My godfather once noted that our rich and privileged celebrities can generally afford moral failure because they have the wealth needed to cushion them from the economic consequences of their misbehavior; if the poor did the same, their lives would be ruined. Yet more often than not, these celebrities – heralded as they are in grocery store tabloids – are, in fact, the very embodiment of aspiration for the poor. In this way, the self-indulgence demanded by the rich becomes utterly destructive for the rest of society; all the government-directed reparations in the world won’t compensate for the powerfully destructive currents unleashed by the norms their behavior inspires. (Long gone, apparently, is any sense of noblesse oblige.)

It may be that the tendency toward self-indulgence and the self-serving denigration of moral standards is intrinsic to the fallen experience of significant wealth. (This dynamic is certainly not unique to this era.) I suspect that this is because wealth also expands options – and with them all manner of temptations; unless the possessor of wealth is deeply committed to something greater than their own appetites, this increase in options and temptations can only be expected to increase the potential for failure. If you can not find examples in your own experience, just go to any Trust department and you will find employees who know of numerous such stories (though confidentiality will prohibit them sharing specifics); these are typically third and fourth generation heirs who inherited the wealth of their progenitors without inheriting their virtues. (If my experience of business owners is in any way indicative, those virtues are considerable.) Since these are often the very virtues needed to generate – or at least preserve – wealth, it is commonplace to see heirs gradually deplete the family fortune — absent spendthrift provisions. Hence the self-correcting tendency of many families to build and then deplete that wealth over a handful of generations.

Watching the Royal wedding provided an interesting contrast. In general, our “aristocracy” can make a virtual career out of misbehavior; vilified or not, they still get face time and publicity – all that is needed to rise above the “noise” of endless media and thereby command attention. (Real TV seems to amplify the worst aspects of this dynamic.) When the royals misbehave (as they have often done), the response is generally shame, and a recognition that they have violated the standards of their office, rather than the “career move” it seems to have been turned into in Hollywood. Yet in the Royal wedding we saw royalty doing what it does best: displaying the Standard for others to aspire to – and a worthy standard at that. I can think of few things that have done more to advance marriage (even if just the wedding) in a positive manner than the wedding. And the response has been what it has almost always been to royal displays: a recognition that this is the way it should be done. If royalty offers any positive contribution, I suspect that it is this: it provides a place in which the highest standards can be displayed and promoted. Of course, as a thorough-going American, I am loathe to cede a permanent place of stature and privilege to any one family. Even so, I saw what such the defined standard of royalty could do – and what we clearly lack. Not that this will, of itself, save Britain – or anywhere else. The bread-and-circuses focus of modern media, the need to break through the “noise” and grab attention (as noted above), tends to spotlight the worst rather than the best in man. The more pervasive media becomes, the more that our passions are put on display. And this harms the poor the most, who most lack the resources needed to buffer them against the consequences of moral failure.

With apologies for my lack of brevity – thank you for a very insightful article.

At that point, expect rioting.