How do you define being Common !!!

My Gran in the fifties said that I shouldn't be friends with anyone from the council estate as they weren't like us she was an awful snob.

Holding a knife like a pencil reminds me - how about holding a pencil as though it is a knife and you are about to stab it downwards into someone? How on earth is anyone allowed to learn to write like that? No fine control at all, the whole arm has to pivot from the shoulder to move the pencil. (Try it)

Calling other people common is common. The aristocracy don't do it.

People who let their children in around retaurants, pubs etc are either common ,or too middle class to discipline their children

If one of us had an elbow on the table, our mum would lift her arm and bump the offending elbow on the table. Oh, and I agree about the way one holds a knife, but that is a minefield.

My mother was a terrible snob. She told me that my father was a white collar worker and the neighbours were only blue collar workers. She hated the fact that we lived on an estate. She was a lovely lady, but resented that my dad refused to buy her a house, even though he could afford it. My best friend would not eat in the street. She would buy crisps and place them in her pocket and eat them discretely. Table manners in our house were a minefield. i.e. you had to take the nearest cake from the cakestand, even if it was one you didn't like. I once announced to our guests "elbows off the table" as I thought their manners left a lot to be desired!

When middle DD ws an Art student, she got a nose ring(stud) I was horrified when I heard, but then I thought, she was a beautiful and kind girl and simply the same as before she had it done!And of course when I saw it, it was very discreet. Duh! Oh course that was 16 years ago and she has long since abandoned it and the hole has healed up but it made me confront my prejudices.
I think we all have an idea of what constitutes "common" in the abstract, but attach it to a person you like and respect? DOES IT MATTER?

My DH and I have an infallible test - when eating, if you hold your knife like a pencil, sorry, but you're common as muck!

Thats put the cat amongst the pigeons!

My daughter has several tattoos Ninnynanny, she is a good mother, an accomplished singer and a published author. I can assure you there is nothing common about her.

Oh dear, now I definitely know that I`m (or I was) really common, because I was one of those women out shopping with rollers in my hair and a headscarf covering them! But it was a very "common" sight back then, I wasn`t the only one.
In my grandma`s opinion, women and girls using coloured nail varnish were no better than they should be, and as for varnished TOEnails, well!!

Mind you, that was the primary school. At Grammar school there was a greater variety of names, we had a Shelley, Thelma, Linsey, an Avril and even a Roxanne! Perhaps that was a social aspiration thing as well....?

Sorry, that should have been jeni without the e!

Yes, definitely a weird school, jenie! All my classmates in the 50s were called Margaret, Jean or Susan! (We did have a Rosemary - that was considered very exotic! )

I remember when I was at school in the fifties, I had a friend whose name was Anastasia, she was usually called Stacey! Another was named Titania! Called Tania!
Thinking back must have been a weird school! Also a Jaquetta?

That has reminded me. When my children were at school, one of them was friends with Stacey. Her siblings were Tracey, Jason and Nathan. It always made me smile

What about names such as Sharon, Tracey. Wayne, Darren ?

My MIL used to have sterilized milk, as she grew up in Birmingham where it was popular. She used to give us any surplus, which I used for rice pudding which was delicious! It seemed more creamy somehow.

I don't think common is a deliberate choice, absentgrana - it's usually learned behaviour and lack of exposure to any other sort of way of life.

A lot of teenagers are gauche and rather sweet with it.

Gauche is not the same as common - more someone who is socially awkward through ignorance and naivety, whereas common is a deliberate choice.

Eating with the mouth open, anyone?

Tattoos, piercings, bare legs and no coat in the winter. Chewing gum and f...ing and blinding in the street especially at children.

Is common the same as gauche?
Or is gauche worse?

charlotta
How do high heels show too much cleavage? Am I confused or is my manflu getting the better of me?

ooohh carboncareful you have reminded me about the milk thing! It was just the same in Yorkshire. We (definitely working class with no middle class aspirations) had pasteurised milk delivered. My Auntie (and most of our relatives) had sterilised milk. I couldn't bear the taste of it. When we visited, she used to buy pasteurised milk specifically for me, I was such a spoilt little princess delicate little flower

I remember that, artygran - the women with their hair in rollers covered by a headscarf. Sometimes they'd spend all day like that, even go to work, until the evening when they took the rollers out, combed and lacquered the hairdo, and went out to the dance hall.
I also remember going to my best friend's house when I was about 12 and having to drink a cup of tea with sterilised milk in it - oh the horror! I'd never come across it before and it was truly awful.