I think Irina thought on visual images stored in the memory.
You example (…those who wear the best clothes and finest jewellery, travel first class…) is only an appearance, a manifested superficial illusion. My dignity has nothing to do with examples like those. I feel and I hope so. Those people do not play a role in my imagination or they incarnate at most the bad will, the ignorance, the laziness, who are regrettable because are not able to recognise even the simplest questions of existence.