To think on a scale of 1-10 - how ‘Mumsnet’ is this?

[Corditer]

rough council estate upbringing
rough school - full of violence
no education qualifications to speak of

completely uneducated likely illiterate parents

no education qualifications between the 6 siblings

Fathers fav pastime is local pub

Parents wear obviously working class clothing - father wears chunky cygnet ring etc

Strong regional accent and incorrect grammar - double negatives etc

This was my DP’s upbringing. However his niece was so different - private school - first class Degree from uni etc.

So it just goes to show what can change in a single generation!!

I love the fact my DP is old school working class! But also like the broader horizons middle class life often brings - his niece being a young graduate has had an interesting career thus far…

But what was the reckoning on massive salads appearing in my DP’s childhood?! 🤣

I’m not sure what you’re asking — your niece has had a good education, unlike at least one of her parents. That doesn’t necessarily mean she’s magically middle-class.

I’m WC, my dad is a retired bin man, my mother a retired cleaner, both from very poor backgrounds, neither stayed in school past the age of 13, and struggled with basic literacy. My siblings and my upbringing was very impoverished. I went to Oxford. I’m still WC, just educated WC. DS is having a very different childhood and will have more opportunities.

I am also proper working class, but went to Cambridge. It doesn't stop me loving my family or being proud of my roots. It does stop me stereotyping the working-class. You sound a bit snobby, tbf, OP.

Love the cygnet ring - bet they swan around showing it off!

ducks

One of the things I find fascinating on Who Do You Think You Are is how completely a family’s status/finances/class can change in just a couple of generactions - in both directions.

My Dad went to Cambridge from a WC background.

He married my mum who was a Doctor.

My Mum used to whisk me off on package holidays that were full of WC kids from uneducated backgrounds. To cut a long story short - I felt much more at home with these WC kids than the MC kids I went to school with - the latter I just felt were irritating and precious while the WC kids accepted me for who I was, I felt.

Class is a funny old thing, and not necessarily as cut and dried as we’d like to think

Not quite sure what you mean, but if you are talking about competitive one-upmanship about who has come the furthest from the most WC background (à la 3 Yorkshiremen) this is very Mumsnet.

No .. to be honest no competition here - just a bit of light heartedness and relaxed observation

Thing is what I’ve stated about my DPs upbringing are facts about his family not stereotypes.

I’d rather spend time with him than the middle class people from my neighbourhood any day who were very narrow minded, boring, etc etc

In only a few posts you've called the MC people on your street "irritating", "precious", "narrow-minded" and "boring" whilst the WC kids were universally wonderful. Yet there's no stereotyping or one-upmanship going on and your thread is intended as lighthearted? Cool story 👍

I think you have some weird, stereotyped ideas about both WC and MC people that suggest a lot of unresolved issues, OP. I mean, tracksuited, signet-ring-wearing semi-literate salt of the earth vs ‘boring, narrow-minded’ MC types and their ‘irritating, precious’ offspring isn’t my experience. I’m a bin man’s daughter who grew up with an outdoor loo and one of my closest friends is an Honourable who grew up in a crumbling Palladian mansion with a ha-ha and shooting. (And yes, going home with her in the vac was eye-opening.)

Plus I’m not sure I understand why you’re focusing in your OP on your partner and his niece when it sounds as if your own family was similarly class-mobile in recent generations?

Were they boring because they were middle-class, or because they were boring people?

Yes ok.

Just thought about your comments and ok .. it just so happens that my DP had what people might see as a very typically - of stereotypically - working class upbringing plenty of cygnet rings but no track suit in sight !! However, another WC family I know - their kids had a less typically WC upbringing - think private housing on a more lower MC street - and the kids got more education quals.
My mum was a doctor - very middle class snob but was an alcoholic abusive piece of s**t who should have languished in jail - long story - think violence and tantrums if people didn’t do as she wanted! She pushed me with one particular vile MC girl. However, as an adult I’ve met great, decent middle class people who don’t resemble the vile MC people I grew up with

I don't think it's Working Class People and Middle Class People. I think it's just People. You get lovely hard working people and drunken shirkers in all classes and walks of life. I think a lot of things aren't down to class, they are down to the actual person involved.

So your mum was simultaneously a snob and yet also took you on package holidays full of mostly uneducated WC kids?

I really don't understand the point of this thread.

Exactly. But the OP claims she definitely isn't stereotyping anyone 🙄

Agree your level of extreme class-consciousness is very ‘Mumsnet’, if that is what you are asking. 10/10.

This is all a bit odd.

Yes - she did - that’s the paradox ! But cynically I think she took me on these holidays because she just wanted to stay in the room and drink ….

🤣🤣

I think this is a you issue OP, don’t really know what you’re going on about tbh.
You sound like you have some issues around class, quite a lot of snobbery, maybe picked up during childhood?
I grew up fairly typical lower MC family, nice mid sized house, state school, parents with professional jobs. I have good friends from WC and MC backgrounds, there’s no typical WC or MC person.

Isn’t it though? I don’t like your first post OP you say it reflects your DHs genuine upbringing but it reeks of prejudice and behind the hand scoffing in my opinion

Your linking of working class with being uneducated is insulting and awful

I would also like to know what constitutes “working class clothing”

Don't worry, OP thinks they're all brilliant and open-minded despite all apparently being semi-literate, whilst the dreadful MC neighbours are all narrow-minded despite their educational privilege. Or something.

Cloth caps for all, to be doffed at every opportunity, plus a signet ring on every finger?