Yuwipi Woman
Whack-A-Mole Queen
Its true that the elite often think of themselves as "middle class." My boss has a company that grosses in excess of $50 mil., but if you ask him he's "middle class."
Obama v. McCain Debate: You gonna watch?
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its good to be middle class....easier for the rich to hide amongst the masses. and if you're poor and think of yourself as middle class then you just moved up a few rungs
Ah, Nino, Nino. Nothing like a bit of linguistic imperialism to start your day, hey?
The English language is not, and has not been for centuries, the exclusive patrimony of people born and living in England. Americans use words relating to class differently, and they genuinely think about class differently. Saying that's good or bad, or that it's the US "reordering" the language, is dumb.
Sure, the way Americans use the term "middle class" makes it harder to conceive of a discrete "working class" - as I pointed out myself right from the kick-off - but who's to say what's a cause and what's a symptom here?
nino_savatte
No pasaran!
My, how patronising of you. There is a tendency in the US, like it or not, to redefine words to suit ideological agendas. The employment of the word "elite" by the Republicans is a useful and appropriate case in point.
From your earlier post
I disagree, there are many Americans who self-identify as "working class". They nary get a mention.
there are auto assembly line workers with no college education that can make almost $100,000/year with overtime pay.
now, are these people "working class" or "upper middle class"?
dilute micro
esse quam videri
Worse than that there is a denial that there is a paracitical/symbiotic elite class who run washington.
dilute micro
esse quam videri
That comes to how the government sees them.
Hi Nino,
I don't disagree that there are some Americans who self-identify as "working class". Indeed, the concept of the "white working class" (as opposed, implicitly, to the non-white non-working class) has received considerable media play during this election in particular. However, it is certainly true that a far smaller proportion of Americans self-identify as working class than British people do. That of itself would indicate that issues you might think of as "working-class" are less liable to be addressed within the American political system.
It's also worth pointing out that as many of the aforementioned "white working class" have voted Republican for a generation, and as the Republicans have been successful at using religious, racial and cultural issues to woo voters away from consideration of the economic interests of working class people, the issues that working-class people in the United States report as mattering most to them may not resemble greatly those that working-class people in the UK report as mattering most to them.
Oh, and there isn't in the UK?
You won't get that one by me, Nino. I lived in the UK for more than twenty years. Let me throw out a few phrases just to refresh your memory. "Investment" rather than "spending". "Back to basics". "Community charge". "Victorian values".
Need I go on?
I don't disagree that there are some Americans who self-identify as "working class". Indeed, the concept of the "white working class" (as opposed, implicitly, to the non-white non-working class) has received considerable media play during this election in particular. However, it is certainly true that a far smaller proportion of Americans self-identify as working class than British people do. That of itself would indicate that issues you might think of as "working-class" are less liable to be addressed within the American political system.
It's also worth pointing out that as many of the aforementioned "white working class" have voted Republican for a generation, and as the Republicans have been successful at using religious, racial and cultural issues to woo voters away from consideration of the economic interests of working class people, the issues that working-class people in the United States report as mattering most to them may not resemble greatly those that working-class people in the UK report as mattering most to them.
Oh, and there isn't in the UK?
You won't get that one by me, Nino. I lived in the UK for more than twenty years. Let me throw out a few phrases just to refresh your memory. "Investment" rather than "spending". "Back to basics". "Community charge". "Victorian values".
Need I go on?
FridgeMagnet
Administrator
Class distinctions in the US don't go by the same names as they do in the UK, but I'd say they exist to both the same level and also the same level of self-identification. "Class" is a bit of a socialist concept, but there are plenty of class references - "Joe Sixpack" for instance, politicians going to NASCAR, and the constant banging on about "liberal elites". If anything I'd say there was more reference to class in US politics than in the UK, though it's used in utterly fake ways - the idea of either party claiming that the other is less in touch with honest working folk is just silly.
There's a lot on this topic at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_class_in_the_United_States.
It might be helpful to view the Democrats as, historically, having been a coalition of the middle- to upper-middle-class with the proletariat, against the Republican coalition of the capitalist elite with the working and lower-middle-class.
I don't at all argue that class doesn't exist here in the United States. Of course it does. It exists everywhere to some degree. All I was contending is that the vocabulary used to describe class is often different to what British people might expect, of which an example is fewer people self-identifying as being part of the working class; and that their use of different vocabulary regarding class is not necessarily wrong.
It might be helpful to view the Democrats as, historically, having been a coalition of the middle- to upper-middle-class with the proletariat, against the Republican coalition of the capitalist elite with the working and lower-middle-class.
I don't at all argue that class doesn't exist here in the United States. Of course it does. It exists everywhere to some degree. All I was contending is that the vocabulary used to describe class is often different to what British people might expect, of which an example is fewer people self-identifying as being part of the working class; and that their use of different vocabulary regarding class is not necessarily wrong.
nino_savatte
No pasaran!
A somewhat different kettle of fish there tbh. None of those phrases are, in any way, similar to the Newspeak style reordering of certain words. Yet, I am puzzled as to why you would include to "Back to basics" or "Victorian values" in that list.
Working class voters have often voted for parties that offer them nothing That isn't new; it happened here under Thatcher with so-called "Essex Man".
Did I suggest that similar coalitions had not existed in the past in the United Kingdom?
I included "Victorian values" because the values propagated were a selection and distortion of the actual values characteristic of the (high) Victorian period. I included "Back to Basics" because the phrase assumes that the audience feels that sexual morality is the most fundamental part of morality.
I included "Victorian values" because the values propagated were a selection and distortion of the actual values characteristic of the (high) Victorian period. I included "Back to Basics" because the phrase assumes that the audience feels that sexual morality is the most fundamental part of morality.
andy2002
To the Bat-poles!
Lengthy but brilliant article about John McCain from Rolling Stone here...
www.rollingstone.com/news/coverstory/make_believe_maverick_the_real_john_mccain/page/1
www.rollingstone.com/news/coverstory/make_believe_maverick_the_real_john_mccain/page/1
nino_savatte
No pasaran!
"Coalitions"? What on earth are you talking about? You have clearly missed the point. Back to basics wasn't just about morality btw.
Oh, I like the way that you don't use the quote function. Any particular reason for this?
nino_savatte
No pasaran!
Speak for yourself, dimwit. 
You appear to have a serious problem distinguishing between slogans (the phrases that you listed) and the way in which words are either appropriated, misappropriated, twisted, perverted and reordered to suit ideology. You have deliberately missed the point about how certain phrases (like working class) are erased from speech because, as FM points out, the phrase itself is seen as "socialist"; redolent of class struggle and, according to mainstream US politics, the class struggle does not exist - in spite of the glaringly contradictory evidence that abounds. Socialism is also regarded as "foreign" and thus, so is the class struggle.
It would seem that you're the one who is slow, Mr Potato Head.
You appear to have a serious problem distinguishing between slogans (the phrases that you listed) and the way in which words are either appropriated, misappropriated, twisted, perverted and reordered to suit ideology. You have deliberately missed the point about how certain phrases (like working class) are erased from speech because, as FM points out, the phrase itself is seen as "socialist"; redolent of class struggle and, according to mainstream US politics, the class struggle does not exist - in spite of the glaringly contradictory evidence that abounds. Socialism is also regarded as "foreign" and thus, so is the class struggle.
It would seem that you're the one who is slow, Mr Potato Head.
woof
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