# Do you fit into our new social class system?



## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22007058

Just reading this over coffee and croissant for.breakfast 

Do you see yourself in any of these categories?

I find this system rather bizarre. Looking across all seven categories I can see myself belonging to all seven categories including homelessness :lol:

Maybe some of us Durkheim relics of social anomia would object here. For example..the technical middle classes are defined as beig culturally apathetic. I would like to belong in this class if cultural interest is defined as football and lady gaga.

Listening to purely string quartets would probably place me in the elite class :lol:


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## cwarchc (Apr 28, 2012)

For those of you who recognise the picture on the link

"I know my place"


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## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

Here's the quiz:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22000973

If you complete it, you probably qualify for being British and will pass our citizenship test 

(PS - the secret answer is '1066')


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## EricABQ (Jul 10, 2012)

I would be "Technical Middle Class" if I was British. Which is good, because that's pretty much exactly what I am here.


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## Ebab (Mar 9, 2013)

EricABQ said:


> I would be "Technical Middle Class" if I was British. Which is good, because that's pretty much exactly what I am here.


I ended up there too. I'm not British, but I felt at home in that segment.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

This completely pointless study has been done by people wishing to justify their existence and salary. Drivel!


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## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

DavidA said:


> This completely pointless study has been done by people wishing to justify their existence and salary. Drivel!


That puts them in the Elite social class


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## JCarmel (Feb 3, 2013)

I'm with you on the 'drivel' bit, DavidA! I think that by the time the people who conceived & wrote this silliness got where they are, they are in such 'safe' pensionable positions... they don't need to justify anything!


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## Wood (Feb 21, 2013)

DavidA said:


> This completely pointless study has been done by people wishing to justify their existence and salary. Drivel!


A survey commissioned by the BBC cannot possibly have any academic integrity. I would be very surprised if the Sociology departments in Britain's proper universities will have found this useful.


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

None of the above.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

It has been said that if all the sociologists trained in the 1960s were put into end across the Sahara desert it would be a very good thing indeed!


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## Wood (Feb 21, 2013)

DavidA said:


> It has been said that if all the sociologists trained in the 1960s were put into end across the Sahara desert it would be a very good thing indeed!


Sociologists do it with class.


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## Schubussy (Nov 2, 2012)

I got 'Emergent service workers' which is basically middle class with no money. Accurate enough.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

I scored for precariat...my results didn't take into my account for off-the-scale in cultural (go to opera, galleries, watch ballet, listen to classical music and jazz), which is annoying...I scored quite low in everything else tough.


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## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> I scored for precariat...my results didn't take into my account for off-the-scale in cultural (go to opera, galleries, watch ballet, listen to classical music and jazz), which is annoying...I scored quite low in everything else tough.


I'm not sure if as a minor you can be categorized into a level. You're still associated with your parents' class.

As soon as I move away permanently from my parents, I will be an Emergent Service Worker, a poor musician with a full life.


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## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

Huilunsoittaja said:


> I'm not sure if as a minor you can be categorized into a level. You're still associated with your parents' class.
> 
> As soon as I move away permanently from my parents, I will be an Emergent Service Worker, a poor musician with a full life.


what.....! you play the flute and you're going to be a pro flute player and your parents didn't set up a trust fund to put you in the elite class?!


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## Klavierspieler (Jul 16, 2011)

You know, I just realized, it's not what you know _or_ who you know: it's how much money you make.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Proletariat forever......... The wording they use seems so old fashioned to me, love the bit about cultural apathy!


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## opus55 (Nov 9, 2010)

Head_case said:


> Here's the quiz:
> 
> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22000973
> 
> ...


I would be considered Technical middle class if I were in Britain. I guess it's not that far off from my real life in U.S. Should I move? :lol:


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Good God my result was *Elite*, no wonder the Uk is in such a mess - when a aussie colonial rates like that!


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## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

Head_case said:


> what.....! you play the flute and you're going to be a pro flute player and your parents didn't set up a trust fund to put you in the elite class?!


No, they save money only for themselves, I have to save/make my own money.  I got something, I'm not broke.


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## Kopachris (May 31, 2010)

Because I'm a lazy bum.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Huilunsoittaja said:


> I'm not sure if as a minor you can be categorized into a level. You're still associated with your parents' class.


That's not fair! I'm as major as Major Major Major Major from Catch-22!!!


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Well, I'd be Elite if I lived in the UK. But I knew that already. In the USA, of course, I'm barely above Precariat. Heh heh...


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## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

EddieRUKiddingVarese said:


> Good God my result was *Elite*, no wonder the Uk is in such a mess - when a aussie colonial rates like that!


Haha. You underestimate yourself...you would be elite class anywhere in the world anyhows 

Is the UK in a mess? Our history isn't quite reducible to the history of class struggle as Marx might have it. Most conceive of class as the haves and the have nots. its interesting to see how BBC respondents break themselves into these classes not based on earnings alone, but inheritance gains and cultural engagement.

Technically at the moment I'm in technical working class. When I was in pleb class and homeless I earned way more (due to not having to pay rent). I don't watch the BBC channel so like Crudblud maybe us outlyers don't quite fit. But their schema seems better than the previous class divisions.

Looking at their criteria, drug dealers would come into elite class as well as bankers paid off with huge bonuses responsible for the banking crises. Having met people in both categories I would rather avoid socialising with this class of people all together in preference for meerkats :lol:


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Head_case said:


> Haha. You underestimate yourself...you would be elite class anywhere in the world anyhows
> 
> Is the UK in a mess? Our history isn't quite reducible to the history of class struggle as Marx might have it. Most conceive of class as the haves and the have nots. its interesting to see how BBC respondents break themselves into these classes not based on earnings alone, but inheritance gains and cultural engagement.
> 
> ...


Thanks Headcase - nice comments for a knockabout aussie colonial who eats emu........ nothing worng with being an outlyers, gotta spread out abit on this planet! (Lopsided otherwise)

Meerkats now your talking - you scare me with the bankers and drug dealers, (or is that drug bankers and dealers?)


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## Oldboy (Jan 19, 2013)

Given that I must sell my labour power to subsist, I am of the working class.


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## cwarchc (Apr 28, 2012)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> That's not fair! I'm as major as Major Major Major Major from Catch-22!!!


But are you "in" or "out" and make sure the windows are open :lol:


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## ptr (Jan 22, 2013)

It seems very much based on ye olde class system! Where the amount of income (or dough on ze bank) defines which Class You belong to, it is not really new is, there's only a few more useless steps on that same old ladder...

Myself, I'm of self owning peasant stock with dirt under my Wellington's and wit on my tongue... 

/ptr


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## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

EddieRUKiddingVarese said:


> Thanks Headcase - nice comments for a knockabout aussie colonial who eats emu........ nothing worng with being an outlyers, gotta spread out abit on this planet! (Lopsided otherwise)


What kind of vegetable is that? :lol:



> Meerkats now your talking - you scare me with the bankers and drug dealers, (or is that drug bankers and dealers?)


Well, there is a social inversion in the UK; gone is the myth of meritocracy: the more you use your merits, the worse it gets you, since it only makes others (without merit jealous). This is where British politics comes in. "Charm" is the new in-house shrapnel. Trust fund managers are busy slicing each other with charm rather than Aussie uncouthness 

It doesn't make them much better....they just do it with class. That's why class divisions are important structurally here. It's not about 'how much money you can earn'. It's more about what you can get away with,without having to work for it.

I've been told that I'm an inverted snob, with a mentality typical of a working class member and the knee-jerk reply has been to tell them to stick it back up theirs the right way up :lol:


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

I think it is a relatively interesting classification. Economic, cultural, and social are certainly three things to have in mind in any kind of modern class system.
I'm an university student and I don't have a job yet, my main focus now are my studies. I'm supported by my parents and scholarships.
According to that test, if I were british, my family would be something between Technical middle class and Established middle class.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Head_case said:


> What kind of vegetable is that? :lol:


I believe it was Vegemite!

Social inversion and inverted snob, you sounds more Aussie every day!

Now fund managers, we call them all sort of different names Downunder but Politician and Taxman also springs to mind.


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## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

Vegemite sounds tasty 

Or at least tastier than:










Just having vegetarian sushi now. I could do with some vegemite. This stuff tastes like chewy spitballs.

I am definitely not Aussie! I listen to exclusively chamber music string quartets, not babes hollering on Bondi Beach :lol:


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## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

Here's some of the comments received from Brits in the BBC Magazine. Some funny remarks:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22025272

From the Established Middle Class: 


> "I'm uneasy about taking this class calculator. If I'm middle class, I'll fill a 4x4 with organic pesto and drown myself." - @SoofiyaC


:lol:


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## MichaelSolo (Mar 12, 2013)

What is funny the callsification is completely meaningless (i.e., useless) except for the purposes of providing a sense of self-aggrandisement to those few attributed to the "uppah classes".

Someone in GB just luvs classification..


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## Ryan (Dec 29, 2012)

Brilliantly, especially if your a raging alcoholic who listens to classical music fm. 

Thank you so much

Ryan O'Brian OBE


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Head_case said:


> Vegemite sounds tasty
> 
> Or at least tastier than:
> 
> ...


Chocolate Emu mmm amybe I could combine the two........


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Head_case said:


> I listen to exclusively chamber music string quartets, not babes hollering on Bondi Beach :lol:


Bondi Beach is hell on Earth. 
I like string quartets by Peter Sculthorpe.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Bondi Beach is hell on Earth.
> I like string quartets by Peter Sculthorpe.


I take it your not a fan then ..... well he was from Tasmania I guess but you know in 1999 he was made one of Australia's 45 living Icons! and also he is an offical Australian Living Treasure- what ever the heck that means!


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## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

naaaa....not a huge Sculthorpe fan but its miles better than the outback culture stuff. Maybe the Bondi Beach String Quartet performing "Air in G String" without deodorant will be as highbrow as it gets downunder :lol:











j/k


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

^Do you have a video of that...................... 

If so please post to--- Downunder Way Outback, care of Emu chewing Eddie Back O' Bourke!


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## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

sadly not...! I am definitely not cutting edge when keeping up with the Bondi babe beach classes 

A follow up:
www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21953364

looks like its working. its confusing everyone.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

^ Damn, would have made good entertainment in the Back O' Bourke Outdoor Theatre "Bring Your Own Movie"- film night!

We are not big on class confusion around here


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## LordBlackudder (Nov 13, 2010)

a smaller version of the quiz is here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/labuk/experiments/

also a musicality quiz on the same page.

i am precariat apperently.


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## moody (Nov 5, 2011)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> That's not fair! I'm as major as Major Major Major Major from Catch-22!!!


When he was in he was out and when he out he was in---so goodbye.


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