Middle class tribe - ever get on your nerves - light hearted rant 😄

[ginorwine]

I live in a middle class area which is dominated by lecturers , gp s , social workers etc -my Dh fits into that catagory and I am an x that catagory .
It's a really pretty area and the kids roam between houses etc
Recently - I seem to be a little irritated by its predictability and 'niceness '- tho am aware it's a good area I really am .
I'm
Grumpy menopausal creature at present !
The paint work is mainly Farrell and ball, same kitchen appliances , similar dress code .etc . Whilst I too have Farrell n ball in one room and may therefore fit into the cliche myself (!) I'm becoming quite amused by it all in a way but don't know why .Part of me loves it part of me wants to say rude words and act up and be a Harridan !
Why do we follow these 'tribal 'things ? .the estate agent once reffered to the area as all lentil s and lintels . 😃

Foggy but not all working-class people are 'chavs' (although that in itself is a classist term). Just as not all middle-class people are irritatingly conformist in what they like.

It's about suffocating conformity, not class really - it's just that the class signallers are different. And being WC I know that suffocating conformity exists amongst us too.

Also I'm not a snob and enjoy nice things whatever class markers they have. Personally I like Greggs and find pound shops very useful (I miss the 99p Store as I preferred it to Poundland, and Poundworlds are rarer - I'd rather have strange forrin brands than big brand names in smaller packages). I also like lots of MC (or 'MC') things.

but not all working-class people are 'chavs'

Well of course not, and that is not what I said ... I was simply pointing out that the nastiness on this thread (#notallposts) towards MC people and habits would be condemned with outrage if it were applied to WC culture/habits/stereotypes.

And my genuine appreciation of the skilled people who transformed a delapidated neglected old house with care & expertise was called 'shite.' Nice, eh?

Foggy, yes I did mean to be so rude. I don't for one minute think you "miss" your builders, what an affectation!

That is not a judgement on you, your house, or whatever lovely works your lovely builders have done for you, I was simply saying that I believe your comment to be untrue.

And I might have put that more politely had you not been so unpleasant with your chavs comment and your "lower classes" (shudder) comment, which both came before my shite comment.

bibbity so it's perfectly OK for you to post several posts which are rude about MC ways, but the reverse deserves rudeness? Oversensitive, much?

You might not believe my comment to be true; your belief on no evidence is hardly fact.

'Evidence' seems to be a MN 'thing', doesn't it?

If you look back you will see I referred to "some middle class people" whereas you referred to "the lower classes", not even "working class" just "lower classes" - that's all a bit Upstairs Downstairs isn't it? Lower than who? Lower than you I guess you mean.

I don't understand the over-sensitive comment at all.

Shrunkenhead - why wouldn't Ellie-Mae be mc? It doesn't matter what we are but I do often wonder why my beautiful dd's name is often ripped apart on here? I know some very mc people with children called Ellie-Mae. Seriously I'm perplexed and yes, a tad upset.

I don't see why foggy can't miss her builders? If they were anything like our's they were a good laugh and a few of them had a tendency to remove their shirts in hot weather, so it was like living the Diet Coke advert [shameless]

Evidence seems to be a MN thing.

Along with science, the judiciary, exam boards and so on and so forth.

MaQueen I never saw them with shirts off - they're a company of middle-aged family men, although I did get to cuddle the 3 week old baby boy of one of them. But if they weren't all good family men, and me a single widow woman, I think I would be like your DH and go out for beers with them. They were just so lovely - I used to swap martial arts & fitness tips with the master builder. The house warming was quite an event, as they all came and all their wives & children - it was fantastic (and they brought enough wine to fill my fridge twice over - the plumber is a complete wine snob and used to shudder at my empties).

I also miss my builders. Having them back soon to build our front wall. Loved them. Don't understand the obsession with class in Britain. We manage to have nice houses, organic cafes and yoga studios all over san diego (my husbands town). It's great. The same thing happens in Britain and it makes people feel awkward.

Thanks some of you who have said that they came from more wc backgrounds like me and now find themselves in a different tribe
Also to the person that said to giggle about finding yourself in a real life stero type is not a negative - coupled with the urge to resist it at times for one s own sanity and amusement
this post ,from my perspective was meant to be a gentle tounge in cheek reference to the sometimes madness that is human behevoir - personally I don't give a you know what about what my paint is - I do like some f and b shades tis all but I do ( mostly) what I like .
A lot of women round here are either arty , white stuff, expensive linen , Boden , or no make up ( sometimes as a political statement - have been the only one on women's group years ago with red lippi on / any make up on which didn't go down well ) I wear vintage , shorts and Bretons , whatever the mood takes me .
As I step outside rule s I have at times been regarded I think as less intelligent when I know I have more qualifications than they do - not that I measure by that but they do . Also I have a northern accent whereas mostly its r p here
Occasionally I get fed up of being told I'm a ' card ' or a ' character ' tho as I'm different .i intend to stay that way if that mean s making my own paint choices 😜

And if m mc has its tribal patterns of behevoir and taste - what are those of the working and upper classes then ? I wonder if they too feel hemmed in by their own stuff ?

We lived in Stoke Newington thirty years ago. It was rough as fuck "emerging" rather than naice, but we loved it.

However rather than buy there (we would've been minted now wouldn't we?) we moved back oop north and ended up in the lovely village we currently live in. Like MaQueen's kids, I suspect my younger ones have little concept of "real life". But there's plenty of time for that when they're older.

As to the stultifyingly Farrow and Bally tastefulness of everything, I congratulated my new new neighbour on the splendidly ironic wishing well she was installing in her front garden. Only to realise mid conversation that it, was not, in fact, a cool, kitschy joke. (I'm honestly not normally so up my own arse thick). New neighbour is very nice anyway.

Mmmmm I love Greggs coffee puffs. Mind you, I remember when Greggs was Birketts

Holidays are a very tribal thing in my neck of the woods. My MC friends have a very conformist view towards them.
A few years ago it was incredibly popular to "do France" whereapoun everybody packed up their cars and drove to a rented property ( or second home) and met up with their friends for a few weeks. There was also at least one compulsory city break sans children and a staycation in either Dorset/Devon or Norfolk.
Now a festival with the girls is also du rigour but the French holiday has been replaced by a more glam two weeks in possibly Croatia or a nice island.

Not that these aren't lovely friends but they are so predictable. They wouldn't dream of doing Disney or staying abroad for a sporting event for example because that's not what they do.

My non standard class friends - well off but non MC jobs, poor but look MC do lots of different stuff, sometimes having many trips ( of various lengths) and sometimes none at all.

Goodmum1234
I'm afraid that many hyphenated names are perceived as being chav

(Lights blue touch paper and retires.....)

Foggy -what are these coffee puffs of which you speak? I used to go into Greggs most afternoons after an exhausting day at the chalkface (some of you will remember chalk). ShrewsburyShrowsbury biscuits, yes, but was never offered a coffee puff in Brum. I started my get fat campaign when 'the sandwich shop' was called Braggs. Stopped when I realised I was moving about much.

Binker, do tell which hyphenated names denote chavism as you like to call it. Then I can check whether the hyphenated names in my family are ok. Are we on first names or surnames here?

Binker!!!!

When I was at school there was a Sarah-Jane "SJ", Emma-Jane "EJ" Mary-Jane "MJ"; not forgetting the Mary-Annes and Sally-Annes. I don't think they were chavvy - just remembered Marie-Louise as well.

Come live near me - the variety of households is staggering. University lecturers, retired West Indian railway workers, single parent families with 6 kids where the mums have never worked and the dads are nowhere to be seen, hostels with a whole family in one room, Romanian gypsies who live in their front room with the door open to the street and all the women (in traditional dress) smoke roll-ups, teachers, academics, care workers... All these people are parents at my dc's school, and come from the two or three roads nearby.

It's like living in a Zadie Smith novel.

Beeziekn33ze - where oh where did you get 'chavism' as apparently I like to call it? Your word, I think. And no, not surnames as a general rule.
And Ohtheroses, I agree with you but I did say 'many' of these names, not the ones you cite.
It is the current crop of names - often ending in -Mae, -Rae, or involving Lily somewhere which are redolent of the c-word.

Beeziekn33ze They now call them "coffee choux buns" and they look like this (although this isn't an official Greggs photo)

Almost 600 calories a pop. But well worth it.

This thread is hilarious. Emperor's new clothes time, I think. Our house was built in 1665 and is highly desirable. Any of you beat that for utter class and a sky high uniqueness factor? Hmmm?