Elitist

Elitism is the belief or attitude that the people who are considered to be the elite; a selected group of persons with outstanding personal abilities, wealth, specialised training or experience, or other distinctive attributes are the people whose views on a matter are to be taken the most seriously, or that these are persons whose views should be regarded as carrying the most weight, or, more simply, these people are best fit to govern or whose views and/or actions are mostly likely to be constructive. Alternatively, the term elitism could be used to describe a situation in which power is in fact concentrated in the hands of an elite, whether rightly or not.

Elitism is often used pejoratively to describe a general mindset of arrogance or disregard for the general non-elite public (Meritocracy, a special kind of elitism, usually does not carry this connotation).

Most people see elitists as an uncultured, though usually almost completely literate, user that defines themselves as "cool". These users may speak with smaller, centered, or colored texts for the sole purpose of being "different" or "intimidating" but this is not always the case. Elitists usualy hang out in cliques, usually in their own threads among their own friends, consisting mostly other of elitists. Most elitists have high post counts or early join dates. It is not surprising to find that elitists tend to fantasize about having fanboys/fangirls and often keep a running track of how many people think they are "cool."

Elitists are often criticized for appearing snobbish to users who they may consider to be of lesser worth than themselves. Another criticism of this type of user is that they have the financial capability to drastically affect the Gaian economy for their personal gain - causing what is referred to as Artificial Inflation.

Although most elitists act as such out of pride, there are some who believe that they are better than much of the Gaian population simply because they have shown such. They may be jerks, just to be jerks, and some get a kick out of this. There are lone elitists, which prefer not to be the center of attention. They are disgusted by n00bs and may use the private message system to tell them off. Some elitists may be 'Grammar Nazis' because they think that the illiterate side of the Gaia society makes the whole site look bad.

Elitists tend to believe that their knowledge on Gaia far exceeds the norm of the general population. There is no room for debate on the subject since an elitists obviously knows the answer. Though they tend to believe they are better than everyone else, they may pick and choose whoever agrees with them to be a part of their social group. They are not necessarily outcasts but try to find others that will heighten their sense of prominence.