In an excellent article, The truth about Labour's class war, Gareth Roberts focusses on Labour’s class spite, which he identifies as being an intra-attack or civil war, by the progressive public sector middle class on the private sector version.
Totally agreed Paul I myself qualify as working class by many of your definitions I am from the Welsh Valleys and still drink in the pub a couple of times a week and have the distinction of never having voted labour in my life I am 78 I think the grossest thing that has ever been done to Wales is the poxy Senedd we have been run by Welsh labour idiots for 20+ years I was able to forecast what life under shitface Starmer would be like all my predictions were bang on.
Good to hear Alan! Keep it up. The only people who'd find my definitions 'offensive' are middle class wankers who'd get offended on behalf of the true working class! As ever, assuming ownership.
Hey Alan - being from the same neck of the woods and background - I too am very proud to say I have NEVER voted Labour and NEVER will. I think our part of the world are well used to their talent of screwing up everything they touch and certainly have ‘their boys’ in their pockets ( and filling them of course)
Oh this is sooooooo difficult. I KNOW I’m working class, but I can’t tell you how I know that- The list =I agree with all of it and none of it ( dither dither)- I need to think about itI grew up in industrial South Wales with a very secure sense of belonging. I loathe the do gooding ‘I know better than you types’ which we are sooo infested with- I think it must be like maybe being gay - you just know - or so I’m told
"Many proudly working class occupations - nursing and sport management (‘science’?) for example - are now things that can be studied at university."
I remember back in the 1980s when I was teaching Health & Social Care courses in a Further Education college. Several colleagues were retired nurses, matronly types who valued cleanliness and "hospital corners" on beds. The students were a mixture of working class and lower middle class kids who often went on to Level 3 courses to qualify as nurses.
When the government announced that nursing would become a graduate profession, my colleagues burst out laughing and declared it the most preposterous thing they had ever heard.
Yes, and it shows the gimmick of doing this was seen through! It wasn't in any way egalitarian or 'opening up education'.
Just like Blair's demand that 50% went to university. I remember asking: 'Why not 100% - what is the 50% target saying - unfairly - about the other 50%?'
I remember it well I trained in the 80’s when Iir was “ Here’s your uniform, get on with it gals” I was and still am in a minority wanting it back that way - how can you get a degree in wiping someone’s arse!!!.
There always was a degree, but only about 5% did it and have probably never been near a patient.
We have lost so much talent by going degree and locals joining the workforce - less likely to leave as have connections with area.
But some good news recently- near us they have just started taking ‘cadet nurses’ 16 from school - hallelujah- only taken 30 years- so there is light👏👏👏
"The Golgafrinchan Ark Fleet Ship B was a way of removing the basically useless citizens from the planet Golgafrincham. A variety of stories were formed about the doom of the planet, such as blowing up, crashing into the sun or being eaten by a mutant star goat. The ship was filled with all the middlemen of Golgafrincham, such as the telephone sanitisers, account executives, hairdressers, tired TV producers, insurance salesmen, personnel officers, security guards, public relations executives, and management consultants."
COVID, Climate Change - just a variety of doom stories to get people onto Ark B.
On item 1, I didn't go to public school or university, but I did go to a good polytechnic with an excellent school of music. Perhaps I only score half a point for that. 2, 3, 4, & 5 I'm fine with, but 6 is problematic. I don't think people see musicians as being working class. Perhaps it's because we wear posh clothes when performing. I also fail miserably because I'm currently Master of one of York's mediaeval guilds, and wear posh clothes, and go to posh places, and eat posh lunches/dinners, and associate with posh people. So, all things considered, I'm a bit of a failure as the son of two very working class parents.
I think your beret tiebreaker is excellent, Paul. It nets this ridiculous and hilarious tw@t (poet Michael Laskey) for one! See his poem below from our supposed premier Poetry Mag, The Rialto…
Excellent! It's just (very just) about OK to wear a beret outside - in extremis, if no other hat is available. But inside - especially at a raffish angle - is a capital offence.
Great list Paul. I may know your wife as I’m from South Wales mining stock as is my wife. I’d have failed your list as a graduate and a bank executive and possibly 6 when I returned to Wales as years living in London and the Home Counties have softened my accent. I would still pass on 3,4 and 5 although I rarely drink alcohol these days in retirement. Not sure I’d look for a punch up but I doubt I’d back down - was in a very heated argument about zero hour contracts with a friend last night in fact. There’s an old saying “You can take the boy out of the Valleys, but you can’t take the Valleys out of the boy!”
Very true Paul. We all know each other and share the same chip on our shoulders! I’m from Merthyr Tydfil (Farage country these days) but we live near Abergavenny. I know Cwmcarn well too. Meeting some old Aberystwyth Uni friends for lunch today. Eight of us. Three teachers, all lefties, a Local Government Officer (very left), a PhD who worked as a lab technician (left of Lenin), a lefty lawyer and a Chartered Accountant from Carmarthen who votes Plaid. And Reform voting sober me arguing when they’re all pissed by 4.30!! One of the teachers worked in Reeds Alsaver and is probably a closet Tory I think. Only he and I saw London getting destroyed by immigration to be fair which makes us a bit different!!
Bloody hell, what a crowd! I pray for your safety. Especially when lefties get pissed, oh boy, it kicks off.
I got into an argument with some absurd graduate student, who started singing Spanish Civil War songs when I disagreed with him about the centre of Oxford being taken over by Hamas! He thought he was Lorca.
Lovely to hear - my wife remembers you well, butt! Everyone in Wales know everyone else.
Where do you live in Wales? I've family all over South Wales - Bridgend, Cowbridge, North Cornelly - and ancestral links to Swansea (Sketty), Pontycymer, Cwmcarn.
I enjoyed your provocative list - but can understand why your wife (and many people I know) might object!
Personally, I could tick all 6 points, but with point 4, if I went to Benidorm, it would have to be by train and I would probably write a Digression about the experience with countless photos, so I think I fail there!
- Because you have phrased it "could have", I'd be OK with point 6 if I was wearing the least eccentric of my clothes and was in London or the Home Counties - but up here (and in the West Country) almost everybody thinks I am posh! But then up here, my nan at her most gord blimey would probably be thought posh! South East versus the provinces?
Regarding point 5, getting into a fight would be (has always been) extremely unlikely, but in extremis, I would not rule it out . . .
It could be argued that almost all artists (writers, musicians etc) become detached to an extent from class, particularly those who have metaphysical, observational or pretentious tendencies!
I still 'identify' (as they say) with having working-class origins (my grandparents all being domestics or lorry drivers, growing up on a council estate, etc) - but even my parents were breaking from that and eventually worked conventionally enough to become middle-class. I supposed in financial and working terms, I have reversed the 'progress' of my parents and have lived pretty much on the edge of society - which is neither working class nor middle class. Not sure what this counts as and wouldn't like to suggest. Even the category Bohemian has come to sound middle-class, since perhaps in most cases, such citizens prioritize style over substance?
I think I would agree Paul - although for potential grant purposes, I continue to primarily consider my origins. One would-be determiner of class (for potential grant or subsidy purposes), asks what your parents were doing when you were 15 - so I'd fail on that, as they were both teachers by then.
However, I certainly don't feel middle class.
In the end, I think I prefer to think of myself as an outsider - perhaps with a capital O - which (vain?) elevation partly compensates in my mind for my lack of 'success'! Of course, had I been 'successful', I would probably count as middle class.
I’m borderline…I went to Aston University, which was previously a Tech College for most of its life (till 1966). I also worked in offices on the railway for nine years but I’d submit that the booking, enquiry, parcel and goods offices on Preston Station in the 70s were unlike any usual conception of an “office”! But perhaps I fail completely as a consumer of vegetarian black pudding!
Borderline at most - any university degree means you're no longer a son of toil! I'd also wonder about the Benidorm point - you've no snobbery, but I don't think you'd visit Benidorm as Benidorm, but use it for walking etc. I think I'd probably fail on those grounds too.
Totally agreed Paul I myself qualify as working class by many of your definitions I am from the Welsh Valleys and still drink in the pub a couple of times a week and have the distinction of never having voted labour in my life I am 78 I think the grossest thing that has ever been done to Wales is the poxy Senedd we have been run by Welsh labour idiots for 20+ years I was able to forecast what life under shitface Starmer would be like all my predictions were bang on.
Good to hear Alan! Keep it up. The only people who'd find my definitions 'offensive' are middle class wankers who'd get offended on behalf of the true working class! As ever, assuming ownership.
Hey Alan - being from the same neck of the woods and background - I too am very proud to say I have NEVER voted Labour and NEVER will. I think our part of the world are well used to their talent of screwing up everything they touch and certainly have ‘their boys’ in their pockets ( and filling them of course)
Hilts I am from Pontypool and my favourite pub is The Rising Sun in Abersychan you will meet a lot of people who think like us there.
Oh this is sooooooo difficult. I KNOW I’m working class, but I can’t tell you how I know that- The list =I agree with all of it and none of it ( dither dither)- I need to think about itI grew up in industrial South Wales with a very secure sense of belonging. I loathe the do gooding ‘I know better than you types’ which we are sooo infested with- I think it must be like maybe being gay - you just know - or so I’m told
"The uncastrated house-slaves of the fertile plain are happier than the tenant farmers of the high plateau".
St Augustine paraphrased loosely.
"Many proudly working class occupations - nursing and sport management (‘science’?) for example - are now things that can be studied at university."
I remember back in the 1980s when I was teaching Health & Social Care courses in a Further Education college. Several colleagues were retired nurses, matronly types who valued cleanliness and "hospital corners" on beds. The students were a mixture of working class and lower middle class kids who often went on to Level 3 courses to qualify as nurses.
When the government announced that nursing would become a graduate profession, my colleagues burst out laughing and declared it the most preposterous thing they had ever heard.
Yes, and it shows the gimmick of doing this was seen through! It wasn't in any way egalitarian or 'opening up education'.
Just like Blair's demand that 50% went to university. I remember asking: 'Why not 100% - what is the 50% target saying - unfairly - about the other 50%?'
I remember it well I trained in the 80’s when Iir was “ Here’s your uniform, get on with it gals” I was and still am in a minority wanting it back that way - how can you get a degree in wiping someone’s arse!!!.
There always was a degree, but only about 5% did it and have probably never been near a patient.
We have lost so much talent by going degree and locals joining the workforce - less likely to leave as have connections with area.
But some good news recently- near us they have just started taking ‘cadet nurses’ 16 from school - hallelujah- only taken 30 years- so there is light👏👏👏
The good old days of Dr Prod and Hattie Jacques.
Cor, wot a smashing bit of crumpet!
Exactly like that and time were good . Don’t forget Dr Kilmore( Jim Dale)
The class that Labour support should all be on Ark B.
See https://hitchhikers.fandom.com/wiki/Golgafrinchan_Ark_Fleet_Ship_B :-
"The Golgafrinchan Ark Fleet Ship B was a way of removing the basically useless citizens from the planet Golgafrincham. A variety of stories were formed about the doom of the planet, such as blowing up, crashing into the sun or being eaten by a mutant star goat. The ship was filled with all the middlemen of Golgafrincham, such as the telephone sanitisers, account executives, hairdressers, tired TV producers, insurance salesmen, personnel officers, security guards, public relations executives, and management consultants."
COVID, Climate Change - just a variety of doom stories to get people onto Ark B.
Yes - I remember it well. If only we could load up Starmer et al....
On item 1, I didn't go to public school or university, but I did go to a good polytechnic with an excellent school of music. Perhaps I only score half a point for that. 2, 3, 4, & 5 I'm fine with, but 6 is problematic. I don't think people see musicians as being working class. Perhaps it's because we wear posh clothes when performing. I also fail miserably because I'm currently Master of one of York's mediaeval guilds, and wear posh clothes, and go to posh places, and eat posh lunches/dinners, and associate with posh people. So, all things considered, I'm a bit of a failure as the son of two very working class parents.
Ho hum!
PS. I have been to Benidorm!
A troublesome case indeed! This is a tie-breaker question:
'Are there any conceivable circumstances in which you would wear a beret indoors?'
I think your beret tiebreaker is excellent, Paul. It nets this ridiculous and hilarious tw@t (poet Michael Laskey) for one! See his poem below from our supposed premier Poetry Mag, The Rialto…
NIGHTINGALES
Who wouldn’t feel a bit low
biking back into town again
from another vain after supper
ride round our nightingale woods
where they’re two or three weeks overdue,
and though it’s worrying what we’ve done,
it’s a warm still evening – perfect
for hearing them sing – and being
in no hurry to go in
I pedal on past my turning
to check if it’s true our local
The Volunteer, shut up for years,
against the odds has reopened,
and yes, it’s alive, lights, music
and inside this Saturday night
as I swing round the corner
a good crowd of mostly young men
in both bars with more arriving
down the side street, one of whom
in reply to my Evening calls out –
Take your beret off, you cunt.
Excellent! It's just (very just) about OK to wear a beret outside - in extremis, if no other hat is available. But inside - especially at a raffish angle - is a capital offence.
Great list Paul. I may know your wife as I’m from South Wales mining stock as is my wife. I’d have failed your list as a graduate and a bank executive and possibly 6 when I returned to Wales as years living in London and the Home Counties have softened my accent. I would still pass on 3,4 and 5 although I rarely drink alcohol these days in retirement. Not sure I’d look for a punch up but I doubt I’d back down - was in a very heated argument about zero hour contracts with a friend last night in fact. There’s an old saying “You can take the boy out of the Valleys, but you can’t take the Valleys out of the boy!”
Very true Paul. We all know each other and share the same chip on our shoulders! I’m from Merthyr Tydfil (Farage country these days) but we live near Abergavenny. I know Cwmcarn well too. Meeting some old Aberystwyth Uni friends for lunch today. Eight of us. Three teachers, all lefties, a Local Government Officer (very left), a PhD who worked as a lab technician (left of Lenin), a lefty lawyer and a Chartered Accountant from Carmarthen who votes Plaid. And Reform voting sober me arguing when they’re all pissed by 4.30!! One of the teachers worked in Reeds Alsaver and is probably a closet Tory I think. Only he and I saw London getting destroyed by immigration to be fair which makes us a bit different!!
Bloody hell, what a crowd! I pray for your safety. Especially when lefties get pissed, oh boy, it kicks off.
I got into an argument with some absurd graduate student, who started singing Spanish Civil War songs when I disagreed with him about the centre of Oxford being taken over by Hamas! He thought he was Lorca.
Lovely to hear - my wife remembers you well, butt! Everyone in Wales know everyone else.
Where do you live in Wales? I've family all over South Wales - Bridgend, Cowbridge, North Cornelly - and ancestral links to Swansea (Sketty), Pontycymer, Cwmcarn.
Dear Paul,
I enjoyed your provocative list - but can understand why your wife (and many people I know) might object!
Personally, I could tick all 6 points, but with point 4, if I went to Benidorm, it would have to be by train and I would probably write a Digression about the experience with countless photos, so I think I fail there!
All best wishes, Lawrence
Hi Lawrence,
Yes, you fail point 4 - photos ok but digression? Well, if it was on anything to do with 'Benidorm' as a trope, then no. A fail.
What about point 6?
Hello Paul
- Because you have phrased it "could have", I'd be OK with point 6 if I was wearing the least eccentric of my clothes and was in London or the Home Counties - but up here (and in the West Country) almost everybody thinks I am posh! But then up here, my nan at her most gord blimey would probably be thought posh! South East versus the provinces?
Regarding point 5, getting into a fight would be (has always been) extremely unlikely, but in extremis, I would not rule it out . . .
best wishes, Lawrence
It could be argued that almost all artists (writers, musicians etc) become detached to an extent from class, particularly those who have metaphysical, observational or pretentious tendencies!
I still 'identify' (as they say) with having working-class origins (my grandparents all being domestics or lorry drivers, growing up on a council estate, etc) - but even my parents were breaking from that and eventually worked conventionally enough to become middle-class. I supposed in financial and working terms, I have reversed the 'progress' of my parents and have lived pretty much on the edge of society - which is neither working class nor middle class. Not sure what this counts as and wouldn't like to suggest. Even the category Bohemian has come to sound middle-class, since perhaps in most cases, such citizens prioritize style over substance?
No, I think any artist could be working class.
Family background is relevant but not decisive.
I'd say you're not working class.
I think I would agree Paul - although for potential grant purposes, I continue to primarily consider my origins. One would-be determiner of class (for potential grant or subsidy purposes), asks what your parents were doing when you were 15 - so I'd fail on that, as they were both teachers by then.
However, I certainly don't feel middle class.
In the end, I think I prefer to think of myself as an outsider - perhaps with a capital O - which (vain?) elevation partly compensates in my mind for my lack of 'success'! Of course, had I been 'successful', I would probably count as middle class.
I’m borderline…I went to Aston University, which was previously a Tech College for most of its life (till 1966). I also worked in offices on the railway for nine years but I’d submit that the booking, enquiry, parcel and goods offices on Preston Station in the 70s were unlike any usual conception of an “office”! But perhaps I fail completely as a consumer of vegetarian black pudding!
Borderline at most - any university degree means you're no longer a son of toil! I'd also wonder about the Benidorm point - you've no snobbery, but I don't think you'd visit Benidorm as Benidorm, but use it for walking etc. I think I'd probably fail on those grounds too.
You know me too well Paul! I can see there’s no way I can smuggle myself in as working class.
It's over - I think a beret is next?