The social engineering actively performed by social/political elites

One of the criticisms of progressivism that I've often experienced is that it is "social engineering". I've always responded that no, it's not - it is in fact, undoing the social engineering of the rich and/or powerful elites in society. Well, further to that, the revelations of the current scandal over political culture - which I've included in my recent news post (see below) - only confirm my PoV: as long as such institutions have existed, the ruling class have been actively performing social engineering.

My question is: why have so many people gone along with this without complaint or even question? Are they too blind to notice, too intimidated or duped to speak out, or too unthinking to notice the harm being done? They are certainly uncaring and irresponsible - this social conditioning does massive harm to their children, society, and the future, and always has. I personally can see the influence of such elites and their social engineering even in how companies are run (focus on dollars, and screw what happens to people - slowly being reversed over recent decades).

We need to answer that question as part of ensuring that evil is stopped, its effects undone, and our future protected from it.

The mentions from my recent news post that I mentioned above are:

• in a powerful indictment of the patriarchal  culture of politics (which includes a backlash that has claimed the job of the first complainant, and a warning the ALP also has a problem), an alleged rapist/sexual assaulter now has complaints of four rapes/sexual assaults - and HUNDREDS of female students have reported sexual assaults by private school boys that feed into conservative politics . . . experts have called for an independent review.
  And, following a caution from the police to Parliament that reports must be forwarded, an allegation of a past rape against a current Minister has been forwarded for investigation; 
• the role of social engineering at elitist male-only private schools in creating and continuing this culture of entitlement and abuse