Something that the Labour Party agrees with me on...

[philmophlegm]

...namely the ideal characteristics that someone should have if they are to run the country:

1. D&D player*
2. Computer game player (and specifically Sinclair ZX Spectrum enthusiast**)
3. Comprehensive-educated***
4. Oxford PPEist


We differ on some things. I've got nothing against the Turks for example. Oh, and my dad worked in a factory, whereas his**** was a professor.


* Yes, really! http://bit.ly/hgaKIB
** Proper working class credentials. Posh kids, as we all know, had BBC Micros, "to help them with their homework".
*** Admittedly, I went to my comprehensive school because it was the local school and not out of a middle-class political principle, like that Fast Show sketch*****.
**** Did you know that before he changed his name to Ralph, Professor Miliband's name was 'Adolphe'? That's pretty unfortunate for a Jewish communist.
*****
I'm totally middle-class. My family have been middle-class for generations!
M1 Listen, I'm more middle-class than both of you. My father was an account-
ant, and I used to have piano lessons.
MW Well, I had cello lessons.
M1 Yeah?
PW Huh! Well, my family used to do recitals. Huh! With me on the viola. As
a quintet.
MW I went to a very good public school.
PW Yes, and I went to comprehensive.
M1 Oh, my God! You are working-class!
PW No. My parents could easily have afforded to send me to a public school,
but they were liberals. They chose to educate me at a comprehensive.
That makes me much more middle-class than you two!

Comments

[miss-next.livejournal.com]

If computers were a class thing, why did I get an unexpanded Sinclair ZX80 while one of my younger sisters got a BBC Micro?

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

I'm guessing because you were a few years older?

Have you still got the ZX80? They're worth a bit now.

[miss-next.livejournal.com]

I haven't got it. I don't know if Mum and Dad still have. It was possible to write a program on it that completely filled the memory, which could be... frustrating.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

In the £150 range.
http://completed.shop.ebay.co.uk/i.html?_nkw=sinclair*+zx*&_in_kw=1&_ex_kw=&_sacat=See-All-Categories&_okw=sinclair*+zx*&_oexkw=&_adv=1&LH_Complete=1&_udlo=&_udhi=&LH_Auction=1&_samilow=&_samihi=&_sadis=200&_fpos=Postcode&LH_SALE_CURRENCY=0&_sop=3&_dmd=1&_ipg=50&_rdc=1

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

I had a 1k ZX-81. I remember that there were all these tricks to try to save memory. Apparently '1' took up more space than 'Pi divided by Pi'.

[knirirr.livejournal.com]

My home computer was a Spectrum mainly for playing ticky games. Of course, the computer room at my public school was full of BBC micros.

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

I think all schools had BBCs. Mine certainly did.

[miss-next.livejournal.com]

Ours had Commodore PETs.

[knirirr.livejournal.com]

IIRC they were heavily promoted as being suitable for schools.
We did have a room full of these as well, which were used in much the same way for writing in BASIC.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

My home computer was a ZX-81.

I would be surprised if many primary schools had computers while I was there. My second secondary school, which I joined in 1977, had a whole room of computers. Three of them, I think.

[helflaed.livejournal.com]

My Dad got such a lousy education at Prep and Public school that he sent us to the local comp!

Although I'm so middle class that I have fishknives!

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

We have fishknives too. Did you buy them or inherit them? We inherited ours from bunn's grandmother. That's far posher! Alan Clark once witheringly and snobbishly described Michael Heseltine as "the sort of man who buys his own furniture".

[helflaed.livejournal.com]

I inherited them from my Grandparents. They are silver. Along with their entire canteen of silver plated cutlery, entree dishes, fish servers and so forth. Sadly I do not have any grape shears. I like fishknives- they are much better for getting fish off the bone than the other sort.

[beckyc.livejournal.com]

"the sort of man who buys his own furniture".

I do find it highly entertaining when something that's actually because I'm a complete cheapskate makes me look posher than I am :-).

My great uncle was a joiner, so I absolutely *adore* the furniture I inherited from him for more than just sentimental reasons. It's amazingly well made, so why would I ever replace it?

[ladyofastolat.livejournal.com]

I understood that fish knives were so utterly, irredeemably non-U, that it doesn't matter if you've bought them, inherited them, or been gifted them by a good fairy in a cloud of pixie dust, you've still branded yourself as hopelessly non-upper-class just for possessing them.

[beckyc.livejournal.com]

Although I'm so middle class that I have fishknives!

Me too, me too!

And I'm vegetarian so I have never in my life used them.

For reasons that I cannot even begin to comprehend, my aunt who was executor for $elderlyRelative decided that the best person to give $elderlyRelative's fish cutlery to was *me*, then the only vegetarian in the entire family.

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

Not using posh cutlery is what it's for. If you start using it, it's just cutlery. Only the working classes and the upper classes actually _use_ cutlery, for the aspiring middle classes, it is better just to own it...

[beckyc.livejournal.com]

Oh, is it cool to be middle class now?

I was raised by TEACHERS so ner, how much more middle middle class can you get? ;-)

[beckyc.livejournal.com]

I can do an excellent poor impression too though (which at uni I used to gleefully employ with my best broad northern accent whenever I came across people who were too appallingly and condescendingly elitist for words and I wanted to make them go away...)

-I worked on a farm from the age of 12 onwards
-I left school at 15
-I worked my way through university with 3 term time jobs and many varied holiday jobs (on farms, in factories, in offices, you name it)

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

My first proper paypacket was from a farm, but that was at 14. Previous earnings were from my dad or his colleagues, from ?10; these continued until I was 21.

Then I had seven years at a stately home, until I left university.

[the-marquis.livejournal.com]

What you did A levels at 14?

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

If it isn't, it DAMN WELL SHOULD BE!!!

[lanciatore.livejournal.com]

as Red Ed was elected by only slightly more than 50% of the overall vote and mainly thanks to Union backing, your entry title should more realistically be "Something that a minority of the Labour Party, but a majority of the Trades Unions, agrees with me on." The bizarre paradox that the Trades Unions ideal candidate has so many of the qualities you find ideal will no doubt bring forth a bout of wibbles.

And for the record, we don't own fish knives, neither of my parents is or ever was a teacher and I wanted a Spectrum but my dad insisted on buying a VIC-20 "because it has a proper keyboard".

and, being a pedantic Yorkshire-dweller, the Four Yorkshiremen sketch did not originate with the Pythons. It was first performed on "At Last the 1948 Show" by its writers Tim Brooke-Taylor, John Cleese, Graham Chapman and Marty Feldman. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eDaSvRO9xA

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

The bizarre paradox that the Trades Unions ideal candidate has so many of the qualities you find ideal will no doubt bring forth a bout of wibbles.

Now you're just being mean to him! ;-)

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

Didn't know that. Suggests it was Cleese & Champman both times then. Monty Python was written in teams - Cleese&Chapman / Palin&Jones / Idle / Gilliam.