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Pulling Up the Ladder

A social phenomenon in which individuals or groups who have successfully advanced in status, wealth, or opportunity then act to block others from accessing the same path upward.

Key Features:

Motivated by fear of competition, scarcity mindset, or desire to protect hard-won status.

Can manifest in politics (e.g., immigrants opposing immigration), economics (e.g., professionals gatekeeping their fields), or class mobility (e.g., elites dismantling welfare or education programs they once benefited from).

Example (fictional): Raymond Leon in the movie "In Time" rises out of poverty to become a Timekeeper but enforces the very system that traps others where he once was.
Example (real): An immigrant who gained citizenship but campaigns to restrict immigration for others.
1. After becoming wealthy through public education, the politician now opposes funding for schools, effectively pulling up the ladder behind him.

2. Some immigrants, once they gain citizenship, support restrictive immigration policies — a classic case of pulling up the ladder.
by Social Climber September 16, 2025
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Ladder Me

When a guys wants the girl to climb her dick
Hey girl I’m hard and ready! Ladder Me Bitch!!
by Dirty-Harry February 25, 2018
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can you stop shaking the ladder

I will never forget my grandfather's last words.
can you stop shaking the ladder?
by i4ba6g4rigt February 27, 2024
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ladder bunnies

Plural form: Female Groupies of Fire Fighters. Usually a derogatory in nature.
Dude, check it out those ladder bunnies... I bet you get lucky tonight.
by Otto Von Mog March 31, 2015
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dominance ladder

A fivesome comprised of hot males that dominate a man named (Ethan) till he can’t take it while 2 men named ( bradley, and Brendan) the guys fucking (Ethan) get dominated by a mostly black and Mexican man and black and Puerto Rican man
That dominance ladder was so good last night
by No socks jerry November 27, 2021
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Ladder Breeze

LADDER BREEZE (n.) The interdimensional energy channels and variant ionic frequencies that connect all points of the Universe throughout time which allow HEKA masters ( or even intrepid psychonauts using various tropes ) to connect to any place within conscious or unconscious perception.

Optimally a ladder breeze is accessed with precise internally generated doses of DMT causing parasomniac awareness in the pineal gland and sending pulses of biophotons through the subconscious minds non-temporal and non-spatial connectivity within the Universal Sub-Consciousness. This creates possibilities of transmission of audio or visual information to any point within perception including backwards and forwards in time and into the subconscious awareness of individuals or groups either as hallucinations, dreams or manifestations into material reality.

Uncontrolled and inexpert ladder breeze connectivity is often contemporarily labeled as Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena and can cause negative consequences for the untrained and unaware individuals who witness these UAP events. Many ancient societies had complex and well considered methodology in magick and cultic frameworks for proactive engagement with ladder breezes and beneficial management of random UAPs.
EXAMPLE OF USAGE - A wizard may not fly on a broom but they can travel anywhere by connecting to the correct ladder breeze and then literally anything is possible.
by HEKA~HANNAH~STONED~GODDESS~ December 6, 2023
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Ladder

A way to elevate yourself.
It turned out others could see through the rungs in the bubbly girl' s ladder as well as she could see through the rungs in anyone else's.
by The Original Agahnim August 11, 2021
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