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Just feels so outdated now.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?

From a linguistic perspective…languages don't invent have words for concepts or things which don’t exist. It might suit the narrative of some people to prevent’chavs’ aren’t a thing but I think those people live very privileged and sheltered lives.

in my town there are middle class and working class areas/people and some horrible antisocial, petty criminal trouble-makers too. They definitely exist.

iWe lived next door to such a family once. They threatened all the neighbours with violence if their behaviour was questioned and the mum once went to our primary school and beat up the head teacher - a 60 year old woman. They were certainly not working class.

Sorry for baffling typos in that post…autocorrect 🫩

Leave the staffies out of it. We have a rescue staffie, are we middle class now? 🤣

I fear that this will no longer be the case hereafter!
You’re talking out of your arse op and trying wayyyy too hard. Give it a rest, is my advice.

I suppose calling women who are no longer in their twenties Karens is similar, in that it demonises a whole group. Chav is about class hatred, and Karen is about misogyny.

I thought roadmen was specifically for young Caribbean men who acted like this? Though obviously other kinds of men often act chavvy too.

I expect OJ lives in Hampstead or some equally rarefied enclave of middle class Marxists. Only in those places can you hold such beliefs.

My boss was a Hampstead leftie. A colleague’s partner said he’d come and accompany her home from a late work event in a dodgy area and he got called ‘a‘ridiculous High Tory’ for suggesting that this rough are might be dangerous late at night.

She’d never met a working class person never mind a chav!

The issue I think is with young people being branded chavs who were wearing certain kinds of clothing but not doing anything criminal/antisocial. I think the OP's article link had a point that some were unfairly labelled as antisocial just because of clothing.

But clearly there was an antisocial/criminal/wilful unemployment problem, that wasn't a media creation. And there still is...

I believe

Chavs definitely existed in the 2000s, they were the ones harassing Goths, Emos and Metalheads.

As a working class Goth who was at secondary school in the 2000s, they made my school life a misery. I'd also argue that the fuckwits who beat Sophie Lancaster until she fell into a coma which she never woke up from were certainly chavvy scumbags.

Apology if already been said but Chav comes from the Romany word Chavo meaning youth.

I'm not convinced that most bad behaviour does come from poorer people so much as poorer people's bad behaviour is more visible : ASBO-style as you say. Whereas wealthy illegal/immoral behaviour is easier to cover up : see the Epstein ring, or wilful corporate negligence.

OP you really are so stubborn, obviously you think you know better than everyone on here, and yes we are right, we all know what chav means and who they are.
Just because some chap in Cambridge has spouted a load of twaddle denying a known fact doesn’t make it go away … surely you have the intelligence to see that!

Sophie Lancaster was killed by evil, feral teenagers, not "chavs". It's like saying someone was killed by mythical "demons" rather than very real, evil people. I'm sure Sophie wouldn't have been cool with classism herself.

😂

That’s not we are saying about Chavs. We are saying it’s an anti social behaviour. If you met someone who wasn’t anti social then they are not a chav. That lad came up on a chav gif.

The OP might know lots of lovely people who wear tracksuits but that's not what cahv describes. Chavs are the antisocial, intimidating groups that upset her friend.
I'm not sure what the working class obsession here is. Most chavs I see hanging around don't appear to work.

If there are any Boondocks fans on this thread, I'd argue that the kind of 2000s gangster rap-influenced blingy lifestyle that a lot of the episodes satirised was a US version of this. I suppose there's parallels everywhere.

"Chav" is derogatory term, I thought, and I don'tuse it myself. But I have to say, I didn't think it was was a slur on the working class.

I thought it referred to the stereotype of nouveau riche who lived in Essex and wore head-to-toe burberry.

#MissesPointEntirely

My mother used to call them 'common'

The word may change but the concept endures.

Yeah, you missed where I said I'm working class (not even working at the moment, I'm a single mum on UC living in social housing.) I can still say other people in my socio economic bracket are a bit shit.

One of my mates has some awful neighbours who she refers to as "the chavs next door" and I would not disagree. They appear not to work, they make endless noise, get drunk, fight, the police are frequent visitors garden is full of semi-disassembled cars, they are up til around 5am in the summer, yelling and playing loud music and any requests to turn it down is met with abuse and threats The other people on the street are scared of them

I think that was a valid criticism of the term at the time : that poorer teens were being demonised just because of the clothes they wore.

Bit at the same time, there was and is a genuine problem of 'chavvy' antisocial behaviour, crime etc

No, she was definitely killed by chavs.

I don’t think the term chavs has ever referred to the majority of working class people. It’s a particular set of non working people, so actually i wouldn’t even classify them as working class. They definitely still exist. Spend an afternoon in Piccadilly Gardens in Manchester or other similar city centre spots and you’ll soon spot them. The normal working class people give them a wide berth.