The White Working Class : Sat Jan 14, 2012 11:53 am  

Just read an article in a kiwi paper about the woman on the tram in Croydon or wherever it was. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/ar ... d=10770034 it goes on to mention that white working class communities are becoming fed up and mentions a report, so I found it: http://www.jrf.org.uk/publications/work ... ghbourhood This is fresh in my head as someone brought up the telly programme "Love thy Neighbour" on another thread recently, where the racist character was a white, working class, northerner who was a staunch Labour voter. So if Labour no longer represents sections of the british white working class back home. Who does?

Just read an article in a kiwi paper about the woman on the tram in Croydon or wherever it was. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/ar ... d=10770034 it goes on to mention that white working class communities are becoming fed up and mentions a report, so I found it: http://www.jrf.org.uk/publications/work ... ghbourhood This is fresh in my head as someone brought up the telly programme "Love thy Neighbour" on another thread recently, where the racist character was a white, working class, northerner who was a staunch Labour voter. So if Labour no longer represents sections of the british white working class back home. Who does?

Re: The White Working Class : Sat Jan 14, 2012 12:04 pm  

Was she actually 'working class' in the strictest sense, or a member of Britain's white scum underclass who often seek to justify their inactivity and failuire to contribute to society in any tangible way by blaming 'immigrants' for their lives of laziness?

Re: The White Working Class : Sat Jan 14, 2012 1:28 pm  

Rooster Booster wrote:

This is fresh in my head as someone brought up the telly programme "Love thy Neighbour" on another thread recently, where the racist character was a white, working class, northerner who was a staunch Labour voter. So if Labour no longer represents sections of the british white working class back home. Who does?

Actually, both the principal characters in Love Thy Neighbour were as racist as each other.

Re: The White Working Class : Sat Jan 14, 2012 3:50 pm  

Rooster Booster wrote: Just read an article in a kiwi paper about the woman on the tram in Croydon or wherever it was. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/ar ... d=10770034 it goes on to mention that white working class communities are becoming fed up and mentions a report, so I found it: http://www.jrf.org.uk/publications/work ... ghbourhood This is fresh in my head as someone brought up the telly programme "Love thy Neighbour" on another thread recently, where the racist character was a white, working class, northerner who was a staunch Labour voter. So if Labour no longer represents sections of the british white working class back home. Who does? NZ must be catching up on the rest of the world, that story is barely a couple of months old, maybe someone left a newspaper on an incoming flight. However... The idea that there is a "working class" in the 1960s sense and whether or not it votes Labour or not is rather outdated, most people have to work to earn their way in life, most people need loans and mortgages to pay for houses and cars, very few have family wealth to fall back on and label themselves something different to "working class" if indeed they label themselves at all, and there is the crux - I don't know anyone who labels themselves as being of a certain class at all these days and its been a long time since I saw a Labour party candidate refer to themselves as the party for the working class.

Rooster Booster wrote: Just read an article in a kiwi paper about the woman on the tram in Croydon or wherever it was. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/ar ... d=10770034 it goes on to mention that white working class communities are becoming fed up and mentions a report, so I found it: http://www.jrf.org.uk/publications/work ... ghbourhood This is fresh in my head as someone brought up the telly programme "Love thy Neighbour" on another thread recently, where the racist character was a white, working class, northerner who was a staunch Labour voter. So if Labour no longer represents sections of the british white working class back home. Who does? NZ must be catching up on the rest of the world, that story is barely a couple of months old, maybe someone left a newspaper on an incoming flight. However... The idea that there is a "working class" in the 1960s sense and whether or not it votes Labour or not is rather outdated, most people have to work to earn their way in life, most people need loans and mortgages to pay for houses and cars, very few have family wealth to fall back on and label themselves something different to "working class" if indeed they label themselves at all, and there is the crux - I don't know anyone who labels themselves as being of a certain class at all these days and its been a long time since I saw a Labour party candidate refer to themselves as the party for the working class.

Re: The White Working Class : Sat Jan 14, 2012 3:52 pm  

ROBINSON wrote:

Actually, both the principal characters in Love Thy Neighbour were as racist as each other.

Actually, at the time the programme was made, it wasn't racist at all, it was a comedy that played on the differences between two characters using commonplace attitudes and situations.

We have labelled it racist in light of latter day viewpoint.

Re: The White Working Class : Sat Jan 14, 2012 10:01 pm  

McLaren_Field wrote:

Actually, at the time the programme was made, it wasn't racist at all, it was a comedy that played on the differences between two characters using commonplace attitudes and situations.

We have labelled it racist in light of latter day viewpoint.

Your right, it is viewed completely different with the benefit of hindsight. The Jack Smethurst character was probably typical of his day in calling his neighbour a 'nig nog', but it was not done with malice in mind, equally the Rudolph Walker character called him 'whitey' in a derogative way. I recall being in a British ex-pats club in Mombasa in 1973 and some of the older members referred to the locals as 'fuzzy wuzzies' which I doubt would even be uttered these days. I t may look bad with hindsight, but it beats the hell out of some of the disgusting, racist language spouted these days, which usually is delivered with hatred.

My father in law in Liverpool has a couple of mates called Tommy, one is black, the other is white, when the black Tommy rang the house one day my wife answered the phone and was shocked to hear him say 'tell Billy, Tommy the coon rang', rightly or wrongly that his how they distinguish themselves, they are in their 70's and have been mates since they were kids and I know that they would die for each other. I suppose the professionally offended will view this as abhorrent, but I doubt their is a racist bone in either of them.

Re: The White Working Class : Sat Jan 14, 2012 10:59 pm  

Corpl. Jones on Dad's Army regularly referred to the fuzzy wuzzies. Dad's Army though is a national treasure, but apparently Love Thy Neighbour is not. Funny old world.

Re: The White Working Class : Sat Jan 14, 2012 11:00 pm  

By working classes are they talking about people on benefits and working up to say 13k?

Anyway

The trouble i find that muddies the waters is 50%(possibly slightly more) of what you hear is false, simply made up by right wing nut jobs trying to justify a point and unfortunately 50% (possibly less) is also true, but people who have all ready set their stall out reject it all outright as nonsense or believe it all as gospel.

The White working class (WWC for ease) seem to be a mixture of honest hard working yet low paid people, lazy workshy feckless people, disabled people unable to work or working at limited capacity and a small mix of people capable and able to work but for some reason(confidence, poor CV, some form of discrimination) can't get a job.

They all have have some form of axe to grind and can't seem to sift through the truth and utter ballcocks around them.
It doesn't help when people of better standing with zero to little understanding of their situation constantly dictate to them how they are talking rubbish and all their problems are either made up or of their own doing. It's not helpful and they feel let down and none of them feel like they are being listened to.
Some of them have genuine reasons to be angry at he world around them and some unfortunately are just blatantly ignorant.

Councils in London (Wandsworth at least) have discriminated on social housing, I've had first hand experience of this so i don't need someone on here telling me "they can't do that, you're talking rubbish" well they have. I even think there was a story about Tower Hamlets that made the papers backing up my point.
There have been people born in this country in desperate need of a home and have been waiting for years for someone to then come over and be granted a home almost instantly, how is this deemed fair? I don't aim my dismay at anyone who comes over and is in need of a home but how are they prioritised over a British citizen?

It doesn't effect me anymore but there are people out there in the situation and feel like they are being treated differently, surely we should be treated as human beings rather than sticking a flag on everyone and giving more credence to one flag more than another.

Re: The White Working Class : Sat Jan 14, 2012 11:53 pm  

Dally wrote:

Corpl. Jones on Dad's Army regularly referred to the fuzzy wuzzies. Dad's Army though is a national treasure, but apparently Love Thy Neighbour is not. Funny old world.

Love Thy Neighbour was awful! Typical crap 70s comedy. Me and my mates watched it all the time though. Nina Baden Semper was a doll!

Re: The White Working Class : Mon Jan 16, 2012 4:36 pm  

Dally wrote:

Corpl. Jones on Dad's Army regularly referred to the fuzzy wuzzies. Dad's Army though is a national treasure, but apparently Love Thy Neighbour is not. Funny old world.

Except that Dad's Army portrays a group of old men hopelessly out of touch with the situation and the times they live in, never mind the time in which it was made. The "fuzzy wuzzy" comments are meant to date the character and show in a very obvious way to a 1970's audience that even though the war was a very long time ago and from a different era, he is from a very much earlier era and would be completely out of his depth if the Germans ever did invade.

Love Thy Neighbour is an exposition of perceived differences between white people and black people in a contemporary context.

I think you would have to take a twenty mile detour to avoid seeing the difference.