Here are two relevant links.
1) Julia Galef comments on a post by Jeff Kaufman:
Status is key to well-being & isn’t zero sum. Modern society’s ability to create more sources of status, via allowing diverse subcultures, is like printing free $ w/out inflation. Possibly one of modernity’s most overlooked benefits.
I and people I’m close to all have our status boosted by membership in these various subgroups, while another random person has, in their perspective, the status of them and their friends boosted by similar means. This is like the paradox of most people thinking they’re above-average drivers: if different drivers are going for different things (speed, safety, considerateness, …) then it’s quite possible for most drivers to be above average by their own evaluation of what counts.
In general, feeling higher status is pretty good for you: it makes you healthier, happier, and you live longer. [2] So the ability of subcultures to produce new status opportunities out of nowhere seems really valuable, and something we should try to have more of.
2) Katja Grace writes, relatedly:
It might sound intuitive that more [subcultures] mean more status for all, but in most straightforward models the number of ponds doesn’t change the size of the status pie.
As a data-point, I’m a rationalist, and a subscriber to the New Humanist, which is published by the Rationalist Association you mention, and is the descendant of the 1971 magazine you mention titled ‘The Humanist’.
So I fall into the intersection of LW rationalists and “1950′s rationalists”.
Wikipedia: