Aibu to think the Middle Class have a much nicer Christmas from the run up to the event itself?

It isn’t necessarily money. We’re MC and always have a packed December but many of the events are free or inexpensive. I’d never spend £100+ on seeing Santa and we avoid Christmas markets like the plague. We go to the local national trust Santa which is way more affordable and do things like watching a street nativity play, carol singing, illuminations, maybe a trip to the cinema, the Christmas tree farm is also a big event for us and just decorating, baking and enjoying the fun. A lot of it is also endless school and extracurricular Christmas events so it feels like it never ends.

I always thought that when I was growing up, the more 'working class' the family, the more festive they were. Like tons of decorations everywhere, massive tree, lights, excess of gifts, everything up on 1st Dec.

I guess maybe there weren't so many of those Winter Wonderland style places years ago. If there was something like that then you'd still go, but only be able to buy one treat. Now I think a hot chocolate is a tenner or more?
There used to be more free activities and stuff at Xmas I think.

The more posher families I know always seem a bit less christmassy. More understated.

Well, I’d say YANBU.
when my kids were little the children in their class with more money did tend to do more ( particularly things like Christmas panto )
my kids had the Argos catalogue - which they absolutely loved I must say

This is an awful POV. We are firmly working class and have a lovely build up to Christmas.

Duh. You think a story that begins with a family with someone who gives birth in a stable because they can’t find accommodation in a journey, then become refugees because a ruler institutes a genocide, and whose child grows up to be an itinerant preacher who hangs out with prostitutes and, tax collectors and other lowlife types, preaches in favour of poverty being a virtue, and who is executed as an incitor of rebellion isn’t about class?

Money make thing easier - with more money when kids were growing up would have done more pantomimes, theaters trips and markets ect than we did - so agree there.

However middle class is harder - more groups/activities all of who do Christmas events/parties I suppose - when my DC were doing a few of those I just found it stressful more stuff to buy things for and remember about though kids enjoyed it but years since they stopped doing things like that don't seem to miss them.

Sort of depends though some mc friends come from music/am dram/church more community minded backgrounds - so they have a historical family links to activities around this time of year- that's not just "middle class" but a certain section of it and they tend to get very busy.

Maybe the moment Mary and Joseph were able to drop their bags off at the stable, they used the down time during early labour to erect a display of outdoor lights with such gaudy working class abandon that the three wise men were in no doubt about their whereabouts but there was local mutterings about how they were jeopardising the house prices?

Great, another class thread. 🙄🍿

Not sure you understand the meaning behind Christmas if this is your take on advent, I don't recall any mention of class in the Nativity story. Perhaps you could enlighten us?

I'm middle class and we don't do anything at Xmas! Arguably, the more MC you are, the more understated you're likely to be. But this is where we have to add that class is nothing to do with money - what used to be called the "nouveau riche" are not MC (channelling my inner Jilly Cooper here!).

No. People who have emotionally healthy family dynamics are the only ones who have a good Chrismas and are the richest of all.

@Siskonot I don't think people really know what makes someone a certain class anyway.
Working Class.... Middle Class.... it's all nonsense.

Oh absolutely. In my WC household we don our rags each 1st of December and walk barefoot through the snow gazing in on all the wealthy people with their roaring fire, fat goose on the table and chubby cheeked children full of festive cheer. I spend my evenings hanging round victorian streets saying "Evening sir, spare a penny for a poor girl at Christmas?" to all the men with the white collar jobs. Then I go home to sew my eight children a rag doll between them by candlelight. This is despite the fact that we are a double income household with low outgoing and disposable cash.

I mean I never came across this mindset till mumsnet it's intresting so it's not even about money because an electrician can earn way more than an office worker. It's apparently about mindset and hobbies but why do they think liking the opera is so superior to liking to watch football?
I mean come on these people always act like they feel sorry for the "low class people too stupid to know which hobbies are appropriate to enjoy" I mean come on why is wine superior to beer? I don't even get it 😂

I think the OP meant the better off familis and not those living in poverty, being food bank dependant, not having enough coming in for a basic standard of living. Of course there are working class families who do well financially but I have yet to meet an actually poor middle class families (unless you count the poor souls who have to live on 60k per annum whose hardship the Guardian likes to write about ;-) )

Do they though, or does it just look good on Instagram?

Growing up my family would have been classed as “working class” but we weren’t poor. We were taken to Regent Street to see the Christmas lights and to Selfridges to choose a winter coat and have a hair cut. We ate out, theatre trips, the ballet and foreign holidays and this was the 70s. It’s about money not “class”

Surely you know the whole point is it gives people the opportunity to indulge fantasies about their own class credentials, with the added bonus of an audience.

@Siskonot yes but money doesn't always equal "middle class".

Look at me, wandering around the estate with a flask of hot lemon squash looking at the non existent door wreaths, standing outside the late night shop looking at the lights. Of course money makes a difference.

This. But then threads like this one give people an opportunity to tell all what class they are, as if it really matters!

Or like we used to- make paper chains from cut up old magazines. - free.

Make a door sized advent calendar with a roll of wallpaper, last year's Christmas cards and paint. Their best ever was Sonic Claus!

Many home made mince pies to feed hungry tummies.

Watching movies all snuggled on the sofa.

They are all 30-40 now and remember all of this very fondly.

Middle Class seems to mean everything from "sometimes buys hummus" to "David Cameron"

Is it nicer to be able to spend 100 a head on theatre tickets or not be able to afford your rent? Would you rather drink piss out of a rusty tin can or stroke a lovely dog beside a log fire? Who can possibly say!

Well I was exceedingly poor when my children were growing up, definitely not middle class, and we 'made the most' of Christmas.

That was someone’s garden!

Foraging is absolutely legal on commons and heaths as I said. It’s also fine in the countryside as long as you stick to paths, observe the countryside act and don’t take anything that has obviously been planted.

The rule is that you don’t take more than you can personally consume.

If you’re going to finger wag get your facts straight.