Food for thought & again no big deal.

I do not give a toss about peoples background, education, or manners. They all tell you absolutely nothing about the person. What matters are how they act and interact.

I once worked for a charity alongside a lady who was everyone's stereo-type of 'posh,snobby and well off' and yet she could sit down with old men who had been merchant seamen or labourers and get on with them like a house on fire, sort out their benefits, deal with any other problems they had and speak of them with appreciation and respect and they really liked and respected her, nothing of the Lady Bountiful about her at all. And I have met the reverse, delicacy and understanding in people who had had hard rough lives.

Never ever judge by appearances.

Good point, well made Elegran ?

Saying "airs and graces" implies that they are put-on, and probably overdone so as to emphasise that the people they are showing off to are uncouth. That is true of some people, but assuming that everyone who speaks clearly and grammatically, holds doors open and has good manners etc is showing off is demonstrating a large chip on the shoulder, just as is assuming that everyone who doesn't do those things is a potential mugger.

Genuine airs and graces? Ok, I should have made this clearer. I mean people who perhaps at one time in history descended from a long line of nobility and life changed possibly through being disinherited. I know people like that who were clever and well spoken and they walked tall with an air about them despite being from humble beginnings in their own immediate family. You could just tell they were a bit different but more caring people you couldn’t wish to meet. I think what I’m basically saying is never judge a book by its cover.

You put that better than I have just typed, Jane.

It is the acting posh like Hyacinth Bucket that grates, or acting as though they were brought up somewhere fashionably scruffy and "plebeian grassroots-ish", as though they are actors who haven't quite got the accent right but are pretending to be Scots, or Welsh, or whatever.

If they had family who spoke "received pronunciation" then without consciously trying to, that is how they they speak. If their family used fish knives etc, then they know their way round a formally set dinner table with an army of cutlery, and so on. Others, if they didn't have these parents to copy while they were children, don't speak like that but as their family did, or don't effortlessly use the right utemsils but neither lot of people are superior to the other lot

However, there are some people who are ready to criticise those whose upbringing is different from their own, in either direction. Some dismiss anyone from, for instance, a council estate, and others assume that using the right knife equals being a snob, and speaking and acting scruffily is somehow a virtue.

No. We are all as we are depending on where and how we were brought up. There's almost no point in trying to.pretend to be posh -that never convinces anyone! Just look what a figure of fun Hyacinth Bucket was.

So someone who was brought up posh is preferable to someone who wasn’t but has achieved some sort of pretend posh?? They’re both acting posh though innit?

I dislike people who poke fun at people as ‘public school educated’ , your school is very rarely your choice, it is your parents. To poke fun at people because of their parents choice is horrible in my opinion and as bad as doing it to people who went to comprehensives.

What does that mean?

Genuine airs and graces ?

I agree. Talking about other people having 'airs' about them or being genteel or showing off actually says more about the speaker than the person being talked about in such a small minded way. Of course I would say that. I'm extremely posh myself!

Yes, inverted snobbery is just as stupid as snobbery.

Totally agree with all posts. My point is there is such a thing as inverted snobbery,which to my mind is just as bad as snobbery in any form,either of which I can’t abide and both exist. Makes for interesting thoughts tho.

I understand what you mean. Some people who have been brought up in a more "genteel" fashion, do, have an air about them. It's not usually to do with possessions or money, in fact I have met a lady you would describe as having airs and graces and her house was thread bare.
As for certain people, whose God is money and think that it makes them better than someone else, it brings to mind the saying:
"You can't buy class!"

I don't know what to make of the starting post.

I cant abide folk who forget where they came from .I have friends who moved abroad and the lives they say they had here have little ot no resemblance to the truth!

I have a nice house a good life but I'm honest and happy to tell anyone who asks that I lived for 10 years in a corporation house in(what you would call council) one of Glasgows housing schemes .It was a great place to live in the 50's lovely families and I made great friends some I still have 60 years later .I'm with your friend I'm afraid I cant abide snobs .Having WORKED for my nice house and all that I have doesn't mean I'm an inverted ...or any other kind of snob.

Hmmmmm..... hard to know what to say about this......