I almost wonder, though, if there isn't an even more basic appeal of such hierarchies. Belonging to an elite scene or network offers not only a sense of membership and identity, but also the sense that one is part of something that's going somewhere and that one has some part to play in it. It offers you community, work, and a destination, in other words. The wealth and status is almost more like icing on the cake at that point.
What you're really after, as a friend put it in conversation recently, is the sense that you have a family, place, and heritage that is worthy of love, affection, and service. And since we live in the void, in the age of abandonment, anything that even faintly smells of that is intoxicating.
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