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AIBU?

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Original poster

to think everyone needs to read the book "chavs" by owen jones

167 replies

GaryShitpeas · 30/03/2015 13:29

well.... everyone earning less than about 50k. ...or if you weren't born into money... if you identify as working class, if you live in social housing, if you don't own your home, if you are on any or have ever been on benefits...if any of those apply then you need to read this to see how much we are all getting screwed by those at the top.....It made me so angry ......i knew things were shit and getting shitter but my god it has opened my eyes even more....I couldn't put it down over the weekend and was sat ignoring everyone while reading it with my face like this --> Shock and Angry

it has also made me want to become properly politically active because the only way things will change is if "people like us" stand up and shout LOUD

I will NEVER use the word chav again

OP posts:
Thetruthshallmakeyefret · 30/03/2015 20:52

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

PeriodMath · 31/03/2015 01:36

I've seen him on BBC 24 the last two evenings as an election pundit.

I'd never heard of him till then. Is he very young? Seems so. Also appears to be carting a bit of a chip around with him.

I count imagine reading a book by him.

squoosh · 31/03/2015 01:47

Have never heard of the 'cotton ceiling' or the 'female penis' before. You can have a penis and live as a female and good luck to you, but there is no such thing as a female penis. Sounds like a group of men dictating to women to me. How unrefreshing.

Does this mean I'm transphobic?

WitchesGlove · 31/03/2015 02:14

YABU

It's not money or taste in clothes/music that make someone a chav, it's an attitude and behaviour.

Hanging around street corners, having loud drunken arguments, blaring out loud music, keeping a few aggressive dogs- these are entirely choices people make, being unemployed doesn't make someone do these things, nor does being poorly educated, just have a look at other countries with even worse economies to see that.

ApplePaltrow · 31/03/2015 05:08

Yeah, Owen Jones actually didn't say any of that. God, are people just liars or what?

He wrote an article and in it stated that trans women are women. Someone tweeted to him saying that if you say trans women are women then you basically are saying that lesbians have to sleep with them. Surprise: Cotton ceiling. He said: wait, I don't think that because consent! You don't have to sleep with anyone you don't want to! But he wouldn't back down that trans women aren't women. In response people went nuts calling him a misogynist and anti-lesbian. Asking him about his sex life. Calling him pro rape. Was crazy.

ApplePaltrow · 31/03/2015 05:13

He never endorsed the cotton ceiling. The article was about stonewall ffs. I usually think the pro trans people are crazier but the radfem contingent had a decent showing of absolute nut jobs on Twitter imo.

Owen jones is fairly solid on class and I think it's ridiculous that a conversation that affects everyone is being derailed by an internal who he between radfems and trans activists. It's prob 1% of the entire population: who even cares. I feel like suddenly all anyone does is talk about trans issues. Is anyone just a bit bored of this group's agenda being at the centre of every conversation?

ApplePaltrow · 31/03/2015 05:15

Also why the fuck is everyone taking someone else's word on the issue. At least be bothered to look up the argument on Twitter/guardian rather than rely on a 2nd hand account after the fact. Lazy, much?

MarshmallowFluff · 31/03/2015 05:38

Chavs is a great book. Lynsey Hanley (sp?) also wrote a very good book about housing policy and the working classes that everyone should read.

Certain trans women have coined a phrase 'the cotton ceiling' to describe the difficulty that they have in getting lesbians to see them as viable sexual partners. Many of these trans women have penises which they claim to be female organs, thereby making lesbians trans phobic for refusing to consider them as sexual partners.
Owen jones was supporting this cotton ceiling notion on twitter, and he was asked whether he would perform cunnilingus on the vagina of a trans man and he responded with utter disgust. Hypocrisy and double standards abounded.

Huh? The vagina of a transwoman = a penis then?

And Owen Jones didn't want to suck a penis and is therefore unspeakable?

Or 'Many of these trans women have penises which they claim to be female organs' but not in this case? Confused

MarshmallowFluff · 31/03/2015 05:40

Does anyone remember a book called Danzigers Britain by Nicholas Danziger about the "underclass" as he called it. It was written about 15 years ago & is an amazing book. Mr Danziger is a photographer & the book has some haunting photos in it.

Yes, I have it somewhere. Very bleak. I remember the lives of young lads described. Locked in terrible cycles ridiculously young.

Lucyloves101 · 31/03/2015 05:53

Yaddddnbu! An important read if you can stand to be furious, but much better than having your head in the sand!

WhereTheFuckIsMyFuckingCoat · 31/03/2015 06:51

No, marshmallowfluff, the vagina of a trans man = a vagina. Ie someone living as a man, but who has a vagina. He is a gay man, who was basically asked if he would perform oral sex on a 'male vagina'. It seems he didn't want to agree to that. For which he took flak apparently.

GoodbyeToAllOfThat · 31/03/2015 06:58

I can't bear Owen Jones but the "cotton ceiling" thing is much ado about nothing.

RedButtonhole · 31/03/2015 07:04

Chavs is a fantastic book, not something I would normally read but came across it by chance when looking for something else.

Inequality and the 1% by Danny Dorling is good too.

EmpressOfJurisfiction · 31/03/2015 07:07

Ehric, hang on... I followed the cotton ceiling debate on Twitter but I thought the transwomen involved would all be aiming to swop their penises for vaginas and wanted to be included sexually in the meantime. You're saying the "female penis" is meant to be a real, accepted & permanent thing as far as the transwomen arguing the cotton ceiling are concerned?

rubybleu · 31/03/2015 07:24

I thought Chavs was very poorly written. I have read Lynsey Hanleys book on housing and thought it very good but Owen Jones is a repetitive bore and one of the worst elements of the left - patronising, pat on the head 'they can't help it' about the poor. You don't have to be IDS but the Jones rhetoric is equally unhelpful.

nowwearefour · 31/03/2015 07:31

I always getting best book recommendations from mn! Thanks!

almahart · 31/03/2015 07:34

Lynsey Hanley's book is Estates, an Intimate History. It's very good

Thetruthshallmakeyefret · 31/03/2015 08:09

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Binkybix · 31/03/2015 08:27

apple calm down. Who's to say that I won't go and look it up now? My research might even be as extensive as looking it up on Twitter AND the Guardian if I'm feeling really investigative. But someone mentioned it and I asked about it. Big deal! It doesn't mean I wouldn't read his book, but you don't get to dictate what I find interesting or important.

MarshmallowFluff · 31/03/2015 08:28

No, marshmallowfluff, the vagina of a trans man = a vagina. Ie someone living as a man, but who has a vagina. He is a gay man, who was basically asked if he would perform oral sex on a 'male vagina'. It seems he didn't want to agree to that. For which he took flak apparently.

Sorry - I missed a page somehow.

That makes more sense. I thought he was gay. But, gosh, what a palaver.

MarshmallowFluff · 31/03/2015 08:33

Lynsey Hanley's book is Estates, an Intimate History. It's very good

Yes, that's it. Thanks Alma Smile

SleeplessinUlanBator · 31/03/2015 08:33

Danziger's Britain is indeed a very good book, if somewhat depressing and a huge departure from his previously uplifting travel writing.

I dont know why the Chav book around these parts is seen as some kind of witness of fact chronicling social injustice in Britain , its an appalling book and to the person up thread calling it Orwellian as if it is on par with The Road to Wigan Pier is just wrong on so many levels. Jones, along with his Guardian stable mates (Im looking at you Polly) make the (deliberate?) mistake of conflating the working class with the chav class when they are two utterly separate groups. 'Chav' does not equal 'working class', it's possible to be working class and not be a chav. In fact, it's the norm. Chav is an identity not a class, it's a look, its a feckless f*ck you attitude and lifestyle adopted by choice. Lumping in the hordes of unemployable, tracksuit wearing thugs, who bring misery on their communities and abuse the welfare state to the extent that genuine claimants have been unfairly demonised, with the working classes is an insult to the working classes. The working class may not have much money, but they will have jobs, or be looking for jobs, they'll have self-respect and respect for others, they'll be decent people. Jones and his ilk utterly fail to grasp this fact.

MarshmallowFluff · 31/03/2015 08:36

I think the question is who is doing the conflating Sleepless.

Since you mention Polly Toynbee, her book 'Hard Work' also belongs on this short reading list.

Flingmoo · 31/03/2015 08:50

I'm with WitchesGlove when it comes to the word "chav".

I agree it's offensive when middle class folk and toffs use it to refer to all working class people. But I think there is a place for the word. Where I grew up in the 90s and early 00s, everyone was broke but my family, and my friends' families have always been respectful of others, taught me not to shout in the street or dump litter etc, and they took me to museums and plays, read lots of books and did all sorts of nice activities, encouraged me at school etc. Meanwhile the people down the street behave antisocially, dumping trolleys in the street, kids kicking footballs at cars, wearing sportswear and copious amounts of naff gold and then these type of people claim they can't afford to give their kids books or new school uniform. And throughout my school life the same kids disrupted my education with their bad behaviour. I don't see why we shouldn't resent these people and call them chavs. They had the same means as us but choose to behave that way.

Flingmoo · 31/03/2015 08:53

Oops, grammar fail - sounds like I meant "everyone was broke but my family" - meant to say that everyone was broke, including my family, but while some people/families behave badly (chavs) others are doing their best within those means.