To find the British "inverse snobbery"… weird?!?

[MillieV]

OK - first things first… I'm not a Brit, but have been here for over a dozen years. As an "international", I seem to not belong to any particular class. Hence, I'm not defined by the class system here, and I find it really weird how so many people think.

I mean… in all seriousness... I sometimes feel this place is some alternate universe ripe to be portrayed in the next dystopian novel, where one is meant to stay in their own class bubble, never moving anywhere else. In movies, it's always "snobbery" that's portrayed - rich people looking down on the poor. So I'm so surprised to have found that "inverse snobbery" exists. To be honest, this is the FIRST country I've ever encountered that in (and I've lived in many), below are just some of the symptoms:

• People not wanting to see other people better themselves (shock horror, how dare they?) - this one truly p*sses me off

• People saying things like they 'are a working class family with professional jobs'. Jeeez… what does that even mean?!? So what… your great-grandfather was a miner or something… and hence, you still define yourself as working class? Oh. My. God. How far back do you go? Middle Ages? Or back when the Neanderthal was still around?

• People never wanting to hear about a sport that's perceived as posh (and turn their noses up at any mention of them).

… and yes, don't even mention private schooling.

Can someone please tell a 'Non-Brit' why this is? What's this obsession about?!?

I don't really like the word 'bettering.' Better than who? Just because you have a nicer house or are educated doesn't mean that you are better than anyone. It doesn't even make you a better person than the person you were before if you decide to work hard, make more money or learn a new language. In my opinion, what makes people better than other people is how much of a genuinely nice person you are.

dozie, I don't think so . I think if you look at Indians and Chinese etc abroad and in the UK they are much keener on their children doing well at school that even typical UK middle class people like I am. I expect my children do well at school because of their inherited IQ and the type of family we are and their selective fee paying schools but that is just a small part of what I hope for them. i want them also to feel content, be fit and happy and lead fulfilling lives doing good and with interesting hobbies.

I don't think everyone is born with the same IQ by any means which is why and am pretty sure how children turn out is about 50% home and school environment and 50% genes.

Class is also partly about how you speak if you say going to or gonna, aitch or haitch, you was or you were etc etc

So can you summarise for a foreigner like me. You are telling that in the uk, you actually have 4 countries (England, wales, Scotland and Ireland) but they on the top of it, the way if being us doooo different between wc, mc and uc that you can't possibly mix, have similar interest/tooics if conversations etc??? So much so that regardless of the money you earn, you any possibly mix together??

Blimey. When I moved here, I though I moved to one country not 10 different ones that refuse to speak to each other.

1. If any of us go to Edinburgh or Glasgow we can usually tell who is middle class and who is not when we are there.

1. Being different classes does not prevent mixing or talking to each other. Most people of most classes are very polite in the UK and nice to others. The most important British rule of conduct is not to embarrass others and put others at your ease. That will be a rule most working class and middle class people follow in the UK.

1. Having a lot of money does not change your class although it can over several generations. Our class mobility here is much easier than in many countries. Eg it is a lot easier than under the Indian caste system.

1. Most of us don't take class differences too seriously anyway. Someone's intrinsic worth is not determined by what class they are in.

You can have similar interests and topics of conversation.

I'm not sure why some on here are saying you can't.

social mobility is worse here than pretty much the rest of europe

yay that it is better than developing nation, india although actually they have quotas to ensure a minimum number of state employees from the lowest social backgrounds, and of course we, or rather, the british ruling classes, entrenched their caste system

yourkids in German the phrase people would use, or at least the phrase my parents used, is "es besser haben" which translates into having a better, easier life, not being better. It doesn't contain a moral judgement and I take the English phrase along the same lines but I might be wrong for the English version.

Dawndonnaagain Well - I find it funny. Imagine a comedy sketch with two people stereotyping and "eye rolling" about how people who do insert random activities here are snobs. They don't care about whether they know people who do those activities or not. For some reason, they just know. They are sharing this wisdom - or rather lecturing - a third person... a foreigner, say, who of course, can't know anything about those so-called snobs. However, that foreigner actually happens to enjoy those very same activities they're talking about.

MillieMoodle That sounds very familiar. DH shared a bit of your DH's view when I met him. He and all his siblings went to uni. He has several degrees, in fact, and his dad went to freakin' Cambridge. I am trying to surgically remove that chip on hi shoulder, because I just find that attitude just ridiculous - I'm not going to have it! In fact, I think that could easily limit your career, if you stubbornly refuse to do certain things that you find "posh" - because someone else who doesn't care (someone international perhaps or someone who is "posh") will have no qualms doing so.

Mammuzza The best first step is to get out of the expat bubble if you can.
I married a Brit. So I've pretty much stepped out of that expat bubble. Hence, I noticed this stereotype in the first place! You can't get to know someone better than marrying them, adopting in-laws as new family, etc. And I'm sorry - I would never accept unfounded caste systems in any country… be it a national character, have a religious background or whatever. Many people think the Indian caste system is just inherently wrong. Do you think people should just bow to it because, hey, it forms part of the national character. Oh, and yes, re. Spain… not too great an example. Bull fighting is part of the "national character". Does it mean no one should challenge it?!?

I find it hard to like people who are obsessed with "bettering" themselves...

Why exactly, Mintyy? What's so bad about "bettering" yourself?!?

*I find it hilarious that people complain about only posh people getting the top jobs in politics, corporate world, etc. And yet, if there was a perfectly good person from a modest background who aspired to do those jobs, someone will hate them for wanting to "better" themselves. You just can't win..."

The only snobbery i have ever encountered is inverse snobbery. Never known anyone "posh" say awful things about those lower down the social ladder.

I encounter snobbery everyday on MN.

MillieV i really do hope i didn't actually give the impression that caste systems are a brilliant way to run a society more that, if you see it in that light, perhaps it helps to understand how people behave

the 'best' form of oppression is one that is internalised so you also police yourself.

sneering is less than useful

although i have to say, i really dont identify at all with this view of everyday people sneering at those who get top jobs but come from modest backgrounds.

the closest i can think of is parents who avoid bursaries for private school but that is because they dont want their kids being bullied for being poor, rather than inverse snobbery

sanfairy No you didn't. It's just that someone mentioned this is a "national characteristic" and made it seem that because of that, you shouldn't talk about it in a manner I do. But as I said… hey ho… I wouldn't just accept a caste system because it's part of a "national characteristic" or accept bull fighting for that matter.

I mean… really… there are lot of "national characteristics" that deserve to be broken, because we are no longer in Victorian times. And sometimes, it takes someone who isn't embedded in that structure to point out the stupidity of certain national characteristics to you.

There are plenty of people in the US who think that owning a gun is their god-given right. Again, could be part of a "national characteristic", but plenty of people don't hesitate to tell Americans it's a very big flaw.

What is the snobbery on MN, though? Is it not just people with different views? That doesn't mean they are right or better; just different.

There's a lot of intellectual snobbery on MN, although lately it's gone a bit quiet. Someone was purring on MN once that snobbery if it's intellectual is okay though. I think any kind of snobbery, whatever it is wrong. Infact it takes away from the person's supposed intellect.

Oh there's loads on mn. There's the whole "that name is common" thing and the wait rose vs iceland thing. That's just the really blatant stuff, there's loads more insidious snobbery.

No it's snobbery. Some people on MN are proud to be snobs and openly admit it.

'I'm a snob though' is written on many a thread.

I don't think it is exclusive to Britain. Unearned privilege (like private education) is met with resentment pretty much everywhere.

I'm shocked you seem to think this is normal? its a horrible flaw of human character. Why resentment? why not aspire for something better yourself? afterall if the good fortune came to these people in question, would they turn it down?

It is everyone's right to enjoy whatever opportunities given and providing whatever best for their children. However, it is no achievement of yours that your parents paid for your exclusive school? Does not make you "better".

DogCalledRudis

Is your resentment mainly to do with private education? Or anything bought with money?

What about kids who are tutored by smart parents on top of school? Those who come from a multicultural background and get to experience life abroad? Those who speak several languages because parents are multiilingual? Those who get taught by their parents that education and ambition is important? Those who have parents who have skills and pass on their skills? I can go on and on...

Parents do NOT have to be rich to cover the above examples. In fact, most likely, they are not, since these are actually common traits found in first generation immigrants… and it's very often the reason the kids from such families do well at school.

BUT you could argue that any kid educated at state school that benefits from any of the above would have a huge advantage compared to those whose parents don't do ANY of the above. Is this then 'unearned priviledge'?

I speak several languages, so my DCs could potentially be multilingual. I can teach my DCs the things you need to learn to have a career in my chosen profession. My DH has a science doctorate, and is pretty convinced that he can teach a 16-year-old the kind of stuff you learn in your first year at uni. He is also keen to get 7-year-old kids programming . So, you see, if we passed on our knowledge to our DCs, they would already have an advantage compared to many other kids, even if we didn't opt for private school.

If you think about it, many parents who send their kids to fee-paying schools often do so because both parents have careers. Not all of them are Lords of the Manor, you see. They are effectively just 'outsourcing' what you may otherwise do, if only one parent worked.

Oh, and yes, some kids may have benefitted in other ways. One mum may have drunk a lot of alcohol while pregnant. Or there's also just the simple case of genetics.

So… where do you want it to stop? Should parents adopt a laissez faire attitude, and not teach their kids anything at all? I would like to know how far we would have come in human evolution, if our early ancestors decided that was the fairest thing to do.

Maybe babies should be re-distributed at birth so that there would be more of an even playing field?

We are humans, and we're part of nature. We want our DCs to succeed. We try what's best for our children. And yes, it's a bit of a zero sum game where one may win and the other one may lose. But that's sort of the circle of life…

To add… if a child does well academically, and happens to have a Nobel-prize winning mum and an Oxbridge don as a father…

… would any academic achievement of that child be 'unearned' privilege in DogCalledRdis' book? Because theoretically, you could argue the child was born with a high IQ. He didn't earn it the hard way.

No wonder such kids often crumble from the weight of their parents' achievements. Because not only would it be difficult to top the achievements of the parents... in other people's eyes, any achievement gained by them would be 'unearned'.

I'm not from a country with a class system like that in the UK, but while at home do experience real inverse-snobbery against people with higher education. Some relatives of mine who don't have a university education talk about education as if having emotional intelligence and a degree are mutually exclusive, which of course they're not.

I see it as being a defensive thing though, so don't really mind.

Plus, the snobbery does go both ways.

I think one of the reason art, literature and theater isn't as popular among certain sectors of society is that the pretension surrounding these areas can put a lot of people off. If you're not a big reader, for example, all it takes is one person to scoff or roll their eyes when you say you thought the Da Vinci Code or Twilight was amazing to make you not want to talk to anyone else about it. I'll never forget how small I felt when I recommended a book to a friend (who I realise in retrospect was a painful snob) and she laughed and said she'd never read it because she'd seen too many people on the Tube reading it, so it was too popular, like that was a bad thing.

...when you have the sort if attitude like the ones described in the OP, like the ones I see around me, doors are closing not because if a lack of ambition or opportunities but because people can't even imagine it can happen. And people around them tell them they can't do it either.
It's nothing to do with how hard the life as a working class is or how many advantages the upper class has.
It has everything about the way you look at things.
[CarrotandStick]

I agree 100%. It's the self-limiting that goes on that I can't understand. I have relatives who emigrated from Ireland to England, worked hard, sent their children to private schools and on to great universities, and my cousins now have careers that many British-born people have told them they would consider 'above' them and their children, yet they come from a similar background to that of my relatives. My relatives were brought up to look everyone straight in the eye and to please themselves.

And I agree with Sanfairy that Britain has a caste system, not a class system. This is what distinguishes it from everywhere else.

The only time I think of class, actually, is when I visit wealthy parts of the Home Counties, or say Henley. Where braying tweedie types still exist and some areas where identikit yummy mummies are seen. But many yummy mummies were once busy professionals so their YM state is a passing thing.

Most other parts of the country are a mix, especially concerning young people, the dreadlocked 20 something could be any class.

And there are so many incomers, from so many countries, now living and established here.

Plus, if you are in the countryside people rub along in a mix of all levels of wealth and class and always have. My DB shoots, his fellow 'shooters' range from the landowner to the retired lorry driver.

Rich landowners do hang onto their land and thus their wealth, but then so would I in that position.