Tricky, yes I think it’s a worldview or cultural or values difference.
My parents still remain suspicious of those in authority as if they are out to get them. They avoid conversation with them if possible. They can be deferential to people like bank managers or doctors or a bit aggressive. Being a bit aggressive is the response to not feeling comfortable or knowing how to communicate clearly. They think people are out to prove them as sun-standard in some way, or to take money from them unnecessarily.
They too aren’t interested in helping others or bigger picture in politics or any area of life. It is very much about them and them getting on. Often their ideas are pretty contradictory. They are suspicious of ‘do-gooders’ rather than seeing any value in the efforts people out into helping their communities, and are suspicious that somehow it’s all for their own gain anyway. They are also suspicious of those who succeed, especially if they are from their kind of background...don’t like them rising up and always feel that they are then being looked down on by people who are in their roots the same as them and how no right to be doing better.
They aren’t socially confident, especially amongst people they don’t know or from a different background. They find making conversation a bit tricky and can’t understand why people want to talk about things like travel or politics or art or ideas, because they aren’t interested in them. Their conversation is very much about things they have been doing.
When I was a teenager, before I left school, I met some kids not from my school via some enrichment type courses I went on and a couple of activities I had somehow found myself involved with. When I went to their houses, which weren’t necessarily any bigger than ours, I found things were just quite different in middle class households. There were conversations about ideas, which we never had. There was a real interest shown in me and pleasure in any successes I was having. The thing I found most different was their general expectation that people were good and would respond positively to them, rather than a fear that people would be critical or negative about them. They expected to accepted, rather than expecting to be treated as if they didn’t belong somewhere. It was a real eye-opener and something I couldn’t put my finger in really for a number of years.
Today, my mum can still get cross when she is with people from middle class backgrounds and careers (now all retired) and often says she feels she’s spoken down to or not listened to. I think she imagines it, plus the reality is she isn’t confident to actually say very much, so there isn’t a case of her not being listened to. She is hypersensitive to anyone expressing a different view to her and she’s it as critical of her rather than people engaging in discussion. Again, I think that’s a class thing.
I think you still see much of this stuff amongst teenagers today too. The middle class teens are confident of their place in the world and expect to be accepted. Some would call it entitled. The working class kids don’t have that expectation but loads more self doubt. They have self doubt about the GCSEs and A Levels they should do, if they should go to uni and which ones they will fit into or not fit into, and are less confident to move away from home and start lives without a close community of friends and family.