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.

All that lovely post-war consensus flushed down the toilet, oh sorry, I mean loo. When we look back it will just be a tiddly blip of niceness in great long centuries of person eat person.

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...

Wordfactory, are you saying that it's snobby to disagree with right wing views because a lot of the working class is right wing? I agree that it's a bit off to pull somebody apart for their spelling and grammar but I don't think that disagreeing with somebody's right wing opinions makes you a snob.

Wordfactory -no - I'm not defending the poor as long as they stay poor at all. You assume I agree with my mother

Plus there are plenty of upper class tossers too.

I have seen some shocking posts on here recently - truly jaw-dropping, spiteful sneering and snobbery. The kind of post where you wait expectantly for the poster to come back with the punch line but it never comes and it gradually dawns upon you that the comment was completely serious.

I generally don't remember who posted what about who, but some recent comments have stuck in my mind and I won't be looking at those posters in the same way again.

Do people honestly value themselves according to the size of their bank balance or the number of bedrooms in their house, or the amount their husband earns? If I picked my friends on the basis of that sort of value system I would be hanging around with some true dick-heads.

There are so many trolls on here at the moment that MN is like a.giant bridge

I dont think people realise that people on our council estate call people Charvers. I thought it was more about a distinct look. Where i am a Charver wears Duck and Cover, Abbercrombe and Fitch or whatever IYSWIM and the girls look like TOWIE's .They used to be the youngins in Berghauses and Nike Airs with a cap. It evolves all the time

The UC and WC call anyone who lives on a council estate a charver.

E.G Somone with a wealthy husband, he leaves, hes been living the high life for years on credit for years. She ends up on a council estate. She would have to adapt pretty sharpish to her surroundings and would probably change to fit in. As do LC who marry into money.

Fifi - all that is fine, I don't care who lives where/does what etc, what I object to is people's lives being sneered at.

Chav, as used on here at least, is an acceptable word for scum.

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.

You've got to love the way "do gooder" is a put down in this country. "Bleeding heart" is another good one. I can't get my head around that really.

Yes Fanjo - get back behind your receptionist's desk, how dare you have an opinion.

Actually that's bad form.

Yy, how can it be possible to sneer at someone wishing to do good?

the right way of speaking dressing comment.... that is becuase being mc is something to aspire to.

there seems to be a vertical line with uc at the top mc in the middle and wc at the bottom and who wants to be at the bottom?

its like being last isn't it? no one WANTS to be last, no one wants to say that they are at the bottom of the pile.

so this is all to do with how the class structure is viewed. I see no problem at at in being wc with money - why not.

why does this have to be a vertical hierarchy? view it a different way - view it horizontally. I personally detest WC class aspirationalists - yes my own snobbery. becuase i thnik you should be proud of your class and your culture.

celia I think it is foolishly presumptious to assume you know best for the poor...which in a way is snobbery. I am middle class and educated therefore I must know what it is the poor and uneducated want.

I'm not saying you shouldn't challenge right wing views...you should...but not by belittleing the person who holds them or pulling class or education rank.

If someone says that they think many mickey mouse degrees are a waste of tax payers money...you don't challenge that by ridiculing that person's (lack of) education. Particularly if you've set yourself up as some sort of defender of the poor and uneducated.

Good grief, that house thread is revolting.

Saggar, yes sir, humble I be

Hully yes i agree i have seen it myself and been called a one. I knew what the poster was getting at.

The bad spelling and punctuation gripes are worse IMO. People cannot help how they have been educated and have basic language skills. The ones i have seen have desended into a class war of the educated and poorly educated.

Just because someone cannot put what they are trying to say into the correct text does not mean they are thick. I actually got sucked into one of these threads and thats what happens on here. I get the distinct impression PM's go back and forth saying have you seen this thick plank on here. There id definately a gang mentality at times

I don't give a shit about class and whose what or what they want to identify with etc. If we have the start point that everyone wants the best for themselves and their families, we shouldn't ridicule what ever that means for them, but we should discuss and debate and encourage thought and questioning amongst everyone.

Ah but cuntardo therein lies the rub.

Although the MC assume that everyone aspire to be just like them, the reality is that many WC people do not.

The idea that every WC kid who gets themselves out of the estates and on to university would want to to go on and live the MC dream is hilarious.

I think it's the success of "divide and rule" and it's happened because people are becoming resentful. There is a significant resentment between people who do not have much and people who have nothing at all. There has also been a significant problem with education: what should have lifted people out of ignorance is not doing so. It gives others the opportunity to laugh and point.

hmmmm, I always feel there is a lot more reverse-snobbery and middle-class bashing than anything else.

I haven't seen any of those nasty threads but I'm sure it is happening. But then more than a year ago I remember a very unpleasant piece of work where a woman asked for help in "learning" her children their letters because she hadn't been very well educated herself. She was jumped on with a bunch of nastiness and not by new nobends either.

There is a lot of reverse snobbery too.

All snobbery is horrid, but in my view inverse isn't as bad because it's all about redressing the imbalance of power. That does not mean, of course, that it shouldn't be rooted out and sent packing.

Yes, but I think that 'inverse snobbery' is an overused term which allows people to disregard others' very real opinions about certain hot topics. Just saying someone is an inverse snob with a chip on her shoulder is a well-worn tactic in arguments, but I see it as a way to disengage from or discount the issues which are being raised.