The Stevie vs Kate class thread

You want my empathy? Earn it. I've never seen you do anything on this board except whinge about how hard done by your are because of your parents' class.

well, your last point's not true.

and i don't feel 'hard done by' because of my parents' class. I've had a lot of luck in my life, good and bad. i'm actually very happy in real life, and not remotely class-conscious in real life, mostly because i don't confront statements like those you've made in the past (on the private/state schools thread, and on the 'why do working class people hate working class people' thread; i tried searching for the exact threads but couldn't find them, obviously not as good at using the 'search' function as you were at making a dig at the fact my dad left me some money when he died last year), which infuriate me because of:

a) your ignorance of how the 'other' you alway identify actually lives

b) your thinly veiled contempt for these people, whether they be 'working class' or merely people who aren't like you

c) the callousness with which you seem treat the fact that some people haven't been blessed with the opportunities with which you've been blessed. I'm not calling for middle-class guilt on your part; some people are rich and some are poor and, again, that's mostly a question of luck, and it certainly doesn't define the lives those people will go on to lead. But to talk about the 'other' with as much condescension as you do riles me, especially when that 'other' is me - again, either because i'm of 'working class' origins, or because i'm from wimbledon, as you acutely pointed out on the I Hate Clubbing thread.

Luck.

To help illustrate my frustration, I'll clue you in to my background. You talked about a 'meritocracy' on the Public School thread. So here goes, on my perception of a meritocracy.

My grandparents were working class, and like their parents before them: very poor. M7 great-nan worked into her 70s, during the day in the kitchens at Queen Mary's hospital in Roehampton (where I was born), and at nights cleaning the houses of better-off people. In those house she would often take a bath when she should've been cleaning, because there wasn't a bath at home. When her sister gave birth to my great-uncle, she proceeded to get drunk on one of her employers' liquor cabinet; when they turned up, she explained why, so they joined in (she wasn't sacked).

My mum's mum and dad weren't well-off at all. They had four kids, grandad worked installing escalators all over the country, was rarely home; my nan was a housewife, raising the kids, working odd jobs wherever she could. My mum quit school at 15 to become a hairdresser; she later became a secretary, learnt how to type, and is now an office manager. She and her 2nd husband own their house and, i would say, are comfortably Middle Class now. But my mum knew when she wasn't so comfortable; throughout my childhood, we never dwelled on where we lived (always council housing, some grotty places, and finally one lovely house) or that we didn't have much money - indeed, i'd say i was spoilt as a kid, any money spent on me, and lots of love too. My mum always made me mindful of how lucky we were, how a lot of people were a lot worse off than they were. When i was a kid, i made a joke about how old people are always wearing clothes about two decades out of daate; i remember my mum scolding me when she heard, saying that they wore those clothes, perhaps, because they couldn't afford any newer or better. i remember feeling really ashamed afterwards.

my dad's parents were a little better off, living in a council flat first in Fulham, and then Putney; this was over 50 years ago, and the places were pretty ropey then, certainly not the well-heeled areas they are now. Gramps was a bus conductor, nan worked as a cashier after her kids grew up. My dad studied to be an accountant, got a great job, and everything was looking good for him leading a more comfortable life than his parents, as was the way back then.

Only he developed Multiple Sclerosis in 1973, and soon had to quit his promising job in the city, because he physically could not travel there, and was often exhausted by mid-morning, thanks to the disease. Mum and Dad moved out of their flat in Wimbledon, to a disabled-friendly bungalow on a council estate in Colliers Wood. There was a park with a stagnant river Wandle running through it behind us. There was a sewerage plant at the end of the road. It wasn't fragnant, but it was fine. My dad was, initially, unemployed, earning money by putting on cine-film shows for kids' parties, screening cartoons and stuff. Later, he started to work from home, worked damned fucking hard, and we started to live more comfortably; but i never forgot the years when things weren't so good; nor that, when things were bad, they could've been a lot worse.

Luck. When I was 14 my mum left home; from then on, until his death in 2002, i was my dad's sole carer. It sucked on many levels, but fuck it, it taught me so many things. It could've been worse too - Dad could've become iller (he did), we could've been in a much more precarious financial state, mum might not have helped every bit thaat she could. I'm grateful to the experience, for what it developed in me.

So I don't feel hard-done by at all. I'm very lucky. I have a great job which I feel I'm succeeding at, great friends, a wonderful girlfriend, creature comforts, etc.

This isn't about class-envy or anything like that. It's to do with the insensitive and insulting things *you* say about class-issues. It's about the way *you* judge working class people, when you haven't got a clue of what it might be like to be working-class. And it's hard to take your comments on class seriously, when you were on this board - back in the days of your on-off CTCL connection - chastising ET for not paying the writers at his (non-profit-making) magazine on the basis that he "owns his house".

I don't want your empathy, and I certainly don't think you're in any place to pity me at all. But I'd like you to stop making digs about the fact that some of my dad's hard-earned cash was left over after he died (split between me, my brother and my nan and my mum). And maybe have a bit of respect for other peoples' experiences, and see beyond the limitations of your own. And I will try and respect your point of view and stay out of your way in future.

I'm not whingeing about being hard done by. As far as I can tell, you're whingeing about - well, everything.