I honestly have no trouble believing that's what PGP's userbase believes about themselves, which is absolutely part of the problem.

Safe communication should be available to everybody. Given how many professional engineers botch PGP at some point, it isn't exactly a great option for people like journalists who may need to depend on it with their lives.

"Don't worry, these few thousand techies are the only ones that need secure communication" is sheer arrogance.

That's fine, but even the "right" people need to interact with the "unwashed masses" sometimes. If your cryptosystem isn't readily accessible to everyone, it's kind of useless.