I Think I Am An Elitest Because I Don't Know What That Means

 Based on a misunderstanding of what the word elitist meant, I decided I was one. The official definition is that someone believes that because of their money, status, intellect or social standing they should be entitled to additional benefits and rights. I never bothered to look that up and thought that it meant that I thought smart and charismatic people should be in charge of making the world a better place for everyone as a responsibility of their talents. After spending a week with democratically elected students at UASC who were in general very smart, attractive and nice it was a half step back to reality to be with students selected by school officials based on their leadership ability. The mood was much less friendly and cooperative and sometimes overtly Machiavellian. The sense I got was that many of these were aggressive type-A(-hole?) kids who were leaders because people were intimidated by them and the teachers who selected them thought that was a good thing. In the week at UASC I never heard any sniping, or even sarcasm and everyone was always trying to make things go smoothly and that was bizarre to me. I was used to any group activity having a couple sassers and poop-pants wearers. At Freedom Academy everyone was also very smart and talented but with their 'something-to-prove' attitudes made for some picked fights and some bullying. I was only a few days removed from Elysium and I wanted back in. Sadly, no man can step into the same river twice and so I took up telling people that I was an elitist and obviously to anyone who knew what that meant I sounded a little arrogant or especially clever in my wry social cometary. It was not until I was in college debate when an assistant coach started laughing when I told someone that I was an elitist. He said that was one of the best jokes he had ever heard in that context. It wasn't a joke but my misunderstanding was so great that it had come back around so far as to sound like irony. I looked up what the word meant and realized I was not actually an elitist.