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Working class means the only ones you can look down on are those on welfare, and you imagine they, not the corporate types and the politicians they own, are responsible for the nation's problems. And you haven't voted for years.
I'm working-class and my parents and their parents were too. Soo I came from a long line of people who had to work for a living. Had to put in their own sweat to make anything of theirselves. Ill take that.
Its just a title. Go drink some poison I don't give a hoot. I'm going to feel bad because my parents worked for their lives....wow....I'm so ashamed.
It's interesting to me that in the US, unlike the UK, people tend to avoid labeling themselves "working-class". Unless they were raised in extreme poverty or are Warren Buffett , Americans prefer the term "middle class". But having been raised in a blue-collar home, I've found there are some significant differences between my expectations and experiences in life when compared with my "middle-class" colleagues and friends.
Interestingly, even though my wife is a foreigner, I find she relates to many of these perspectives, as she also comes from a working-class background. Some shared traits/experiences I've noticed:
1) Very little education in how to use/create wealth. Frugal by necessity, but sometimes spendthrifts at payday. No sense of how to invest wisely. Generous, literally, to a fault (for example, by unconditionally lending money to relatives and friends). A lot of time spent visualizing being rich, or hatching hare-brained schemes/playing the lottery, etc.
2) Work is seen as necessary drudgery, not a means to personal fulfillment. Unions are our only defense / don't cross a picket line. Satisfaction is found in hobbies, family, or weekend tasks around the house. College is OK if it leads to a job, but you'd better get a scholarship, and parents can't help you navigate the labyrinth of applications, SATs, tutoring, and financial aid. Reading is an OK escape, but don't do it too much. The TV is always on.
3) "Don't think you're better than other people." Mistrust of "pretense," "elitism," and "fancy stuff." What's familiar (sports teams, neighborhoods, religions, race) is good. For example, domestic beer>boxed wine>any foreign stuff (unless there's an ethnic connection, i.e., Guinness if you're Irish-American). Food should be cheap & plentiful; healthy eating, not smoking and taking care of yourself is weak.
4) Not knowing "the Code." Tendency to over/under dress for the occasion, speak too frankly among wealthier people.
I don't encourage a class warfare mentality, nor do I romanticize growing up working class, but I find the differences interesting. Although I'm probably a "middle class latte-drinker" now , I'm sure I've internalized some of the values I was raised with.
What are your "growing up working-class" experiences?
I was raised in a family that is difficult to place on the class spectrum. My mother was born to a delivery driver for a bakery, who later owned businesses, and ran an illegal gambling operation; my father was from much the same background, but his father eventually ascended the ranks and had a comfortable pension and 4 weeks of vacation, and was just months away from retirement when he had a heart attack. My mother's brothers and sisters (six of them) occupy every rank from a temporary laborer to an owner of a practice; my father (now deceased) had one brother and one sister, who are solidly working class.
My father, who did not graduate high school, was a carpet layer when I was born, and eventually rose to found a business and own two stores; unfortunately, his "working class" sensibilities probably got the best of him and he ran into major problems with the IRS and other government agencies. My mother stayed at home and later spent time working at the store until it failed, and we were thus propelled on a downward spiral into poverty. My dad, who was probably more solidly working-class at my birth, had a curious mixture of sensibilities late in his life: my uncle, him, and I went out to the Indian restaurant for a lunch buffet often and in our good times, our family could be seen at the poshest Italian restaurant in town, him still in his sweat pants. He raised us up to be "individuals" rather than the "group members" working-class children are often alleged by academics to be raised as, but still had a suspicion of things foreign and different. He used a broad vocabulary around us kids, which was a mixture of swear words and surprisingly cultured terms. He had the ambition to raise me as a lawyer, my brother as a laborer who would one day take over his store, and my sister, well, she was his favorite but he died one day before her 13th birthday.
I seem to get on best with middle/upper middle class foreigners from the developing world (Moroccans, Mexicans, Colombians, etc.), while my working-class and working poor co-workers often despise me as pretentious and my I don't quite fit in with the upper middle class people I've met either.
Unless the wealthy person is in a position of authority, they really aren't anything special and shouldn't be treated as such.
I don't think it's so much that they are "special". It just reflects a lack of cultural fluency between the upper or upper middle class and the working class. Upper middle class children are raised with much greater exposure to a rich vocabulary as children, parents who can navigate SAT and ACT and college admissions, piano and violin lessons, vacations with more cultural depth; working-class children tend not to have these advantages. There are cultural subtleties between the upper-middle and working class as a result.
It's interesting to me that in the US, unlike the UK, people tend to avoid labeling themselves "working-class". Unless they were raised in extreme poverty or are Warren Buffett , Americans prefer the term "middle class". But having been raised in a blue-collar home, I've found there are some significant differences between my expectations and experiences in life when compared with my "middle-class" colleagues and friends.
Interestingly, even though my wife is a foreigner, I find she relates to many of these perspectives, as she also comes from a working-class background. Some shared traits/experiences I've noticed:
1) Very little education in how to use/create wealth. Frugal by necessity, but sometimes spendthrifts at payday. No sense of how to invest wisely. Generous, literally, to a fault (for example, by unconditionally lending money to relatives and friends). A lot of time spent visualizing being rich, or hatching hare-brained schemes/playing the lottery, etc.
2) Work is seen as necessary drudgery, not a means to personal fulfillment. Unions are our only defense / don't cross a picket line. Satisfaction is found in hobbies, family, or weekend tasks around the house. College is OK if it leads to a job, but you'd better get a scholarship, and parents can't help you navigate the labyrinth of applications, SATs, tutoring, and financial aid. Reading is an OK escape, but don't do it too much. The TV is always on.
3) "Don't think you're better than other people." Mistrust of "pretense," "elitism," and "fancy stuff." What's familiar (sports teams, neighborhoods, religions, race) is good. For example, domestic beer>boxed wine>any foreign stuff (unless there's an ethnic connection, i.e., Guinness if you're Irish-American). Food should be cheap & plentiful; healthy eating, not smoking and taking care of yourself is weak.
4) Not knowing "the Code." Tendency to over/under dress for the occasion, speak too frankly among wealthier people.
I don't encourage a class warfare mentality, nor do I romanticize growing up working class, but I find the differences interesting. Although I'm probably a "middle class latte-drinker" now , I'm sure I've internalized some of the values I was raised with.
What are your "growing up working-class" experiences?
Pffft. Some people are born working class, and some come from upper-middle or even upper, and still have this mentality.
1. That's probably true. But actually I was a class traitor the moment I got out of college, taking jobs that the guys told me I was overqualified (and, it turned out, undertrained) for. Money doesn't even keep up with inflation, and you get taxed on it, or blow it on basic expenses. So when you have very little, does it make any kind of sense to keep it when other people can steal it?
2. Work is drudgery. Listen, if I were to spend all my time working for some guy, I get promoted. I feel compelled to get a better house, or a better car, all to keep up with means. Even if I don't... sooner or later the old ones fail. You ever seen a gerbil running on a wheel? Don't be that gerbil. Unions are crap, you'd be better off working personally for someone who treats you right, or being your own boss, even if the pay isn't as good. What makes life satisfying are one's hobbies and family, not something that you can blow in an hour of decent shopping. And I do plenty of reading, way to paint people as illiterate or stupid.
3. When people assume you're lower class, even if you're not, you get lied to. Alot. You ask for people's help, and get turned away by superficially "polite" people. A person who actually is polite is able to welcome anyone from any social class into their home. They care less about manners (which when you boil it down are simply a set of preprogrammed actions and responses to situations) and more about right treatment of people.
4. Remember I said about manners? The same is true of "The Code." There was a movie called Trading Places, where they essentially got a guy from the slums (with some explaining) to learn how to live an upper class lifestyle. Given the proper education, the only real distinction is a shower and nice clothes. It's garbage. As if to drive the point home, these nice clothes will get grubby and tear to shreds as/more quickly than common clothes.
I, as a largely lower class person raised by largely upper-middle parents, do not snub my nose at the poor. I snub my nose at the rich, since they really are worse than me.
I don't think it's so much that they are "special". It just reflects a lack of cultural fluency between the upper or upper middle class and the working class. Upper middle class children are raised with much greater exposure to a rich vocabulary as children, parents who can navigate SAT and ACT and college admissions, piano and violin lessons, vacations with more cultural depth; working-class children tend not to have these advantages. There are cultural subtleties between the upper-middle and working class as a result.
Rich vocabulary? My dad exposed me to all sorts of rich vocabulary early on, particularly a select few four letter words
you know you are from the working class if....
you refuse to buy a 6.00 beer , even if you can afford it..
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, Americans prefer the term "middle class". But having been raised in a blue-collar home, I've found there are some significant differences between my expectations and experiences in life when compared with my "middle-class" colleagues and friends. 
, I'm sure I've internalized some of the values I was raised with.
Some people are born working class, and some come from upper-middle or even upper, and still have this mentality.
