I can only speak as my experience as an American, but how do they not have ANY self awareness? They aggressively defend the status quo in the most embarrassing ways possible. White pmc-types frequently appropriate the language and culture of black women in a way that is painful to witness.
They are almost universally smug and assume everyone else is dumb and uneducated.
Why is this? I assume some of this has to do with the fact that American conservatives give them such a low bar to compete against. Americans are probably the most overconfident people on the planet.
It seems like they all are just trying to emulate an Aaron Sorkin character. Is this common in other parts of the world?
Trained to do so since birth. You explained it yourself. It’s all about toeing the status quo, being experts in parroting the state line. Being on the in club, the establishment, extreme appeal to authority. etc. etc.
Every time they align themselves with the state line, (or in casual matters, conforming to “the trend”, the “leading expert”, the newest thing), they are showered with positive reinforcement on how that makes them moral/smart/individualistic/cool. It’s by design. The psychopaths at the top can now make any decree and liberals will be tripping over each other to follow the official line, including echo-chamber circlejerks and self policing any deviants.
Not much different than how religion worked in a sense.