Are you middle class or not, the Allegra McEverdy test

[Teatime55]

In the frankly bizarre Guardian article today, Jack Monroe says she didn’t realise she was working class until she met Allegra. (I think shes trying to defend her WC credentials).

So Allegra went to St Paul’s, her dad went to Harrow and Oxford, and was a psychiatrist etc. Dhe built a business that sold for millions.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegra_McEvedy

Anyway compared to Allegra I am definitely working class, are you?

My dad drove an Austin Allegra in about 1973. It was the only car in the village and we had to give lifts to people to take them to the doctor or to the library in the local market town. We thought we were middle class, but the local farmer drove down to church that weekend in a midnight blue Volvo estate. He paid rent to the landlord, who arrived in a Range Rover.

It was clear to me then, class is very much steeped in history. And sometimes brandy.

I think you are getting a hard time on this post OP! The comments about class by JM are utterly stupid.

Allegra is clearly upper middle to upper class. JM is lower middle to middle class. It’s really not that difficult. JM loves to pretend she’s working class though because it’s what her career hinges on. She doesn’t fit in with Allegra’s circle because she’s an insecure idiot, not because of her class.

If I were Allegra I’d be furious at her painting me and my friends as poshos who can’t relate to anyone who didn’t go to boarding school and doesn’t know how to ski, rather than the complex and intelligent people they no doubt are (because most people are complex and intelligent outside of JM’s fantasy world).

This is so funny. I grew up not too far from Jack and was definitely working class. My dad didn’t inherit significant wealth and a rental property empire. I didn’t have ballet lessons and grammar school wasn’t even mentioned, even though I was academically able (the closest grammar being the one Jack went to).

Jack is clearly not even close to working class. But one thing is clear, which is she will adopt pretty much ANY marginalised identity for clout.

It’s nice other people get it.

Im probably one of those floating classes now where I don’t belong somewhere specific.

My dad (was very WC, but went to grammar school and uni) always said to him class was defined by your expectations for your children. Not just that they do better than you, say to be the first to go to uni, but it was expected without saying it. PIL for instance hated that DH stayed on at school and went to uni etc. they expected he should have gotten a ‘proper job’ and stop wanting more.

Jack is not a WC writer though, Dawn Foster was though. Jack had all the opportunities of any lower middle class child. Allegra being upper working class doesn’t knock her down a class at all.