The "self-made person" and "pulled by bootstraps" narrative is very American. People love to frame their success as the outcome of their own effort rather than from a source of privilege. If you read accounts from entrepreneurs, almost all of them will tell such a story, mostly glossing over attending elite schools, having connections, or receiving large amounts of funding. Even Cal Newport normalizes this in "so good they can't ignore you" by saying that "small breaks" such as connections to a VC are relatively common. I guess I must live in a different planet.