"In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald depicts the indolent,
troubled world of upper-crust young Americans during the Roaring
Twenties. A Yale graduate from an old-money family, Tom Buchanan is the
most conventional character, and in the opening scene he expresses a
conventional upper-crust view. The white, northern races - that is to
say, virile, strong, commanding men like Tom Buchanan - rightly rule.
The mansion overlooking the Long Island Sound, the horses, the trust
fund - he holds them in accord with the higher justice of racial
evolution. It was a convenient social philosophy for American elites,
one expressed most consistently in the doctrines of Social Darwinism,
which provided a seemingly scientific justification for the impulse of
the powerful to think of themselves as exempt from the old and limiting
constraints of duty and conscience. Today's convenient philosophy for elites is a new materialism."
[...]
"As materialism disenchants, the principles and norms and standards by which we can hold the powerful accountable melt away."
[...]
"Like the Social Darwinism and racial theories that eased the conscience
of Tom Buchanan and gave him peace of mind in his supereminence, a
materialist philosophy reassures those who hold power today. Because
nothing we do in this vast cosmos governed by the laws of nature
matters, because nothing lasts, the elites can do what they want and
nobody can criticize them."
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