Friend still believes in "chavs"?

[waytoooldforthisshite]

Had a funny (well, slightly depressing) conversation today. my friend came round all flustered, telling me that she'd been "harassed by chavs" outside the shop. One was some teenager who asked for her number 🙄

Tried to explain that "chavs" aren't even real, it's a tabloid invented stereotype/myth from the early 2000s that was basically used to demonise working class people. But she just went on about it like she was quoting The Sun from 2004. I ended up showing her this article. She's 39.... and I expected her to know a bit better but what can ya do eh?

Just feels so outdated now. You don't really hear anyone say "chav" anymore (thankfully), and it's weird how those old class-based stereotypes still linger. I honestly felt like I'd timetravelled back to the Little Britain era 😂

Anyone else still know people who talk like that?

Went to a normal secondary school yes. And I'm working class myself for context.

Well said.

Chav is/was a term used to describe a type of person. Not a blanket term to describe the working class, despite what Owen Jones says!

I do know young people that do aspire to chav(ness). And not all of them are working class either. Idiots, you would call them!

Now, the “road man”, that’s another thread! I wonder what Jones has to say about that!

OP do you think goths exist?

They're badly behaved working class people, not "chavs". Bad behaviour can happen with every class.

Only after dark. You don’t see them often during the day.

Chavs aren’t “working class people”.

Chavs are the ones who make the daily lives of working class people an absolute misery.

Why are you so obsessed that chavs have to be working class? You are actually the one being classist.

your poor friend. You sound very hard work

What you described just sounds like naughty teenagers. Naughty teenagers exist in every class. Doesn't make them a mythical "chav" that only exists on paper.

We're there no big gold earrings ir burberry caps there? Because there was loads at my school and we called them chavs (whether they called themselves that or not) What on earth makes you think the term was invented by the middle classes? It was invented by teenagers in comprehensive schools

Her we call them Ned’s. Wee shites that knock about in balaclavas or face masks these days getting up to no good on large groups. The style has changed. I preferred the 2000’s version 😆

I grew up in what used to be known as the underclass. I self identified as scum rather than a chav as a teenager, but knew plenty of self described chavs. I believe that phrase, underclass, is also no longer considered acceptable, but it fit well. Maybe it should be out-class instead? We weren't part of a national society at all; we were a rowdy group with no respect for institutions of any kind, and very limited loyalty to anyone, including within the scum community.

We weren't working class, because most people didn't do legitimate work.... Maybe the odd bit of cash in hand, but mostly not. Genuinely, every single adult I knew was dealing drugs and/or on benefits long term and very openly. People would block the roads when Police came, so they couldn't drive through as a routine reaction to seeing the cars - social workers wouldn't come near us without police alongside. People would burn you out rather than phone the police; all crime was dealt with 'in house,' because prison wasn't seen as a proper punishment like torture was.

I think that's what people mean by 'chav.' It's a very different profile to a working class person in sportswear. I am confident it's a social group that existed, because I grew up in it. It's just a social group that has different names as time passes. It's the section of society who hates the rest of it, has no respect for it and lives outside any idea of respectability. I have dragged myself up to the giddy heights of working class and I'll not have my scum family included alongside me! It's a very different world.

Chav transcends class though. Scummy fuckers can come from any background. How do you know that the people the post is referring to are working class? Did you ask them all their income bracket and parents occupation?

Oiks
Ne'erdowells
Rapscallions
the list continues 🙂

@waytoooldforthisshite Tried to explain that "chavs" aren't even real,

Oh right. I guess all of the chavs who harass me and throw things at me in the street were all just a figment of my imagination then.

it's a tabloid invented stereotype/myth from the early 2000s that was basically used to demonise working class people.

Absolute nonsense.

Being a chav has absolutely nothing to do with being working class. The overwhelming majority of working class people are not chavs. Most chavs earn more money than I do.

Chavs are a cultural group, not a class. The culture is about wearing specific clothing, listening to dance music, and being as loud and obnoxious and bullying as possible. That's not a class thing.

No. It’s a subculture.

It incorporates fashion, music, food, behaviour, hobbies etc.

Look at the 'Fucking Fulfords'. They were right chavs. Upper class

I am from a council estate in the North East. There are most certainly “chavs” and “charvas” which my had subtly different meanings.

A chav twenty years ago was someone who wasn’t particularly pleasant to encounter, would hang around on the streets in a tracksuit smoking and drinking and being slightly intimidating.

I think today a chav is someone who holidays (or moves to) Dubai, or lives in a new build house kitted out in grey velvet.

A charva was a lovable rogue who was all the things a chav was (and more) but who had a good heart and was completely harmless, despite the beatboxing blasting from the speakers of a clapped out banger.

Really? My mum told me when I was ten that it was her who filled our stockings with knock off burberry caps and paco rabanne, and that the revving of vauxhall corsas and blasting of D&B we'd heard on Christmas eve had been my dad playing a tape. I was gutted. I'm trying to keep the magic alive for my own DC though.

Your friend might have an opinion about the people she saw being mythical.

Love this!!! 😂😂

🤣🤣🤣👌

Is this a troll post to see how many times OP can mention "Nessie" the lock ness monster in her replies?? It's the most random and odd comparison and it's given me some entertainment this afternoon 🤣

Also when I was a teenager at school in 2005 ish being a chav was everything and we all went out to dress specifically as chavs because it was cool at the time!

It has nothing to do with demonising the working class. It is demonising chavs. The overwhelming majority of working class people aren't chavs, and know how to behave.

I live in a deprived town in the SE...chavs are def still a thing!
Its just that chav isnt a trendy insult anymore.