Why should going to Eton make you less part of 'real life'?

That quote shocked me as well Claire.

I'd take Eton over Kirkaldy High any day.

LOL at Claire's quote. Did he really say that?

I'm worried by senior politicans (of any party) who can't comprehend the powerlessness that comes with multi-factorial poverty (lack of money, poor education, poor diet, few resources, lack of a support network, health problems, etc etc). It's one thing to know about these things in an academic sense, but if you have known real people in these situations, you're much more likely to appreciate how trapped many people are. Whereas if such people are just statistics to you, you're more likely to think that they should jolly well pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

Teehee SallyJayGorce. Anyone else done it with an Old Etonian (or David Cameron for that matter)?

"The papers keep writing that [my wife, Samantha] comes from a very blue-blooded background", but "she is actually very unconventional. She went to a day school."

I think that sums it up. It isn't the privilege it's the lack of comprehension of just how privileged he is. I mean does he really think not going to a boarding school is unconventional. Does he not have any friends in his group who went to state school for example?

Am arfing that you lump sending your children to state schools with getting cancer and becoming an alkie

But you could argue we don't need our politicians to be understanding of everyone's situation - being well educated may make a better politician than being empathetic. I'm not saying this is true btw and you can be well educated at any school provided you have the brains in the first place.

I don't think it does, my dd almost went to a public school but she would have still been very real and we ceratinly are. We are just a normal working class family who have first hand experience of living on benefits, divorce and poor health .

But I suppose if you come from a family who have been educated at Eton for centuries then you could be said to be our if touch. Despite my hairy socialist ways I dated quite a few public school boys and many of them did not have a clue what normal life was like .

But I suppose that you could also sAy that someone from a staunch working class background may not know much about life outside of their social circle.

I wouldn't vote or not vote for someone on the basis of where they went to school. Blair went to Fettes - not that different from Eton. Most top politicians went to Oxbridge. Singling Cameron out for the Eton connection doesn't make much sense.

However, I do think that it's entirely reasonable to point out that someone who attended Eton (or Fettes) and then Oxford is going to have had a powerfully skewed idea of what life is like for the vast majority of people, unless they have worked very hard to correct their early conditioning.

I've had a couple of those but can't say they were that enjoyable. Still, at least you had something to read.

I once enjoyed a one-night stand with an Old Etonian . In the morning I put my hand down the side of the bed and pulled out ... a copy of Gun Dogs Quarterly