‘Global Elites’ or ‘Global Parasites’? A personal quest for the appropriate descriptive

Dr Mathew Maavak

As a popular observation in Ancient Rome went: “So many slaves, so many enemies.” Class enmity is the spawn of social repression and wealth inequality. It is the hallmark of elite parasitism

Writers in the alternative media have been routinely reminded that the term “global elites” should be updated to “global parasites”. After all, the top 1% relentlessly leeches off the bottom 90%, resulting in the steady dissipation of fundamental freedoms and means of economic sustenance; often under the guise of “sustainability”. (The remaining 9% are enforcers in this matrix).

The word “elite” does provide an unwarranted veneer of venerability, expertise, knowledge and merit which this class acutely lacks. I will admit that many commentators have been grappling with the “elite” tag for a long time.

There is also the danger that online shadowbans — a Sword of Damocles constantly hovering over independent writers — will swiftly shift from the penumbra to the core umbra region once the term “global parasites” are normalised in their writings. Beyond that region lies oblivion. Furthermore, I cannot possibly use that term in any of the Op-Eds which I periodically submit to RT.com although the editors there, or at least the older ones, would be familiar with the deceptively similar tag of “social parasite” from the USSR era.

Social parasitism was how Soviet rulers had described those who refused to work, study or serve in accordance with socialist principles. On May 4 1961, the USSR even passed a law titled “On Intensification of the Struggle against Persons who avoid Socially Useful Work and lead an Anti-social Parasitic Way of Life”. I guess this was targeted at anti-Stakhanovites who baulked at the propagandistic drivel of the ruling nomenklatura who constituted the parasitic Soviet elites of the day. Stakhanovites are those inspired by the mythical feats of Aleksei Grigorievich Stakhanov, who once allegedly mined 102 tons of coal in less than 6 hours (14 times his quota) in 1935. Soviet science, superhuman feats and statistics were very precise back then.

No one in the communist bloc could live up to the socialist ideal which itself was a hollow illusion built on lies, gulags, forced labour and the control of information. Labour productivity plunged as a result. In Cold War-era Poland, there was even a saying which roughly translated to “Whether you stand or lie down, a thousand zlotys you get” (Czy się stoi czy się leży, tysiąc złotych się należy). In some versions, the pay was two thousand zlotys which I presume was doubled in an attempt to douse the flames of the anti-authoritarian Solidarity movement in the 1980s.

Throughout history, the elite classes and the disenfranchised had routinely accused each other of parasitism. The latter of course had to do it behind closed doors. Ancient Rome, which was built on slave labour even had a saying: “So many slaves, so many enemies.” Class enmity is the spawn of social repression and wealth inequality.

Back to the future, I diligently probed all hidden recesses of my lexical repository in order to coin the most encapsulating term for the global ruling class. Of course, analogous terms already exist — ranging from the academic to the conspiratorial, e.g. transnational capitalist class (TCC), The Cabal, illuminati etc but these were deemed either unsatisfactory or overly tendentious.

The scientific method I employed even got me cursorily studying platyhelminthes (flatworms), acanthocephalans (thorny-headed worms), cestodes (tapeworms), trematodes (flukes) and nematodes (roundworms), among others. The clincher I was seeking however remained elusive.

I almost had an epiphany moment when I grappled with leeches during my jungle treks. Leeches are bloodsucking (hematophagic); so why not describe global elites as the  “hematophagic class”? However, that term was a tad mouthful, and it also lacked the snappiness and hint of “tauroscatology” (bullshit) which this class eructates on a frighteningly daily basis.

I finally gave up. That was until I was triggered by a recent video clip featuring World Economic Forum (WEF) “agenda contributor” Ngaire Woods.  Woods, whom I have never heard of before, considers herself to be part of the “elite”. Upon a quick check online, I realised that she was a celebrated expert on global governance. Now, I am well-versed in the field of governance (my doctoral thesis touched on integrated governance mechanisms) but I had never encountered any of Woods’ opuses. Furthermore, I am also averse to academic tauroscatology!

Woods’ compatriots include Singapore president and WEF stalwart Tharman Shanmugaratnam whose recent appointment to the highest office was facilitated by a radical change to his nation’s constitution. From now on, Singapore will no longer deem it a conflict of interest when an “elite” public servant also serves “elite institutions” like the WEF. There was a minor outcry in Singapore but the elites get away with just about anything these days. Incidentally, Shanmugaratnam has also promised a new vaccine for a new pandemic that has yet to emerge. I had debunked this snake oil science in a recent commentary.

Back to Woods. She rejoiced in the fact that “elites across the world trust each other more and more. So, we can come together and design beautiful things together”. That was the “good news”, according to Woods.

One can see such beautiful things in the cockroaches, worms, maggots and slugs which the WEF promotes as food for the global underclass.

“The bad news,” Woods continued, “is that in every single country they were polling, the majority of people trusted their elites less. So, we can lead, but if people aren’t following, we are not going to get to where we want to go.”

Gee, I wonder why? Nobody likes cockroach fried rice or maggot consommé?

Hypocrisies abound in this tiny circle. When it comes to their pet climate change obsession, the top 1% is defiantly “responsible for the same amount of carbon emissions as the world’s poorest two-thirds, or five billion people, according to an analysis published by the nonprofit Oxfam International”. This report was published just as world leaders were preparing to meet for climate talks at the COP28 summit in Dubai from Nov 30 to Dec 12, 2023.

And yet what did the elites do? The British delegation led by Charles III, ex-prime minister David Cameron and current prime minister Rishi Sunak all flew to Dubai on separate jets. Carbon emissions or not, they see themselves as “part of the solution”, to borrow a quote from Bill Gates. There is one rule for them and yet another antithetical one for the unwashed masses.

It gets more sinister when Al Gore, another jet-setting climate change charlatan, equated certain social media algorithms to AR-15s, and implicitly called for total censorship. Free speech was deemed a threat to democracy. Why should the rabble enjoy the freedom to question gourmet meats at COP28 while its participants want everyone else to gorge on cockroaches and worms?