#urgh... finally really good words to articulate why i always thought thought leadership was weird and not good

[noodledesk]

Surveying this new landscape, it is clear that the true role of the thought leader is to serve as the organic intellectual of the one percent—the figure who, as Gramsci put it, gives the emerging class “an awareness of its own function” in society. The purpose of the thought leader is to mirror, systematize, and popularize the delusions of the superrich: that they have earned their fortunes on merit, that social protections need to be further eviscerated to make everyone more flexible for “the future,” and that local attachments and alternative ways of living should be replaced by an aspirational consumerism. The thought leader aggregates these fundamental convictions into a great humanitarian mission. Every problem, he prophesies, can be solved with technology and rich people’s money, if we will only get our traditions, communities, and democratic norms out of the way.

David Sessions, The Rise of the Thought Leader

#essays #capitalism #articles #thought leadership #morningread #david sessions #urgh... finally really good words to articulate why i always thought thought leadership was weird and not good