The middle class don't exist

And the idea of it is very useful for dividing the working class of course, and for the Blair/Thatcherites who say "the working class is dead, we're all middle class now". Using it as an insult if you don't believe in it - like you do - is stupid and counter-productive.

So you think british citizens do worse academically then most of the rest of the world's population do you?

I was always led to believe that the middle class is a product of capitalism - a minority of the working class who are socially mobile. But I get the feeling I'm about to be told why I'm wrong.

I've taken the faststream tests and got paid for it

Although judging from how easy they were I do wonder if they pick the people that fail them

Keep the pictures coming LR

Well it's a sociological term if you ask me. They maybe materially more affluent than the "working class", but there's no difference in terms of their relation to capital.

I thought they worked to promote capital on behalf of the ruling class. The equivalent of a vampire's Igor.

What's the relevance of individual classifications of people? None. Institutional structures are relevant since they're the things that shape the world.

You claimed that you were working class but a Sierra Leonian doctor was middle class. I think that shows up your analysis as pretty ridiculous.

Well seeing as how Lazy Riser's more or less correct in sociological terms, surely it is sociology that's ridiculous??

so are you seriously suggesting that ther is no economic correspondance between certain occupations and certain cultural aspects that are labelled middle class?

the relevance is in understanding the contradictions and divisions within the proletariat, remember we aren't dealing with a homogenous working class, unity has to be created by the actual concrete unification of struggles, and surely trying to find points of division and deal with them is important. For example the tensions between teachers and pupils, the rioters in France and how some of their actions effected the wider organised working class.

yes but the boundaries between the proletariat and other classes aren't solid they are fluid, and i would say there is a space where middle class is useful in describing these contradictary positions, for example proles who buy small amounts of property, small business owners, self employed people, lawyers, many consultants, pyschiatirists, doctors etc etc

Hi

This is an excellent challenge, and it will take significant investment to do it justice. Whilst I’m thinking about it though, imagine you had a wheelbarrow full of stuffed olives. I’m pretty sure that knowing that the people in the middle class part of town are hardly short of a few bob would come in very handy.

Where does middle class wealth come from? Middle class decision makers. Where does working class wealth come from? Middle class decision makers.

Ben: Middle class.

Love

LR

but you exist so you obviously aren't too middle class.

Either that or someone's wrong

Is a plumber who earns 80k a year drives a flash 50-60k car (probably a truck actually), lives in a big house and talks in a socially frowned upon dialect middle class? What if he takes his family on four foreign holidays a year?

What about a teacher, who earns less than the average UK worker's wage, can't afford to live where her workplace is in London and is applying for one of Johno's key housing thingmies? What if she spends her money on things like Bruscetta (sp?) and sun dried tomatos and only ever shops in Waitrose, Sainsbury's or M&S, but still can't afford to run a car and keep up her rental payments?

Working class/middle class is culturally relative. Money and actual status in the workplace are obviously important and (as people are mutable) much of the cultural things those two ridiculous examples I gave would be subject to change over time to take as people 'adjust' culturally to their actual financial situation (e.g. Eric the plumber, or more probably his wife, will probably decide it behoves them to start shopping at Sainbury's instead of Asda's) but you get the point, it's really more a question of attitude, deportment, culture, accent and educational experience.

In our community council we have people coming along every meeting about things which are affecting their own neighbourhoods which they'd like the community council to try and tackle. There are two groups. They go about things very differently.

One group of people comes along and moans about anti-social behaviour. This is a very real issue for these people. Cars are being burnt out in their street, numpties are running about having wild parties in the scheme late at night, arseholes are chucking furniture and TVs and so-on from the deckaccess flats at passing cars and people are being assaulted and mugged and having their houses tanned, their close doors kicked in, the windaes panned in etc. The way they approach it has been to moan at the community council that somebody should do something about it; the ones that come to the meetings have been angry about it but they've also been pretty passive and by and large people in the scheme as a whole are totally demotivated to do anything about it themselves (even tho it affects them day-in, day-out). By and large with a few exceptions they get ignored.

Quite another group from an area of posh tenemental flats and owner-occupied low to medium income flats come along and talk about the parking issues that their area is facing. Now these are a problem and the council has been utter dicks about how they're implementing the scheme. They didn't consult anyone sufficiently and they've put it into place partially in order to cause parking chaos and people are being charged large sums to park their cars in this area. These people have themselves an organised group which has been holding public meetings, doing petitions, firing emails, writing to MPs/MSPs/Councillors and all the rest. They've staged protests. They've gotten exceedingly angry about the issue. Not to be a tad harsh but it almost seems like it's been a wee experience for the people concerned. They seem to have been slightly shocked that the council didn't listen to them, that the various agencies walked all over them, and that nobody in authority had ears for their views. They've had to campaign to even be heard and it's meant they've thought quite deeply about what is to be done. When these people come to the community council meetings they tend to be listened to and their concerns taken on board. The council might not be listening to them but they've made damn sure everyone else is. Whether or not they'll succeed or not I don't know - they are very liberal.

Which of these two groups has a worse problem? Why is it that the folk from the scheme have been persistently ignored? I don't think it has anything to do with wealth directly.