AIBU to conclude that it is not a crime to be a "Champagne Socialist"

[Rosaxpxp]

I hear this term getting bandied around as an insult. Surely it is better to be an affluent socialist than a well off Tory!?

Well..... when I've heard the term, it hasn't been used to describe just socialists who are affluent, but those where there is an element of blindness to the reality of other people's circumstances, e.g. loudly decrying anybody who chooses private education for their children, but failing to acknowledge that the state system works a lot better for people who live in affluent areas with access to excellent schools and children smart and resilient enough to cope with what might get thrown at them.

I don't think it's merely affluent socialists that are called champagne socialists, it's just the hypocritical ones.

@Deliaskis

Well..... when I've heard the term, it hasn't been used to describe just socialists who are affluent, but those where there is an element of blindness to the reality of other people's circumstances, e.g. loudly decrying anybody who chooses private education for their children, but failing to acknowledge that the state system works a lot better for people who live in affluent areas with access to excellent schools and children smart and resilient enough to cope with what might get thrown at them.

I don't think it's merely affluent socialists that are called champagne socialists, it's just the hypocritical ones.

A lot of people I have heard using the term "Champagne Socialist" seem to be coming from the angle that you have got no right to be a socialist if you are wealthy.

To me the term means more than just being affluent and also left leaning. It implies some kind of hypocrisy and/or someone who puts theur own need to be at the centre of 'class war' drama ahead of things that would actually help people who are struggling. Like going on about anti-capitalism while owning loads of expensive designer handbags, or signalling socialist values by going to rallies for (just as an example) solidarity with Palestine while ignoring pressing issues that affect working class people in their own community. It may be that they ignore the issues that aren't as trendy, or maybe they conflict with some of the champagne socialist's own values, and so get conveniently swept under the rug because it doesn't fit their overly simplistic world view. There's more to it than simply being middle class and leafleting for Labour, for example.

X-post. Can you give an example of where you've heard it used in that way?

Agree with @psychomath .... it's not a criticism of a status of wealthy+left, it's a criticism of a behaviour.

No more or less of an insult than assuming that somehow a socialist is automatically a better person than a conservative (small s and small c).

A bigoted arse is a bigoted arse, regardless of their political persuasion, gender, race, religion or any other characteristic. Judge people on their actions.

Champagne socialism itself perhaps is not so much a problem if we are merely talking about someone who happens to be wealthy believing that wealth should be more evenly distributed.

However, that belief almost unfailingly comes with a pious and often unrealistic outlook which lectures and hectors, which gives handouts and bestows charity on others, rather than working for better conditions for working people. I think that socialism on its own was not really the core movement of the Labour Party and it is a pity this has been forgotten.

Don't think you've seen the word used in the right context. Champagne socialists are massive hypocrites and show a complete lack of awareness to their fortunate backgrounds and circumstances.

I agree with you. We can only hope they will do something benevolent with at least part of their wealth.

It's being loudly (and sometimes patronisingly) socialist in ways that don't inconvenience their super duper comfortable lifestyles one bit.

I prefer champagne socialists to beer capitalists.

It doesn't just mean wealthy though, it implies being oblivious to actual poverty and problems.

@ClariceQuiff

I prefer champagne socialists to beer capitalists.

A more perfect illustration of the point would be hard to find! ....Better someone who says the right things but does nothing meaningful about it, than have to engage with actual disadvantaged people who by virtue of their very different life experience and education, might have different priorities to you.

Hope not because I definitely am one

We have a six figure income (just I should add) but I vote labour and believe in socialist principles at least in part, well more new labour I suppose. I don't feel any issues with this

My understanding of the phrase is that it’s more people who are hypocritical. So say they are socialists but is really just lip service to make them look good at dinner parties but actually don’t do anything to look like it.

J k Rowling i think is someone who is extraordinarily wealthy but also quite left in her views (if not as far as socialist - which is actually pretty far on the spectrum) and reflects that in her actions - eg doesn’t avoid tax, gives away bucketloads, takes a stand on political issues that causes her a headache that she doesn’t need to etc.

@Rosaxpxp. I totally agree with you, it’s often used by people who seem to think being left leaning and caring about the social situation but are also comfortably off have no right to be that way. Personally I think it’s what everyone should aspire to!!

"Or signalling socialist values by going to rallies for (just as an example) solidarity with Palestine while ignoring pressing issues that affect working class people in their own community. It may be that they ignore the issues that aren't as trendy,"

That totally describes my now middle class sister (late 60's) and her middle class friends. They love a bandwagon to jump on. They have no understanding of the real causes of poverty in today's world, cycles of poverty and how being poor can impact on every aspect of life and how it influences the choices that have to be made etc. In the UK that is, like Corbyn they could write books on poverty in places like Latin America.

Nothing wrong with being a Socialist and having the money to drink champagne. Surely you don't have to be poor to be a Socialist? If you have worked your way to enjoying a good standard of living and still retain a good moral conscience and sense of social responsibility - great.

Then they don’t understand why people vote differently to them but they’re so fucking arrogant that it’s clearly other people who are thick and don’t have a grasp of the issues!

Of course; stupid working class people should leave politics to their betters. I often have the impression that the name calling is an expression of the frustration those terribly clever and socially aware people have when the plebs aren't grateful for the help the champagne socialists have decided they would benefit from . The fetishising working class people is also cringe inducing.

It's another way of saying Hypocrite. Someone who talks about what "should be done" when it comes to achieving equality but wont give an inch of their own comfort to do so. For example someone who thinks all grammar schools should be got rid of but sends their own children to private school.

As others said, champagne socialist means hypocrite. These people have benefitted from all the virtues of free markets. But they want to pull the ladder from underneath everyone else. It’s quite telling these people mostly seem to be civil servants and part of the public sector. They are are getting the best of both worlds - benefitting from other people creating wealth that they unabashedly waste while having guaranteed income streams for life. They just want to perpetuate that system even more. The problem is that they are stupid.

Champagne socialists versus out of touch poshos who think they've worked hard for what they've got but the rest of us are lazy scroungers....a la Johnson, Cameron and Osbourne.

I"m probably a champagne socialist and come from a background of 100 years plus of middle class educated professional socialism. My family were university educated women (and men) from later Victorian times but have been socialists and Labour Party members for over 100 years. If you look to Labour in the 1920s then it was very mixed.

Growing up I had a friend whose father was a labour MP, minister and later member of the House of Lords. His father was working class grammar school educated but he was very much MC by the nature of his upbringing, education and professional role. Are you saying that you can only be a socialist if you are WC?

There has always been a middle class (and indeed UC) aspect to socialism.