When did illusion become reality?

Wasn’t there a time, and recently,
when efficiency and competence
were considered the ideal? The loftiest
laurels reserved for quiet ability.

It was a bar set high that was aspired to.
The considerable meaning of work
and effort resulting in achievement.
Experience valued above all.

Has this been replaced by the illusion
of triumph? Knowing that it is a
chimera being weighed and feted,
and yet still gifted with worth. Why?

What merit has reality in a world that
elevates and worships delusion. This
new religion of the soothing semblance
of reality, is dulling us as a whole.