[Surprised] Societal Structures

Some might think that ... [Fribble] might have come forward and confessed his part when he saw what I was in for. But that, you know, was hardly to be expected. ... By coming forward he would have imperiled his social position, in a community where social advancement was the one thing that mattered; school is a preparation for public life.

One of the interesting things about Lewis is his keen perception of humanity and what it is that makes people tick. In the section quoted above, he explains what it is that keeps "Fribble" from coming forward to prevent the flogging of young Lewis in school: a community where social advancement was the one thing that mattered. As Danielle pointed out to me, it is not necessarily the case in 'the real world' that social advancement is the one thing that matters, or that social advancement comes only from the acceptance of one's peers. Lewis, however, was not in 'the real world':

At some schools, I am told, there is a sort of dyarchy. An aristocracy of Bloods, supported or at least tolerated by popular sentiment, stands over against an official ruling class of Prefects appointed by the Masters. ... It was not so at the College. Those who were made Prefects were nearly all Bloods. ... We thus had only a single governing class, in whom every kind of power, privilege, and prestige were united. Those to whom the hero worship would in any case have gone, and those whose astuteness and ambition would under any system have enabled them to rise, were the same whom the official power of the Masters supported.

Lewis here identifies the fatal flaw which made the school's class system of "Prefects" and "Bloods" and "Fags" and "Tarts" inescapable: the lack of a competing or alternative social order. Anyone with the ambition to revolt against the Bloods would have become a Blood before he had accumulated the clout to stage his revolt. And once he becomes a Blood, it would make little sense for him to attempt a coup. Thus, the Bloods remained in power not by destroying the 'rebel leaders' but by assimilating them. The few natural leaders who would not join the Bloods would simply graduate from the school before any changes in the social structure could be affected.

I think that's it for now. Perhaps I will edit this post and add more later.