to wonder why we worship rich people?

[kindlypudding]

Or to put it in context, why are there so many posts over the years that presume rich people (including the the established upper class) have better ideas about how to dress, spend money, behave and go about the world?

I am 50 and recall being a very young teen in the early 90's.
I was bog standard middle class, and had a good amount of privilege, compared to todays' world. Yet my friends and I would have preferred the ground to swallow us up than to emulate the wealthy. We sure as heck didn't presume they were the arbiters of taste, in fact, if anything, we considered it all a bit fusty, behind the times, etc.

I noticed a shift towards emulating wealth again around 2012, where everyday teens were suddenly starting up blogs to show off their Chanel handbags. And then Mumsnet, post after post asking how the upper class lived and how it could be copied. A presumption, I presume, that considered wealth and high status to be the pinnacle of good taste.

Perhaps it is my own background that puts me in an odd space with this. Maybe our particular entourage were subversive, alternative? But it never struck me back then, both amongst my middle class and working class peers, that anyone wanted to worship the upper echelons.

I know that there might have been many people who chased the money, where property and investment were paramount, but it didn't feel quite as consuming as it does today.
What do you think altered that? Did the internet have some effect, or perhaps was it the growing divide of wealth that brought it home to people?

I wonder if it has something to do with more mindful consumption. Most of us are on a treadmill of passing fashion trends - speaking for myself anyway - and are now wanting to shift to less clothes better quality. The wealthy have always bought quality items that don’t date the way high street clothes do, or if they do date, become retro classics with a resale value.
On one hand I find fashion fun, on the other hand the sheer volume of poor quality clothes crammed into high street shops nowadays is depressing.

Of course people have historically worshipped the rich and powerful as the two often come together. The ancient Egyptians literally worshipped their monarchs as Gods and the Roman emperors tried the same. If you read Dickens, Eliot, Austen respect of wealth and desire for status thread through many of these texts and we are all.aware of the rigid social hierarchies during these times as well as an expectation to diff you can to your betters.

Are we really that surprised then that we have the same attitudes but possibly with a distinctive take on 2025? I think a lot of old style magazines such as country life and vogue essentially advertise houses and clothes for the rich and probably more importantly the aspirational rich. The internet and influencers are just extending the trend a bit.

I notice a lot of posters are getting edgy and trying to project the you are socialist when I think this is an interesting question. Maybe the middle classes feel insulted that all their career focus to get the nice house,car and holidays is being dismissed as emulating of wealth and the motivation a crude desire follow others.

Interesting points.

I would amend this statement to 'MNers worship old money'. Why is beyond me, especially since a lot of that old money was taken from the poor, earned by exploitation or even stolen.

Rich people in the UK in the past had very privileged public school education and spoke with a plum in their mouth (now not fashionable so greatly toned down even by the king) and had an arrogant confidence. In the past eg 1950s the workers doffed their caps to their bosses and landowners. Possibly because further education wasn't seen as available to them and ?they knew their place, or might lose their job if disrespectful.

Now the reverence has rightly gone. Many more go to public school.

Today I've no idea about envying rich people as I'm not so into fashion that having a ridiculously priced bag would be something to envy. There's always been huge discrepancies of wealth but not the tv, internet to have that fact made so obvious.

The Musks of the world are going to shake things up and some. The old hierarchy is already taking its last breath so to speak. The old order is falling away, and dying out. There is fear - there is a growing anti capitalist movement taking root. Many say we are already a post capitalist society and are witnessing it devour itself.

Time is now the new luxury,

I can't say I do. I admire people who march to the beat of their own drum and think outside the box. Whether they are rich or poor doesn't come into it.

I hope you are right. Certainly my young adult DCs are like this and their friends. it does give me hope.

On the dark side though, having been truly more optimistic about forming a more meritocratic society in the 90s, it does seem nowadays that it’s fashionable again to come from ‘old money’ and there are more nepo babies than ever before. It’s still very much about who you know which is pretty depressing.

The disparity between wealthy and poverty has grown more since 2008 than any time since 1900

if you have such a gulf between to fractions of society then you’ll end up with a situation of wanting to cross that gulf and looking at the other side with a longing to be there

Huge swathes of hedge funds and banks, for example, are switching to blind applications. It’s impossible now to offer internships to family or friends. Nepotism is not dead, but it definitely does not have the same leverage as before.

Tremds come and go, but there does seem to be a fundamental shift taking place. In the UK we are in transition. It will be exciting to see what happens.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9122750/

inequality of wealth

The media (including social media) is now controlled by plutocrats for the most part. It's inevitable that they will promote (unconsciously or otherwise) values that affirm them.

We're expected to listen to the views or rich people on all manner of subjects regardless of their own expertise. Meghan on cooking. Musk on politics. Various slebs on health / social justice / what have you. Trump on climate change. It's all the same.

A generation ago this space was held by politicians, professors, clergy and public intellectuals.

Totally get what you mean, OP. It's a tale as old as time, though, to do with the image we want to portray to others about our position in society. Old money > new money because it says "I was 'ere first".

Saying that, if it's a choice between emulating old money style and some of the chavs people in my town then I know which I'd prefer! I'm not sure I can see Vogue doing a feature on see-through leggings worn as trousers/matching grey tracksuits/shiny black puffer jackets anytime soon!

That's fantastic to hear! At last; cause for hope! 😃

Sadly it is still very much not the case in media or the arts ☹️

Media and celebrity culture is the roots of the idolisation, unfortunately.

I think inheritance tax has largely got rid of “old money” as it was designed to do and the reason for not flashing their cash is they don’t have anywhere near as much as they’d like people to believe.

The huge houses they built historically were hardly understated. But now that they do t have that amount of cash they want to look down their noses at people who do.

Well very simply there is also a gnawing fear of looking 'poor'. The vast majority of people can't afford this stuff so they turn to Shein, Temu and Primark to at least buy NEW. This is enormous wealth inequality in action.

The gap between rich and poor in the UK has NEVER been greater.

That's why that TikTok shit is so popular, because for £20 they can buy a new or a fake item.

Someone said up thread that they had high hopes for the young and their eco mindset. I wish that was true as all I see all over social media is hideous enslaved cheap, fast fashion.

I'm calling the young now 'the anxious generation' as I'm seeing first hand as a therapist how anxious the 15-30 age group are. It's awful for them, so much pressure.

Some of it is clever marketing. Made a lot easier through social media.

Think about it, a lot of people are rich / staying rich because we buy the products they promote.

I'm more afraid of how we keep putting these narcissistic billionaires like Elon Musk on pedestals and in positions of power, just because they can turn a profit (quite likely at the expense of good morals realistically, getting to that level of profit) doesn't mean they have a shred of intelligence to apply it to matters of state, they're too individualistic.

I am nearly a decade older than you, OP, and grew up in a comfortable upper middle class home.

The establishment was what people looked up to then, rather than wealth per se. When Diana and Charles got married, 750 million people globally watched the event on TV. The establishment probably consisted of the nobility, civil service, judiciary, some in the media and academia.

My late mother’s favourite put down was the snobby ‘just nouveaux riches’ to dismiss some of my friends’ parents who lived in multi million pound homes and drove Rolls Royces and similar.

Wealth has always bought power but, when I was young, this took time and learning the subtle rules of the establishment and cultivating the right friendships. In the U.S, the relationship was always more direct.

Now the nexus between wealth and power is far more direct and people feel that, by imitating the wealthy, some will rub off on them. And, for some, in the age of instant fame and, with it, money, it will.

We do live in pretty shallow times driven by 24/7 media and a political class who seem to be bought for the price of a few pairs of flashy spectacles.

Is it just me who doesn’t understand these threads, there is another one saying we worship the civil service. I know no one who worships rich people or the civil service and really didn’t know either was a thing.

I do think there is something lovely about the well mannered, tradition based upper middle class, compared to a section of society that are loud, crass and somewhat uncouth.

Think of the noise and "type" in whetherspoon compared to a country pub.

Think of Butlins type behaviour - loud, kids up late having pop and crisps, adults smoking, swearing, watching the karaoke etc - that is less classy.

I don't aspire to the wealth per se, but I do find the way people conduct themselves, behave and speak to be preferable in some sections of society.

In terms of wealth I completely disagree. Why should it only be for the same old group of people.

I love that footballers etc can make huge amounts of money now, people who have a skill they’ve worked very hard at and been rewarded. Why not? Why should it always be nice, middle class, educated types that are “entitled” to be rich?

You missed my point entirely.

It's not necessarily the wealth that is coveted.

It's wonderful that people can have money they weren't born into.

I'm so glad I grew up when I did. The only people I idolised were musicians (Kurt Cobain mainly). My parents hated me going out looking like some hobo, but that was the fashion and I loved it (they had been 60s hippies so couldn't really judge). It didn't matter where your clothes came from or what you wore. We all had our own style.

As for the comment about Weatherspoons, my very upper middle class parents drink in them, because it does real draught ale (and my Dad has shares). They also go to country pubs which can be full of the type of people that go to a 'Spoons.

David Cameron was from one of the “nice” families you mentioned. The behaviour of the Bullingdon club was anything but classy.