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> In the UK we have many people who claim to talk for the "working class" that as one of my friends put it "looked like they have never done a day of heavy lift

> In the UK we have many people who claim to talk for the "working class" that as one of my friends put it "looked like they have never done a day of heavy lifting in their life". I wouldn't speak on behalf of the working class, I do a white collar job. Let's take this rhetorical pattern for a spin around the block. Here in the USA in the 19th century we had many people who claimed to speak for slaves who looked like they'd never been black a day in their lives. I wouldn't speak on behalf of slaves. I'm a free person. Here in the UK during the Potato Famine we had many people who claimed to speak for starving Irish people who looked like they'd never been starving or Irish for a day in their lives. I wouldn't speak on behalf of the starving Irish. I'm well-fed and English. Here in Wherever we have many people who claim to speak for sexually harassed women who look like they haven't been a woman for a day in their lives. I wouldn't speak on behalf of women. I'm a man. It doesn't seem all that robust.

uk_programmer 7y ago
People always take the most extreme examples. In the example I gave it wasn't nearly anywhere as extreme. Obviously it depends on the circumstances.
- powowowow 7y ago
  Your example was also fatally flawed because it buys into the notion that white collar work is not working class. White collar laborers are labor; they are not capital. I make a couple hundred thousand dollars per year. I have far more in common with a nurse or a teacher or a store clerk than I do with somebody who was born with $10MM in a trust fund, and who makes as much as I do (by selling my full-time labor) just by buying and holding VTI.
  - uk_programmer 7y ago
    Blue collar work means physical labour typically. White collar means office work and traditionally office work has been done by the middle class and the elite. I will concede that In the last decade or those definition probably don't make any sense. So maybe I should have said "traditional working class" to make the distinction.

uk_programmer 7y ago

People always take the most extreme examples. In the example I gave it wasn't nearly anywhere as extreme. Obviously it depends on the circumstances.

powowowow 7y ago
Your example was also fatally flawed because it buys into the notion that white collar work is not working class. White collar laborers are labor; they are not capital. I make a couple hundred thousand dollars per year. I have far more in common with a nurse or a teacher or a store clerk than I do with somebody who was born with $10MM in a trust fund, and who makes as much as I do (by selling my full-time labor) just by buying and holding VTI.
- uk_programmer 7y ago
  Blue collar work means physical labour typically. White collar means office work and traditionally office work has been done by the middle class and the elite. I will concede that In the last decade or those definition probably don't make any sense. So maybe I should have said "traditional working class" to make the distinction.