The intelligentsia and their various gatekeeping mechanisms are not guardians of “intellectualism”. They are representatives of a class that is seeing its end coming.
Anti-intellectualism is not worse than being against the actual working class (those stupid rednecks who don't even know what is best for them).
That’s pure straw man. There isn’t anyone against the working class in this thread, and there is anti-intellectualism in this thread. I don’t doubt there are some academics who are jerks, but you’re incorrectly assuming something about all academics (not to mention all working class) that simply isn’t true.