To think working class shows?

[MrsBonnie]

I work in a lovely school where they’ve all had very different upbringings to me. Very much working class here. Sometimes I think it shows with little things I’ve noticed.

Having sugar in tea, using a tumble drier, not having a cleaner, using the wrong glasses for different drinks (I.E using the same one for everything!)… what else am I missing that excludes me from the club 😂 sometimes I will mention something like the above and get “oh I never use a tumble drier” … then I just think oops have I said something weird there?

Sometimes I think they’re judging me with things I say and do but I hope not! I grew up being homeless at a certain point, council houses, single teen (but amazing) mum, a very specific type of circle. I feel like Mum did everything she could to get us out of that way of life, but I can’t help but feel I don’t belong sometimes. Or that I stick out like a sore thumb. Am I being daft? Imposter syndrome a little bit!

People with any class at all won’t care about any of that stuff, they’ll just appreciate you for who you are. I have friends across the class spectrum
and all use tumbles now and again! Stop worrying, be who you are and enjoy your lovely school!

Gold-plated? How vulgar. You're clearly new money, not upper class. Go back to your superyacht with the footballers and oil tycoons.

hou Sound quite judgmental yourself tbh

It sounds like you were a survivor. That is something to be proud of. Maybe they are secretly intimidated by your strength.

If your feelings are accurate, then I feel sorry for them. They can never have the self-confidence that comes from having been able to survive hardships.

I'm middle class, have a cleaner and wouldn't be without my tumble dryer. It has nothing to do with working class or not. Those that differentiate are snobs and to be ignored. The working class are the backbone of Britain. Don't forget that. Xxx

I worked with a woman who very much believed that her working class roots and accent held her back in her career. It was very interesting to hear her perspective. I couldn’t disagree with her. Especially as the hiring panels weren’t generally working class …

I didn’t grow up in a place where class was really a “thing” and am amazed by the comments about dryers. To me the best thing about dryers is that they eliminate the need to iron most clothes.

*I just asked my tumble dryer if it was middle class or working class. Apparently it's a bit of a family outcast and is only one generation removed from nobility!

Bit of an awkward conversation actually, it got quite uppity and started lecturing me on the assumed entitlement of the bourgeoisie.*

I know it's a couple of days since you posted this, @alwaysmovingforwards, but you deserve recognition! I cackled.

Totally off point but I’d totally forgotten you could get coloured toilet paper!

I think you are probably overthinking things in the nicest way possible.

I'm proud to be from a working class background. Both husband and I have successful careers and live comfortably, definitely would be classed as 'middle class'. Would never refer to myself that way though and pride myself on being down to earth in general.

My husbands job means we have to socialise with some very wealthy people at time and I never shy away from speaking about my upbringing of asked.

Nothing wrong with being from a working class background, even if it shows! Take pride in your roots, it's a persons character and kindness that really my matters.

Different glasses? For what? Genuinely confused!

Went on a property selling website, set prices high to low, looked at £5m+ properties and 9/10 had a tumble drier in the pics (go look it’s fascinating 🙃)

So either working class involves having a multimillion pound home, or whoever thinks owning a tumble drier makes you a pleb is seriously overestimating their own (probably quite mediocre) social status 🤣🤣

Port glass, whiskey tumbler, champagne flute, tea cup, espresso cup etc etc

Bang on! YANBU to feel it but I bet it’s barely registering on anyone else’s radar. Be proud :)

I'm from a middle class background but my parents were careless with money so we didn't maintain it. We didn't have a tumble dryer (i do know what you mean!) but i do now and rarely use it. I have sugar in my tea (but do know what you mean!). I'm very practical and just won't have a load of different glasses or crockery that i hardly use. I confess i did recently get pastry forks and would also like some small plates for cake! We have a cleaner because we work hard and decided its our treat as otherwise we're quite careful with money. I don't like telling people we have a cleaner as i feel judged for being lazy and posh!

I might notice these certain differences with others and commonalities in class, but I won't judge. What matters to me when i meet other women is if they're kind, fun, good mums, real and i love it if they swear a bit and will join me in a moan about Men! Rather than pretend they're perfect.

You sound like a lovely fellowe overthinker too and i can see why you're just trying to fit in but the right people won't care x u

Bit puzzled as to how people dry their laundry without tumble dryers? I try to use the washing line as much as possible but when it’s lashing down with rain obviously not an option. I’d like not to use it because global warming/fuel bills but as I don’t have the heating turned on for the same reason - how does anyone dry their clothes without?

I choose my wash days- that is really important.
I don't wash big heavy things when the forecast is torrential rain.
Otherwise dry on racks.
I don't crowd the racks, and I put them in rooms that get sun with a window open.
I don't find drying clothes difficult.

I think you're right. We're having a lot of training on improving cultural capital at the moment and the trainer was quite explicit that middle class values dominate access to the work place and if our children don't have enough access to (or understanding of) these values then we're hindering their access to the workplace. Now I don't fully agree with this stance, I think it's very flawed and slightly misunderstands the premise of cultural capital, but it certainly is an attitude that exists.

Previously in my career I've worked in a private school. A boy joined in ks2 after his father won the lottery and he had a terrible time of it. The kids identified him as 'different' immediately and it showed and these children were only around 9 or 10 years old.

I’ve never had a tumble drier and neither did my upper middle class parents or grandparents. Glasses - wine or tumbler, that’s it. Tea - I have one sugar or xylitol if it’s available. I think it’s just personal taste not class, although in more recent years of course there are also environmental concerns and now cost of running with tumble driers to consider.

My parents were peasants in China, my mum was illiterate, I’m the first to go to university. DH and I have now have successful professional and upper managerial careers and live in a naive house in an affluent area. I think the posh kids of just stop oil are a disgrace. I have a tumble drier. So what clas does that make me?

It is interesting to learn about how others live. Of course people have different cultures and these reflect your upbringing , this will be in part related to class. I am sure some differences in how people live over generations is about the space they have for example to hang wet washing around the place etc. Hopefully you've got lovely colleagues and none of this will matter.

Sniggering to myself at all these people explaining their elaborate clothes drying routines in order to maintain some sort of bafflingly specific ‘tumble dryer-free and therefore a cut above the working class’ badge of honour. The people asserting this—if it is indeed a thing that people actually think—are perhaps overestimating their own social standing. They are too poor for paid help to do the laundry for them, but just high up enough to know they should embrace that weirdly middle middle suspicion of things that make your life easier (with the notable exception of garlic presses, which they profess to be essential and yet do NOT actually save time and in fact bruise the garlic). Upper middles and above have no such hangups, and they certainly wouldn’t spend all day jostling around clothing airers set up in every room. The fussy pieces are either at the cleaners or have been done by hand and are drying on a pulley rack in the utility, but the rest has been put into the dryer by the cleaner.

I believe her. I’ve had to learn over the years that my working class background (and the fact I do unfortunately sound very common because that’s just what my accent is) can hold me back, and there’s many occasions I’ve had to be really careful how I portray myself around certain people. It’s sad but that’s the same for many people with many different reasons they’re discriminated against.

I would say you were first gen middle class like me. I grew up in a firm working class household but was the first of my family to go to uni. A few years ago I claimed I was still working class and got shouted down by colleagues for being ridiculous.

To be honest though I’m not bothered which category others put me in, I’m still going to like what I like, eat what I eat and do what I do. Couldn’t give a monkeys if onlookers describe it as working or middle class behaviour.

We’ll probably be the last generation to wonder where we fit though due to social mobility grinding to a halt.

I mean… people with true means don’t sit around discussion the way they clean their clothing…

Growing up poor and rising the ranks I do notice something that is definitely a difference between the poors and middle class.. it’s the ability to network.

blew my mind to watch it in action! The way those with real means (not middle class vs working flapping gums about how much sugar is poured in a cup)… the way they can pick up a phone and BAM things are in motion.

I have spent a lot of my time building a network where I actively help others and connect people. It is something invaluable.

Also I have learned from the truly rich is the way to handle money. So many tricks and ways.

I swear I’ve never heard anyone in my life say anything bad about the sugar tea thing. It’s banal. Actually , while not using a timber dryer is seen as washer woman status … it gets some cache being environmentally friendly.

Im American though. But … I really feel like the power of networking is really something those of middle and “working” (same
thing) could benefit from learning. … if they haven’t