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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To get irritated when people who wear expensive clothes sneer at those that don't?

167 replies

2015Queen · 06/01/2015 16:01

I just think it's so rude, snobby and nasty. We can't all afford designer and high end clothing, and it doesn't make someone a total scumbag if they choose to/have to wear cheaper clothes.

DH's friend and his wife both wear designer and high end high street clothes, and dress their 3 year old daughter in the same way. Fair enough, that's their choice and they all always look nice. However it irritates me that they look down on others who don't dress as they do (such as me, DH and our kids!). It's little things like asking where an item DD is wearing is from and if we reply it's from Asda/Next/Tesco they pull a bit of a face and say how they would simply never shop there. They also make a big deal about how they would never shop in Primark as they think it's horrible and that they'd hate anyone to see them going in or coming out of there. They were also once totally disgusted when I said DS's trousers were from a charity shop, and one of them made a jokey gagging noise.

I also used to work with a woman a few years ago who referred to lots of high street shops as "common" and "disgusting" and made a huge thing about only shopping at places like Reiss, Selfridges, Karen Millen etc. She always talked about how great her wardrobe was and how she could never bring herself to shop in the shops that the rest of us shopped in.

These kinds of attitudes really bug me. It's just so nasty and unnecessary. By all means buy clothes wherever you want to and can afford to, but don't assume that anyone that doesn't go to the same places it beneath you!

OP posts:
bigbluestars · 08/01/2015 06:54

I know that people like this exist- I am more intererested as why you and OH would want them as friends?

MakeMeWarmThisWinter · 08/01/2015 19:19

Bogeyface - I disagree. The initial point of the OP was that it's horrible to be sneered at for not wearing expensive clothes. Around 2/3 of the posts on this thread contain insults aimed at people who do wear expensive clothes.

Eg. from just scanning back a few posts - it must be on credit card, it must be due to social anxiety, it's overpriced polyester anyway, it was probably made in sweatshops, that properly stylish people look good dressed cheaply, that properly rich people don't bother with expensive clothes, 'to mask deep insecurities or emptiness within themselves'.. the slurs are endless!

I am of the mind to live and let live, without sneering in either direction. Two wrongs don't make a right - can we not all just agree that it's twattish to judge people based on clothing choices?

MakeMeWarmThisWinter · 08/01/2015 19:23

Even 'I tend to despise people who wear designer clothes' as a single sentence comment wasn't picked up on as possibly a tad judgy perhaps.

I wear them when I can afford them and enjoy doing so. This thread has been an eye opener tbh - not many of my friends as as bothered about clothes and stuff as me, and I hate the idea that they're judging me for it.

TheLovelyBoots · 08/01/2015 19:29

I tend to agree with MakeMeWarm - discarding someone for spending money on clothes is as hollow a judgement as the OP's moronic friend would make. I've got a small army of Chanel bags and I would be hard-pressed to feel badly about it.

Kab13 · 08/01/2015 19:44

Think it depends what sort of wealth you come from.
My in laws are very much "new wealth" (I'm not saying everyone who has recently comes into money is like this but I have noticed a trend) and they are all about designer , constantly trying to get me and dh to wear designer, ohh how my mil loves to show off her money and yes she looks down on those who don't share the same values.
I also have a lot of old wealth friends, who come from generations of family with money, lots of and they really couldn't give a fuck about designers etc, they can also be pretty blunt/rude about the "prats" who are fooled into buying "expensive tat".
The richest guy I know resembles a tramp. Honestly .
Your friends (not really friends are they?) sound like dicks.
Ditch them.

MakeMeWarmThisWinter · 08/01/2015 20:05

I'm 'new money' - didn't have much growing up and now I do so I appreciate it. I love being able to impulse buy a designer handbag and carry it with pride. Sorry if that makes me tacky Hmm

People are so fucking classist on MN.

hmc · 08/01/2015 20:20

I'm new money too (am proud of that - it's funny when people are sniffy about new money - essentially it's just covetous sour grapes) and don't buy designer as I am not remotely interested in clothes......I don't care if other people choose to spend their money on designer stuff though. It seems that it is barely tolerable that people with newly acquired wealth exist, and perish the thought they should spend any of it Wink

hmc · 08/01/2015 20:23

Don't worry about people being classist Makemewarm - the lower middle classes are the main offenders and they are just petrified that you have leap frogged them. It's funny, no? Grin

Kab13 · 08/01/2015 20:36

Knew id get slated.
I did say not everyone's like that but noticed it's the case for many people who are "new money" that I know.

Nicknacky · 08/01/2015 20:36

monty you would dislike someone purely because they wore expensive clothes?

There is some horrible attitudes on this thread. Because people choose to spend their money the way they see fit seems to mean they are fair game for ridicule. It's like handbag, car, holiday threads etc. People who spend more than mumsnetters feel is necessary are subject to judgement.

Kab13 · 08/01/2015 20:42

Don't remember calling anyone tacky either.
For what it's worth when I've got the cash I splash it too & am very found of my new money friends and family as much as the ones who were born into wealth.

listsandbudgets · 08/01/2015 20:47

YANBU OP.

I know a lady who I've always assumed was very well off because of the way she dresses herself and her children. That was until I met her in a charity shop buying a dress for herself and a pile of clothes for her children. I don't think she spent more than £15 on the lot. I expressed surprise at finding here there saying jokingly "I thought Selfridges was more you than charity shop" and she said she always bought charity shop stuff as it was more interesting and you could get a unique look.

Her dress sense is completely exquisite.

FuckOffGerbil · 08/01/2015 20:50

Why are you friends with them?

Also what's the difference between charity shop and vintage

PhaedraIsMyName · 08/01/2015 22:33

I really like the irony of all these non- judgemental posters making distinctions between new money and old money.

I buy expensive clothes. I have a very cheap, very basic Freeview television. I don't have any cable or Sky packages or home movie systems. May I sneer at those of you who spend your money on them?

fuzzpig · 08/01/2015 22:40

It's nothing to do with the clothes they wear, it's their personality.

Yep, if it wasn't clothing it'd be something else...

PhaedraIsMyName · 08/01/2015 22:42

Vintage doesn't really mean anything but generally taken to be clothes which are at least 20 years old. They should also be obviously of the period.

Some charity shops sort out their better quality older clothing into a vintage section. Most vintage clothing is sold in specialist shops.

I don't buy from charity shops as I'm not interested in cheap, second hand modern clothes. I've got some stuff which is from vintage shops, my favourite is a little black 1960s cashmere coat with a fur collar which from Rokit in Covent Garden. It cost I think £100, so cheap for an exceptionally nice coat but not bargain basement.

Obviously for vintage Chanel etc you'll pay 100s.

MakeMeWarmThisWinter · 08/01/2015 23:03

I don't understand why 'new money' is an insult tbh. Is it better to have it handed to you on a plate, or to earn it? Why is it seen as better to act as though you don't have money, than to be visibly loving it?

Tangent, sorry.

JapaneseMargaret · 09/01/2015 07:42

New money, per se, isn't an insult.

It becomes easily insultable, however, when people behave in the way painted in the OP.

Bonsoir · 09/01/2015 17:32

"New money" can be a polite euphemism for "showing off bad taste"

Mrsjayy · 09/01/2015 17:36

New money new wealth its like fecking dowton abbey on here sometime s jesus !

FastWindow · 09/01/2015 17:43

Never confuse price and value.

PhaedraIsMyName · 09/01/2015 18:05

New money" can be a polite euphemism for "showing off bad taste" which is how it was being used on here.

Not like the real quality of real old money real toffs who don't care about such trivia (and are more usually more likely to be bashed on here for the way they made their money exploiting the poor in the last 2 centuries and holding on to it by clever tax schemes - but at least they're not showing off)

thatwouldbeanecumenicalmatter · 09/01/2015 18:07

I've worked in Fashion Design, unless you're buying couture or bespoke the rest is a 'much of a muchness' just with varying degrees of mark up - believe me you don't want to know how much of a mark up is added onto high end clothes!

Alibalibumblebee · 09/01/2015 18:16

I think it's the people you know. They sound awful.

I know someone who is designer label mad and thinks Michael Kors is the label to have. We recently had a holiday together as part of a group and he sneered at my watch because it wasn't desinger and not as nice as the one he's just bought his wife. The fact is my watch is very understated and was very expensive yet to him because it wasn't Michael Kors it was nothing I laughed that day when he said if I want something I get it - a Michael Kors watch if it's a watch and Heinz beans if it's beans.

That summed it up for meGrin

tobysmum77 · 09/01/2015 21:22

I have never come across this. tbh I'd pmsl at them. I could afford to buy more expensive clothes than I do but I choose not to.

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