Brahmins routinely broke caste rules yet fiercely defended caste ideology to preserve class power

Evidence

Almost every Brahmin has transgressed the rule of caste. The number of Brahmins who sell shoes is far greater than those who practise priesthood. Not only have the Brahmins given up their ancestral calling of priesthood for trading, but they have entered trades which are prohibited to them by the shastras. Yet how many Brahmins who break caste every day will preach against caste and against the shastras? … For one honest Brahmin preaching against caste and shastras because his practical instinct and moral conscience cannot support a conviction in them, there are hundreds who break caste and trample upon the shastras every day, but who are the most fanatic upholders of the theory of caste and the sanctity of the shastras. Why this duplicity? Because they feel that if the masses are emancipated from the yoke of caste, they would be a menace to the power and prestige of the Brahmins as a class. — Ambedkar, B R, Annihilation of Caste_ The Annotated…, 1272

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the pattern in the Frankfurt School materials of an intellectual class whose material interest locks it into defending an ideology it privately no longer believes — a classic ideologist-of-the-ruling-class dynamic.