of being looked down upon, it's that sense of failure that's built into a system that assures everyone they can make it to the top, but then reserves the top for only a tiny fraction of the strivers.

Every society naturally divides itself into classes. The author of nature has bestowed on some greater capacities than on others--birth, education, talents and wealth, create distinctions among men as visible and of as much influence as titles, stars and garters. In every society, men of this class will command a superior degree of respect--and if the government is so constituted as to admit but few to exercise the powers of it, it will, according to the natural course of things, be in their hands.

Our democracy may have an aristocracy of talent, as Jefferson said – which is fine – but we don’t want everyone else to be left out. Something like that seems to be happening, though.

I'm not interested in classes ... Far be it from me to foster inferiority complexes among the workers by trying to make them think they belong to some special class.

The surface of American society is covered with a layer of democratic paint, but from time to time one can see the old aristocratic colors breaking through.

[There is a] desire of individuals, particularly business men, to create privileged positions for themselves

You have to believe that those privileged from birth achieve success all on their own..

Surrounded by the evidence of their success, the wealthy come to believe that they are fundamentally better than other Americans and that working people deserve their declining fortunes. They trumpet meritocracy while ensuring that their children enjoy crushing advantages from birth. They have unprecedented access to politicians and use it to push policies that swell their wealth while defunding institutions, such as public education, that sustain opportunities for less-fortunate Americans.

The Honours List is accused of being too top heavy, rewarding those born with a silver spoon in their mouth - as if hereditary titles and accidents of birth are incompatible with democracy. But if you stop to think about it, what is more democratic than nature?

The rich do not want people who come from poor families to rise to the highest position in the country.

Class and the snobbery it provokes still matter far too much in Britain, but we are a far more mobile society than we used to be.

Truth is, only the useless get to the top in this country.