You're not working class!

[Womeninthesequel]

Ridiculous conversation with an NCT acquaintance - we as a group were discussing the cost of living crisis and it was mentioned that working class families are really going to struggle. He scoffed and said "not all working class families, we're going to be fine." To which I goggled, and said "you're not working class!" He looked cross and said "of course I am, I grew up on a council estate, my dad was a binman."

This is true, he definitely is from a working class background, but he went to university, then med school, is now a senior surgeon doing mainly private practice, he makes six figures (which he'll tell anyone who walks past him) and his house is currently on the market for £1.2mil! He's not working class! This was pointed out to him (not by me) and he was vastly offended. He seems to genuinely believe that his upbringing means he'll always be working class, but that's not right, right? Class isn't innate, is it?

He's a bit of a dick in general, but this has raised a wider conversation at home. DH is from a working class background and is now uni educated and a professional and feels he's now middle class, so is confused by the idea that he's not.

@hotdiggetydog And tbh the fact you see it as lanes, rather than one big pool, makes you the snob!

Why does someone have to leave the WC lane if they become a barrister? Why can't they just be a brilliant barrister and retain all their background too?

Social mobility for me will have worked when working class people don't feel the need to change what they eat, or wear, or speak like or where they holiday to fit in at work .

I want no lanes at all, just free swimming.

Yes this exactly. Those saying his kids will be MC but not him, what if his kids end up happily working in Asda and living in a modest house are the still MC because of their dads job but he stays WC?

Three different definitions/ statements

the social group consisting primarily of people who are employed in unskilled or semi-skilled manual or industrial work.
"he came from the working class"

/ˌwɝː.kɪŋ ˈklæs/ (UK also the working classes) a social group that consists of people who earn little money, often being paid only for the hours or days that they work, and who usually do physical work: The working class usually react/reacts in a predictable way to government policies.

More than one in five of those earning between £75,000 and £100,000 identify as working class. For context, a salary of £75,000 would have put you in the top 6 per cent of taxpayers in 2019-20, according to HMRC figures published last month.11 Apr 2022

@carefullycourageous yes good point. I am proud of my background, identify strongly with how I was brought up. Social mobility suggests moving up. Whilst this is obviously a good thing in terms of moving out of poverty, all the other things that make someone WC are not necessarily things they would want to move up from - that implies the personal/ emotional elements of being WC are somehow not good enough.

All this rubbish about not being able to change class 🙄

Class is about categorising people based on their economic position in society. The higher your class the more power, status and influence you have in the economy.

Upper class refers to the very wealthiest and powerful people in society, often the very top percentage of the population. They are usually connected to politics and includes anyone in the aristocracy or nobility. Middle class includes people who work in high status, secure and stable jobs, like doctors and lawyers and the people who own their own homes. Working class refers to those who have to work in order to to survive. They don’t have many savings and may even be in debt, and have low wage and insecure jobs.

He is Middle Class. End of.

He is working class, as am I. My children are middle class due to home owning professional parents and their lifestyle and education. But I will always be/feel working class and will always understand the working class in a way that my children possibly won’t.
I consider myself working class living a middle class lifestyle. It’s not at all about money or where you go, it’s where you’re from and how you were raised.

I used tho think it was your current circumstances that defined your class but learned recently its based on what your parents were/how you were raised. So I think he would be working class (although living now in a middle class environment (but not part of it) and raising his children that way).

You can't buy class, but you can buy stuff like food, and heat. If you earn enough to afford it that is. Your friend sounds like a nob.

I wear Hunters, and White Stuff gilet’s and you would never see me having a ‘fag’ outside Weatherspoins. My dad smoked ‘fags’ - I would generally never use that word. I live a very middle class lifestyle, in a very middle class area, my accent has changed. I am still working class. I will always be working class and am a better person for it.
But I do like having nice things 🤣

Completely agree with everything you've said.

The people going on about how you can't change/move up or down the classes aren't even providing any evidence or reasoning behind it. Just touting their own personal opinions as "facts".

Does it matter? I'm just me & take people at face value. Dislike pigeonholes.

Surely it’s subjective though. There might be indicators of material things you can use to indicate class but that’s not the whole picture.

Someone that comes from a WC background could move into an MC lifestyle but still identify strongly with their cultural upbringing and that frames their perspective on their whole life. How can you say - fact, end of! - when talking about how someone views themselves based on such strong elements such as culture, experience and upbringing?

So wrong . Money/wealth is a factor but by your reckoning Wayne Rooney is upper class 😂

He can absolutely recognise that he came from a working class background, but it is grossly offensive to continue to claim to be working class when you have the level of economic power that he has. Imagine telling someone who is struggling to make ends meet, working all hours of the day on a zero hour contract, that you’re working class too on a 6 figure salary with all the cushy trappings of a MC lifestyle?! Utterly nonsensical.

No, I’m not wrong. That’s the economic definition of class.

And no, Wayne Rooney would be upper-middle. He’s not aristocracy/nobility/political.

He isn’t saying he’s poor he’s saying he is working class. You can be poor and upper class and stinking rich and working class.

You can be stinking rich and working class? That's the biggest laugh I've had all week, thanks for that! 😂

You can’t be stinking rich and working class. The very definition of working class is the social group consisting primarily of people who are employed in unskilled or semi-skilled manual or industrial work.

Class is not a feeling. Class is about economic power.

We’re straying into identity politics here. I fear this is Class-Dysphoria territory. Perhaps we should start a new Tavistock to help people comes to realities with their class identities 🙄

😂😂😂 Wayne Rooney upper middle. The fact that you seem to have posted that in all seriousness is astonishing. You are talking about wealth not class. It’s evident that on this thread people are not just talking about wealth. The British class system does not have a simple definition despite the best efforts of social scientists over the years, that’s one of its strengths or problems depending on your view. If it were as simple as wealth it wouldn’t be nearly so effective. It’s something you are subject to whether you want to be or not, you can’t opt out and that has been a source of power for some and misery for many over the years.

You can be stinking rich and working class? That's the biggest laugh I've had all week, thanks for that!

What's funny about that? Middle class / upper class doesn't mean the same as rich. Class and wealth level are related, but not synonymous. Lots of markers of social class are cultural, whether we like it or not, and however unimportant we might think class is or should be. Someone who's working class and then wins the lottery doesn't automatically become middle class overnight, because they are still the same person, with the same upbringing, attitudes and social characteristics. Equally, if an aristocrat loses all their money, they don't just suddenly become working class.

No, I’m talking about economic and societal power. Wayne Rooney was born into a working class background but is no longer working class. Your class changes based on the economic and societal power you wield. It is not a static concept based on what you’re born into. This completely defies the concept of social mobility!

Class is only solely about economic power if you are considering the narrowest Marxist definition which is not how the British class system has ever worked. The sad thing is this lie is sold to people who think that if they get rich they are suddenly going to move class, they then can end up getting a bit of a shock when it turns out that they don’t quite ‘fit in’ for some imperceptible reason they can’t quite define. People have posted about it in this thread

We’re straying into identity politics here.

It's not straying. Class has always been about identity, not just wealth.

Social mobility - that would be a concept that has been generated by government advisers and academics. Inter generationally families can change class but it takes a certain amount of time.

This. With the added caveat that it’s probably less based on how you identify yourself and more about how others identify you.