The middle class are defined and valued by what they own, their successes in business, their rise through the tiers of the education system, and their ‘good taste’. The Class War has too often been measured through the narrow distribution of wealth, education and through the economy. Meaning that when working class people enter into higher education, or become entrepreneurial and innovative. Setting up local businesses serving their community, or enter into the creative industries of art, drama, or literature they must immediately deny their working class identities, lives and families. To be working class has too long been used as shorthand to mean failure, they are the ones that were not good enough to rise and become middle class. It appears almost impossible to describe yourself as a working class academic, or a working class artist in the UK today, the common misconception is that we (the working class) cannot appreciate the arts, literature, or engage in critical thinking. Instead to be working class is to be poor and shabby, unhealthy, and always connected to dirt. George Orwell in ‘The Road to Wigan Pier’ told us that the middle class despire us and think of us in 4 frightful words ‘the lower class smell’, and I trust his first hand account from the playing fields of Eton.
Even though class difference and inequality is often seen only as connected to wealth and the economy, it is class snobbery that ensures that working class people feel an eternal shame of where they come from and who they are. Culture and ‘taste’ constantly keep those class boundaries and class inequalities visible and legitimate. In the ways that the middle class define themselves against working class people and use culture and cultural preferences to make sure they remain in their prime class position. While at the same time demeaning and ridiculing working class people for their lack of good taste.
Class snobbery judges what is high culture and low culture and that snobbery filters down to our personal taste and image. Lazy shorthand markers of taste are used to quickly point to our class position, for women wearing big gold hooped earings are used to explain ‘how common’ or ‘how rough’ we are. Richard Littlejohn described Carol Duggan the grieving mother of Mark Duggan who was shot and killed in Tottenham by the Metroplitan Police in 2011 in his Daily Mail column as ‘looking like she comes straight from benefits street with her big gold earings’. Despite the middle class attempts to demean our ‘taste’ we have always loved ‘bling’ and wearing our big gold earings to us is a sign of our glamour.
They laugh at us watching and enjoying soap operas on our 48” flat screen tellys, and use this has examples of our simple and low culture. Yet think of themselves going to the Royal Opera House to sit through 4 hours of a operatic production of the French Revolution as having good taste, and a critical and interesting mind and manners.
Despite the constant propaganda that the culture of the middle class is that of high and refined knowledge it is the working class that are the innovative and creative class, taking risks and enjoying life. The British working class are multi-cultural we share our ideas, our family life, and our class struggle at school, in the pub, and on the street. Those shared ideas of an international working class in the UK then transform into exciting and interesting sub-cultures. From West Indian working class people in the UK came Ska, Two Tone, and Lovers Rock music, our Jewish brothers and sisters brought us anarchy, literature, and well fitting suits. Working class Asian families brought colour and a sense of passionate and loyal politics to our grey streets. We have been generous with each other, although it might not always be easy.
The British middle class are mostly white, and are culturally homogenous, they are static. The whole point to being middle class is to be static, and not to move, not to be mobile but to stay still. Although staying still needs to look effortless despite the amount of work they do in order to stay in that one place. Their reading of all culture has to be ‘disinterested’ because it has to appear to be ‘as natural’, showing emotion, being emotional, being angry, being passionate, being spontaneous are not traits they are allowed to show. These are the traits of the working class, that they must distinguish against.
Our working class pride of who we are and what we like, our desire for the ‘bling’ for the garish, for the loud and the emotional, our angry politics and our vulgarian humour is something to proud of.
Our love of bawdy seaside postcards, our obsession with a big telly, the money we spend to be glam and to look sharp is nothing to be ashamed of. Our plain and direct language need not be watched, or monitored or policed by those who believe in our inferiority and their superiority. The very fact that they need to define us means they fear us. Class traiter George Orwell told us their secrets; in Down and Out in London and Paris, he tells what we all knew, part of our drudgery is about their fear of us as a mob. If we are kept busy worrying about the rent, and how we feed our children from the minimum wage, it is difficult for us to organise, to stand in solidarity with each other. Therefore when it appears we have time, or money to live it up, and get the glad rags on, we become a threatening force. Working class hedonism, bling, and vulgarity is a resistance to a humourless and terrified static group of grey people, enjoy yourself. And theres nothing too good for the working class.