I think this is close to right, but not exactly. Working class people in the global south learn theory too. But there is absolutely a dynamic in which the world's most privileged people go to elite institutions where they learn the magic words that absolve them of personal guilt https://twitter.com/MazMHussain/status/1280936738278572032

But the second thing is more relevant when talking about English-language mainstream media. It's mostly people from those schools. You are born elite, you're awaiting a position that will cement that material status, and you learn exactly what to say to appear to be a good person

It's like an extremely expensive potion you can drink that mystically hides the fact that you benefit in every way from a global system built through violence and exploitation. Concretely you sit at the very top but you are linguistically moral. You can get why people want this

So I don't think this stratum wants to impose their morality on others. They don't care much. They just need to find some group that is less moral than them, in some way (like, using the wrong words) so they can point to it in the service of hiding the truth about themselves

I think this partially explains the "White Fragility" boom. The frenzied white-liberal reaction to BLM was not so much, "how do I help dismantle oppressive structures (that benefit me)" but "fuck fuck, what new things do I need to be able to say to not appear personally racist"

So I think theory and complex thinking can be really useful, liberating, but I also think it's right to be suspicious of the people sitting in the control room of the Death Star using some complicated language to explain why the planet they are aiming at is actually problematic