17 February

The massive shift to private schooling in Australia in the past 20 years was a deliberate policy decision of the Howard government. And what made that shift successful was that it targeted status. That’s what conservative ‘aspirational’ politics is all about. To shift from a collective, public-focused society, to a society of status-seekers. It’s also why when others criticise things like inequality, conservatives will immediately call it the ‘politics of envy’. They know that the poor are more interested in status than they are in justice, and will vote for anybody who offers them a fake step up the status ladder. It’s why parties of the ’Left’ keep losing, they keep offering polices to ‘help’ the poor. The poor (rightly) hate being patronised like that. They see themselves (again rightly) as the equal of the rich. They want to be offered status, not assistance.