George Hannah
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All things must pass
Alexandole Boris de Pfeffel Johnson
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blue b4 the moon
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Ancient Citizen
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All very true, the left constantly reference 'The Working Class,' it's done on here regularly,
as the ones that need perpetual help from government, where nowadays, there's no such class
anymore. The tradesmen you mention are as you say, all doing pretty well, whether they work
for themselves or companies, and it's them, and the vast majority like them, that gave the Conservatives
their massive majority recently. Labour is now seen as a middle class (another misnomer, ironically),
metropolitan party, and it hasn't realised that the demographic it keeps pointing at is looking the
other way.
"For the many not the few" was good radical policy when the few with the money could be outvoted by the many without money (not that they had a vote). But yes, having got everybody the vote, and used collective bargaining to force better pay and conditions (unions - the people who gave you the weekend) Labour is a victim of its own success, and the many now have enough money to be less concerned about those in poverty (though it's not that few). If any long term good comes out of this crisis, the benefit of benefits (and tax to pay for it) will now be more obvious to a lot more people who thought they'd never need state help.
Fred_Quimby
Well-Known Member
The crime here is-
WE SAW IT COMING AND DID NOTHING.
WE SAW IT COMING AND DID NOTHING.
Rascal
El Presidente
WOW!
Just WOW!
I really don't know where to start with that.
Lets start with perpetual help. Every citizen of the nation has perpetual help from the state in some form, because without the citizens the state wouldn't exist.
Perhaps if you clarified what you actually mean by perpetual help, it might elicit an answer, but such a broad stroke statement is palpable nonsense.
Once you have done that I can go further and deconstruct your statement.
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Deleted member 77198
Guest
I’d say so, yes. While some have a more awake philanthropist outlook and look at the greater good for all; most just want the best for themselves and their family. And there’s nothing wrong with that. Life is short and the most important people in the world are each of ourselves and families.
The more people have and can get, the less they think about those who don’t have and can’t get. I’m not saying it makes them care less, but it simply makes them comfortable so they aren’t feeling the pressure or keeping themselves aware of the struggles that low or no income populations are living through.
Therefore their political stance will be more liberal in nature than their same jobs, income and living situations would have lead them to be politicised to decades ago.
In 2020, a lot of the labour force is middle class. So is a further left leaning Labour Party going to be their party?
I'm afraid if that thesis comes as a surprise that's down to you.
"How important was 'affluence' to Conservative dominance between 1951 and 1964?
" ‘Affluence’ has never been a politically neutral term. For Galbraith - whose 1957 work The Affluent Society is generally attributed with having popularized the concept – the Western world’s experience of increased prosperity, individualism and mass consumerism in the postwar period not only raised expectations of economic security but also revealed the anachronisms inherent within the complex of ‘conventional wisdoms’ that informed a culture of disproportionate emphasis on private production and a comparative neglect of public institutions. For the British political Left between 1951 and 1964, the rise of the ‘so-called affluent society’ not only appeared to threaten the very values upon the basis of which the first majority Labour government had been elected in 1945 - namely class-solidarity, civic responsibility and collective action - but it also appeared to be severely correlated with sustained electoral decline. By the time that the Labour party suffered its heaviest of three successive electoral defeats at the 1959 general election, it was widely held that the politics of affluence were chiefly to blame for the party’s inability to recover. The kinds of crude determinism that characterized Labour attitudes towards its dire electoral situation were epitomized by the title of the study carried out to examine the origins of the party’s weakness in 1960 – Must Labour Lose? For the dominant Conservative party, the increasing strength of the critical working-class Tory vote between 1951 and 1964 appeared to confirm beliefs that conditions of prosperity encouraged conservatism."
That article challenges that view but I won't spoonfeed your education.
Churchlawtonblue
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I see your point and agree with much of it. However , we are continually being told the gap between the very rich and poor is getting bigger.
Ancient Citizen
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The constant referencing of the 'Working class' is a feature of leftist politics, this description
is now not so relevant, the tradesmen being cited are an example of that.
These people, as I said, are the ones that have eschewed Labour, as it now doesn't represent
them, and made that perfectly clear at the last GE.
Rascal
El Presidente
I see absolutely zero connection between wealth accrued and liberal values. Many of those with the majority of capital will be more authoritarian rather than liberal, authoritarianism guards wealth, liberalism does not necessarily guard wealth in a social sense, but maybe does in an economic sense assuming those who are now accruing the wealth have somehow changed to become libertarian laissez faire Hayekians over night. What is often missed about the working class is their inherent small C conservatism and patriotism which has been exploited by overt Nationalists like Farage. Values though are values and if financial gain has changed their values then to me that makes them shallow cunts.
The term Champagne Socialist comes to mind, if ever a term was misunderstood its this one, it is used to accuse those with wealth and holding Socialist values as somehow being hypocritical as only Socialists can be poor, however the real meaning of champagne socialism is that under Socialism its not just those with capital who can afford to quaff jeroboams of Bollinger, everybody would be able if they so wished to quaff jeroboams of Bollinger. The propaganda though is strong and the term has become parlance for hypocrite, a bit like that other widely misunderstood term "cultural Marxism"
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Deleted member 77198
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It’s never been bigger. But the poor aren’t particularly the manual tradesman workforce anymore.
We have a class of people who are doing the same jobs but have moved up in newly labelled stages of class. These new labels of stages of class had to be thought up in recent decades because it was apparent that the manual workforce weren’t poorly paid any longer. Working conditions, rights and pay are very different to what they once were for tradesman.
We now have a huge class of people who have never worked, are long term unemployed or are in low paid routine occupations. This would once have been the class that those in trades were once close to because their pay was low, but not anymore.
Most of my mates are tradesman and they all earn much more than the average U.K. salary.
Ancient Citizen
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Another good point, and no, not in my opinion, although many of the far left refuse to accept
it, Labour need another Blair figure, the likes of Corbyn and his ilk are never getting in.
Starmer may be this figure, nobody knows as yet.
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Deleted member 77198
Guest
Maybe I’m thinking of “liberal” in the wrong sense. Maybe what I mean is that their political stance is softened the more comfortable they are. So they don’t look for a harder leaning Labour Party.
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Deleted member 77198
Guest
Do you create these yourself, mate? You come up with some cracking cartoons I’ve never seen anywhere before!
Gabriel
Well-Known Member
Good heavens no; there’s no beginning to my artistic talent.
Simply read too many newspapers from around the world and have a penchant for cartoons. Help us laugh and reconsider our unshakable beliefs.
Rascal
El Presidente
The power of propaganda, this is just untrue. It was made up bullshit by the right wing press who were intent on destroying the welfare state amidst stories of lazy feckless Brits and doleys having 20 mile wide TV screens.
The vast majority of those who had never worked are students or under the age of 23, but are counted as being of working age. There are also disabled, homemakers and retired to take into account and even then the figures just about hit a million, its certainly not huge and certainly not millions and millions of popular myth.
Zuriblue
Well-Known Member
Swales would be a better option than the clowns in charge.