Anyone going to own up to being a snob?

[rickman]

?

Oh come on - people on council estates can ger a seat on a bus and as far as know the didn't activate a 'coucil estates rights' movement. I really don't think there are the same. I grew up on a council estate right next to big posh private one. I never felt discrimminated against.

Sorry that last post was in response to colditz and not a general comment.

"I drive over the othersid of town to the bigger tescos instead of the one near us as its full of scruffy people from nearby areas."

Bigbaubleeyes, you avoid people because they are scruffy? And you are assuming the scruffy people come from these 'nearby areas'? And that is totally different to avoiding people because they are black, and it is offensive to suggest otherwise?

oh yes please! and move up on the sofa!

oh do shove up girls

Sorry, had to see to DS.

By scruffy i meant personal hyigene issues which anyone can have, so yes it is different to avoiding black people. It is different in that IF you avoid people according to postcode then you could argue its a 'class' or 'elitest' form of discrimination whereas avoiding black people is clearly racial discrimmination. And I agree that neither are justified, I wouldn't have them on the same page thats all.

Last time I was in the tescos nearest a smelly man pushed past me at checkout whilst I was being served, the staff never said anything to him and let him lean over and stand there - I was trapped . I was heavily pregnant at the time - this upset me and I havn't been back since. Besides the other one is much bigger and always has 'value grapes'!

I live on a council estate and couldn't give a flying what people think of me. I hate snobbery, but i think being a snob is different to having standards. Ihave standards but am definately not a snob.

mykids - I think you have out that better than all of us.

'put'

Btw most snobs I know are inverted snobs. Essentially not well off, but will judge you if you don't buy your kids clothes from debenhams, or if you haven't got a flat screen, plasma telly. I seriously know a girl who is such a snob that when she looks after her step son she puts him in the bath and washes him as soon as he arrives and then changes him out of his tesco's tatt into his designer clobber. She lives on a council estate herself but has got into serious amounts of debt buying designer kitchens, quad bikes, latest paddling pool etc. I have always found this kind of inverted snobbery very bizarre

i used to be a snob (even though i didnt actually have much to be snobby about).

It was just nice that even though i was a young mum in some people's eyes (19), our ds was planned, i was engaged to be married, we had decent enough jobs, a brand new (mortgaged) house. i had an "oh so perfect" life and would happily flame anyone who looked down on me without knowing my circumstances.

then i became a single mother in a brand new mortgaged house.

then i became a single mother in a council house.

i used to look at my neighbours...no, actually i used to look down my nose at them, didnt really want to speak to any of them (i am very shy anyway) but i admit, i didnt quite "approve" of the way they gossiped over the garden fence, had so much time on their hands.

then i was left pg and so became a single mum, in a council house, two kids with different dads.

then i got made redundant too and so i am a single mum, two kids with different dads, living in a council house, on income support.

and slowly, i made friends here. people started to talk to me. all the loneliness i had felt for years seemed to dissolve. basically, over the course of a few years i went from being someone seen as being "respectable" to someone now seen as gutter scum basically i assume by many people on here and in rl. thats how im made to feel. but since ive actually known the people in this council street, ive learnt why some of them cant work..ive also found them to be nice, respectable people, happy to help out with anything, even my children. more than i can say about where i used to live.

so i dont think i'll be judging again. it does rile me though that i am judged constantly..it makes me very unhappy. i did it, and then had to walk in someone elses shoes. it wasnt a nice experience by any means and still isnt at times. i try to get a job and provide for us myself but it hasnt happened yet..but people think im lazy, cant be arsed..and thats like rubbing salt in the wound.

no-one is "immune" to a fall. i had to learn that the hard way.

Lovely, sensitve, thought provoking post Nightowl.

Thanks bbe .
I think your post says it all Nightowl, its very easy to judge, but not particularly nice to be judged. Sorry you have had a rough time,and try not to care what others think

Nightowl - nice post its got me thinking:

My mam raised my brother and I on a council estate we never had much but didn't go without. Thats why DH and I both really value and appreciate what we have now and seek to maintain and protect our standard of living. I joke that I feel eally posh cos i have dishwasher (never lived in a houshold with one until 2yrs ago )

I dont know if this is still classed as being a snob? Maybe I havn't explained myself to well

im not looking for sympathy at all. sht happens as they say. i just wish more people could understand that its not so easy. when you end up in a situation similar to mine you can try* so hard to get out of it..i did, i got another job and i was made redundant from that one too. as time goes on you start to think whatever you do, it doesnt matter, because you get patronised, looked down on, you start to believe what people say..and you think "is it even worth trying just be kicked down again!" i see so many posts on mn that perhaps, three years ago i would/could have written but now i know better.

I think I am disdainful but without knowing someones full circumstances I am reluctant to judge someone entirely based on first appearances.
On 2nd appearances however...
And excepting gross nutritional violations which incur the Full Monty wrath...

I put my milk bottles in the dishwasher. Does this mean I am a nob?

s

Nightowl - you put so perfectly why people should be slightly ashamed to be card carrying snobs.

Mykidsmum - that's not what I understand to be inverted snobbery ??? Inverted snobbery is - I think - when people of more modest means scorn those who are more affluent or perceived to be 'posh' (..I think...but I could well be wrong of course)... - smiley to indicate that I am not deliberately being pedantic!

It seems me and you have a lot in common Nightowl. My immediate neighbours are very nice people and I haven't had any problems at all.

BBE - just to reassure you that I didn't find your comments any more annoying than some of the others. Sorry if it looked that way.

'and slowly, i made friends here. people started to talk to me. all the loneliness i had felt for years seemed to dissolve. basically, over the course of a few years i went from being someone seen as being "respectable" to someone now seen as gutter scum basically i assume by many people on here and in rl. thats how im made to feel. but since ive actually known the people in this council street, ive learnt why some of them cant work..ive also found them to be nice, respectable people, happy to help out with anything, even my children. more than i can say about where i used to live. '

you know, nightowl, this used to burn me up, too!

i grew up in a priviledged home in another country, but to a father who was born in poverty and got himself out of it - along with his brothers and sisters. by choice, b/c he wanted that.

but where i grew up, there wasn't so much of a class system.

when i got here, i fell in love w/a man who is truly the most wonderful man i've ever met besides my dad - patient, kind, gentle, understanding, all those things.

and we lived in an area that turns out is one of the most deprived in all edinburgh.

but to me it was just a place. a place where some folks had problems, and maybe they were more open than in other places i'd lived, but i had a hard time getting my head round what awaited us living there - 'postcode discrimination', people turning up their noses when i told them where i lived - or worse, expressing shock that 'someone like you' was actually living there, or asking 'how did you meet your husband' (and being no stranger to subversive racism, i could detect this undercurrent of snobbery in their tone), etc.

wtf? so you're just going to write off thousands of people just b/c of where they live and then say i come from a place that's the world capital of racism in the same breath? what's the difference? is there one, just b/c they're all mostly white? sorry but i don't see it.

i hope i NEVER get my heard round that - judging people by their abode. that's just beyond goofy!

i don't know why people live where they live and it's none of my business. i'll talk to anyone if i find them interesting.

if people diss you b/c of where you live - be it a council estate or a mansion - they're not worth knowing, imo.