The Class Divide

cordshoes

(think it's my first ever started discussion on here...so here goes)

From the Richard Branson thread I got thinking about this in the UK.....we are all a result of our environment.

From being a kid in Coronation streets, to then mixing with people who grew up in houses with gardens, to now networking, and sometims socialising, in the leafy surrounds of Cheshire.
Not just Manchester overspill Cheshire and the Mere, but proper Cheshire (Delamere etc).

Also got me engaged as watched a Dragons Den last night that got me thinking, again.
2 posh good looking "rugger bugger" twins failed to get investment for their cider they had developed. The programme didn't really focus on them and how it had been financed, but I had my opinion.

Then the programme went to the bloke in the video below. I know it's over 10 minutes but try to watch it all.
Really got me thinking about talent and opportunity. So much so that i'm going to make contact with him.

Placid

cordshoes What a really likeable bloke. Good luck to him, polite friendly didnt get they hump when the pied him off.

They need to make it smaller then it will be in every plumbers tackle box.

Jon

cordshoes What are you driving at here? I watched it, seems a smart lad. Went in there with zero sales, one product, essentially a prototype, and no business plan, currently making 100% of zero profits. Came out of there with £41,000 and a business partner who’s confident she can get his product manufactured substantially cheaper than he has been able to and into stores. I know nothing about her but, from that clip, it sounds like she’s done it all before and successfully. He’ll now enjoy 70% of whatever profits they make while she does the heavy lifting. He went in offering 15% of the company (there was no company, there was a good idea) but would probably have gone 50/50 and still have been happy. If anyone’s been played here, and I’m not sure they have, it’s certainly not the inventor.

Flaneur

I'm fascinated about this too, and from a personal perspective, I have not 'managed' the fact that I come from a council estate, nowhere near as I should have and could have done. Much to say.

What's your thinking?

Anchor

So you are saying what ever our early environment that is the way we will be? Attitudes, outlook and that sort of thing, irrespective of personal wealth, employ or housing?

cordshoes

Not 100% sure what i'm saying. 😅
"give me the boy at 7, and i'll give you the man"....can see something in that. (edited for my slow typing re Misura above)

We can try to evolve our behaviours and language into new environments, but there must always be the basic you, with our own belief systems, morals etc.
Was in the bar on a golf trip a couple of years ago and some monied bloke from Cheshire was proclaiming that all the world's problems could be solved "if we just killed all the world's Muslims".
Instead of immediately getting my hackles up and creating a scene I took it as a jokey remark.
Responded with " what all 1.3 billion of them? Good job we didn't do that with the Christians like Hitler or when the Catholics and Protestants were killing plenty in our lifetime".
Just different upbringings, again.

This is going to make me watch the film of Mark Twain's The Prince and The Pauper about this subject, isn't it?

heyho

Misura Yes but didnt Jimmy Savile say something similar?

Rudi

There's a book on this very subject called "The Likes Of Us" which is worth a look. Basically, it boils down to expectations - the upper middle classes see certain things as their natural right, whereas people born with a less privileged start have "dreams and wish lists". It's a big subject and that's a sweeping generalisation, but that's the general gist of it. I remember when I went to University as a mature student after five years on the dole. That was the first time I met genuinely upper class people. This drawling louche kid at a house party asked me "where I was skiing this Spring?" Not if, where. He seemed genuinely surprised when I told him I had never been skiing ever. "Why not? Not your thing?"
edited to say - just watched that clip - what a set of patronising cunts. That laughter at the end. The other ones apart from that Geordie woman weren't judging the product, they were judging him. People buy people. And they detected a whiff of something they didn't want to be associated with. Jesus, the class system in this country is so firmly entrenched.

Placid

Misura After he bummed him within an inch of his Ancient Classical life..

cordshoes

Jon my point was not about this exact situation as such, as a TV programme is not really a good representation of how things work in the real business world.
More about the opportunities available which are still broadly based on class and money, rather than talent and inherent ability.
Think a modern expression would be Horizons. How much of the world is available to see dependant on where and how you grow up?
Social mobility is another term I hear. Yes there is some but how many regional accents do you hear now in the top media jobs. Look into the backgrounds of Kuennsberg and Peston and wonder why we ae such a soft country.
No edge and the days of 70;s punk and 80/90s working class music seem a long way back.
And as for anything changing in our kakistocratic 😆 government and the background of them........

Flaneur

Did the fact that they grimaced at his accent and body shape piss you off?

It did me a bit.

Jon

I miss so much when I watch tv.

Flaneur

I noticed it because it was in a post about class and wasn't at the end of the video.

Jon

I noticed a bit of grimacing when he said he’d sent a few emails out. Northern accent like Davies and similar body shape.
I don’t think they’d give a fuck how he spoke or looked if they thought they could make money out of his product.

Flaneur

True

Flaneur

I do think that there is something that cordshoes is trying to say here though...

Jon

I do too. I don’t see this as a good example of it though.
Life’s infinitely easier if you’re born into money. It’s been that way since money and property and ownership became a thing, or things. Social mobility is possible but the deck is stacked against you. Heavily. And even if you get the chance there’s a good chance you’ll feel second best, inferior, even if those around you don’t see you that way.

Flaneur

And, often, it's the person who feels it not the audience. A council estate of mind, as it were.

Mike_Jones

Flaneur council estate of mind

That's a fantastic album name.

cordshoes i’ve felt a goal down as soon as the accent in my voice kicks in

I used to have a pretty thick Teesside accent, even worse. One of the main reasons I moved abroad, cos of the job interviews I'd had in London.

cordshoes

I have been in some situations when i've felt a goal down as soon as the accent in my voice kicks in.
(That said it is better to a have certain accent in a situation that may involve a physical threat).

Anyway me and the bloke in the video have made contact so interesting to see how it has panned out for him.

Still interested in other opinions about whether the UK is more class divided than it was 10, 30 or 50 years ago........

Travis_Bickle

Mike_Jones Done already....

Intro's Tim Roth from Made In Britain

Jon

Mike_Jones It’s less obvious in educated circles over here, I think.
I always find it funny when people say they love my accent. I say thank you but really I think they like the idea of the English accent and the one they really like is the Merchant and Ivory accent.