To wonder why our value is defined by money?

[Abigail47]

I was just wondering why everyone's value is defined by how money they have.

When I went to school, all of the most popular girls were from rich families. If your dad was wealthy , you were popular. The rich girls would only hang around with the othe rich girls.

If you were less rich they wouldn't talk to you. If you were poor or from a single parent family, they definitely wouldn't talk to you.

It made me think from an early age: why is my worth/ or anyone's worth defined by how much money I have. It seems so ridiculous.

There are so many other things that add up a person's worth: such as how kind they are, how good they are at different things etc.

Similarly when I went to college, the rich people would only hang around with each other.

I lived in a small town in England growing up, and again, it was always divided by money. The rich people would only really be friends with each other.

I then moved to London, which is a lot more diverse and multicultural, however you still get wealth snobbery in some of the workplaces. And even though in the workplaces, everyone talks to each other.

After work, and in hobbies, I've seen the same thing: that the really rich people in London will only be friends with other really rich people.

I mean is it not all a bit ridiculous. How is our worth tied to money? There are so many othe things that make a human valuable.

Yet alot of people seem to think of money over everything else

That just reads like a group of insular people that are averse to outsiders. Again, this isn’t something exclusive to the wealthy - you can find people like this from all walks of life.

So because you haven’t seen others shift their opinion, you won’t do it yourself? (And it actually happens quite a lot on here so I don’t know where you’ve been looking)
For someone who talks about her own experience, you definitely use a lot of absolutes “always”, “never”, “only” etc. You didn’t ask “why do I feel like my worth is linked to money” you insisted that everyone felt this way.
And just like you managed to miss all the threads where the OP changed their mind, you also seem to see all your experiences as a confirmation of your biases. You don’t know why women in your singing group were not welcoming to you but you made an assumption based on your biases and, bizarrely, had these biases confirmed by someone who wasn’t even present at the event.

Be fair, you are wandering around with a chip on your shoulder the size of a planet and you dismiss everyone's differing interpretations because only you have an insight into the dark and uncaring hearts of The Rich. (cue dramatic music)

People with things in common get along. It might be work, children of an age, interests, living on the same street, campaigning for the same cause, holidaying at the same place etc

For a lot of those things, geography and income play a significant part. As a result, people of similar affluence come across each other more often. I only know a couple of surgeons but more teachers than you can shake a stick at - that's not because I hate surgeons or they hate me, we just move in different circles.

@Abigail47 , you are ascribing every interaction to a callous, materialistic world filled with rich people who dislike or distain the poor. That's bollocks. There are unfriendly, judgemental people at every economic level - your own view of the well off is pretty unpleasant, for example. We've all known absolute gems and absolute gits across society, it's not a wealth based system.

Maybe the singing grouop people didn't like you because you came across as prickly. Maybe you sat in Mavis's chair, and that's a faux pas. Or maybe they and you would never be friends for a myriad of reasons.

But to you, it must be because they are richer than you.

Oh how you seem to know so much about a group that you never attended.

I didn't make "an assumption based on my biases". How rude of you.

My friend also attended the choir with me. They also froze her out. She decided that she wouldn't go back as in her words "they were so snobby and cold".

The choir were known locally for being snobby and cold to "poor" people. They were extremely unwelcoming.

The choir were known locally for being snobby and cruel to "poorer people".

I see another thread just posted today on mumsnet where a woman said that richer people are leaving her out.

Is that an assumption based in her biases?

You are aware that we live in a class based society that is filled with inequality and segregation yes?

That's not opinion. That's fact.

It's been going on for a long time.

If only people could start to see beyond money.

It was because they were richer than me.

And they didn't do it just to me. They were known to be a snobby and cold group locally.

They were cold to anyone that was poorer than them. I remember someone else that i knew tried to join the choir and they were really nasty to her aswell. She told me "they only seem to want other doctors or psychologists in that choir" . Not anyone else

Indeed I remember one of the older women In the choir refused to go to her own sons wedding because he married a "poor" person.

She didn't approve of his girlfriends upbringing, so she refused to attend the wedding.

I remember we all spoke about it at the time, how crazy and snobby it was.

But that was how the town was.

A lot of the richer people wouldn't speak or have anything that all to do with the poorer people.

It was very class based

People literally say “He/ She is worth £1 million” when describing how much wealth someone has.

So it think it’s pretty ingrained!

Not in my experience. I grew up dirt poor. The popular girls at school were the rebellious, sexy ones with older boyfriends with cars and jail time. I went to Oxford, was the poorest person at my very trad college with a high percentage of Old Etonians, but though I wasn’t hanging out with the OEs, absolutely all of my friends were far richer than me, my mind was blown by being invited home in the vacs, and many of us are still friends 25 years on. DH is from a similar poor WC background, and our friendship groups are very mixed. In some settings we’re by far the richest, in others much the poorest. I choose to be around interesting people, and that’s not class- or income-dependent. I assume our friends who own strings of racehorses, multiple homes, and take us out on their yacht like our company.

Luckily, we don't buy into that narrative and the people who surround us dont either.

We don't put our worth on what someone else tells us it is by the amount they are willing to pay us, or by the house we have or the cars we drive. We live a nice life and enjoy ourselves, but we would hate for that to be how people value is...how sad.

We mix from one end to the other, and we treat everyone the same. I place value and worth on how someone treats me and others around us.

I think when people say capitalism they are looking through a very modern lens and its quite a lazy answer.

The reality is that all social animals have a hierarchy and that is represented by numerous things dependent on the animal

So it may have been the family with the biggest hut, because they had the biggest piece of land, because they bargained more for it, because they were more powerful than the next family, they then became the leader of the group or the elder, or the influence in the community. Their children then had the prize picks of marriages and so on and so on

Land, resources, food, shelter, assets, all markers of a successful human. Money in its present form is just the newest incarnation of that (and I say new, meaning thousands of years old, but it replaced other ways of bargaining and measuring power).

Because the ability to acquire resources (money, food, land etc), and the need to compete and associate with others with resources must have been a massive driving force in human beings since we have existed. It's always been important for status and survival. We haven't really evolved out of any of our basic drives and I doubt we ever will.

I think it’s because humans are hierarchical animals and are driven by gaining status. So people often like people who they think have value, social currency etc. Most of us manage to have that civilised out of us at some point and try to be pleasant to everyone regardless.

I think whats good is that over time as a society we have inched towards valuing different thing or have a more thoughtful view about value.

Yeah this

Yes acquiring more money/land/property means you are more successful. But it doesn't mean that anyone is better.

Especially as it is often in a system that is designed to keep the rich rich, and keep the poor poor.

People are not poor because its their fault. Especially the chikdren.
It's just not fair on the weak and poor at all.

They are the people that people should be treated with kindness, and yet I have often seen poor children mocked, treated with cruelty and left out.

When I was a child, my parents divorced and my father walked away and didn't pay maintenece.
We were all of a sudden a poor, struggling single parent family.
Instead of me being treated with kindness by other children who had better more supportive families, I was mocked and treated with cruelty.

So when the poor child is already suffering terribly and has a worse life than other children, she is also treated cruelly by others.

I work in a school now and I see it happening again with the children. One of the girls is from a very poor single parent family. Father not around. Mother is not in great shape to be a mother.

This child has a bad home life. Instead of the other children being kind to her, they leave her out, because she is poor and from a "bad home".
It's just cruel .

We live in a society that picks on the weak.

I hope so!

I grew up with immigrant parents in a council house in an area that was 'down on its luck' in South London. I work in a company where most people have no money problems. Most went to uni, ski, boarded at school, have a family summer homes with space to accommodate guests. It is different.
I'm in the middle, grew up with very little, have 2 homes now, nice cars etc and find it hard for my 2 circles to mix.
People often feel tied to the they know.

Also people often have a “like me” bias. The thing they consider to be most “like me” may be way they filter people. So some people don’t care about money, it may be an interest such as pp poster mentioned dogs. Some people may consider only other rich people to be like them. Dh has always struggled to get on with a lot of other men because he doesn’t give a fuck about football and can’t be arsed to pretend (I sweat this has cost him a promotion) , could be because someone is the similar level of attractiveness or intelligence. Loads of stuff really.

There are posters here with friends in very different income groups but they will probably have something that connects them. So I don’t disbelieve you at all but I don’t think it is anything you should worry about. Don’t let feeling rejected take over your sense of wellbeing.

What is fair has very little to do with anything.

What you are describing is behavior that is common across not just humans of all stripes, but across the animal kingdom as a whole. None of this is behavior exclusive to capitalism or the wealthy.

Unless these women explicitly told you they shut you out based on your socio-economic status, I'm afraid you made an assumption. It's not rude to point the bleeding obvious.
I don't know the contents of your bank account but I am pretty certain we wouldn't get along. See, I am quite capable of seeing beyond money...

This definitely exists. Everywhere.

It really, really doesn't.
I don't recognise what you said in your OP (or many of your later posts) at all.

I don't judge someone by their wealth.

I don't think I agree with you. I'm not sure what you think of as rich, but I'd say my household is fairly comfortable. We socialise with people similar to ourselves. I would never think ooh that person is poor I won't talk to them, but naturally I socialise with others who are like myself as we tend to have similar values, ways of bringing up our DC, go on days out together without having to think of cost, go for meals and drinks, talk about holidays, things we've done, things were going to do. Growing up I never knew or cared how much money my friends parents had but I can see now they were again similar to my family. Again, shared interests, days out, play dates out, parents had the same values. It's just life isn't it.

I agree with you op. I think people are even more materialistic here in London as property is so expensive.

You make a very good point there, I have frequently wondered this myself and where they justify it.

You gave the example of kindness, which in my opinion is priceless so people who are kind can not be valued in money
as kindness, generosity, and charisma are on a different frequency or wavelength. Monetary value is on another frequency and can not be cancelled out by each other, in my opinion because personality traits ( such as kindness, are subjective ) and monetary value is objective.

I am not referring to aspectrum to describe the personality traits of human beings, I hate the word spectrum, it's as bad as comparing the human race to a pelican crossing, it misses out the subtle differences in people, their ways and personalities which are complex.

Everyone is different and thats fascinating to me!

It's fascinating that the more you speak about them, the more detail you seem to remember. I wonder though...
If they were notorious in the area for their snobbery, why did you want to join them?
How did you become aware of such level of the detail about someone's family life and their reasons for not going to the wedding if they "shut you out" of the group?
Who are "we all" who spoke about it at the time? Did you speak about this with the rest of the group (who shut you out) or were you gossiping behind their back?
You speak of kindness but you are not kind to these people at all. What do you make of that?

Why did I join them?

It was a small town. They were the only choir to join. I love singing and wanted to join a choir.

'How did I become aware of such details of someone's family life if they shut you out of the group'

Eh have you lived in a small town?

People talk about each other. And they know a lot about each other. Especially about family events. There is a lot of talk about weddings and funerals.

No one in the choir actually told me about the woman not going to her sons wedding. As no one in the choir talked to me.l at the time

However I met people in other places in the town, who knew people in the choir.

After I left the choir, I moved into a house share with two women.

One of them had heard about this woman in the choir not attending her own sons wedding. As she knew her from around town.

And my housemate told me about it then

Yes London is definitely pretty materialistic.