The Upper Class

So it sounds like you work in a petrol station. This thread fascinates me for some reason, I wonder if the snooty guy had been the one who bought the camera and vice versa whether your thoughts might be switched?

Yea both are petrol stations. The one down south has an M&S food add on though... Perhaps a point on southern lardy dardyness?

Hence the need for more grammar schools!

Rubbish essex boy...

Watching new tricks... last night... something about essex in that involving stables and horses and stuff... very posh...

And I now live in Winchester which is perhaps the most lardy dar place I've ever been. Compared to Notts...

but I am interested in what you know of said places... Divulge?

PS - Emmerdale doesn't exist...

How on earth is M&S food "lardy-dar"? It's expensive, but so is buying a burger off a van outside Villa Park

I think the class system is pretty much rooted in economics, and by economics I don't mean money, I mean industry, business, the world of work. The class system isn't based on how much money a person is in possession of, it is what a person does for a living, or indeed whether or not they have to do anything. For instance, the so-called underclass probably connotates unemployment, but in actual fact, the upper class are just as likely, if not more likely, to be unemployed than the underclass. But whereas the underclass are those, for instance, who are receiving benefits long-term, who live in a house with more than one generation of the unemployed, the upper class simply do not have to work. The working class is pretty self-explanatory. Those who work manually, with their hands, the bluecollar workers, eg. plumbers, factory workers etc are all "working class". Even though, as a poster previously mentioned, plumbers earn a lot these days and so might live in detached houses and own two cars and commit to supposed middle class values, strictly speaking - economically speaking - they are still working class, simply because of the jobs they do. A doctor or a barrister, someone who is more "intellectually" employed is probably an archetype of the middle classes, or a university lecturer perhaps. You might have a binman who reads Proust in his spare time or who works on string theory by TV light of an evening dressed in a tweed suit, but he will still be working class by profession. It's like someone said about if a working class person won the lottery. If a working class person won the lottery this would not elevate them to the upper classes! I agree with those who have said that, essentially, if you are not born into the upper classes, then, I'm sorry, but you ain't ever gonna get there.

Of course at the top of the social hierachy is the monarchy, the Mountbatten-Windsors. This is a family who have genuinely been reared and brought up to believe that they are rulers by God's will. Elizabeth, bless her, will think that. Or at the very least this is what her ancestors believed and have presumably passed on down to her. It's like a poster said, politics in the past was the preserve of the nobility and upper classes. The House of Lords is perhaps one of the last vestiges of the upper classes ie. they have status and power adorned on them simply through right of birth. However, a lot of the hereditary peers have been stripped now and are being replaced with Life peers, which I suppose are the political equivalent of the bourgeoisie in the economy. But this is a prime example of being born into power (Hereditary Peers). The upper classes are those families which have, for generations, owned land, or wealth or who have held titles - these are things that can only be acquired by inheritance by birth. Thus, the upper class is exclusive in that it cannot be aspired to. Or you can aspire to it, but it would be delusional. Aristocracy actually is probably all down to feudalism - the practice in medieval times of the nobilities lending their miltary services to the monarch in exchange for land. This land, - ie. "the landed gentries" was presumably kept in the families and thus the wealth remained and the aristocracy was born. But the aristocracy are capable of being extremely poor! It's like Oscar Wilde used to constantly make jibes in his plays about the aristocracy being broke and having to sell all their furniture off because they couldn't afford to eat. More recently, there have been programmes about the old money, the landed gentry, having to rent out their spectacular manor homes which are falling apart because they can't afford the upkeep. There was one programme, on More4, I think, about a family who were hosting wedding parties in the grounds of their manor and opening a strawberry farm to try and earn enough money to carry on living in - and heating - the house. These people are still 'upper class' - but they are poor as %%%%%%%%%%. This is how money is separate from class status in Britain, and this is why I don't think money can ever "buy" upper class status. In fact, I think an effort to do so would be absolutely ridiculed by the authentic upper classes.

It works both ways. Kirstie Allsopp, for instance, works in the media, (like, euw!), spends her time running around dingy Brixton flats and slopping ice-cream down her Burberry knitwear with Phil Spencer but she is still very much upper class. And it's not just because of the way she says "rum" when she means room. It's because of her title, The Honorouable Kirstie Allsopp, and the fact her father is a Lord, and that she grew up in a great big landed estate etc. She might appear to be your average thirty something city professional, but she is very purely upper class.

In contrast to that, we have the nouveau riche. The new money. These are your Bransons, your entrepreneurs, your media moguls, people who have benefited from the dot.com boom or taken advantage of a zeitgeist and made %%%%%%%%%%loads of money from it. Like the Greek dude who runs EasyJet, or Branson or Philip Green, head of the Arcadia group (as someone mention) or Simon Fuller or Simon Cowell. These are prime examples of the nouveau riche. They live in McMansions and earn millions but these are exactly the type of people - perhaps even more so than the working class (!) - that the upper class look down upon! If they are true, loyal archetype upper class people they will find it oh so terribly meretricious and ostentatious for these people to be flaunting their new money and splurging on vulgar displays of wealth. Again, as somebody mentioned, something as demeaning as earning money can be quite repulsive to the genuine upper classes. Owning the means of production - how vile! The burgeoisie have to had to work for their money and this is not attractive to the inherited wealthy. Also, you might argue that the bourgeoisie flaunt their wealth because they are insecure in their status and aspiring to be upper class. Notice how letters from the Queen Mother were recently published, and in them she mentioned how some of the dresses that were being sent to her were too "expensive".

No, being upper class is not about ostentatious wealth, and this is why you cannot buy a place in it. It's debatable whether or not you can buy your place in the middle class - it is more likely. But again, I think it is economically based. If someone is a binman, (I'm sorry to keep using the example of binman, I'm not anti-binmen or anything), but if Nice Binman re-trains or something and becomes a uni teacher or a solicitor, then he will, in my view, have elevated himself into the middle classes. Purely by profession. Not that I necessarily agree with this, but my understanding of class is that it is an economic-based strata system/hierachy.

Obviously there is fluctuation and change in societal hierarchies, but in opposition to what a previous poster said - but in total agreement to what another poster said after that - I disagree that social mobility is more prevalent than ever - the statistics say the opposite! It is true that median wealth has increased, something like 70% (seriously), over the last half a century, - everyone is getting richer - but the gap between the extremely poor and the extremely rich is widening. And these statistics reflect the proliferation of the new money. The oligarchs in Moscow - doesn't Moscow have the most billionaires resident, followed by London I think (?). I do know that just outside of Moscow there is virtually a whole gated suburb of meretricious mansions for the super-rich; your Putins and Abramovichs. So even though, in the UK, Blair pledged to diminish that gap, it has actually widened.

Changes in economy have effects too. With manual labour becoming more and more obsolete, hands-on work obviously becomes untenable, as machines take over what once were working class men's jobs. Mines have shut down, car parts factories etc are now "manned" by machine. Even in industry were technology has not completely saturated, a lot of the workforce is being outsourced to other countries, were the labour can be bought for cheaper, so again, working class employment is being removed. This can have, in my view, one of two (main) effects. Either those of the working class will either slip down into the underclass and below the poverty line (those earning less than 60% of the median national wage), and become the long-term unemployed - or - they somehow resolve to get themselves promoted to the middle class and join their previous employers in the bourgeoisie. Thus they start their own business or retrain. Some might argue that the working class as we know it is disappearing in this country all together and will diverge thus making either the underclass or the middle class bigger. At the moment it seems to be affecting the middle class to a greater extent. The middle class has certainly grown in size. This might also be due to better education - on the basis that middle class is relative to profession, then education allows improved access to archetypal middle class professions: doctors, barristers, professors etc. Higher university intake etc.

I suppose the other element of class is breeding, manners, etiquette. To quite an extent being upper class is about decorum, the way one holds oneself. Not just accent, but lexicon choice. For instance, the uppers can always tell a non-U by the words they employ. A wonderful example of the snobbery that (some) of the upper class hold towards the aspiring middle classes is with our very own monarch. Apparently the Queen was unhappy with William's choice of potential bride aka Kate Middleton, because of her mother displaying cringingly middle-class behaviour. ie. the use of non-U terms such as toilet (lavatory or loo, darling), chewing gum and Oh my God! - having worked before. (She was once employed as an air hostess). Kate Middleton, I think - I'm not 100% sure - was educated at Marlborough, which is one of the top public (not private) schools in the country, at probably thousands of pounds a term, but to the Queen her millionaire family represent the perfect embodiment of the nouveau riche, trashy-cash, if you will. Although I'm sure Ma'am doesn't put it such. It's things like that, which are class indicators I feel. Take how Zara was given a relatively modern name because she's quite far off in line to the throne. They wouldn't have risked calling Harry, say...Chad, or something. Also notice how Kate Middleton, even though only about 23 or something, has taken to dressing as though the Princess Royal (Princess Anne) was the new Kate Moss.

Obviously now the upper class is a tiny, tiny percentage of the UK population. Probably less than 1% I would say (thought that is a wild guess). I don't think they were ever a big minority. But now more and more upper class people you might argue are being, theoretically at least, relegated to middle class status, in that they are having to work to earn their money (usually in order to maintain the upkeep of their inherited estates etc). So this, using the economic structure - would see them inherit something rather different; middle class status. So that, just as the nouveau rich aspire to be U in their wearing of Savile Row suits & purchasing of polo tickets etc but will never truly become the upper class, the upper class (for instance, the Goldsmiths), start working and becoming educated and so start to manifest middle-class habits but their breeding, birth stature and ingrained etiquette etc keep them upper class. I suppose another example of change: in the past politics was the reserve of the upper classes - a hobby almost, now it is probably looked down upon by the U as a bit rough and tumble. I don't think the Queen or indeed much of the monarchy shows much interest in politics. (Although Charles is more interested than a lot of them). More working class are now inflitrating politics - for instance John Prescott, and health secretary Alan Johnson, who used to be a postman. It is no longer Churchill in his suit, sucking on a cigar etc.

So changes in the economy and to a certain extent changes in the British population, immigration etc are altering the class structure. But I still believe it is occupation based, and not wealth-relative. In some ways it can be likened to the Hindu caste system, although it could be argued that the caste system is in better health than the British class system. Although I think the Hindu caste system, as well as occupation, is based upon so-called "personality traits". I think in a Hindu society if a person from the lowest caste suddenly became incredibly rich, they will would almost certainly still have no chance of marrying a higher caste. And as I said before, I actually think a lot of the time those aspiring to social aspirations - especially the middle class adopting pseudo-U behaviours, as opposed to the working class becoming middle - are subject to ridicule and revulsion. The upper classes aren't too fond of the bourgeoisie.

I actually read something recently about the wealthy spending money on philanthropy courses to educate their children - children who will be the inheritors of the new money - on how to aid "worthy causes" and charitable pursuits. I wonder what people think of this?

Anyway, yes, I do think the class system in Britain still exists. I do think that it has eroded somewhat, and that perhaps deference is not as ubiquitious as it once was. And there is the new phenomena of inverted snobbery ie. not only the working class mocking the upper class way of life, but also internal inverted snobbery - basically when the upper class themselves, or middle classes, adopt a working class culture and class attitute to appear "cool". Note Wills' and Harry's concert and their media interviews talking about pop music etc, and the so-called "mockney" accent of people like Lily Allen - who was educated at Bedales, the same school as Allsopp, one of the highest-fee paying publics. Then you have to think of how polo shirts have become a staple of working class indie bands and how previously socially-deprived hip-hop stars wear a uniform of Ralph Lauren cashmere & drink Moet - these are clear indicators of how class indicators are merging and becoming converged.

Note that a Leeds working class lad, artist Damien Hirst, now owns one of the most magnificient (to my eyes) mansions in the country, Toddington Manor - a ****ing amazing example of Gothic architecture. It only cost him about £3m because it was so delapidated.

But, yes, whilst political power is no longer the reserve of the aristocracy - the Queen is only nominal Head of State for instance, ok so she has a veto on our laws, but in effect, she doesn't do much - and institutions which were once the reserve of the elite such as Oxbridge are becoming more societally all-encompassing, there are still flickers of the old boy network, the ties with the right coloured stripes, the nepotism that goes on in certain professions, in an almost Masonic way. I do things are becoming more egalitarian, but meritocracy is not all that prevalent yet. Although it is becoming massively unpopular to be posh (except in the America idealised view of the British U). A poster made a very good point about Blair's hobnobbing with Oasis and banging on about playing Foo Fighters tunes and getting guitars from every foreign diplomat since he arrived in office. Just look at how Cameron does, essentially, exactly the same thing, going on Desert Island Discs to bang on about The Smiths - a working class Manc band - and talking of hugging hoodies. He probably loved his little cannabis scandal, because he's so eager to get rid of that squeaky clean floppy haired Etonian-Oxford background. The fact that he went to Eton or that Blair had been to Fettes is not seen as a plus, because it alienates the general voter as it is so far removed from the general experience. And then there's the fact that nobody looks good in a boater.

:O nothing rong with the north <-- cept we cant spell coz we dont have enough middle class grammar schools

We've already established that the bright but poor can't get into grammars because they've been colonised by the middle classes, haven't we Dan?

I wouldn't say I have ever met an Upper Class person, so they hold an air of intrigue I don't think you get aristocracy in Birmingham. Here the class system is more like: Working Class/Middle Class/Middle Clarse, as in people who's children have been born and bred here yet speak in Southern accents, somewhat bizarrely because they must be making a strenuous effort to do so.

My grandad managed it, as did countless others.

How on earth is M&S food "lardy-dar"? It's expensive, but so is buying a burger off a van outside Villa Park

You may not realise it, but your attitude of thinking perpetuates class differences.

Essex is a county of contrasts, it's generally pretty wealthy but has an image of being tacky and downmarket, which a lot of it is.

What you can't do is generalise a whole region on one thing you;ve seen, just like you're generalising the entire midlands from a couple of villages. Go out into rural shropshire/staffordshire/worcestershire/lincolnshire and it's very nice indeed.

And since when did I say anything about Emmerdale?

Firstly, Emmerdale is set in Yorkshire, which I didn't mention at all.

Secondly, Emmerdale's cast is full of southerners, so of course it isn't realistic.

Perhaps my 'attitude of thinking' does... never mind... we'll live.

We will, certainly; you'll probably die ten years earlier though, if statistics are to be believed.