2.A. Be Self-Centered

Meditations on a negative trait

This is a companion piece to a piece I wrote for my own blog, The Professional Amateur. In that piece, I talk about my experiences writing other people’s college application essays, how I would tackle them if I had to do it myself, and how I would try to get a dog an MBA. Reading that first is optional but recommended for your enjoyment.

Tell Me Your Story

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Why is Self-Centered an insult?

We are all self-centered. Naturally, it is impossible to escape the confines of your own brain. You must see everything through your own eyes, hear through your own ears, and think with your own mind – nobody else’s. Thinking about it that way, the use of self-centered as an insult is more a matter of degree than of principle. Everyone is self-centered, and what people really think poorly of is being only self-centered, simply not considering the needs and wants of others around you.

Vilifying a blunt truth of life is instructive – I have written before on this theme. The idea that one can simply flex their power and influence upon us without the option to resist is an affront and a challenge that requires either combat or submission. As such, we come up with organizing principles – rules that simplify communication and allow us to couch our displays of power and influences in acceptable terms. These become, in some sense, reality, forming a set of totalitarian rules that one must follow to join or remain part of one of the fractal communities that make up society.

It then follows that the current highly-networked society puts a great deal of emphasis of caring for others. As the minimum viable size of communities rises due to greater specialization in tasks, communication and consideration become more and more paramount to maintaining community numbers and skills. Self-centeredness to a greater degree than others’ becomes an obstacle to community life, and is therefore called out.

Selected for Ambition

Here’s the thing, though – society still needs ambitious leaders and go-getters to entrust positions of power to. Greater specialization and division of labor means that even labors such as leadership, vision, and setting rules must be specialized into. We need a way to select who is allowed to manage things and steer the ship of society – the bridge crew to our deckhands, engineers, and seamen. All forms of government have a different method of doing this – warlordism through success in war, aristocracy by blood, democracy by votes, autocracy by ability to maintain rule. I do not think we live in any of these systems.

I think we live in a credentialorcracy, ruled by degrees, awards, titles and positions at megacorporations and international non-government organizations, all selecting for a few things – the wealth, the ambition, and the ruthlessness to ascend the vampiric pyramid of power and sit at its zenith. No better example exists than this article’s companion piece, where I encourage the itinerant applicant to upsell their experiences and tailor the story of their life to the whims of the admissions committee. Naked ambition must be clothed in the toga of idealism and concern for others in order to make it palatable to make a grab for the reins of power. Those whose naked ambition is earliest exposed are removed from the contest – to allow such an operator to exist could discredit it in the eyes of others and jeopardize the whole enterprise, so the gatekeepers naturally select for those who can best conceal their naked ambition. Theories and ideals are crafted to support this narrative, and show handy guideposts on how to climb the social cliff face.

Oh, this? This is mountaineering gear.

Important to the credentialocracy is the appearance of egalitarianism while staying very strongly rooted in origins. Credentials such as education and awards are allegedly available to everyone, but in practice have buy-in costs. Diversity purports to make education available to everyone, but in practice makes them available to everyone the admissions committee thinks fits their idea of what “everyone” looks like. The preface “As an X person…” before any statement is the perfect manifestation of this look – one’s ancestry and origins are turned into credentials, providing context on the surface while conveniently excluding others and elevating oneself as a source.

This phenomenon wears many names and many faces – scientism, credentialism, expert worship, and effective altruism being just a few. The one I believe best explains how the sausage is made, however, is the humblebrag.

The Humblebrag

Webster’s defines the humblebrag as follows:

Humblebrag (verb): to make a seemingly modest, self-critical, or casual statement or reference that is meant to draw attention to one’s admirable or impressive qualities or achievements.

An example is provided below:

Writing is so torturously difficult – my inventories massive, my quality average, my sales nonexistent, myself at a loss.

Translation:

I write a lot as a labor of love, look at me being so artistic and creative.

A lot of the victim mentality and self-flagellating you see in public speech is simply a naked power grab. Ostentatious displays of charity and care for others are naturally used as a cynical marketing tactic, getting you to pay more for doing good works. Classifications such as fair trade, organic food, sustainable/responsible sourcing, so on and so forth – there is always an element of portraying the product as a responsible choice that does “the right thing”.

From a pure profit-oriented standpoint, one would think these are crosses to bear, but they’re really just part of the game. Pretending to be relatable matches the faux-egalitarian ethic of the credentialocracy, which encourages troweling the makeup onto the profit-greedy pig like it’s Animal Farm. The humblebrag is a perfect manifestation of this trend.

Advice to the Ambitious

Specialize into a form of public outreach or a fashionable cause that will allow you to make a lot of money. Convince others that you wholeheartedly support this cause, tying it into your life story and making your growth appear to be a natural extension of your capabilities. Go to big schools and corporations with international reach. Have or make a lot of money or rich friends who can fund your prestige-enhancing tech startup, renewable energy project, or social outreach effort. Use this to secure yourself a golden parachute or establish connections that allow you to enrich yourself. Above all, make room for those below rising to the top, because as their prestige rises, so does yours by proxy (do not forget this step). Last of all, refuse the temptations of lifestyle inflation. Continue to live simply and sock away savings so you can quit while you’re ahead - success can be fleeting, after all, and there’s no guarantee that this score won’t be your last.

Believing in any of it is optional. Collecting credentials is everything. And remember to quit while you’re ahead.