In the news

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/12/flint-water-scandal-charges-ex-governor-michigan-rick-snyder

There's a very decent documentary about Flint on iPlayer at the moment.

Haha

“The government stopped at nothing in its zeal to kill this damaged and delusional woman,” Henry said. “Lisa Montgomery’s execution was far from justice.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/13/us-carries-out-first-federal-execution-of-a-woman-in-nearly-seven-decades

That poor woman. An awful, despicable end to a miserable life characterised by violence, betrayal and mental illness. Shame on the people that should have looked after her and shame on American justice. I hope she may at last get some peace.

America has executed criminals so mentally impaired that they left a bit of their last meal "for later".

I know. And likely innocent ones. If you've never seen it (I saw it when it aired originally and it made a lasting impact), 14 Days in May is incredibly powerful https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p05m5xb9

Putting people to death is barbaric, but hearing this:

America has executed criminals so mentally impaired that they left a bit of their last meal "for later".

is absolutely tragic. Awful.

.

Technical issue resolved after '150,000 police records lost' https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55672194

The Thick of It !

https://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/hip-hop/9510990/post-malone-crocs-donating-10000-pairs-sold-out-shoes-frontline-workers

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/15/montreal-chinese-restaurant-canada-customers-aunt-dai

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Interesting study just published on why the UK middle classes all want to be working class;
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0038038520982225

Really enjoying the article...(as someone who has grown up solidly middle class but would like to identify as working class). Reminds me of Kate Foxs Watching the English and her views on the middle class

Something something Kae Tempest

Interesting how it says that in other European countries people don't do this. Instead they over-identify as middle class. Brits are weird.

What always strikes me is that in the UK (well England more than NI) what is called "middle class" is not 25-75% income percentile...it is more top 25% and sometimes top 10%.

In NL/France that is the burgeousie and if you would try to pretend to be Dutch middle class in NL coming from that background the reaction would be a clear "Hah, lol, no".

Big houses and all that and middle class? Pffffffffffffft.

I had an acquaintance in uni, who tried to get in a golf club. No joy. When he said his dad was the owner of a well known factory, suddenly he got an invite. So clearly, there are class bubbles there too, of course.

But he wasn't trying to pass himself as "I am so working class" if anything he pointed out how bull this was.

Sample size of 1 obv. And yeah we do have cultural class, but this cap doffing pretend not rich when loaded to the hilt is pretty alien to the Dutch. And I think Norn Irish too from speaking to my colleagues.

When the English invented middle classes it was wealthy industrialists sitting between landed gentry and factory and farm workers, trying much harder to be like the toffs, that's spread out a bit since the industrial revolution but I don't think middle class sits as a kind of percentage thing of the central section of society.

Yeah the UK class system is different because despite how much money you may have, if you don't have a title, a traceable relation to royality or own a chunk of a -shire then you're stuck in upper-middle.

Oh yeah I'm aware of the history of it, I'm just annoyed at how the term is used so often so loose.

Making ordinary middle class sounds like top 25, while not calling out people the study references trying to be fake authentic.

In NL if you behave what is seen as vulgar even if you have £ you won't be seen as proper middle class. Just vulgar.

And the very rich won't get applauded for their success, some move out from NL cos they think it's too negative. Wealth is suspicious as another extreme.

What always strikes me is that in the UK (well England more than NI) what is called "middle class" is not 25-75% income percentile...it is more top 25% and sometimes top 10%.

Isn't middle class in GB the bigger percentage? To my mind lower-middle to upper-middle encompasses a pretty broad range of professional, specialist and retail services. But I guess it all depends on how you define it. Big house, small house, flat, owning, renting - I don't think any of those conditions excludes middle class. On the other hand if being working class means not having assets, then maybe you can't be middle class and not own property.

We have to redefine things though - eg education qualifications like A-levels and degrees used to be a signifier of middle class, but if half the younger population has them, it doesn't give you significantly more security, so are they really useful signifiers anymore?

That’s a bit harsh her dad was only a barrister not a QC or nuffink

There’s two middle classes though aren’t there?

They can intersect but also be separated

There’s middle class semi detached, big car, holidays abroad, survivable pension.

There’s middle class bookshelves with books, cooks fancy food, goes to museums, drinks posh tea, pronounces foreign names and words with an accent.

You can tick those boxes and be working class, but tick too many and the next thing you know, you might not feel quite at home as you did at your old local

I'm sure I will get shot down, but I can't get my head around this:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-55702855

The overwhelming majority of people will be familiar with Phil Spector because:

Record Producer / Wall of Sound / The Ronettes

In which guise he had a profound impact on popular culture. I'm not even sure I was aware he had been convicted of murder much later in life.

The point of obituaries is not to list all the bad things, or good things, a person has done, but to highlight the things they did that made them famous and or notorious.

I'm certain there will have been loads of people under say 40, who had never heard of Phil Spector or the wall of sound.

Also, quite why the picture editor had to find a picture of him looking like a vagrant is beyond me.

Isn't middle class in GB the bigger percentage?
=Yeah it could very well be, it even seems to include the super rich due to the history. I think that's not helpful.

I agree the old definitions are not so accurate anymore to reflect wealth and income.

It used to be that culturally middleclass and income/wealth middleclass usually overlapped.

But now you can be a nurse, have to go to uni and still be underpaid.

In that sense culture/income have become detached for the old school middle class definition.

But then I read if you are working class you used to be able to become education/culturally middle class via the unions, and now when you work a trad working class job with matching income, but become educated some people no longer see you as working class.

So income wise you are still working class, but culturally you are not as Alf0nse said.

Just gets my goat that the 50-75% get talked about as if they are the top 25% and cause the same problems even though they don't have the same power or income.

Same thing, it's true they have it better than the 25-50% but there is a lot of (probably intentional) narrative to make it sound the 25-75 band is the cause of all the bottom 25 and 25-50 problems where it's the top 10% income that can take the journo/art jobs cos they can live of bank of mum and dad and have more power.

(it's a tricky thing for sure class...)

Oh I see - I just misunderstood your post as saying that the middle class is the top 10 or 25%, but I get it now.