The Middle Classes
I will freely admit I have a chip on my shoulder about the middle classes. Perhaps it stems from growing up in a country where the English class system is quite irrelevant. However, since moving ten years ago to the land of afternoon teas and cricket on the green, I developed an intense dislike of the comfortably well-off.

It's the smug, right-on bubble of liberal organic veg buyers I hate the most. You know the sort - not a clue in the world: they have coffee in delis; they spend weekends in the West Country eating in bistros in charming little market towns; they call their children quaint old-fashioned names like "George", "Arthur", "Emily", and "Mabel"; and they listen to world music. Twats. I detest their cosy little circle where nothing bad ever happens, where they've never known what it's like to be dirt poor, where their destinies are a prescribed solid education, a 2:1 from a decent University and the unwaivering (financial and/or emotional) support of their loving parents.

Even more, I detest the fact that despite growing up in poverty in a family of alcoholics, with parents who left school at 16, in an area classified as socially deprived, I now fall into the higher tax bracket and had olive bread and houmous for lunch. I've turned into those fuckers by dint of education and lunch choices. Having said that, it wasn't any fun being working class either. At least I don't have to eat watery mince stew anymore.
( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:39, 40 replies)

Try being brought up with one side of the family that is middle-class and the other side that is working class.
My friends on the council estate where I lived thought I was posh and my posh family thought I was rough.
( girlinthehole, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:47, closed)

Aye, I think I can empathise a bit - I grew up in a Catholic area and went to a State (Protestant) school.
Double the prejudice! The only way it could have been worse was if I was foreign. Ahhh, tolerant Norn Iron.
( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:49, closed)

Fuck me, so true
i've just had to endure a bunch of these fuckers sitting outside Starbucks drinking a coffee held in both hands while they blow at the foam.

ARGHHHH DO SOME FCKING WORK LIKE THE REST OF US
( Victor Meldrew, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:48, closed)

My life in a nutshell.
Pretentious wankers. Saying that, I did get a 2:1 from a good uni, but I refuse to eat all the faux-Italian shite my labmates have for lunch from the faux-Italian restaurant on campus.
( Colonel Boris "...a desperate Buzzfeed imitation...", Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:50, closed)

I eat Faux-italian food.
But that's because I like it.
what's wrong with that?
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:53, closed)

As in they eat it to be seen eating it.
There are proper Italian restaurants nearby that are cheaper, but not so fashionable.
( Colonel Boris "...a desperate Buzzfeed imitation...", Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:58, closed)

In that case
silly them.

I'm not sure that's a class issue, more a lacking-common-sense issue.
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:01, closed)

Dunno, really.
Many of them really seem to aspire to be what they percieve as being comfortably middle class instead of just getting on with living and enjoying things.
( Colonel Boris "...a desperate Buzzfeed imitation...", Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:03, closed)

My mum's family
are like this, double-barrelled surname, all male members in the Armed Forces, Judiths and Barbaras and Williams etc.

My dad's side, though, were alcoholic Glaswegians from Goven, possibly the roughest area in the known world.

So I'm a halfway house sort of deal who likes a nice Merlot just a little bit too much.
( Kroney, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:52, closed)

Hmmm
if you have kids, which way of life would you rather bring them up in?

Middle class comfort or deprivation?
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:52, closed)

With more of a clue but with less of the cheap food.

( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:56, closed)

I dunno.
I fondly remember meals of brown watery mince and onions.

This may be because they are nicely separated from me in time.
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:58, closed)

I still eat that when I go home.
Mum does a bloody good job of it, especially when she can be arsed to do dumplings.
( Colonel Boris "...a desperate Buzzfeed imitation...", Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:59, closed)

BLEURGH!
My mother's talents must lie elsewhere...
( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:00, closed)

dumplings improve any stew-y foods
100% of fact.
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:00, closed)

^this.

( Colonel Boris "...a desperate Buzzfeed imitation...", Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:01, closed)

And how do you feel about middle class liberals who are poor?
Or is class purely dependant on wealth?

It always struck me as slightly bizarre that "salt of the earth" people would rail against "poshos" in the same sentence as talking about their latest skiing holiday. I wouldn't know, because despite having home counties accents my parents never could afford to take me on holiday. Not that i minded - i was quite happy.

Classists - truly the stupidest type of bigot there is.
( 100% Cock Raw like carrots., Thu 1 Apr 2010, 13:58, closed)

less stupid than racists and homophobes
You can choose/change your social class to some extent, after all.
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:00, closed)

Can you?
Remember that fucking evil witch on "The Apprentice" - the one with the cold, dead eyes?

She continuously referred to herself as "working class" whilst also talking about the various horses her dad had bought for her as a child.
( 100% Cock Raw like carrots., Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:09, closed)

I didn't watch it.
I was too busy wallowing in my middle class comfortable life of working reasonable hours for middling pay in a job I enjoy.
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:19, closed)

I love being a scientist.

( Colonel Boris "...a desperate Buzzfeed imitation...", Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:33, closed)

Me too
My job description is basically Batman.
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:35, closed)

Best conversation ever.

( Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:02, closed)

Yep.
I feel I should modify my above comment to denote thaat it's just the pretentious wanker-type I intensely dislike.
( Colonel Boris "...a desperate Buzzfeed imitation...", Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:01, closed)

Fair enough.
It's a tad annoying that people assume that because of your accent and the fact you care about social issues you are just like Viz's "Modern Parents".

It's possible to enunciate clearly, whilst voting Green and sorting my recycling, without also being a pretentious wanker about issues that don't really matter at all.
( 100% Cock Raw like carrots., Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:07, closed)

I'm not English, I don't really know what class is based on so my categorisation may be misled
but it does appear to be income and employment-related.
( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:02, closed)

It's very blurry these days and increasingly irrelevant.
I'd say it's more nowadays about money than being born into a class.
( Colonel Boris "...a desperate Buzzfeed imitation...", Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:04, closed)

I think it's more related to what preoccupies a person.
If you're constantly worried about money, crime and disease you're middle class.

If you're worried about yourself because those things are all around where you live, you're probably poverty stricken.

If you don't give a flying fuck about anything at all and do whatever you want and get away with it without the slightest problems, you're upper class.
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:05, closed)

Cor!
I seem to have become upper class without noticing. Go me!
(davywavy, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:06, closed)

I say!
well done. Let's go shoot some proles.
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:08, closed)

Quite so, old bean.
What what.
( 100% Cock Raw like carrots., Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:12, closed)

I say, me too
pip pip!
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:15, closed)

Ah, the difference between owning a Banksy,
queuing for 3 hours to see the Banksy exhibtion, or living in Stokes Croft with a Banksy on your gable wall.
( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:07, closed)

True true...
Although alot of the people who live in Stokes Croft are the worst of this type - This pointless no Tesco fiasco being a perfect example..
(Burt Burt, Tue 6 Apr 2010, 13:38, closed)

What if you're somewhere in the middle ground between garden suburbs and council estates?
I'm from a small mining town; while it was hardly Chelsea, it was quiet and generally crime-free, bar the odd post-pub fight on a Saturday. The gap between rich and poor there is nowhere near as great as it is in a city, so the gaps between social divisions are less clear. Apart from the handful of thieving cunts and vandals, they're scumbags.
( The Mock TurtIe ™ --- Thinks you are a cunt, on, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 18:33, closed)

Your values and outlook on life play a significant part too, more so than money.
For instance, I work in a factory, have no real desire to ever get married or own a house, and go to the pub with friends rather than invite them to dinner-parties. I have a noticeable regional accent, swear a fair bit, and I don't adore France and all things French. Yet I have a 1st from a university ranked second only to Cambridge for that particular subject. In society, I sit somewhere in the grey area between these totally dissimilar cultures.
( The Mock TurtIe ™ --- Thinks you are a cunt, on, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 18:47, closed)

Not the stupidest,
Just equally stupid to all the others.
( Zuowan, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 14:05, closed)

I sympathize
I go to a university not famed for its working-class intake, and I lie awake at nights fearing I'll turn into one of "them". My West Country accent has been scoured off over the past few years, I eat dinner later than 6 and I pronounce French correctly. My family think I'm a posh weirdo and my university friends think it's odd that I don't go skiing every holiday or own a boat.

You can't win, can you?
( Pretender, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 19:28, closed)

The culture gap between home and university was so great I found the latter incomprehensible.
I spent a lot of time smiling, nodding and desperately hoping there wasn't going to be a test at the end.
( The Mock TurtIe ™ --- Thinks you are a cunt, on, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 20:29, closed)

Safety Net
What sets those people apart is the safety net... If your parents have enough money and they make it clear that they'll be there for you financially, you can be incredibly relaxed about the stuff that worries everyone else. Some people seem to have to then become obsessed with very trivial stuff.

What if you're posh but poor, though?
( Ennui loves you, Sun 4 Apr 2010, 22:15, closed)