ffs.
this is not new, it has been going on for centuries. there is a famous quote (i think it is in paxman's the english) and the bishop or whoever is talking about all the youths getting well pissed and lairy and fighting in the streets on friday night, and you read it and it sounds like now, but is actually from about 1610 or something.
also , it is easy to scoff at this stuff, but remember, most of these people dont do nice office jobs, they have shitty boring factory and warehouse Mcjobs, and if your life consisted of standing at the end of plastic extrusion machine for 10 hours a day 5 (or more) days per week (or nights even) and you know there is no way out, you are stuck doing this shite for ever, then come friday night and you are gonna want to let loose.
cos where are you going to go? you are from the wrong class: similar to how the posh give/gave each other jobs, the middle classes do the same now, and you are from the wrong class, the school on your cv is the wrong one. you are stuck. what else can you do? go university? no, cos it is full of middle class kids who you will not fit in with and get on with (many who have wealthy enuff parents that they have no or minimal debt wheras you will graduate with full tuition fees/loan debts).
and yeah, i know, you (the reader) went to uni, parents not rich etc etc; still, the ratio of working class kid who go uni is ridiculously low (there was a bbc article with the stats recently, cant find it now - google fail - here is an old one news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/4826924.stm).
so fuck it, maybe if the country hadn't had 30 years of asset stripping, the social enginering of thatcher, outsourcing, etc etc and there were opportunities for the workng class poor to do something better with their lives perhaps this problem would have lessened.
Also, finally, we are drinking less now than 10 years ago (source - again the fucking beeb lol) so maybe this is on the decline as no fucker can afford it any more.
sorry for rant and length. well im not really sorry, just saying it. like when you were a kid and were forced to apologise to your sister for throwing her barbie doll down a drain in an "action man saves barbie" game gone wrong.
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Avast is still alive!!!!, Sat 5 Mar 2011, 20:21,
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There's no excuse for not being able to handle your drink
Although I agree with the main thrust of what you're saying, the Gin epidemic etc I know about, actually there was an interesting and only slightly rubbish arty exploration of the history of drinking culture in the UK on the telly not so long ago, stereotypical louts reading old accounts of situations not uncommon on our streets today
Point is, Im a student I know, I drink a hell of a lot and don't get into fights, and I bump into family who do the same and work in manual jobs who similarly dont get them selves into a fight every weekend, why should our nights out be ruined by fuckers who look for a fight after 2 shandies. Frankly if you cant drink without being able to control you're self you shouldn't be drinking at all.
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Jorvic, Sat 5 Mar 2011, 20:40,
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I have to disagree
I've now worked in the booze trade for almost fifteen years, and as a now pub manager I'll have to present the opposite case. I live and work
in east london and the twice I've been cut have been from men in suits. Those "factory" people want a beer. Mayhaps they also want to stab me, but they haven't ... yet. An annoyed/angry/frustrated/whatever bank fella caused the lovely long and often painful scar on my upper arm.
I'm not sure that your findings tally with mine.
(, Sat 5 Mar 2011, 20:50, Share, Reply)
Not quite
but this is the trade that I'm in, and I have less problems with those of the "wrong class" than those of the correct class.
(, Sat 5 Mar 2011, 21:14, Share, Reply)
I don't know.
Bankers are complete cunts and narcissists but chavs will occasionally throw bottles and bricks at your head.
couldn't say which one i feel is worse personally.
(, Sat 5 Mar 2011, 21:34, Share, Reply)
And yet bankers will always throw bricks at my head? The missus is one of them bankers and perhaps I lack the education to understand this catechism of violence, but, perhaps because of where I live they are failed bankers, but people in suits are who I fear. Those chavs will at least shake my hand.
(, Sat 5 Mar 2011, 21:57, Share, Reply)
you're friends with lots of bankers then?
(I mean, you know them personally?)
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JamTallons, Sat 5 Mar 2011, 23:04,
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Nope
nowt to do with class, being a cunt transcends class boundaries. Some people are cunts, some aren't, unfortunately it's the cunts that usually make the headlines for all the wrong reasons.
(, Thu 17 Mar 2011, 9:22, Share, Reply)
Fuck off!
I went to one of the worst schools in Britain that was on national news for being so shit at the time, in one of the shittest areas in the south east. I thought myself how to write computer software, and now I have fucking awesome job, and earn a fucking lot of money.
So what can they do? LEARN A FUCKING SKILL! And stop being a bunch of fucking animals, simple as that. Life isn't going to throw everything you want right onto your plate, you have to go get it, and it takes alot of hard work and dedication.
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Firkinfedup last shat on your wife's tits at, Sun 6 Mar 2011, 9:13,
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so you didn't have parnets who encouraged your ambitions or anyone else who supported you?
you just done it all by yourself, off your own back? edit. parnets... heh heh heh
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tickle I was away, Sun 6 Mar 2011, 10:14,
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sorry to nitpick, but ....
you mentioned "they" have shit jobs in factories so they want to go smash the world up, then talk about thatcher ruining everything by sending all the manufacturing jobs (i.e. shit repetitive jobs on factory lines) to other countries so they cant go to uni as there are no opportunities.
surely if all the manufacturing jobs were still there they would be in the exact same position doing the exact same thing.
(, Sun 6 Mar 2011, 10:27, Share, Reply)
I grew up in Lewisham
Spent 19 years of my life there, got into a couple of little scraps in a comprehensive school but that was it. Since then, I've never got into a fight, and it's not fucking difficult! A lot of the people I was in class with at the time have either spent time or are still in prison (murders in some cases), and some are dead (non-natural causes, I assure you), but what am I doing differently that I don't even get into punch-ups?
I walk down the stupid streets, I get drunk and run down the street with my trollied comrades, and I even end up in chip shops at 3am but never get into fights!
I don't care what your fucking background is, there's no excuse for this shit.
Although if the point you're trying to make is that kebab violence is not the fault of recent governments then I agree with you. If it isn't, then I might need to re-read your post a couple of times...
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Extinct Jesus Dossier "...I think it counteracts Hitler's magic...", Fri 11 Mar 2011, 20:26,
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I have to disagree.
I'm sure you're right in some cases, but I think you're generalising too much.
I grew up in a "deprived area" and a lot of my friends back there are the poorly-educated factory/call centre/supermarket workers you describe, doing crap jobs for crap money. Me too - I don't have a degree and I've never earned more than £14k. However on the whole, they don't tend to get into fights and most of them don't even go out drinking that often - why go out and pay through the nose for drinks and kebabs when you can get ten times as much booze (and some frozen pizzas) from Lidl for the same money? Yes, some of them are violent fuckwits, but it's a minority, and it's rarely the ones who would be considered the most unfortunate members of society.
Happily I've escaped to a nice middle-class area of the country.It's all very white-collar. Living here I've lost count of how many of pillars of the community brag about getting absolutely wasted on a weekly basis and vomiting all over a bar/kebab shop/hotel/whatever that they don't seem to realise some poor underpaid working-class oik will have to clear up. Or if they do, it's okay, because cleaners aren't Real People or something.
To summarise: an arsehole is an arsehole is an arsehole regardless of social class. And often it's those nice white-collars who have the means to be the bigger arseholes.
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Batsgirl, Sat 12 Mar 2011, 16:45,
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McJobs
I don't think university attendance has as much to do with class as it does from your parents putting value on education. My Dad's a truck driver... But he works bloody hard, and taught me to do the same. Both of my parents wanted me to go to uni, and I did. I didn't "not fit in", because there were people from all backgrounds there, an part of the experience is being able to get on with a wide variety of people.
So, when people say that working class kids can't go to uni, I think "bollocks". What they actually lack is an attitude that values education and values hard work. Unfortunately we have an ever widening underclass, who have never worked, who will never have these values.
(, Mon 14 Mar 2011, 8:30, Share, Reply)