Lower working class???

[primitivemom]

Following on from the class threads? Can anyone tell me what constitutes lower working class? Is this benefit street class lol? staffies and job centers ?

Why is the working class looked down upon? I've always wanted to be middle class but now I'm wondering where that mentality came from. I work very hard and have a masters but I would still be considered working class but I don't think that means I'm "less". Sorry that was a bit of a ramble I can't think how to phrase it.

Oh this old fucking turnip again.

• obviously i'm WC as i said 'turnip' not 'quinoa'

It doesn't matter what class you are. A twat is a twat.

The working class has graduations within in. I live in social housing and can tell you which end of the estate is "respectable"
Its about as relevant to some of you as it is to me when you tell me that the Kate Middleton "isn't really posh"

Like reanimated I would also use the Socio-economic Group scale.
The lowest grade is E.
This is people in very casual, unreliable and probably unskilled work. Possibly alternating periods of poorly paid work with periods of benefits dependancy.
The scale usually includes long term benefits claimants and retired people as well but I would dispute this. People from any social class can retire or develop a disability which prevents them working and I don't think you lose you previous class completely in those circumstances.

Sky tv and lack of dentistry! Vests for every occasion are a must too!

If you are able bodied, able minded and of the right age, what is so shocking about going out and getting a job?

StillDrivingMeBonkers I guess that's what I don't get. Here your "class" is based on your income. My family earns more than $100K a year. That makes us upper middle. It doesn't have anything to do with what you eat or how you hold your silverware, etc.

It just seems like on MN people like to go out of their way to prove they're not middle class, as though it's a bad thing to be. Or to chastise people they perceive as middle class, a la the current "diet Coke at the airport" thread. That thread had nothing to do with class, yet someone brought it up, in the very first page. So you can see how an outsider might view this as an odd obsession.

If you are able bodied, able minded and of the right age, what is so shocking about going out and getting a job?

IF you are all of these things, nothing. But that isn't what you said is it? You implied anyone on benefits was scrounging, even people on disability benefits, by adding the comment that disability assessments need to be more stringent which is fucking laughable given it's virtually impossible to claim disability benefits now because of attitudes like this.

The working class has graduations within in. I live in social housing and can tell you which end of the estate is "respectable"

^^this

I read some of the WC thread and the cleanliness thing came up over and over.

Dh and his family were always in hand me downs. Weren't taught to brush teeth and rarely were washed as children and definetly not middle class!! They were bullied as the 'pikey' (horrible word) kids at school and their house was a shit tip. This is according to him and his siblings.

And in comparison to that my mum goes mad if I let dd out without brushed hair or a clean face

"finding out if they really are disabled"

Are you Gareth Keenan from The Office??

Disgusting.

Class these days has nothing to do with money.

In my opinion wealthy, yet cheap and nasty chavs such as Geordie Shore/TOWIE/Kadashians/many other reality TV 'celebrities' are pretty much down at the bottom of the food chain. Decent, hard working,but possibly poorly paid folk are higher up the social class than these individuals.

Anyway....must go now.

Off to work.....

sxround

Plenty of working class people know how to use a knife correctly. I'm also a bit at the suggestion that they might wish to "claw" their way out as if they are in some type of cess pit rather than being hard working for perhaps not much money and doing the best for their children. People deserve better than to be sneered at.

People who say LOL. nice thread OP, classy.

We don't obsess about class, we don't have to, class just is

Why these threads?

I've only just noticed the knife thing and for ages didn't even know what 'holding a knife like a pen' meant (I think I have Mumsnet to thank for that, I have no recollection of ever been told how to hold a knife and fork) and now I've realised that that's what I do, but DP holds his 'correctly'.

Both DP and I are definitely of a working class background (fathers and pretty much every other older male relative, miners or factory workers, mothers SAHMs, barmaids, cleaners, shop workers etc).

We are northern with regional accents. DP is a talented musician and passed all his grade exams as a child - his parents and grandparents encouraged him to play an instrument.

And despite my obvious working classness, I have a first class honours degree in a STEM subject and work in a professional career. We have one old car and one new car and the new car is only because it is my company car. Some of my colleagues have similar backgrounds and are now worldwide experts in our field, regularly writing papers and presenting at international conferences, as have I on occasion.

So much for the oft quoted 'working class parents not valuing education'.

I have no enthusiasm for AI holidays, reality TV, cleaning obsessively, showy possessions or beauty treatments or all those other classic alleged working class markers. I think because of this SIL (DP's brother's wife) jokingly thinks that I am 'posh'. Ironically, her family are quite well off, because her parents had a business that made a lot of money and they retired at quite a young age to one of their two holiday homes.

My interests are reading, hill walking and holidays in the Meditteranan in places that are not AI English Breakfasts central but not showy/expensive like Marbella or Puerto Pollensa. I tend to go more where the average locals go, or city breaks like Granada and Seville.

So because of this, I think the class divide isn't that great any more, especially in the working/middle classes and maybe the socio economics groups A to E scale is more reflective of reality?

I disagree ScarletForyou.

Have you seen the recent stories a nice place Clontarf n Dublin are bringing the County Council to court for purchasing a B&B to use as a homeless hub, to house transitioning families from homeless to housing, with so many family's in hotels rooms. It was shocking the snobbery and name calling from the leafy area.

If your from certain areas in Dublin you are automatically judged.

SIL tells me she must be middle class, as she is on benefits and therefore can't be "working" class.

Scroungers off the state I prefer to call underclass

I'm surprised that you didn't use the term 'untermenschen'. Seems to fit more with your worldview.

we all know where we are in the pecking order and can tell that just by looking

Can we?

I can't. I still have no fucking idea after 45 years. Working class people often judge me as posh even though I spent more than a decade living on a council estate on minimum wage/benefits. In middle class circles I am definitely a bit rough.

Never fitted in anywhere TBH.

I personally think class is to do with how you behave as a person, in regards to etiquette and common courtesy, you could earn hundreds of thousands a year but if your a rude sneaky cunt then you have no class, if you are polite and well mannered regardless of money then you are by far classier.

Well said Bustergonad

I hate the term " scrounger". Some people are on benefits because they are unable to work. I've been on income support for 3 years because I found myself a single parent of three children, one with a disability, and I can say that that is harder work than when I was working full time. Even now with a new partner who works, we still get some benefits. He works full time, but he doesn't earn enough to come off them completely.

Google for class definitions, OP. Mustn't be lazy...