Being middle class based on what you own?

[BlancheBlue]

Anyone seen this "quiz" in the telegraph - aside from the fact that it is probably just to flog certain items, anyone agree with this list or come out with all of them.

Hot tubs ffs? "vulgar" no?

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/23/how-middle-class-are-you-it-depends-how-many-of-these-items-you/

bogey

What a crap article! So you can only be middle class if you're materialistic and into labels and brands??? Luggage brands, FFS?

We only got 3 of those - but then I'm not materialistic.

I thought class was more about attitude, accent, manners and education?

I never think of myself as any class, im just me.

My mum was a teacher and my father a principal in the civil service. My dads background was poor, (outside loo etc) he won a scholarship and proceeded to carve out a good career and as a result became financially very secure. My mums parents were considerably wealthier than my fathers, her mum was a stay at home housewife in a semi in London raising 4 children while her father was a civil servant.

I am a receptionist on a modest income, my ex was an electrician, but because my parents helped us get on the property ladder we ended up in one of the best roads in my town, (we stood out a bit as my ex had his white van alongside the neighbours Porsche)

Move on several years and I am now single in an ex council flat (very very happy) with not many assets (hot tubs or BBQs) but comfortable.

Am I Middle Class?...I think I am probably mongrel class a mixture of all.

I got 1

So not middle class at all

I'm fine with that

Wtf is a Brompton Bike?

Class and wealth are very different things. There are many things on the list that I would like very much but feel would be extravagant (qooker tap, Brompton bike) and hot tubs are not an indicator of class.

The only people obsessed with class are those without any.

A Dyson vacuum? Really? Ours is a Meille, surely that's more MC then a Dyson

DH wants a spiralliser. He works in a factory, but if I buy him one that'll help make us MC will it?

Daft.

Iced, one of my most well-born friends - who is, incidentally, poor and a total free spirit - has an ancient portable TV which lives in a cupboard upstairs, and which needs to be pulled out and plugged in with a lot of fumbling behind the furniture.

^I'd say we're squarely middle class, possibly even upper middle - degree educated, professional jobs, own home, kids at independent schools, visit museums and galleries, have pensions and investments.

We're not very materialistic, particularly regarding branded items. We're more into reusing and sustainability, and ethical production than buying the latest brand name. We're not into TV watching, so don't have a smart TV.

I don't think that list remotely resembles middle class living^

This almost exactly describes me, except the DCs at independent schools, because I don't have any.

I disagree that middle class = buying lots of stuff. I thought possessions as status symbols were supposed to be a working class thing, with MC people, with the possible exception of their house, not giving a stuff about possessions?

I don't think many people can be pigeon holed into classes any more.

My dad was a northern manual worker who also played the stock market and was interested in antiques and museums. I have a degree and professional qualifications, but a strong northern accent. I have traits of all classes. I listen mostly to radio 4, I care not a jot about possessions. I'm not obsessed with house prices, cleanliness or status symbols. I make do and mend and fit well into the wellies and filthy old landrover filled with dog blankets identity.

Does having a degree make you a certain class?

Does having an accent that is not RP make you a certain class?

I think not.

A Brompton bike is one of those folding bikes with tiny wheels that you can carry with you so you ride it to the station, fold it up, take it on the train with you, unfold it and ride to the office at the other end.

I only got 3 'right' btw and I am 'not middle class'.
MIL gets the same which is actually right as she's too posh to be middle class

Ha ha
There's a saying most people are a class lower than the one hey believe they are. I'm seeing plenty of confirmation of this here.

Yy, this is a very weird quiz. I only got 3 - woodburner, Aga and vinyl records. I wouldn't want the rest of it - except for maybe a hot-tub. I'd love one of those.

So - people (like me!) who got a low figure but would define themselves as middle class -

What one thing about you most defines you as middle class?

Mine is:-

I can sign people's passport applications. (Me and two friends who are all in the same profession have our own little cottage industry going where we have all signed each other's kids first passports. I can't help but think that there is a flaw in the system somehow! )

Same here Mumof two, and I'm and out and out U according to Nancy Mitford on the following quiz

So am I, apparently! I only own one of the items in the list.

I'm solidly working-class, though. That list seems like an advertiser's ploy aimed at the more materialistic and status-conscious of the working class so that they're influenced to buy the items and feel they're being upwardly mobile.

That list certainly wasn't what I was expecting. I was imagining something more along the lines of an antique, something inherited, a piece of original art, a musical instrument, a Booker prize-winning novel in hardback, a broadsheet newspaper, specialist equipment for riding/skiing/cycling...

Ok Blanche better leave it so

i got 3, but there's only a couple of things on that list I would like.

Surely coasters just "are" tbh - are they not a generic thing that prevents marks to tables?

But it implies that you have antiques tables worthy of protection. Just like a BBQ implies that you have a garden.

4/16 I'm pleased to say and U.

jasper you sound upper middle

The origins of the middle classes was owning stuff though, it was proving that while you werent part of the upper class, you were at least better than those horrible oiks further down the scale than you. Buying stuff proved that. The Victorians especially were obsessed with proving social status through their possessions.

That list is wrong though in what it considers to be markers of middle classness.

Navy we only have 1, I'm practically Royalty then yes?
...nothing to do with the fact that we can't afford another!

WhisperingWind Thu 29-Sep-16 09:08:50
You've stumbled across the Footballer's Wives version of the class system!

This is how I see it too.