[Mon 12th Sep 2011] Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class, with Owen Jones (London, WC1B 3QE)

[dynamicbaddog]

I knew near all the FTers in that part of the world, as would 39th Step, and can't remember any called Jones.

http://owenjones.org/category/the-left/
My family did go through “financial hardship” (for want of a better phrase) for a number of years when we were based in Sheffield; but I was too young to remember this, unlike my brothers who spent years having clothes bought from jumble sales. In any case, it was for very different reasons than the thousands of workers in that city thrown on the scrapheap by Thatcherism’s vandalism of British industry: my dad spent years as a full-time official of the Trotskyist Militant Tendency, and fomenting revolution doesn’t pay the bills.

 

[Fedayn]

http://owenjones.org/category/the-left/
My family did go through “financial hardship” (for want of a better phrase) for a number of years when we were based in Sheffield; but I was too young to remember this, unlike my brothers who spent years having clothes bought from jumble sales. In any case, it was for very different reasons than the thousands of workers in that city thrown on the scrapheap by Thatcherism’s vandalism of British industry: my dad spent years as a full-time official of the Trotskyist Militant Tendency, and fomenting revolution doesn’t pay the bills.

In Sheffield then? Be interresting to see who it was.

 

[articul8]

Not according to the book they weren't. One was a lecturer and the other was an economic regeneration oficcer.

Jesus christ - what a scion of the ruling class

 

[butchersapron]

Jesus christ - what a scion of the ruling class

Who said any such thing? Apart from you, of course.

 

[articul8]

you're the one making out he's some middle class imposter

 

[butchersapron]

you're the one making out he's some middle class imposter

No, i'm the one responding to the post that claimed both of his parents were militant full timers by pointing out that the book doesn't say that. So pull your trousers back up and come back with something better than that.

 

[Sue]

you're the one making out he's some middle class imposter

Eh? You're saying he's not middle class?

The man himself disagrees...:

#89
'Like all people with my background, I will almost certainly die as I was born: middle-class.'
ETA link:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/mar/01/social-mobility-dead-end

 

[articul8]

I'm not commenting on his class origins - just questioning others who think apparently the fact he went to Oxford and onto a job as a political researcher is *automatically* proof positive he doesn't have any connection to w/c communities.

Anyway, people can have been Millie full-timers at one point in time, and done other occupations at others. Nothing conclusive here...

 

[butchersapron]

You're insisting that i was commenting on his class origins in the post of mine you quoted. I wasn't. You jumped in and fucked it up. Pointless.

 

[articul8]

You're insisting that i was commenting on his class origins in the post of mine you quoted. I wasn't. You jumped in and fucked it up. Pointless.

you've nowhere implied he is other than w/c? Come on, people can read

 

[dynamicbaddog]

I spoke to him this afternoon about the critisms some of you lot have been firing at him. He said it was very ironic because when he was at Oxford the poshos would give him flack for coming there from a comprehensive school. Saying he was only there because of 'quotas' etc

 

[butchersapron]

you've nowhere implied he is other than w/c? Come on, people can read

Indeed they can, that's why you're fucked. Have some integrity for fucks sake. Your post and mine are up there for all to see.

If you want to call Jones a liar go ahead. If you want to argue that he's not middle class then go ahead.

 

[Sue]

you've nowhere implied he is other than w/c? Come on, people can read

Bit confused. Owen Jones has said he's middle class. Why are you making out it's a horrible slur (and can't be bothered to go back and check exactly who implied what or otherwise) to imply he's not working class?

 

[love detective]

I'm not commenting on his class origins - just questioning others who think apparently the fact he went to Oxford and onto a job as a political researcher is *automatically* proof positive he doesn't have any connection to w/c communities.

can't speak for others, but my point on his education and then straight into politics was about just that - i.e. the increasing trend of people who go straight from university (usually oxford or cambridge) into a job in politics - it wasn't so much about his class background but about the increasing professionalisation of politics itself (and by implication how that can't be a good thing in terms of independent pro working class political organisation)

 

[articul8]

yes I don't disagree necessarily, or at all. But judgements on individuals shouldn't be made by sweeping sociological generalisations.

 

[Sue]

Still, looking forward to hearing all about articul8's interview with him. The cut and thrust, the incisive questioning, the clever parries, the final thrust of the stiletto...

 

[articul8]

not convinced yet another Labour hack who appears to have never had a proper job in his life has much to add to the debate.

This is what I'm objecting to - even if he did go straight from HE to a job as a researcher in Westminster - how do you infer from that he "never had a proper job in his life"?

 

[articul8]

Still, looking forward to hearing all about articul8's interview with him. The cut and thrust, the incisive questioning, the clever parries, the final thrust of the stiletto...

I'm not out to skewer him - I'm out to clarify what he thinks and challenge him to respond to alternative perspectives

 

[Sue]

This is what I'm objecting to - even if he did go straight from HE to a job as a researcher in Westminster - how do you infer from that he "never had a proper job in his life"?

How do you infer from that he has had?

 

[articul8]

I'm not inferring anything - you are making the inference

 

[Sue]

I'm not inferring anything - you are making the inference

I'm happy to be proved wrong... The point behind all this is put very eloquently by ld in #104.

 

[love detective]

This is what I'm objecting to - even if he did go straight from HE to a job as a researcher in Westminster - how do you infer from that he "never had a proper job in his life"?

because as I mentioned earlier on the thread - he's 26 now, he graduated in 2005 which would make him around 20 years old upon graduation, and therefore about 17 when he started university, presumably straight from school - so where in all that would he have found time to fit in a 'proper job'

there's no inference here in any of this - all we're musing on are the facts as they stand

 

[revol68]

he's shite, embarrassing working class identity politics looking back all starry eyed at a time when labour "had a place" in society, a middle class kid with a hard on for a outdated caricature of "the working class".

 

[Treacle Toes]

So is the criticism od OJ here that he is 'academically intelligent' but not 'worldy wise'?

 

[revol68]

So is the criticism od OJ here that he is 'academically intelligent' but not 'worldy wise'?

he's not even very intellectual, he's shite.

 

[Treacle Toes]

he's not even very intellectual, he's shite.

I said 'academically intelligent', as you well know.

 

[revol68]

well i don't really care what grades he got, afterall shit heap Hari has a double first, so he could be academically "intelligent" as in he got good grades but I think the criticism of him comes from the fact he has position himself as some sort of working class identity politics white knight whilst having no experience of that which he fetishises. If he was just some standard leftist/marxist academic I don't think many would give him shit for this lack of "prole" cred.

 

[Ibn Khaldoun]

The Morning Star gave him and his book favourable coverage. Now it sounds disappointing.

 

[dynamicbaddog]

The Morning Star gave him and his book favourable coverage. Now it sounds disappointing.

most of the reviews have been favourable, only people who really hated it were Spiked

I've been asked to review it for 'Permanent Revoultion' magazine

 

[Ibn Khaldoun]

Pretty good!

I'll check Spiked out, thanks. Sort of good they're back online.