Social Climbing and Kates family

[GabbyLoggon]

Kate Middletons family must be top of the league in respect of Social Climbing...

Lets make it more personal than royal

My Family? A big one, there are just 2 of us who were bone fide Social Climbers.

How are your tribe doing?

I assume the first step towards moving into a different class is by getting your kids in private prep school

How about social descenders? well, the author who wrote 1984, went to Eton and down the mines.

FFS, Gabby, don't you have something better to do?

Op Who gives a shit. It's who you are and what you do that's most important, actually.

DH and I are both privately educated but have noticed that an increading proportion of people locally sending their children privately are 'social climbers' and many people we thought would go privately are going for state schools. In fact, many of our privately educated friends are going for the state sector and many from the state sector are going privately.

Personally, I DETEST social climbers.

What's your definition of a social climber Mudandmayhem?

Stepmonster was terrible social climber (sadly always given away as being muck by her penchant for gold jewellry and lots of it!)

One of the funniest things I ever heard was her saying to Father (who was trying to convince her to agree that they should move to massive farm) 'I will not live anywhere that has a Cess Pit - I just couldn't live like that' Father replied totally sraight faced 'But you come from the Isle of Sheppey!!'

I think all social climbing terribly sad - one of my best friends has moved counties and started being a prize winning social climber, changed her accent, her circle of friends and started saying frightfully quite a lot - she was born and bred in a council house but all of a sudden has friends who I think are also social climbers as they aren't titled or anything or seriously seriously rich but act as though everyone else is below them - me included sadly as I have even been de facebooked by her!!

Alan Clark didn't say that about Michael Heseltime, iirc he quoted someone else who said that in his diaries.

Also, why knock Orwell? He was a v posh person who bothered to find out about the way the working classes lived their lives in order to understand their experience and write about it. He was honest about his upbringing and what it had done to his understanding of the way the world worked. He wrote about the amazing job miners did and emphasised just how much civilisation owed them and how little they were paid.

Yes, it was Michael Jobling who said that about Michael Hesiltine.

Tis all too much fuss and nonsense.

I withdrew from the class debate when one of the writers in The Times referred to the Middletons as lower-middle-class...

which would mean my children are chavs of the highest pedigree.

Pass the ketchup please...

What the hell is all this about hating "social climers"?

What is a social climber? Someone who dares to want to earn more money, live somewhere nicer, send their children to good school???
Oh I get it, if you are born in a coucil house, and maybe go to a shit school, do not have the cheek to want anyhting better for yourself or your DC. What a load of bollocks!!

Sorry about typos. Perhaps you can tell am a little bit miffed!!

oooh I only read the first page but I realised that the description of Orwell in Down and Out in Paris and London reminded me of something

...of course- Pulp's Common People!

He came from Henley had a thirst for know-ledge
Got a scholarship to Wellington Coll-ege

that's as far as Wikipedia got me and the scanning ain't great. Though if I get fed up with Children in Need I may be back to finish it off...

quickookbusy, I think wanting to earn more and have better home and education is not social climbing or how I define it.
I think of it more as trying to be 'in' with the right people, kissing ass to get ahead etc.

jonicomelately - I think a social climber is someone who is aspirational in an arrogant way, snubbing their roots and bragging way too much.

I know people who have done really well for themselves and manage to maintain friends from their old lives and to be well rounded people whilst having climbed a social notch or two. That is totally different.

One thing social climbers dont like to admit is when you are upwardly mobile you join anither class and leave your old one behind. (commonly referred to as your roots)

You cannot be manchester united and accrington stanley at the same time

Seriously Gabby you have ishooos. That's my only rationale for having a problem with two people who have come from an ordinary background and have worked hard to become multi-millionaires. Off the back of their money, they have been able to educate their children well, which has propelled their children into a different circle of friends. DH has pretty much an identical background to KM. I admire his parents for how well they have done in life.

The types that choose to send their kids to boarding public schools have got to e social climbers or aristocracy already.

Urm... really?

Dad got in to a grammar but had to travel a vast distance to do so. Did really well for himself and ended up being sent to India by his company. I hated it, parents marriage was messily ending and the schools were terrible. The company paid for my brother and I to go to a good boarding school in the UK instead.

So are we social climbers or did my parents just want what was best for me? Or should we have all returned to the UK to keep me happy?

On another note all this sneering at "class" is revolting. Kate's family worked hard and did well for themselves. Good for them and it's a shame there aren't more entrepreneurs like them creating jobs and money now that the public sector will shrink.

Good grief.

We have better social mobility in the UK than in some countries.

Also some people make mnoey but don't change class. Some people make no money but change class. The two aren't necessarily linked.
Some people are chameleon like - move to the US get a US accent. Others stay exactly as they were. I think it is partly personality too.

The term social climber is rather old fashioned and it is a denigratory term from the days when there was less class movement. It implies someone is putting out the doilies and referring in polite tones to the toilet or some other such thing they have convinced themselves is "posh" or U rather than non U or whatever. It is all just a game although some take it seriously.

Plenty of people move socially downwards too particularly in recessions.

I think it's quite indicative that people have to laff at others saying pardon or toilet or serviette or whatever in order to decide what class everyone's in. It just shows how murky it's got since the Mitfords etc.

beijingaling, I too went to boarding school!
NOT Public school though!

There is a difference between schools like Marlborough and other boarding schools, and also good Grammar type schools such as your father went to.
Some of these schools are just toff schools I'm afraid.
what school were you at?

Social climber = someone who denigrates the class that they came from, or tries to hide their origins, fawns at the class above them and sneers at those below.

Well worth ridiculing. And quite different from someone who has achieved something but isn't ashamed of their background.

No idea which camp the Middletons fall into. But it's true to say they didn't aim for their daughter to have a challenging career - Marlborough and St Andrews history of art are for your less intellectual posh gels who want to marry well (or the offspring of new money who want their gels to marry well).

FrameyMcFrame

Very true re boarding school and public schools. Sorry I should have realized when you said "boarding public school" that was what you meant.

My school, Benenden, I once was quite toffy (Princess Anne went there) but definitely didn't seem to be when I went there. There was a definite spectrum from girls like me who would never have been there without the company paying or scholarship or what have you to girls like the granddaughter of Mr Marks of Marks & Sparks fame plus the odd member of foreign royalty who tended to only be there because there mothers were old girls. In the middle was everyone else from girls whose parents scrimped and saved to give their daughters what they could to those who could give their daughters anything. Some girls were very insecure about their "standing" and were embarrassed about wearing "least years coat" but for the most part no one gave a toss. Far too self absorbed!

lol... what a thread hijack! Clearly I'm still too self absorbed!

sorry... last years coat. Baby brain.