To ask what makes you working class? (Lighthearted)

[MissAlabamaWhitman]

So, the whole 'what makes you middle class' has been done to death hasn't it?

We're all pretty au fair with avocados, elephants sodding breath, the ubiquity of joules et cetera.
And lovely as it is to have such knowledge of the middle classes, none of it applies to me.

I'm working class and I'll explIn to you that which denotes this in just a minute.

Incidentally I heard that there's a few of us about so perhaps we can make our own list of our very own class signifiers.

Who's in?

I shall go first.....

Love of charity shops, this week I picked up a leather Hobbs bag for 3.99 and a couple of Abercrombie & Fitch tops for DD1 1.49 each!

Love of Iceland/Heron foods/Home bargains/B&M. Yes I know I could get everything I need in Sainsbury's but I actually prefer scrabbling around for bargains and topping up at Lidl.

Chardonnay. I love it, tastes fab. I can't be arsed to pretend that I prefer a Beaujolais or Cab Sav. I don't.

One bathroom/toilet in a five bed house.

Regional accent which I take pleasure in.

Children who play football and wear replica kits whilst doing so

Girls who wear pinkI draw the line at bloody Jojo bows though

Getting drunk at barbecues and performing impromptu Karaoke.

Allowing my children to 'play out' in the cul de sac from age seven.

Cleaning my own house.

Holidays at Center Parcs rather than overseas.

Owning a Huskita

Letting my children watch TV and eat crisps in full view of other parents.

Having a 'pop man'

Listening to LBC rather than R4

Not really giving a fuck about trans, one way or the other.

I'm sure there's lots more besides which I'll try to remember.
How about you?
What makes you sit back at the end of a hard day and think 'yep I'm a fully paid up member of the old working classes?'

According to my DP I'm working class because I carry my son to the paper shop, I also sit in the front garden. Oh and I leave my washing to get darked on. Living on a council estate means I don't have to worry too much as most of our neighbours do the same. We have just spent £100 on a bin though so I feel quite posh at the moment.

I remember driving through Fulham once...pavements were packed with joggers! Come down to a less salubrious part of London and try to find some!

Weight is a class issue too....as is cooking. All my middle class friends can cook really well. Putting on a dinner party would be no problem. My working class friends don't often seem to cook from scratch.

No, not all Chasinghighs. But some. Personally I'm not arsed, but my mother can have her moments.

I would say having active hobbies that need a lot of equipment is middle class. Wc have active pastimes that involve animals in competition (dog agility, cat showing, pigeons, some riding) or just themselves (athletics, fell running). Also no shame in not being active, because traditional working class jobs are absolutely bloody knackering.

No, I see myself as working class.

DM dropped out of college at 17 to have me, single parent family in a terrace house with a big hole in the floor. Grandparents worked in the pits and factories.

I was the first to go to uni and then moved to the South to get a job.

I think others see me as a mix, I'm very proud to be working class. I have an obvious WC accent which I don't try to change. I tease my friends about their MC-ness, I talk about my experiences and how things are for people outside the MC bubble we live in.

I do think I have one foot in each camp...but I don't think I should start saying I'm not working class because I earn good money or have a degree as that plays into shitty stereotypes about working class people (if you're intelligent and successful you must be middle class?!).

This is all bewildering me! Shop at Lidl, with a bit of sainsburys on the side, love charity shop bargains, have been to both butlins and parkdean (hate centre parcs), have kids in hand me downs except when going out (as they trash their clothes during crafts and mud gardening). I don't care about trans except where it contributes to the safety of vulnerable women (prisons etc). Have old cars as DH cycles and I walk where possible. We both are degree educated and friends likewise. No regional accent. WTF am I?

I'm thin because I'm educated and I wok in nutrition.

This doesn't necessarily make me MC.

I can't cook for shit, hence Iceland pre packaged chateaubriand

You sound very middle class TheABC

Also I am not university educated, nor are any of my family

Same here... Although DH is (as are many of his family)
I also don't understand the whole charity shops thing as being MC. We go to charity shops for stuff for the house and certainly don't see us as being MC!

Lets face it, it is exceptionally rare for people to have friends and socialise with others from a different class isn't it? Can anyone say they have good friends from a totally different class? I don't mean people who you just say hello to

It probably is rare but we do. WC friend moved to very posh area with his partner who is VERY MC (went to all girls boarding school, has a very well paid job, posh accent and tells stories of when they uses to go to some duke's house for pheasant at Christmas!)
She is lovely though... nearly nice woman and down to earth in spite of her background.

Oh I wholeheartedly concur stumbly

It's not what you do/wear/say etc. It's about where you're from, what kind of family you were born into. That determines your class. You can be solid WC and live a MC lifestyle. You can be MC and live upper class lifestyle like Kate Middleton.

Oh fuck.

Im funny cos I holiday in Butlins and the South of France.

I live in a council house and work in an office

Strong regional Yorkshire accent, but never use text speak.

Have a degree and more recent AAT qualifications.

My kids have wierd names (well they did when they were born, but DS is rather common now and DD1 is getting a bit more well known thanks to a recent-ish film) and are named after characters from Comics/films and TV shows.

We often have Maccy Ds or KFC for tea (usually once or twice a month each)

My favourite alcoholic drink is lager- you just cant beat a nice cold pint mmmmm

I run and try to eat healthily most of the time (not very good at it though).

I very rarely wear makeup

Not sure what class I am.

I'm working class
My list:

• Clean house

• Loved dressing my boys in matching stuff when they were little (they were v cute!)

• Kids had short, styled hair from the start (can't stand scruffy, outgrown hair)

• Went to caravan parks on holiday

• Like to have matching stuff in house

• TV, takeaways, crisps & fruit shoots not remotely shame inducing or hidden

• Kids played out with their pals from when they were small

• Older brother put in charge of little brother to go to park etc from about 7

• Know my neighbours

• Kids now teenagers & allowed to 'roam the streets' with their pals

• Kids made to earn their own money from 14 (paper rounds to start off with)

Or you can be WC and have a nice lifestyle without ever making mention of or considering yourself to be or even partaking of anything which you feel compelled to describe as middle class.

All this talk about clean houses makes me laugh. How may times do you see theads on here about people terrified about buying a house that social housing will mean rubbish everywhere

I meant a lifestyle traditionally thought of as MC. Private schools, second homes, expensive holidays etc have historically been MC markers.

The Trans thing most affects lesbians and services for vulnerable women such as refuges. If you are a working class lesbian, or work or volunteer in places like refuges, you are more likely to care about the trans issues. I know many young working class lesbians who are now identifying as trans and having surgery.

In fact it is a class issue. Generally middle class young people identify as gender queer and simply dye their hair and have piercings., It is far more working class lesbians who have mastectomies and genital surgery.
Of course the ordinary working class person with an opposite sex partner does not care about transgender implications, because it has no impact on their day-to-day life.

My accent is WC Londonish. I shop at Tesco, have an 8 year old car, buy clothes from Primark and I called my GM Nan.

However I have a gardener and cleaner, work in a white collar job and hardly ever watch ITV. I think i'm a WC/MC hybrid.

Most WC people don't live in social housing though Tea

Lots of us are homeowners.

my house is currently a chess pit though

So on that note I'd better get off of this iPad and go and clean it, as I mentioned previously I am completely devoid of paid help

There are definitely plenty of fat middle class people but I would say being really, really overweight is more of a Wc thing.

Disclaimer: I'm a size 20 right now, so not judging but that's how it tends to be. Up to a size 16/18 is fine, much above that and tends to be more of a wc thing

Its funny with kids names. The names we chose, I thought one was posh and had concerns about it although I loved it.Is now seen as chavvy. The other one I thought was ordinary, is now seen as posh.

From my working class perspective:

Working class

• dress their kids in new clothes. Buy all a brand new wardrobe for holidays and always something new and planned for occasions.
• boys hair is always short and smart. Kids are always clean and well presented for school.
• holiday either in caravans, butlins or places scorned by middle classes i.e. Marbella, Dubai, Florida.
• women generally very well turned out with manicures, tan, make up and never roots.
• houses are clean and well maintained. Women would never dream of not ironing things.
• live for the moment.
• don't stress about ear piercing on children 🙈

Should have said cess pit, obviously.

I'm WC, don't own a chess board. Unless you count DS1's doctor who version.

miss so what do you class people who live in social housing as then?