To wonder why there seems to be such a socially conservative streak in many working-class communities

[Revengeoftheseabass]

I come from a fairly working-class background, but have always had liberal views on diversity, feminism, LBGTQ rights, etc. And yet I somehow seem to have ended up being part of the supposed 'metropolitan elite', despite often feeling acutely self-conscious in middle-class milieus!

1. It's partly a stereotype, on the whole I think middle class/upper class people can be just as bigoted (Nigel Farage was never a coal miner). Unfortunately this stereotype has sort of become a definition. So someone from a working class background/in a working class job/on a low income who expresses liberal views automatically becomes classified as liberal metropolitan elite (in other words no longer working class). In the same way being interested in learning is now sometimes viewed as a middle class/aspirational marker. Which is bullshit.

1. There is, in my experience some correlation with traveling outside of your comfort zone and being more open minded. As a general rule people who stay in their home town, mixing with just the friends and family they grew up with will be more socially conservative. Arguably people from higher incomes tend to have more opportunities to do this (be it through higher education, traveling, international work). Of course, many people from working class backgrounds also travel outside of their familiar zones, but any changes in outlook (and everyone changes in outlook with age) can lead to them being called liberal meteropolitan elite (see point 1)

1. Lots of people with money are shielded from having to balance their idealism against a deep down fear of other/genuine impacts of change. I can remember how quickly the atmosphere at my (largely) middle classuniversity turned quite unpleasant when some travelers pitched up on the rugby pitch.

Ooooh an it works the other way as well - Nigel Farage is a man of e people apparently because, despite being a former banker, he expresses bigoted views so this makes him working class. When you stop and think about that it's actually really insulting.

I agree, Flop. Farage's man of the people schtick is offensive on so many levels, yet it seemed to work somehow, to the point where people thought he'd gone to a comprehensive and Ed Milliband was privately educated, whereas the reverse was true.

Some people are more socially conservative in all classes.

This is self evident. Therefore yabu

I remember on thinking aloud there was a feature on a sociology study into the extent to which housework/ unpaid labour is shared between working couples across classes and put simply in working class households (by the metrics they used) labour was shared more equally (though women still did more) than in higher socio-economic groups. The theory put forward was that this was because working class households had traditionally had women working outside the home more, so men had grown up seeing their fathers taking up more of the load through necessity whilst men from more wealthy backgrounds had seen their stay at home mum do more (and this effect persisted even though now we are probably 2 generations into women having it all, doing it all. Sorry I know is is a bit of a digression, but it is such a contrast to the " working class caveman v sensitive and more liberal middle classes I thought it was worth mentioning...

Tribalism.
Working class areas were often 'made' and people from different areas built a hierarchy and flocked together to establish community.
So the Welsh mining areas were populated by people from different areas of Wales. They had their groups. When the Irish arrived, the Welsh closed ranks. And so on.
The Labour Party was very much an organisation that belonged to a conservatively minded population. Opposing the EEC because of the risk to jobs, protecting their jobs and lifestyle.
It's been the struggle of the Labour Party. The movement of international Socialism versus the protectionist, suspicious ILP fighting for the rights of the workers. That's why UKIP picked up votes.

I do think there's an element of that as well exploded. As I said having money, and social position, insulates you from the negative effects of social change. But I think that that explanation alone gets used a lot and I think it's an oversimplification of what's actually going on which is waaayyy more complex.

I think it's because traditionally in such communities the line between having enough to live on and starvation has been so narrow, and financial disaster always a real possibility, that anything that seemed to alter the status quo was seen as a threat. The middle classes, being protected by their capital, could afford (literally) to be more open minded about new ideas and possibilities.

I agree with pp, especially Felix's point about wc communities not having the luxury of trying something new.