To wonder if middle class children appear more ‘scruffy’

[Workingclass]

Went to a Childs party today for an old school friends DD (they are incredibly middle class) and her group of mum friends (who are equally as middle class)

I admit I don’t usually socialise in many middle class circles but I couldn’t help but notice that all of the children looked... scruffy, for want of a better word.

None of them had brushed their hair, they were all in mismatched clothes with muck on their faces. Didn’t look bathed..

I feel awful saying it, but I notice this also with the MC children at the DC school, has anyone else noticed it? I’m just curious as to why this seems to be a thing? Does my dds plaits and dresses ‘out’ her as having a working class family?

Is it more of a privilege thing? We don’t have much money so am weary of being judged as lazy by not doing her hair, I also make an effort to dress her nicely so she doesn’t look like ‘the poor kid’ is it that if your middle class you don’t have that fear?

Absolutely happy to be told IABU and judgemental but I am genuinely curious on the subject.

How are people defining middle class on this thread? The majority of people in this country are actually 'middle class' by old definitions - for example, two office workers with a car and one foreign holiday etc.

Some of the statements on this thread are downright ridiculous. Of course different social groups dress in different ways, but the idea that middle class children (and, as before, who exactly are these middle class children anyway?) don't wash and that middle class houses are filthy is just weird reverse snobbishness.

I live in a mainly middle class area with some outliers at either end - some very well off people and some much less well off people - and the only unwashed children in dirty clothes at primary school were genuinely 'vulnerable' kids from families with quite significant problems. Yes, middle class boys may have longer hair, but all the children I knew had baths every night and clean clothes, even if not everyone wore exactly the same type of clothes.

As an aside, do you socialise with “farm workers”

Why is that funny? Honestly not understanding why this is funny.

I worked on a farm as a kid. Lots of local kids lived on farms. Our previous neighbour lived and worked on a dairy farm. We have friends who are farmers. My uncle kept sheep and lived on his in-laws farm.

Some are very working class. Others are very very middle class.

We are NOT rural. Just close to rural.

I found it very odd that we had a friend who had 'never seen a cow'. So we took him to a farm. He lived in a very urban part of Manchester.

This is just different lifestyles according to where you live.

Some of my family are farm labourers. Nothing funny about it. The point is that better off people tend to know a wider range of people from poor to wealthy, than working class people do.

Middle class area here.no one is filthy, but no one is prissy about clothes, either. The kids are kids- they play, they get a bit grubby, no one is wearing fancy brand clothes so the parents aren't screeching at the kids to stay clean.its a nice atmosphere to live in.

I work in a community centre for less privileged children and absolutely none of them look spotless. None of them wear ardidas from head to toe, have a haircut, or even have more then 5 pieces of clothes (all stained and worn off). Are you sure those kids that are all nice dressed, with clean hair and looking lovely are poor? Those mothers that I work with do not get home until 12am by the time someone else put their kids robbed without a bath or brush their hairs. I feel really sorry that some people believe that working class parents could afford those trainers and nice clothes just to prove a point. And hygiene has nothing to do with class!

I think most people aspire for their kids to do better than them, the middleclass are just more relaxed since they have a cushion I.e. enough wealth, space, earning potential, savings, pension, transferable skills, relatives etc for a raining day.

I think the middle class can be more 'free thinking' which may stray to scruffy kids, because they are more confident in their futures. They will dress right up when needed ( interview etc) and the accent is always there.

Just for clarification re 4 kids class issue. We are mostly MC (according to that BBC test we are 'established middle) but no private education or expensive holidays and our house cost less than the national average. We had 4 children by choice rather than as a demonstration of wealth.

What about family size? I've been 'accused' of being both posh and very much not posh for having 4 children. 2 children is seen as safe and respectable it seems. Perhaps that is a middle class thing. Certainly easier to keep 2 looking clean and tidy as opposed to a large troop!

Yes, this is supposed to be a thing.

I think it's related to 'sensible middle class' beliefs about how each child should have their own bedroom and how you can't fit 4 kids and two adults in a 'normal' car.

If you have 4 kids they either share bedrooms (big middle class no no), live in a rougher area or you can afford a house big enough for all of them in a 'nice' area and are therefore rolling in it. Or the logic you can afford a 'fancy' seven seater or you simply don't travel anywhere by car.

Lots of younger middle class families are now having just one child and with changes to child benefits, I can easily see 3 + being labelled as 'posh', 'irresponsible' or 'something immigrants do' depending on other identity related factors.

I work in a community centre for less privileged children and absolutely none of them look spotless. None of them wear adidas from head to toe, have a haircut, or even have more then 5 pieces of clothes (all stained and worn out). Are you sure those kids that are all nice dressed, with clean hair and looking lovely are poor? Those mothers that I work with do not get home until 12am by the time someone else put their kids to bed without a bath or brushed hair. I feel really sorry that some people believe that working class parents could afford those trainers and nice clothes just to prove a point. And hygiene has nothing to do with class!

This. In spades.

Shared bedroooms here (well at least til we get loft converted) but we do have the 7 seater + a commuting car for DH. Definitely not rolling in it. But dont struggle either. Poor by middle class standards I expect.

Poor and working class is not the same thing.

Agree with festive nuts but wasn’t brave enough to say it. The immaculately turned out working class kids are also often well off and not living on benefits by any means.

You may have had 4 kids by choice (and thats lovely)but you could afford that choice. Noone is turning their nose up at you for "breeding like rabbits" I shouldn't think.

Yes. I see what you mean Bernard

less privileged children

Is not necessarily the same thing as being working class.

Ok I mean "working class" not poor. And the working class children that I work with are not spotless at all.

I have 3 sibling and our family is the epitome of middle class. My best friend growing up also had 3 siblings and her family was the epitome of working class.

Our parents probably had similar family incomes though. Her dad owned his own building firm. We both had 7-seaters but we visited stately homes in our while they visited theme parks. I was always jealous.

There don’t tend to be many middle class families using community centres in deprived areas in the areas I have worked in the past. Maybe in some parts of UK but not where I have been. They are used by local working class people living in the social housing close by.

The 'underclass' notion, I find truly shocking. I think it's prejudiced and disrespectful to refer to it as an entity (and classify those in it as addicts who are unlikely to ever work). There are people in all classes with addictions or an inability to find work, or who live chaotic lives. To class them beneath those who are lucky enough to have their health and a paid job seems highly unfair to me.

Agree festive- I think it is appalling too and desensitises the general population to the reality of welfare reform.

Ok I mean "working class" not poor. And the working class children that I work with are not spotless at all.

Was wondering about that myself. The large number of filthy neglected children in the working class village i lived in must have been an anomaly. That's usually the middle class per Mumsnetters.

I guess the uptight clean WC just did not live around there.

But that assumes that people in the underclass are somehow there of their own choosing and that by acknowledging it exists, we are blaming them or insulting them. Which is not really the case (or at least, it certainly shouldn't be).

There's no use pretending there isn't a section of society for whom life is extremely difficult, who are denied access to work and opportunity.

Underclass is a relatively new term tbh, if you’re having trouble identifying them, they’re the ones you secretly don’t want your kids playing with

Hello, Katie Hopkins. Didn't see you there.

I think ‘socially and financially excluded’ is the appropriate term now.

I do think underclass is rude. But I also think the lack of sub-classes within the working class isn't helpful either.

It's surely not coincidence that the middle class occupations - I'm looking at the academics- see a colourful spectrum of middle classes who are distinct from one another and only see the working class as one homogeneous mass and I think underclass was a backlash of being lumped in with the spectacles presented in the poverty porn genre.