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

[GaryShitpeas]

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 --> and

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

apple no worries!

I just went to buy it but it's £6.64!! Is it worth it?

Casuallyvacant
Never done a day's graft and cushioned by money but feels the need to patronise the poor and tell them how to feel.

How is he 'cushioned by money', especially since you say he has 'never done a day's graft'? According to Wiki, his father worked for the local authority and was a senior trade union shop-steward, whilst his mum was an IT worker. He appears to have had a state education prior to Oxford.

UncertainSmile has also claimed he's never done a days work in his life. So he writes books, writes for newspapers, campaigns, commentates. What sort of work do you want him to do?

Haven't read the book. Will buy it, along with another book I've been meaning to buy - The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists (can't accuse that author of being privileged).

You can't compare Ragged Trousered Philanthropists to anything by Owen Jones! One is a timeless classic that will still be read in a hundred years. Guess which one.
Owen Jones has nothing original or interesting to say, it's all so predictable.

Owen Jones is just another North London Guardian type. It's pretty clear that the people he claims to champion are 'them' or 'those people' to him, just like they are to Saint toynbee.

He is emphatically not the new Orwell. Orwell could write, for one thing.

If you must read Owen Jones, introduce some balance into your life by reading Theodore Dalrymple on the same subject.

I live in one of the most deprived areas of the north, and in my social circle being a chav has nothing todo with money or economic class. It just describes anti-social, vulgar people who intimidate others.

manatee I love Theodore Dalrymple. So refreshing.

It's pretty clear that the people he claims to champion are 'them' or 'those people' to him, just like they are to Saint toynbee.

If you must read Owen Jones, introduce some balance into your life by reading Theodore Dalrymple on the same subject.

Oh manatee, I absolutely adore TD, but how can you level THAT particular criticism at OJ and PT (which I don't think she deserves, actually, she appreciates her privelege, I think) and then go on to recommend TD?

I don't think Dalrymple is a North London liberal. And I don't think it's important that Dalrymple talks about 'those people' because he never claims to be like the cultures he describes.

I wouldn't see it as problematic in Jones or Toynbee if they took a view more like Dalrymple's, rather than being pretty much emblematic of much of what he deplores

I live in one of the most deprived areas of the north, and in my social circle being a chav has nothing todo with money or economic class. It just describes anti-social, vulgar people who intimidate others.

I agree, and this is the point Jones misses I feel. To me, being a chav is a state of mind. It's nothing to do with being working class or not.

Oh come one Marshmallow, Polly is nothing but a cheerleader for the labour party, no different to Hitchens or Littlejohn who bang the drum for the right. I have no issue with that as it stands but she unfortunately occupies a that stage so popular with the Oxbridge middleclass left that manages to be both hectoring and patronising in equal measure. Her thinly veiled contempt for the working classes who have the audacity to not vote labour is a marvel to behold, I mean how dare they, and if they cant be converted we shall just label them thickos or swivel eyed loons. Her uncanny ability to read any good news item and twist it into a criticism of government policy is at times pathetic as is her dubious use and cherry picking of statistics to support her political narrative. She gets torn to shreds on CIF most weeks as her opinion pieces are picked apart for the flimsy piss poor journalism that they are. In Polly land more nanny state intervention and spending is always the answer although she never quite gets down to the details of quite how this can be achieved beyond the something must be done message and that the rich (without quite defining who this nebulous group consists of) are either to blame or should be funding her latest batshit crazy idea.

With the Left I always find The Rich means, simply, someome with just a bit more money than them.

yes casually, that always makes me uneasy

to be honest, shaming as that is.

I think they talk about me, in my semi, and my 8 year old car. And I am worried they want to take my savings/pension/spar cash, one way or another.

YANBU. I want to read it now!
I just finished reading 'Harry's Last Stand' now I am waiting for his memoir '1923' to be delivered. I am off work this week so I think I'll get down to the library today to borrow a copy of 'Chavs'.

A Labour Govt terrifies me both personally, in terms of how hard they will tax us, and as a society because, without fail, they fuck up the economy with hideous, horrible public sector bingeing. Sure Start, anyone?

it's quite a horrible indictment of our political system that the "voice of the downtrodden" should have to be filtered through anyone. All these career politicians, on both sides, are so hopelessly out of touch.

Who was the last high profile politician to have had a "proper job"? I can only think of Prescott, Hesseltine maybe.

Alan Johnson - postman.

casually public sector bingeing? Such as? (not being arsey, just wondering what in partic you mean)

And what was wrong with surestart?

What madmomma said up thread re anti-social behaviour etc.

To me, chavs are people who shout at their kids, have little respect for their kids, are selfish, lazy and vulgar.

IMHO chavs can come from all walks of life regardless of class, income.

She's a polemicist Sleepless not a social scientist.

Most of the writers under discussion are.

Does anyone have a copy of it that they want to sell on/get rid of?

Toffs use it to refer to all working class people

What nonsense.

It is ironic and disappointing that in a thread (about a book) about the negative stereotyping of a sector of society, we have negative stereotyping as per the above quote about 'toffs', and as per the criticism of Owen Jones himself e.g. from whattheseithakasmean's:

a little white middle class boy's voice

and

a pampered bleeding heart like Jones

How is Owen Jones 'pampered'? Is it solely based on his Oxford degree?