to think that "middle class" has become a derogatory term

[hijk]

and actually, most people aren't actually part of any class, really, they are just individuals who make their own way in the world.

lol maybe, but you know their wives are driving 4x4s and look all polished in that moneyed way.....

stayingstill, how do you define yourself as working class, and why are you proud of it? Do you think less of people you think of as middle class, and why, and how do you define them?

I once posted on AIBU that I was cross that DH had used my White Company towels to clean his golf clubs with, and subsequently stained with grass mess.

This was accused of being the most middle class post ever. Not about the golf, but because I had White Company towels (I'd bought 2 bath sheets in the sale but the flaming got so bad I then pretended they'd been a wedding present and all my other towels were from Tesco).

I also lived near Hull and was considered eccentric because I didn't give my children Fruit Shoots (this was before they reformulated the mixture and took half the E numbers out). I wanted to say "I am not eccentric. I am Middle Clarse." But didn't dare.

Heels My point was that I do NOT call myself middle class - it is the others, I tells ya!

See middle class people wouldn't care about the towels, they wouldn't be keeping them for 'best' like working class people would.

I do tend to think that the idea of class is still inherent in our culture. However class is fluid and my own family history demonstrates that it is possible to move up and down even within a generation.

I would characterise myself as middle class and would never consider it as an insult but I wouldn't consider it an insult to call someone Working Class either. I think it's a cultural marker - there's no judgement implied (by me, others are less polite!)

I wasn't keeping them for best. I was using them for their proper purpose.

Which is why I got cross with DH for trashing them and turning them green.

Reading this reminds me of Reginald D Hunters observation that the British Class System is a way for white people to be racist to other white people.

I was born in a council house, rented at that point.
My Father was an engineer for the Post Office [ now BT]
My Mother cleaned and picked potatoes during the summer for money until we went to school.
We had egg and chips on a every Friday as that was all the food we had in the house.

I'm married to a tradesman and don't have a well paying job myself.

I don't knock anyone of any class and don't think less of anybody else either, I treat all people as they treat me, with respect. Why would I think less of anybody else because of their upbringing and lifestyle?

I simply don't consider myself middle class and never have.

it is true about the towels etc., my SM is working class by origin and it is all fussing about slippers and best towels in her house. Just so naff!

Class and money have nothing to do with each other.

I thought Grayson Perry's Channel 4 documentary Taste summed up really well the British notions of class and taste. The middle-class episode is clever. He talks to a nouveau-riche lady in a shiny new build house, a hipster type couple who have a house full of 'cool' collectables and a more established middle-class couple who have proper art and a scruffy big house.

www.channel4.com/programmes/in-the-best-possible-taste-grayson-perry/episode-guide

There are some very sensible, and nice people replying, thank you. I suppose I am looking for an answer and an explanation from some of the less pleasant, more anti-middle class snobby people, but they probably won't come and explain themselves!

There's nothing kept for best in this house.

The aristocracy would give you a towel they use to dry the dog with without batting an eyelid. Towel categorisation in a Monica from friends manner is lower class.

Basically, they all think they are 'middle-class' because of their taste.

Exactly, that's what in earn about nobody thinks they are working class any more.

Having White Company towels = middle class.
Referring to having White Company towels under any circumstance at all= not middle class.

HTH

ha that is true Hak.
Like when my bro drove a Maserati and insisted on referring to it as 'that red car over there'.

We use the term middle class to poke fun at things in Casa Wordfactory.

Middle class to us means a bit uptight, a bit rule-bound. The traditional middle classes can be quite funny, especially with their signifiers of class.

I categorise towels. If I get new ones only I get to use them for a while then I put them into general use. I have a separate towel for drying my hair and those are hair towels. That Friends episode sounds fun!

That is my point exactly, Hak - my mistake was to say White Company towels when I should have just said (on both threads) THE BRAND NEW TOWELS WHICH ONLY ARRIVED LAST WEEK AND HE'S TURNED THEM GREEN, THE BASTARD.

And that proves why I cannot take the middle classes seriously. How could there be a right or wrong way to describe towels ?

No wonder the MC has gone down the crapper.

We have "middle class salt" chez Hakluyt- it's the flaky Maldon type. Had a slight difference of opinion about which was the most middle class salt when dd brought some back from Poland she'd bought in the salt mine she'd sung madrigals in........

lol
Maldon sea salt deffo more middle class than the Polski stuff.