frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
if you've got a successful restaurant or chain of restaurants you're bourgeoisie - the aristocracy (the real posh) are something different
i expect somebody will be along in a mo to tell me i'm talking bollocks
EDL watch
- Thread starter Das Uberdog
- Start date
if you've got a successful restaurant or chain of restaurants you're bourgeoisie - the aristocracy (the real posh) are something different
i expect somebody will be along in a mo to tell me i'm talking bollocks
if you've got a successful restaurant or chain of restaurants you're bourgeoisie - the aristocracy (the real posh) are something different
i expect somebody will be along in a mo to tell me i'm talking bollocks
They're probably upper middle class then.
I do class the aristocracy as exclusively the upper class. Maybe I have that wrong.Actually you might be right. I don't think he worked alongside the chefs etc.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
I mix up bourgeois and bourgeosie aswell.
Quick lesson pls.
Bourgeois - singular or impersonal collective definition. "He is bourgeois". "They are bourgeois swine".
Bourgeoisie - Definitive collective definition.
Cheers.
Corax
Luke 5:16
I think a lot of this comes down to definitions of middle class tbh. Frogwoman's dad I don't see as a typical member of the working class, as he doesn't need to work. Teachers, accountants, IT bods, public sector middle-managers (like me) are what I perceive as the typical middle-class. Those people don't have 12k in the bank.
I'm not altogether convinced how much salary comes into it anyway. Plenty of tradesmen that would self-define as working class earn a damn sight more than me or others in those groups above.
Oh shit, I've started another variant on the 'does class exist' thread haven't I.
I dunno. I just think that harnessing the power of the majority would be a good thing, and the MC/WC distinction is generally not worth sacrificing that potential.
I'm not altogether convinced how much salary comes into it anyway. Plenty of tradesmen that would self-define as working class earn a damn sight more than me or others in those groups above.
Oh shit, I've started another variant on the 'does class exist' thread haven't I.
I dunno. I just think that harnessing the power of the majority would be a good thing, and the MC/WC distinction is generally not worth sacrificing that potential.
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
I'm a fucking weirdo lol, but I don't like the term middle class, I think that if you're discussing in economic terms "labour aristocracy" or "petit bourgeoisie" depending on what kind of middle class people you're talking about is a lot more accurate
it's all right if you want to swear at taffboy though
it's all right if you want to swear at taffboy though
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
you can be posh and middle class and not posh and middle class... 'posh' isn't really a technical term for owt ;P
i'd say teachers are middle class because their job provides them with legal privileges, relative autonomy and creative control (albeit increasingly hampered). in almost every sense, teaching is one of the old 'professions' - qualitatively different from jobs with completely restricted creative roles and responsibilities. it also still carries with it a degree of social capital and potential for career advancement into other spheres of public service. even though teachers are paid less than a lot of folks in manual working professions, i'd say teachers weren't 'working class' for the above reasons
Edit: thread moved on without me
i'd say teachers are middle class because their job provides them with legal privileges, relative autonomy and creative control (albeit increasingly hampered). in almost every sense, teaching is one of the old 'professions' - qualitatively different from jobs with completely restricted creative roles and responsibilities. it also still carries with it a degree of social capital and potential for career advancement into other spheres of public service. even though teachers are paid less than a lot of folks in manual working professions, i'd say teachers weren't 'working class' for the above reasons
Edit: thread moved on without me
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
I think a lot of this comes down to definitions of middle class tbh. Frogwoman's dad I don't see as a typical member of the working class, as he doesn't need to work. Teachers, accountants, IT bods, public sector middle-managers (like me) are what I perceive as the typical middle-class. Those people don't have 12k in the bank.
I'm not altogether convinced how much salary comes into it anyway. Plenty of tradesmen that would self-define as working class earn a damn sight more than me or others in those groups above.
Oh shit, I've started another variant on the 'does class exist' thread haven't I.
well exactly. Once he did though and I imagine it won't be long till he has to again. After 10 years I don't think he's got all that much now either tbf!
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
nah, they're labour aristocracy aren't they? Less and less though, as you say. I'd say they were working class. I'd never have said they were middle class except in a period where it carried a lot more social status and autonomy which it hasn't for a very long time now. Wasn't it Marx who described scchools as "teaching factories" in the 19th century? could be wrong tho.
you get headteachers going on strike though, or at least you did on the 30th November, and I wouldn't say those were usually "working class"
DotCommunist
So many particulars. So many questions.
I'm eating baked beans from a tin and stolidly refusing to sell my labour to the lowest bidder. Lumpen? I think not, these beans merely have sausages in them
Corax
Luke 5:16
That made me think of Modric and Berbatov. Not the same kind of striking I know, but it did raise the question in my head of "Are professional footballers working class?" The quintessential working class sport, working class heroes - and on £90k a week.
No, I don't have any sort of point to this.
Anyway... The EDL right? On balance, I reckon I'm against.
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
lawyers can strike, judges can strike, police can strike... striking in and of itself isn't necessarily an indication of your 'class'. i think most on the left completely miss out on the importance of workplace alienation as a factor in the development of classes. to a great extent i think the keen-ness of many on the left to hoik teachers into the 'working class movement' is more an opportunistic one, based on the fact that teachers are one of the few remaining 'organised' and generally 'left leaning' groups left in the TU movement. they never used to be seen as a part of the working class, and they still play many of the same ideological and political roles of 'control' and instilling order that they always did.
also i hate school
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
undoubtedly they're like a more privileged section within the working class (mostly) but they still have to sell their labour and therefore are working class. same with police etc no? i'd still see the police as working class (despite being cunts). they still rely on a paycheque at the end of the day
being working class doesn't mean you can't be a cunt, and the police are undoubtedly a more privileged section of it, but that doesn't mean they've become pb
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
labour aristocracy, so far as i've always considered it, is based around skilled manual labour... still restricted in its creative scope and also specifically 'waged'. lots of people get paycheques, people in boardrooms get paycheques as do managers and all sorts. what makes the qualitative difference between working and middle-class 'professionalism' is, for me, the range of intellectual freedoms and creative control (coupled with the legal privileges mentioned earlier) which, combined together also act to attract higher levels of social capital.
i definitely don't see police as working class... i also struggle to see social workers, prison officers or anyone else with legal privileges allowing them to 'discipline' or control other working class people on behalf of the state as being 'workers'. my definition is structural, not subjective - as individuals they can still be progressive but their structural role in the perpetuation of social relations is definitively different
i definitely don't see police as working class... i also struggle to see social workers, prison officers or anyone else with legal privileges allowing them to 'discipline' or control other working class people on behalf of the state as being 'workers'. my definition is structural, not subjective - as individuals they can still be progressive but their structural role in the perpetuation of social relations is definitively different
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
really, easy as that!? i'm getting better at this debating business
emanymton
A cat politely sat on the flaming gardener.
I promised myself I wouldn't post on here any more but Fuck it I want to chuck a couple of thought into the class debate to confuse everyone more.
1) Is being working class about having to sell your labour, or about being exploited when you do? Middle management types still have to sell their labour but are arguable paid more than any value they produce where the workers are of course paid less. Is it the case that in exchange for their role of controlling and administrating the labour of others they are given a tiny share of the profits? Are footballers also in this group? If working class is just about selling your labour would that mean some chief executives are working class?
2) Marx drew a distinction between productive and nonproductive workers. Productive workers where basically just manufacturing and transport workers as they are they only ones involved in direct production of material goods. I think the ideal example of unproductive workers are bank workers as they don't produce anything their role is to extract surplus value produced by other workers for their bosses with a tiny fraction of it being syphoned of to pay their wages. They therefore suffer exploitation but do not themselves produce any surplus value. Is Marx right about this distinction? is it helpful? Are teachers, nurses, social workers etc productive or nonproductive workers? Are they workers at all?
Have I decided on answers to any of these question? Some yes but for most of them my answer is fuck knows. Have I got all my terminology correct? Probably not. Is this the wrong thread for this discussion? Absolutely!
Now I need to go a read something called 'the role of activation patterns in connectionsit models'.
1) Is being working class about having to sell your labour, or about being exploited when you do? Middle management types still have to sell their labour but are arguable paid more than any value they produce where the workers are of course paid less. Is it the case that in exchange for their role of controlling and administrating the labour of others they are given a tiny share of the profits? Are footballers also in this group? If working class is just about selling your labour would that mean some chief executives are working class?
2) Marx drew a distinction between productive and nonproductive workers. Productive workers where basically just manufacturing and transport workers as they are they only ones involved in direct production of material goods. I think the ideal example of unproductive workers are bank workers as they don't produce anything their role is to extract surplus value produced by other workers for their bosses with a tiny fraction of it being syphoned of to pay their wages. They therefore suffer exploitation but do not themselves produce any surplus value. Is Marx right about this distinction? is it helpful? Are teachers, nurses, social workers etc productive or nonproductive workers? Are they workers at all?
Have I decided on answers to any of these question? Some yes but for most of them my answer is fuck knows. Have I got all my terminology correct? Probably not. Is this the wrong thread for this discussion? Absolutely!
Now I need to go a read something called 'the role of activation patterns in connectionsit models'.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Point of order. Police in the UK signed up to a non-strike clause in return for an unspecified number of silver coins. Although they can strike, to do so would leave the officers and their union up Shit Creek without a paddle, in terms of breach of contract.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Not so sure about "specifically waged". What we nowadays call the "artisanal" classes, the boutique potters, stonemasons, fabricators etc, usually do piecework, i.e. get a negotiated rate for a particular job. It's the labour they contract that's usually waged.
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
I never found anything wrong with your attitude tbh
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
DotCommunist
So many particulars. So many questions.
framed
Leave it!
It's not all that 'short notice' to change a date from 18th August to Sept 1st, is it?
I presume Hope Not Hate are hoping to provoke a furious email and facebook comments response to Robinson/Lennon 's late postponement and shift of dates.
"You faaakin c@nt Lennon, if any further proof were needed that you and yer faakin uncle are provos in disguise, this is surely it!? Now I'll 'ave to make a 2 minute phone call and switch the bus from the 18th to the 1st, you treacherous faaakin c@nts!"
Nah, I can't see many feathers being ruffled either, but it's nice of HNH to keep the EDL's events diary up-to-date for them.
taffboy gwyrdd
Embrace the confusion!
I'm a fucking weirdo lol, but I don't like the term middle class, I think that if you're discussing in economic terms "labour aristocracy" or "petit bourgeoisie" depending on what kind of middle class people you're talking about is a lot more accurate
it's all right if you want to swear at taffboy though
Given that I have to sell my labour or sign on, ,have lived and worked in working class areas all my adult life and identify with interests of those who would see a vast re-transfer of production means and infrastructure to accountable public ownership?
There's plenty like me, whose parents would be seen as middle class (dad was an academic)
I used to confuse culture and class a lot. I now see much of that as a divisive distraction. I now see class far more as a soley social and economic relationship thanks not least to this place.
I don't consider working class people predestined to ignorance of culture, history and know plenty who aint. Likewise I know plenty who might be supposed middle class who are ignorant of those things, and bigots into the bargain.
I have no wish to drag up past rows and am glad from some recent posts that even strictly off topic class discussion has moved on. On a personal level FW I have never and do not object to how you have disagreed with me.
another thing before some EDL commentary: FW your thing about thinking UC was exclusively aristo: there is gentryas well isn't there?
Again, with regards to money there are more than a few poverty stricken aristos and a respect in which money can't buy class or, more importantly, plain manners and human respect.
taffboy gwyrdd
Embrace the confusion!
Anyhow...
Many will now know of the cancellation of the Luton demo planned for late Aug. The rather weird official notice of this cites a "change of approach" which seems like it might infer a longer term strategy change.
Greeted with mirth by many antis, this surrender could be deceptive. Nearly any approach would be better now than the downward spiral of recent months. I don't know what they are planning or, at least as interestingly, who is really behind this. They themselves may have no clue. But I don't see that champagne corks should pop just yet.
Many will now know of the cancellation of the Luton demo planned for late Aug. The rather weird official notice of this cites a "change of approach" which seems like it might infer a longer term strategy change.
Greeted with mirth by many antis, this surrender could be deceptive. Nearly any approach would be better now than the downward spiral of recent months. I don't know what they are planning or, at least as interestingly, who is really behind this. They themselves may have no clue. But I don't see that champagne corks should pop just yet.
taffboy gwyrdd
Embrace the confusion!
OK, culture meaning?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Kev Carroll is standing for Bedford police commissioner for the Bfp
Ranbay
The same rules apply
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