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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Hating the middle/upper classes

270 replies

Ryoko · 31/03/2010 16:34

I was brought up on a council estate, my dad worked full time, we got some benefits.

Work is hard to find (1 in 3 people in London is unemployed) the unskilled can't even get a job flipping burgers because the Uni educated are clogging up the jobs market.

Is it wrong for me to hate the upper/middle classes?

I live in a private rented accommodation now with my other half, we both work full time
and we will need state help to pay for the baby to go to nursery or to support me to stay at home.

All I hear from the middle/upper class is insults aimed at those on benefits or in council housing or just plain working class, calling us all scroungers, work shy, underclass etc, they seem convinced that living on benefits is great the poor are poor because they are lazy and are sponging off of them and that the poor should not be allowed to have kids if they need help from the tax payer to bring them up.

while moaning about how there tax money is given to the underclass they don't bat an eyelid at running multiple cars, jetting off on holidays, think that owning a home is a right not a privilege and spend obscene amounts of money on fashion, gadgets and the like.

Am I wrong to hate them as much as they hate us?

Do the middle / upper class no longer see the working class as the salt of the earth people because political correctness has stopped them blaming societies ills on other groups so the poor working class is the last easy target for them?.

OP posts:
usualsuspect · 31/03/2010 22:13

Work is hard to find (1 in 3 people in London is unemployed)

Are unemployed dear, are

could you be any more patronising.....

brogan2 · 31/03/2010 22:15

Actually, I have to say 'is' is correct as the singular refers to the 1 not the plural word people. If she was saying 2 in 3 are would be correct but as 1 is singular then is is correct.

Hulababy · 31/03/2010 22:16

:shock: Think you have just described me brogan!!!

Hulababy · 31/03/2010 22:17

Think you have just described me brogan!!! Although DH doesn't work in the city, just a city. And only the one child. I do have a degree though and I am a qualified teacher, but I do work as a TA currently and earn about that amount.

junglist1 · 31/03/2010 22:18

Perfect example of class differences right here.

cheesefarmer · 31/03/2010 22:18

I have looked it up and the classifications seem to have changed in 2001 to

1Higher managerial and professional
2Lower managerial and professional 3Intermediate
4Small employers and own account workers 5Lower supervisory and technical
6Semi-routine
7Routine

It doesn't say which is which class though. i would guess 5, 6 and 7 are working class?

Brogan - she would be middle class as it is based on the breadwinner of the household.

Quattrocento · 31/03/2010 22:18

I do know someone who is unemployed. She is a beneficiary of a singularly large trust fund though. And she has got a phd. But still, y'know, unemployed.

brogan2 · 31/03/2010 22:18

Hula, it is the soon to be me! Giving up teaching and taking a TA job. DH a solicitor, pay for school etc.

Class hate all crap. Judge people as you find them, I say.

junglist1 · 31/03/2010 22:19

Correcting grammar I mean

nannynick · 31/03/2010 22:21

Looks like Government uses NS-SEC to help determine classification.

You certainly can't do things on the job of the head of the household, as was done in the past.

brogan2 · 31/03/2010 22:22

I didn't actually correct the OPs grammar. I was just pointing out that actually she was correct. If she hadn't been I wouldn't have mentioned it. I brought it up because someone had (wrongly) corrected her.

whomovedmychocolate · 31/03/2010 22:22

FGS, not a burger, steak hache if you don't mind.

Honestly, the level of literacy in the working classes

You also forgot to include the ubiquitous 'innit'

I will give it a 4/10 for incendiary quality though as an OP though

brogan2 · 31/03/2010 22:23

DH would love to hear he was considered head of the household.

junglist1 · 31/03/2010 22:25

It's not plain old innit anymore, it's "innit doe" for "is it not, though?"

nannynick · 31/03/2010 22:27

SOC2000 seems to be a list of some jobs and their social classification. Still would be hard to determine by that factor alone.

Hulababy · 31/03/2010 22:28

brogan - DH is also a solicitor! lol, very spooky! I taught for 10 years, then did 3 years in prison ed, and now a year as a primary school TA.

OrmRenewed · 31/03/2010 22:28

" My values are accepting people for who they are not what they earn or whether they drop haitches or not. "

Well exactly. I am with you 100% junglist. i don't much care for rude or unkind people but that's all. But would you be as accepting if someone had a posh accent and a wealthy family?

Wineonafridaynight · 31/03/2010 22:30

I'm middle class. I would like to have children. If I was to have them in the near future or quite frankly, in the next ten years (which I hope I will), I will more than likely end up having state help despite working full time and my partner working full time.

brogan2 · 31/03/2010 22:32

It's funny. We've known a few solicitor +teacher combo. Ive often wondered if it's a common match!

whomovedmychocolate · 31/03/2010 22:32

Ooh so I'm a 1114

Anyhooo thanks junglist1 for correcting my lingo. I don't think, right, there were enough, like, extraneous, like, words in that sentence though, you know?

junglist1 · 31/03/2010 22:33

Of course, if they were nice. In fact if a really posh person was nice to plain old me I'd slobber all over them, because it would mean more in a way. You don't know what I look like but think MacKenzie puffa jacket, big hoops and chewing gum. Not joking

junglist1 · 31/03/2010 22:34

Get me doe fam

whomovedmychocolate · 31/03/2010 22:35

Big hoops? Well it's good to see someone participating in charity hula

brogan2 · 31/03/2010 22:35

I'm a primary teacher so not such a shift work wise for me but I am so looking forward to it despite the crap pay.

Hulababy · 31/03/2010 22:39

By whomovedmychocolate Wed 31-Mar-10 22:35:48
Big hoops? Well it's good to see someone participating in charity hula

???? Did I miss something