British class system

I think that people are getting two things confused.

There is the subjective idea of class which brings out comments like “I don’t give a flying fig about class, it’s where you are going not where you have come from etc etc.”

And then there are the way groups are defined for practical reasons, by academics like education, health, political affiliation, etc etc.

So people get very het up at the first and accept the second as academic fact.

MissAdventure

I'll have to move there, then.
Any spare blokes going?

???

But only if you are a hairdresser, clerk or similarly uneducated woman.

MissAdventure

I'll have to move there, then.
Any spare blokes going?

I'll come with you!

I should fit in

Where I live we have quite a few hairdressers,clerks and uneducated women who have married their boss,

Kircubbin Are you saying couples should only marry if they are in a similar job or profession?
How do you know they are uneducated?

MOnica ^ I do not give a * about class. It is what you make yourself not where you come from that matters^
??

I'll have to move there, then.
Any spare blokes going?

Where I live we have quite a few hairdressers,clerks and uneducated women who have married their boss, doctor,judge. They flaunt their wealth and are quite cliquish. I still dont view them as upper class. One of my friends, from a humble background herself but married to a well respected senior manager was miffed when a local charity group run by these ladies didn't welcome her to their group.
The younger generation seem to carry on the class/wealth divide too. My gs gets pleasure noting the Ferraris and bmws around here. The yummy mummies in them really look the part.

So people think class no longer matters. But the eviidence shoows otherwise. Yes our generation probably did better and moved up the social scale but that has changed.

• Britain has some of the lowest social mobility in the developed world - the OECD figures show our earnings in the UK are more likely to reflect our fathers' than any other country

• Social mobility hasn't changed since the 1970s - and in some ways has got worse. For every one person born in the 1970s in the poorest fifth of society and going to university, there would be four undergrads from the top fifth of society. But if you were born in the 1980s, there would be five

• 24% of vice-chancellors, 32% of MPs, 51% of top Medics, 54% of FTSE-100 chief execs, 54% of top journalists, 70% of High Court judges …went to private school, though only 7% of the population do

• Education is an engine of social mobility. But achievement is not balanced fairly - for the poorest fifth in society, 46% have mothers with no qualifications at all. For the richest, it's only 3%

• Parental influence still makes a big difference to a child's education in the UK, especially compared to other countries - in fact in the UK the influence of your parents is as important as the quality of the school - unlike Germany, say, where the school has a much bigger role

• Higher education is not evenly balanced either in terms of aspirations - 81% of the richest fifth of the population think their child will go to university, compared to 53% of the poorest

• … or achievment: 49% of the poorest will apply to university and get in, compared to 77% of the richest

• There is a strong link between a lack of social mobility and inequality - and the UK has both. Only Portugal is more unequal with less social mobility

• If you are at the top, the rewards are high - the top 1% of the UK population has a greater share of national income than at any time since the 1930s

You’ve amazed me paddyanne, I thought feudal property rights weren’t abolished in Scotland until about 20 years ago, didn’t you learn about that in school?

Oops, complete format fail
Obviously my first sentence is quoting MOnica

* I do not give a * about class. It is what you make yourself not where you come from that matters.*

Hear, hear, MOnica, and anyone else who has said similar on this thread. ?

I must admit that I keep looking at the thread title and thinking "Does it bl**dy matter?"

But Britain is still riddled with consciousness of class, which is such a shame as social mobility over our lifetimes has made a significant difference to people's lives. As many of the tales on this thread demonstrate, it's really hard to classify ourselves these days.

My education was mainly in England and in the 1940s 50s, no one was particularly bothered about the issue either. I went to all kinds of schools, state, private and army, I rarely had a clue what sort of home people came from or what their father's did. I cannot remember it ever being a subject of conversation

The obsession with the class system is a modern obsession and very boring at that.

That lecturer was from London and the "middle class " woman from Liverpool

I'm Scottish I had never heard of "class" until I was grown up .there were children of labourers ,sat beside children of doctors and lawyers in my state school .No one was treated differently ,nor should they have been.

Well the same at my English State school and then I was at college with a Princess.

But, goodness me, paddyanne - you let us share your Royal Family!

There are some very posh independent and private schools in Scotland. My friend went to one.

I'm Scottish I had never heard of "class" until I was grown up .there were children of labourers ,sat beside children of doctors and lawyers in my state school .No one was treated differently ,nor should they have been.
I first heard "class" when I was at college .the lecturer asked what class we were .....one woman ,a mature student said she was "middle class" because she had a mortgage , a washing machine and a fridge freezer ...lol.By then I had run my own business for 10 years and employed around 16 people ...(the course was a catch up with new methods) He asked me what classs I was and I said working class,which I am .I have always worked to keep a roof over our heads and food on our table .
Royals in my opinion are parasite class ,they feed off the poor through taxation that could be better spent ,thats to the poster who asked what class Royals are .

I was surprised when moving to the US that mostly, they considered money to be an indicator of class.

And in Switzerland, there is snobbery about other European nationals (French are posher than Spanish, for example).

It is funny looking into a system you aren't part of.

I grew up in HK where all the expats were middle classish (Sorry pedants) except for the bankers and lawyers who lived on the Peak and sent their children to boarding school. We didn’t come across them much. They were definitely Upper middle class.
I do know someone who lived fairly well up The Peak, in fact very high up. He's very down-to-earth

(Sorry, didn't mean to be punny)

Can anyone name a modern country where society is not organised, or has not organised itself on a hierarchical basis?

Personally as the grandaughter of impoverished Irish immigrants who made their way in the world, to be far better off than they started and having made my way in the world predominantly in the engineering industry I do not give a * about class. It is what you make yourself not where you come from that matters.

I don’t really think that I was aware of the class system before I came to the U.K. to live.
I grew up in HK where all the expats were middle classish (Sorry pedants) except for the bankers and lawyers who lived on the Peak and sent their children to boarding school. We didn’t come across them much. They were definitely Upper middle class.
There were some of us that were very rich, usually the Americans, and some of us were more ordinary but there wasn’t a divide in our attitudes to each other.
After college I married a farm worker. Definitely working class even though he had been to agricultural college and is quite clever. I think that class is alive and well in the country.
So, I am middle class, my husband is working class and I have 2 children and I would say that their attitudes to life and the way they live it also fall into 2 categories.

Yes, unfortunately I agree Daisymae. The British are ravaged by class.

I think at times it is admired to have worked your way up the ladder, but at other times resented by those who were higher up the ladder already. Easiest just to be yourself and not worry about what others think.

Stuck in Switzerland BlueSky. Trying to make the most of it and throw myself into my work, watching lots of TV, reading etc. I am safer here, that is for sure ATM.

I think that the class system is alive and well in GB, with roots firmly entrenched in the educational system. The old boys club has yet to be replaced with something more egalitarian. Look at the current chumocracy doing rather well at the moment. How many priministers went to comprehensive school? Probably less than have been to Eton. Ditto any other profession. It's interesting to note that some in the arts are playing down their upper class background as it's seen to be frowned on, much better to have pulled yourself up by your own bootstraps than admitting you got your break because of your parental connections.

I abhor the word ‘servant’. It really sets my teeth on edge. I prefer to think that some people employ and pay for ‘staff’.

I consider myself working class as did my dear late husband. We were reasonably happy with our lot. He went to a comprehensive school and left with 2 '0' levels. A practical chap who worked at 'blue collar' jobs. A thoroughly nice and genuine chap. Practical and socially confident.

His brother got a scholarship to a minor public school and then went to a poly where he got an 'average' degree. I feel that he was too posh for the local kids to play with but too rough for the school - thus falling between two stools. He'd say he was middle class. Insecure and sensitive, he can be quite snippy - afraid of being found out and kicked back down again. His education gave him a well paid profession and a good pension but he never seems to be content or happy. What a shame.

I had this discussion with someone several years ago. I was born into a working class family, my husband was also working class. The person I was talking with told me that because of our financial position we were now middle class.

I told him I considered anyone who had to work in order to be able to live was working class - whether they were an unskilled manual worker or a highly educated professional person.