to think that MN is descending into class war?

[Hullygully]

Today I have read a comment that someone's potential home looks like "a council house on a sink estate," seen a debate about "chav fashion," vile comments about "Poor Kids" etc and seen numerous threads over the past few days where people fight to gang up together against the infesting lower orders with their bad grammar, poor articulation, txt spk and poor spelling.

WTF people?

It is snobbery. Nothing else.

When i was made redundant i was searching for a new profession and it came to my attention you have to have a degree to be a youth worker now

Yy, Cory, that's what I'm seeing (but again, outsider, not necessarily the best informed). People are scared about their own situations, and they're being told that The Reason The Country Is In A Mess is the benefits system - whether DLA or JSA or whatever's being cut this week - and swallowing it.

Good point about reality shows, etc., but am I really the only one who thinks there's been a shift in discourse over the last year that's more noticeable than the creep over the last decade? I think both exist, one on top of another.

I'm with Pag.

I've seen plenty of posters who set themselves up as the guardian's of morality and wear their left wing credentials very publicly...yet at the first sniff of a person with right wing sensibilities, the claws are out. We get comments on the grammar (despite the fact that said poster may not have english as a first language or have LDs or be uneducated).

I actually saw someone say on another thread that another poster had nothig valid to say about higher education because she was clearly uneducated and 'couldn't string a sentence together.'

It's just a more MNish way of calling someone a chav.

They will defend the poor, the vulnerable and the uneducated...but not if they've got a mind of their own.

I think social aspiration has become solely about having ostentatious wealth. Being flash used to be considered gauche and vulgar. It is almost impossible to be vulgar. Thus the measure by which we judge others has become massively, almost exclusively focussed upon what you own.

Used to be people sought status in their job and respectability. A teacher or the local shop keeper was a great thing to be. Now you are a mug unless you have a fuck off car and boing.
Girls want to be lap dancers. Money and looks are the only aspiration.

Boing?

Bling.

Tortoise. I agree about it worsening. I just don't agree with those suggesting it is a new phenomena. I have seen that on multiple threads

I would also say that some of the unpalatable things that get said on MN are just what people at large are saying.

In the fluffy bubble of middle class intellegencia, these views are never spoken, but out there in the real world they are.

I have been a Labour supporter all my life but I saw under GB a definite narrowing of the core of power...one that ingnored the views of ordinary WC people, because inconveniently much of the WC is not happy about immigration policy, Is not happy about europe, is not happy about benefit fraudsters...

the furore when GB met that lady on a walk about and she asked some awkward yet typical questions...and he called her a biggot.

I think the aspirational element has caused this. It is like the itv/BBC version of MC is what we should all aspire to. You are what you are. You can't buy yourself into an acceptable class with the right coat or house and why wouldyou want to. It is generally those who think they have climbed the class ladder who are terrified and sneering of those they see as less socially ambitious than themselves. I have this from both sides in my family and it is hilarious really. The snobby ones have the least class but just can,t see it. Makes for some great family get togethers

Im proud to be a Chav from a sink estate

Been called a chav on here loads. I think one was for going to Park resorts

By the way, in the NE Chavs are Charvas

Fur coat, no knickers as my mother would say noddy.

noddy - that's just MC snobbery...it doesn't matter how hard you try or how well you do you will never be one of us. You just don't have the class.

Maybe it was always out there, but we didn't see it in its blatant glory because we didn't have MN and other fora (slips in educated plural there, nice signifier), to make it so apparent. Much as people sigh and say fings have got so much worse (re violence etc) merely because we see/hear about it so much more in the world wide webmeedjanet.

What a great name: WebMeedJanet

I don,t know I think the ones I know are working class who have made something of themselves (their words) and now look down on anyone who hasn't reached their dizzy heights. They equate their new found status with money I think.

saggar listen to what your're saying.

You're perfectly happy to defend the poor as long as they stay poor.

Once WC people start getting a bit of brass, they're nouveau. They just don't have the right way of dressing or speaking or whatever...

pure snobbery.

And I think Paggy's right re reality shows etc. I don't watch them (except MIC of course...), so maybe not aware of impact, but yes, a general coarsening of approach.

noddy better they all stayed poor eh?

As I say the MC are perfectly happy to defend the poor as long as they know their place.

I agree with so much that has been said here that it would take too long to mention every poster/analysis.

To add to what has been described already I feel that the anonymity of internet forums contributes to some of the worst behaviour here. Thoughts and attitudes which might only be shared with likeminded people or even held privately burst into public viewing without the usual self-censorship. And sometimes leads to quite disinhibited, attention seeking which doesn't generally occur in RL.

I think a frightening mob mentality can develop quite quickly in the speed of the communication and a wish to be accepted.

Yesterday, I was attacked by a poster when using a different username. I was surprised how hurt I felt. On reflection that was what was intended and it possibly served to check the above behaviours. It's self-preservation to move away from anonymous strangers who assault one's sense of wellbeing.

Thank you for starting this thread, hullygully. I think it's very pertinent and so far has on the whole been thoughtful and measured.

Ps I agree with the poster about anti-textspeak being ageist - I imagine that the average age of the text writers are is much younger than most MN users. They are often re-buffed 'with how old are you?' comments. The young threatening the old's sense of security has been around for aeons!

Cuntardo

You could plug your laptop and fryer in here but I think you'd find it a little basic

Absolutely not better they stayed poor but better they stayed decent. The acquisition of money should,t turn you into a complete loon.

What I don't understand (vair old hippy) is WHY people don't want to love each other and make the world a better place? Everyone would be happy. I know people say it's about insecurity etc, but how can we help them to realise how much happier they would be if they gave and received love?

Really interesting review of a new book titled "Chavs" in The Times last week.

Was writing about how the white working class are being demonised by the UC and MC elite and how it is seen as ok/cool/funny (i.e. Prince William using the term "Chav").

Made very eloquent arguments IMO. Its a fact that the WC are paying for the mistakes/negligence of the elite wrt the current financial crisis/recession.

Because then people go on about "do gooders" and "woolly liberals" Hully, they decide you can't possibly have any idea how the real world works if your not actively trying to make it shitter for everyone else.