Tragedy of the Striver
Vice President J.D. Vance’s comments about China have been living rent-free in my head for some time now.
My first reaction to Vance’s insults towards the Chinese was one of sheer disgust. It’s incredibly inappropriate for a sitting representative of the American government to use such language to describe a population of 1.4 billion people on Earth.
As someone who has had the fortune of visiting China recently, the Chinese “peasants” are doing quite well. Sure, the Chinese may not have the same GDP per capita as the US, but in every city I visited (Beijing, Xi’an, Chengdu, Chongqing, and Shanghai), I found their inhabitants to be living abundant, vibrant lives.
Vice President Vance may be jealous. (I easily could have named this piece, The Peasants Are Doing Well”).
Then I came across this tweet that reacted to Vance’s comments in a different light:
In this context, Vance’s negativity towards the Chinese reveals a deep insecurity about his origins.
Where I was once angry, I now feel pity for Vance.
Someone of his background should be proud of his humble beginnings and his tenacity to have made it to becoming second-in-command of the Free World.
One would think that Vance would see a little bit of himself in the Chinese peasants he denigrates, or that he does, and they serve as an uncomfortable reminder of his tough childhood, hence his reaction.
Vance is the archetypal “striver,” or someone with a lot of innate talent combined with palpable desperation to make it to the very top of society or some arbitrary social hierarchy, no matter the cost.
No one likes a striver because they know that a striver is quick to turn on his or her friends and family if it helps them get ahead in school, the workplace, clubs, and their broader community.
Strivers are only loyal to themselves. It wasn’t even a few years ago that Vance publicly displayed his disdain for President Trump during his first term.
Vance will do anything to ascend in a meritocracy, because that’s what’s helped him survive and thrive in navigating the halls of power.
In Vance, we find the tragedy of the striver. Within American meritocracy, all that matters is your ability to climb the social rungs based on your intellectual and emotional intelligence. Your self-advancement is your North Star, society be damned.
In an older tradition, the ancien regime, there once existed the concept of noblesse oblige, the idea that one would have an obligation to give back to the community in some way, shape, or form as a tacit admission of the arbitrariness of their station in life due to the luck of birth.
Under a meritocracy, noblesse oblige falls to the wayside. Now, the talented, regardless of social class, compete for the limited slots in the upper echelons. If you win, the spoils are yours. Lose, and you’re fighting for scraps against everyone else.
The blind pursuit of individual ambition doesn’t guarantee collective success; if anything, it ostensibly opposes the advancement of all.
Yet to live a standard middle-class life in America, one must strive. One must compete.
One must win.
But at what cost?
The price we pay to strive is the tears in the social fabric. Climbing on top of one another just to stay ahead, the bonds that link us together in a common cloth rip to shreds.
All that is left is the striver, having conquered society, staring into a mirror.
It is in his reflection that we find what remains: the anti-society.
Soda
