Some people are too stupid to get ahead, Boris Johnson, London mayor,

[BurfordTJustice]

That is some inconvenient truth there.

Some people are too stupid to get ahead, Boris Johnson, London mayor, says,
drawing cries of 'unpleasant elitism'

Economic equality will never be possible because some people are too stupid
to get ahead in the modern world, said Boris Johnson, the mayor of London,
in a speech that is igniting a wave of criticism.

Nick Clegg, Britain's deputy prime minister, accused Mr. Johnson of
"unpleasant elitism."

In the speech honouring the work of former Conservative prime minister
Margaret Thatcher, Mr. Johnson said natural differences between humans will
always mean some will succeed and others fail.

"I am afraid that violent economic centrifuge is operating on human beings
who are already very far from equal in raw ability, if not spiritual worth,"
he told the Centre for Policy Studies think-tank in London.
"Whatever you may think of the value of IQ tests, it is surely relevant to a
conversation about equality that as many as 16% of our species have an IQ
below 85, while about 2% have an IQ above 130. The harder you shake the
pack, the easier it will be for some cornflakes to get to the top.

"And for one reason or another - boardroom greed or, as I am assured, the
natural and god-given talent of boardroom inhabitants - the income gap
between the top cornflakes and the bottom cornflakes is getting wider than
ever. I stress: I don't believe that economic equality is possible; indeed,
some measure of inequality is essential for the spirit of envy and keeping
up with the Joneses that is, like greed, a valuable spur to economic
activity."

Mr. Johnson said more should be done to help talented poor people advance,
including state-funded places at private schools.
He warned against persecuting the rich, saying wealth and success should be
celebrated. He said the top 0.1% of earners in Britain - 29,000 people -
contributed 14% of the government's total revenues from income tax.
"That is an awful lot of schools and roads and hospitals that are being paid
for by the super-rich. So why, I asked innocently, are they so despicable in
the eyes of all decent British people?

"People aren't remotely interested in how much tax these characters pay.
That does nothing to palliate their primary offence, which is to be so
stonkingly and in their view emetically rich."

But Mr. Johnson also said the successful owed a duty to those less well off.

"I hope that this time the Gordon Gekkos of London are conspicuous not just
for their greed . as for what they give and do for the rest of the
population," he said, referencing Michael Douglas's character in the movie
Wall Street.

In a furious response, Mr. Clegg said, "Much as he is a funny and engaging
guy, I have to say these comments reveal a fairly unpleasant, careless
elitism that somehow suggests that we should give up on a whole swath of our
fellow citizens."

The Liberal Democratic politician told a London radio station by using the
term "species" Mr. Johnson was likening people to dogs.

Mr. Clegg, whose party governs in coalition with Mr. Cameron's
Conservatives, added, "The danger is if you start taking such a
deterministic view of people and start saying because they've got a number
attached to them, in this case an IQ number, somehow they're not really
going to rise to top of the cornflake packet - that is complete anathema to
everything I've always stood for in politics. You've got to try and do more
to instil greater opportunity in society."

David Lammy, a possible contender for the mayor's job in 2016, described Mr.
Johnson's remarks as insulting to people on low wages.

"I don't think that's just careless. I think it's an insult," he told the
BBC.

"It's an insult to cleaners in London, to people who are home carers in
London, people who are [on] minimum wage, giving them the suggestion that
they are sort of bottom of the cornflake packet. That's not the sort of
society that I thought we wanted to live in.

"It's extraordinary for a mayor, who should be for all of London, to think
it's all right to glorify greed - a greed that has brought a banking
collapse and caused misery and hardship to many Londoners, particularly to
young people who can't get on the housing ladder."

[Andy Wainwright]

Johnson should be looked at more in context, where he does have a valid
point- we need to have jobs and lives that those with lower academic
ability can excel in. Not everyone is going to be a rocket scientist or
brain surgeon.

Yet there's a lot of people who are indeed very clever who aren't really
bothered about quatitive material things, property that might be
important might be something more personal to them such as a musical
instrument or small boat. Is there anything "clever" about working
really hard at the expensive of your life and health to buy things that
you don't actually want to buy?

Why these people make a rare impact on the media despite being a good
few in number is that media is supported by advertising and poor people
with brains are exactly the opposite of what advertisers want.

Poverty brings misery but great wealth doesn't bring happiness- plenty
of rich and successful who look like they've just sucked a lemon- they
can't talk love and peace even when they've got enough money to do
almost anything.