Class difference - if you're posh

[2022bebetter]

Posh people of MN, help me!

I have married into a very posh family. Not titled posh, but public school. DH and his brothers all lovely.

Sister, MIL and SIL clearly look down on me.

I know I shouldn't care and it's their problem etc but I feel so embarrassed when I clearly get stuff 'wrong'.

SIL in particular, will never correct me but quite often say 'I could never do xx, so tacky / common' knowing full well it's something I do! Most recently I have learnt that I say garage 'wrong'.

Wherever we go, they always dress so similar and I get it 'wrong'.

Obviously the easiest tip is not to care, but any advice from posh MNetters would be so gratefully received.

'you do you' to your sil andher silly comments

My late DF was the antithesis of posh. He had about 3 teeth in his head, terrible table manners and wore holey clothes. He knew how to deal with people of all social strata. He treated everyone exactly the same and I've tried to follow in his footsteps. Our shepherdess is very posh and she adored him. Your SIL sounds very insecure. instead of trying to put her down, find out what interests her. She needs love not hate. We're all human after all and life is short.

@mathanxiety

I suspected they were a bunch of poseurs when I was reading your OP, *@2022bebetter*, but when you mentioned charger plates I knew it.

My dad came from seriously old money, and I never saw hide nor hair of a charger plate at my grandmother's dining table. Have seen them at plenty of tacky weddings though.

Anyone who can stump up the money can go to public school. They love you as long as your cheques don't bounce.

If you want to figure out all the table palaver, find an online demo.

If you want a good laugh at it all, treat yourself to 'Miss Manners' Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behaviour', by Judith Manners.
Get it shipped from the US if you can't find it in the UK.

So mathanxiety you can be kind after all

[quote 2022bebetter]@My200lbLife dinner etiquette is my weakness!

I once used the charger plate as my main plate that didn't go down well.[/quote]
Then they should have used theirs too ....that would show good manners and breeding !!!

Oh, I'd be so tempted to turn up with some friends wherever they were and have a much better time than them! Or just so clearly have an amazing time with Dh and brothers while the sour faced cows suck on their Highgrove lemons

Also, your pronunciation of garage is the acceptable one and hers is tacky pseudo posh bollocks.

I worked with someone who kept mock imitating how I pronounced certain words (what with me not talking posh enough) till our boss told her to wind her neck in.

Those that give a shit about how you pronounce things aren't worth giving a shit about.

I don't know if this is unusual, but my in-laws are landed, partner's wider family has landed gentry and at least one multi-millionaire and none of them are like that. Granted, my in-laws aren't the best, but they'd behave as they do whether they had £1 or £1million to their name. The wife of the multi-millionaire is nasty and does look down on people who don't have as much as her, but she married into money having previously had not much at all, she's not from a "posh" background.
My family is very well off, I guess, but my parents made it themselves through hard work, they're from a working class background and also don't look down on others who may have less. It sounds like the people you describe are just entitled and unkind OP, I wouldn't let them bother you.

Oh I honestly would just ignore them, clearly actually have no morals let alone class! My dad is as working class as they come and he is currently a delivery driver - he’s had Stella McCartney and the Duchess of Rutland holding doors open for him and offering him cups of tea and a tour of the castle purely because he doesn’t treat them any differently to anyone else - he is polite and respectful which is much more appealing that ‘posh’

@JeffThePilot

Milk and then just as it comes dear? I'm afraid the preserve's full of stones; Beg pardon, I'm soiling the doileys With afternoon tea-cakes and scones.“

Scon-s, surely! 😂

The point is the poem is full of the sort of faux-pas that distinguish Hyacinth Buckets from the genuinely smart. Milk should go in after the tea has been poured, it's jam rather than preserve, you don't say 'beg pardon', you don't use doileys, they're not afternoon tea-cakes and allegedly, it's sconns not scoans though in fact this is a regional thing.

Truly classy people wouldn't be so rude. Don't pay attention. They're just stuck up cows.

I haven't RTFT but if no-one's pointed this out yet, true class is knowing the difference between etiquette and manners (etiquette - knowing what to do; manners - shelving that knowledge and doing whatever makes your guest feel comfortable)

Isn't being "posh" in and of itself quite twee/kitsch now? I blame Downtown/The Crown/the American obsession with Kate and Meghan et al. It's all faintly ridiculous at this stage and should be easy to laugh off OP.

Admittedly I'm not English though (thankfully if this is the nonsense your lot still has to contend with!) For instance someone unthread said to be truly "posh" you should use the words napkin, sitting room, lunch and dinner. Every working class Irish peasant uses those terms which really shows it up for the absolute balderdash it is! Laugh it off is my advice. I'd be truly embarrassed for people like this, fawning over some caricature-type concept of aristocracy as though it is somehow aspirational. Bleurgh, turns my republican stomach.

@WaitingForSunshineAndDaisies

I haven't RTFT but if no-one's pointed this out yet, true class is knowing the difference between etiquette and manners (etiquette - knowing what to do; manners - shelving that knowledge and doing whatever makes your guest feel comfortable)

No such thing as true class. Things matter because people expect it to - mostly it's about customs and normal behaviours and that will flux and change by geography and time..

Rugby is odd choice for girls as it’s traditionally a boys school. I even remember when they started allowing girls, but I am in my 50s.
Normally if brother/sister siblings don’t attend the same school then they attend schools that are known for traditionally favouring their gender e.g. girls go to a girls school; Cheltenham or Roedean etc. Girls who have been to Rugby usually tend to be a bit strange and lacking social skills in my experience.

Ok I haven’t read every post on this thread but have looked at the OP’s - I am from what would be termed a pretty posh background (think titles, boarding school, country life style, land etc etc). Basically your in laws sound grim - and lacking in basic manners. I’m intrigued by the SIL who is the rudest but apparently according to herself the poshest. She is clearly very insecure and just all out rude. As others have said you really have a DH problem - he should have your back.
And I’m also confused by the comments about girls at Rugby. If you are looking at boarding schools you decide if you want co-ed or single sex, and then choose schools accordingly (ie in a pretty normal way) - no idea why you’d only send girls to a school that used to be a girls’ school .

@AuntieObnoxious

Rugby is odd choice for girls as it’s traditionally a boys school. I even remember when they started allowing girls, but I am in my 50s. Normally if brother/sister siblings don’t attend the same school then they attend schools that are known for traditionally favouring their gender e.g. girls go to a girls school; Cheltenham or Roedean etc. Girls who have been to Rugby usually tend to be a bit strange and lacking social skills in my experience.

@AuntieObnoxious

This is rubbish. Lots of girls whose brothers are at Eton/Winchester/Harrow are at Rugby/Marlborough/Oundle etc - it’s a perfectly normal choice if you want all your kids to have the advantages of the scale, resources and networking of the major originally-all-boys public schools.

OP - I’m in a similar situation to you re. class difference, except they’re not overtly snobby and disrespectful towards me. I have been ‘accepted’ perhaps on merit given I’ve done very well for myself and am a charming conversationalist and nice person I would never let anyone make me feel inferior anyway so perhaps it’s how you carry yourself and this is a you not them problem per se. There are always dickheads in life.

Generally my IL/extended family are nice people although I often observe some of them need a reality check. Early on I once overheard and was then asked to comment on a conversation that a cousin was dating a plumber as if this was a very negative thing. “what do you think Pensieve”, at which point I loudly guffawed. Said my father was X tradesperson and quoted how much we (and they all) had had to pay for work in the house and had to wait months so I very much doubt they’d have financial concerns. .

Shame they didn't learn any manners or grace in their public school isn't it. I'd be suggesting a refund to MIL.

+1 here for the fact that the genuinely posh (a) would not really notice or care how you pronounce something or how your behaviours might differ from theirs, e.g. cutlery at the table etc, and (b) even If they did, it's been drummed into them that you never, ever draw attention to anything that would make someone else feel uncomfortable. It's the essence of good manners.

So, SIL and MIL etc are in fact not genuinely posh. As has already been observed on this thread, they're snobs with money.

You need to find a way to let them know that, or you need to rise above it. Don't ever feel inferior to them, because quite clearly you're not. You were brought up to understand making people feel bad about themselves is awful.

"SIL, you know what you just said about how is pronounced, I know this wasn't how you meant it, but I actually pronounce it like that and I know you're a kind person with good manners but if someone else heard you say that they might think you were being bit snobby like Hyacinth Bucket? I think it's called 'new money' or something like that? Linguists agree that pronunciation is descriptive and people being prescriptive about how you should say something just don't understand how language works. I love language though, it's like a lovely garden, all the flowers can bloom, anyway, just to let you know, because I can imagine it could be embarrassing for you to be misinterpreted"

Or something.

You sound lovely, your in-laws sound appalling.

I had a posh upbringing (public school, a few titled friends with a butler, that sort of thing). I am not remotely posh now.

Nobody in the circles in which I grew up would refer to anyone as 'common'. The only people in my experience who use that word (referring to people) are the worst sort of stuck-up, upwardly mobile, pretentious twats.

For a genuine mix of people all working together in harmony, treating each other with kindness and respect for everyone's glorious differences see Christmas at Holkam Hall - I think it was on Channel 4. It is a lovely example of how we all complement each other, regardless of our roots. Good manners and kindness are all that matters.

Just be yourself, and if you can, laugh inwardly at your in-laws ridiculous pretensions.

@RingBinderInjury

Be happy in the knowledge that by uttering the words “so common” out loud and purposefully putting you down she has revealed her true nouveau riche self. How embarrassing for her.

Yes so very true

How ridiculous

For instance someone unthread said to be truly "posh" you should use the words napkin, sitting room, lunch and dinner. Every working class Irish peasant uses those terms

LOL, YYY to this.

The 'posh' thing is incredibly insular.

If I were you, OP, I would let it all wash right over me and treat it as a pathetic expression of insecurity on a personal level on the part of the ILs, which it is.

There is nothing real about the English class system. It only holds power over people because they are willing to let it. If you decide it doesn't exist, nobody can make you kow tow to the silly expectations.

In the words of Eleanor Roosevelt, “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”

They sound like a pack if oiks! Do not allow yourself to feel inferior to these rude morons!
I personally would wind them up as much as i could by deliberately using wrong cutlery whilst proclaiming my love of all things tacky, sit back and watch the pearl clutching!

Ive come across their kind before and I think you could dress like them, walk, talk and act like them and they will still look down on you unfortunately.

Better to be yourself and own it. You sound lovely by the way. I'd much rather a cuppa with you than them!