To find middle class parents insufferable?

[Gwst]

Sorry rant incoming! I'm so sick of how since becoming a parent half the people I speak to seem to be insufferable snobs about the area we live in (in a big city). Schools are "terrible" despite good ratings, couldn't possibly be good enough for their children, and are upset they don't live in a posher area, too many undesirables round where we live, complaining about drugs etc when this is an issue that 100% doesn't affect their demographic. I've recently had someone say they had to move to the suburbs because at their local school all the parents had "a can of coke in one hand, a fag in the other and 10 kids" and another saying a nursery wasn't good enough as they didn't want their child looked after by someone with a speech impediment. Both of these left me with my jaw on the floor shocked someone would think it's OK to say that but they seem to have no embarrassment about saying it to me, a casual acquaintance. And the area we live in is full of creative types, ostensibly left wing etc but also seem to hold these reactionary views when it comes to their kids.

The thing about schools drives me mad as I guarantee most of these people have zero experience of attending or their kids attending a challenging city comprehensive. It's just this perceived bias that their kids will get bullied or become drug dealers or other crap that they heard from their parents as to why they went to private school and are now parroting but can't afford private school or a posh area themselves. I went to a pretty crap school but I came out with good grades and went to a prestigious uni. It wasn't all great but it was a realistic cross section of society and arguably gives you good expectations of the real world and that fact that not everyone in your community is privileged etc. But no one seems to care about that and just wants to look out for themselves and everyone else be damned.

I am middle class myself lol. And my kid is going to have plenty of (unfair) social advantages anyway without us having to get them into "the best" school or only socialise with other middle class people. I just really don't get it. Am I alone in thinking like this??

Thing is, I went to a state school and a proportion of the teens did deal drugs and/or carried weapons and there were 14yo pregnancies and all sorts of horridness. I did really well in school but would have probably still gotten better grades (especially A Level) at a different school. Great for me to experience a cross section of society...and I'd still be happy for my kids to go to state schools, but I'd absolutely be choosing the best one I could find because it makes a difference.

In the 1980s the Minister of Education, Kenneth Baker, regularly eulogised about the superiority of German schools. We were in Germany working in Forces schools but I knew a lot of non-Forces families, some British most German, and they would tell me that they found his comparisons hilarious, one staff room had his picture on their dart board! Many of the German teachers of younger children would visit the Forces school and were very complimentary about what was going on, far better than their schools!

I have no idea what was going on in the glorious 80s or in the Forces, but we had family in Germany, Switzerland and France and education is incomparable.
It's changing now too and becoming more area dependent but is not yet ruined completely.

A coke in one hand and a fag in the other in their PJs at school pick ups are exactly the sort of parents I find 'insufferable'.

I agree. I went to crap schools in bad areas. At least a third of my lessons were a joke. I remember kids throwing chairs, climbing out of windows, even groping female teachers. Many of them were from such f-ed up backgrounds that trying to teach them anything was a waste of time. The one thing that school did teach me is that violent, abusive people should be stopped from having kids.

I wouldn’t blame someone for not wanting to send their child to the schools I went to. And I wouldn’t blame them for not wanting their kids to mix with some of the kids I had to mix with. Presumably, they’d prefer their kids to be grow up polite, civilized and well-educated. GOOD FOR THEM. I wish more people thought like that.

The loony lefties think that put in nice normal children in with the scumbags lift the standards of behaviour of the scumbags. Actually what happens is the nice kids are absolutely terrorised and learned nothing.

And me. I’m sick the Left romanticising and defending people like that. They seem to think that ignorant people with filthy manners are ‘keepin it real ‘ and ‘fightin da system’. I’m also sick of the constant sneering at the middle-class. By ‘middle-class’ people seem to mean polite, refined, and well-educated. Well, if that’s what it means to be middle-class then I wish everyone was middle-class!!

How did we create a society in which people are ashamed to be polite and refined, whereas those with hideous accents, who can barely string a sentence together, are proud of it?!

God, tell me about it. What I can't get my head round is the people who clearly have no job or anything to do all day and yet still end up stinking to high heaven. There's a SPAR on a local council estate and if the supermarkets are shut, I go in there, at least someone stinks of shit, weed or BO or is shouting in a barely intelligible dialect. The people who have to work behind the till are sick of these customers, too and are not shy about saying so.

Our tax money funds this lifestyle, no less. I say, enough!

Waitrose and M&S is like my happy place at this point. Always calm and serene. Have never had to hold my nose to pass someone in either of those places.

What is coming through on this thread is the lack of understanding of the impact of regional inequalities. I saw an article on it yesterday. Our country has the worst regional inequalities in Europe.

That's why aspirational people get so absorbed in sending their DC to the best school in the area or they can afford. It makes a real difference, particularly if an area has high levels of deprivation.

If you haven't lived through this, you simply don't understand. You don't know other parents life experiences, they could have gone to a shitty school and will do anything to prevent that happening to their own DC. Good on them. Stop sneering at this @Gwst

@Dappy777
No political party, the 'left' or otherwise, condones this type of behaviour.

What 'the left' did was put in Sure Start centres to teach parents to be good role models for their children. Put plans and structures in place if they were struggling, generally helped them.

Unfortunately Sure Start centres were cut quite a while ago now (austerity cut?). This is what happens when services like this go.

I remember sure start centres. They were a good idea , trouble is the people that used them weren't generally the ones they were designed fore. Mtds went to a lovely sure start nursery that was new at the time. Many of the kids in there were from the surrounding areas not the town the SS was for, as they stuffed to fill places.

Same as the " classes".
I know there was baby .massage and stuff like that. It's wasn't attended by the parents who needed it to improve their lives. The ones who would've gained from it we still standing outside Greg's with a fag and sausage roll. There were even sure start people out in the streets promoting all the services ( how I knew about nursery) but uptake was better from people in surrounding areas ( less deprived) that from the deprived areas

@Thechaseison71
My mum worked in a job that worked with SS.
Yes I agree that some classes were populated with MC parents - baby massage and the like.
There were other classes where struggling parents were referred to attend. You probably didn't see these as you had to be invited to attend. Absolute 101 of parenting - all about structures in place to succeed, sleep routines, then diet and discipline etc
My mum said that these courses were transformational for the parents

Were they" forced" to be attend? And weren't there classes for normal parents to learn this stuff also rather than those with SS involvement '

DS was my third child and I was working full time e so wouldn't be attending this anyway so only know what I saw

@Thechaseison71 the classes were for parents who had been identified as a potential concern from Health visitors but they weren't quite 'bad enough' for full SS involvement.
It was deemed as a kind of intervention. From what my mum said, the people who attended got a lot from them and turned it around so that SS didn't need to get involved - which was brilliant.
I don't think they were forced to attend but it was made clear that if their current situation continues SS may have to be involved.
My mum was a specialist health visitor so was aware of these types of courses.

So effective blackmail. Ok.

Wouldn't have such classes been of use to othershough

Nothing wrong with a regional accent, I have one myself but I’m working class. A middle class person is unlikely to have a strong regional accent. A regional one maybe but a posh regional one

Snobs aren't always middle class

Absolutely not middle class here. Very lower class, single parent, working but on uc. There are 3 (state) primary schools quite close to where I live. One is very academic, great ofsted reports, very well known for being a fantastic school. One has a reputation for being not so academic, rather nurturing, but small and a little more into one of the nearby villages. One has children at the local park who are carrying knives and swearing. The latter one was not even something I put as an option when I was applying for school places and that was the only thing I really knew about the school. A lot of the time when applying for schools, we have 1 visit and the rest of our opinions are based on word of mouth. It's not wrong to want the best for your child.

Half of these parents only class themselves as 'middle-class', because they married someone who did an apprenticeship, at a local college, and now rip people off with their plastering and electrician jobs, not declaring their entire income to HMRC, because they take big cash-in-hand jobs.

To add to that, these people do not have an education, have never worked (or they've done a few supermarket jobs), and would be stuffed if their partner left them, needing to sign on for UC and register for a council house (there is absolutely nothing wrong with this and I am not judging) - My point is that nobody is invincible to catastrophe, hardship, homelessness, death. However, it's better to learn independence than be a 'middle class' parent with 0 independence who would end up in the gutters because they're all wedding bells and talk.

People like this need to look back at their family line, because somebody would have needed to swear blood and tears, to give them the life they have as an adult. Honestly, don't give these people your energy - They are utter wet wipes and a complete and utter bore!

@Thechaseison71 Yes there were other parenting classes that anyone could sign up to. I am assuming the ones that were 'invitation only' had less people in them, more teachers and more time to go over the various topics.

I don't see this as blackmail. I see it as giving people the opportunity and support to change their potentially damaging behaviour

OP, I have read your comments (and the replies you replied to) only but I have to say I understand completely where you are coming from.

Someone I used to be friends with lives two streets over from me. There are two primary schools within our catchment area. She loved one of them, the one my children went to, it's a great school with a good reputation and has an Outstanding OFSTED. Very low staff turnover, they've all been there many years. Headteacher a well known and well respected figured in the community and it's C of E.
Even after her and her husband looked around it and loved it, she refused to put it down as an option because, and I quote "it's surrounded by council houses, so he will have loads of council estate kids in his class". So she sent him to the other one. Purely because it's surrounded by people who own their houses.

Some parents are simply insufferable snobs.

And the kicker? He got bullied at that school and she ended up transferring him to ours, where he was very happy and did well!!

@Theboredpanda completely disagree with your view on accents (and the rest of your list) as a criteria to which class you are. There are wealthy, educated & professional people all over the country

I grew up in the North, I have a northern accent. My parents had well paying professional careers, as did my grandparents. I went to private school (as my local state schools were pretty dire). Had amazing holidays. I am a good horse rider & skier.
With the upbringing I had, I am very middle class yet you would say I am not as I say 'class' not 'clars' - your views on this are ridiculous

Seems they didn't have a choice if they were threatened with SS. for not attending

Did you not have elocution lessons at school? We did as part of " Speech and Drama" classes

Elocution does not necessarily mean acquiring a Home Counties accent. I'm northern and wouldn't dream of changing my accent.