The Obscurer

Sunday 20th August 2006

It's A Polenta Jungle Out There

There was an article in The Economist on the matter of “class” last week, reporting the findings of their YouGov survey on the subject (you can read the article here, free from subscription – yippee!; survey pdf can be found here).

According to the poll, 48% of people aged 30 or over say they expect to end up better off than their parents. But only 28% expect to end up in a different class. More than two-thirds think neither they nor their children will leave the class they were born into.

What does this thing that people cannot escape consist of these days? And what do people look at when decoding which class someone belongs to? The most useful identifying markers, according to the poll, are occupation, address, accent and income, in that order. The fact that income comes fourth is revealing: though some of the habits and attitudes that class used to define are more widely spread than they were, class still indicates something less blunt than mere wealth. Being the sort of person who “buys his own furniture”, a remark that Alan Clark, a former minister and diarist once reported as directed at Michael Heseltine, a self-made Tory colleague, is still worthy of note in circles where most inherit it.

It’s a funny thing, class. Perhaps it used to be simpler to figure out who belonged to which class when there was a clearer divide between a blue collar manual worker with keys to a council house and a white collar office worker with keys to the executive bathroom. Today the office worker could be a minimum wage slave scraping by while the manual worker is a self employed builder or tradesman employing an accountant to audit his vast income.

Did I say I find class funny? I think I prefer silly. Is it really anything more than an excuse to indulge in and to justify basic snobbery, be it inverted or the original, genuine article? I couldn’t care less which class I supposedly belong to because I don’t think such a thing exists as such. I don’t mind others considering me to be part of one class or another because I think it is more a reflection of someone else’s attitude and prejudices; this may count for something to some people, but I don’t knowingly move in the sort of circles where it does. However, it appears that I am writing about class; so, for the purposes of this post, which class do I belong to?

If you were to look at where I’ve come from you would probably conclude that I am middle class, at least if you were to consider many of those clichéd status symbols of my youth; my parents’ jobs were solidly middle class; they were home owners (of a detached property and all!); we went on foreign holidays (and I don’t just mean to North Wales); bought shares in the privatised utilities; my brother and I went to university. Other than going to private school, I don’t know what else we could have done to be middle class.

Having moved out of the family home and been left to my own devices, however, and things are not so clear. That university degree hasn’t been relevant to any of the jobs I’ve done, none of which you would describe as middle class; I live in a ex council semi; I’ve flogged all of the shares that have fallen into my lap (except my sentimental ones for Manchester City); I haven’t paid to go on a foreign holiday since my honeymoon four years ago.

In my penchant for eating chips and curry in the street you could consider me working class, while my penchant for using the word “penchant” could mark me out as middle class. So where do I fit in?

Well, yesterday, as I was about to pop out to the shops, I asked my wife if there was anything we had run out of that I could pick up along the way.

“We just need some balsamic vinegar and a bottle of extra virgin olive oil,” she replied.

Did you get that? She said we needed balsamic and olive oil, not for some special, specific recipe or owt, oh no, but because we had run out of those essential household staples. We needed them, just to have in! In my book you can forget “occupation, address, accent and income”, you can place them in any order you like; if my shopping list* doesn’t tell you that I am middle class, then I really don’t know what does.

* and then I go and spoil it all by doing something stupid like shopping at Morrisons rather than Sainsburys; but I prefer Morrisons, and as I’ve said I don’t actually care which class I belong to, so that doesn’t matter anyway. In fact, the more I think about it, the more I realise that with this post I’ve just gone and wasted everyone’s time. Again. Soz.

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Sunday 13th August 2006

Lakeland Reflections

Last Wednesday, after we’d pulled onto the car park of the Water Edge Inn at Ambleside, the wife and boy grabbed a table by the lake while I went to the bar. About to order a Stella for myself I noticed the beer pump for Kronenbourg Blanc, and being on my holidays, decided to live a little and give it a go. As the barman tilled in the price of £3.40 I decided Kronenbourg Blanc would have to be something pretty special for me to have another pint.

In fact I had two more. One swig and I was hooked; it was bleeding gorgeous. I’m not a stranger to white or wheat beers; I’ve had the occasional Hoegaarden for a change, and have whiled away many a happy hour in Sinclair’s Oyster Bar with a pint of Sam Smith’s beautiful Ayingerbrau Hefe Weizen, but this was nicer still. A clearer looking pint than I expected, with a sharp, fruity, citrus tang without being too sweet. Delicious.

The only fly in the ointment was the slightly disconcerting feeling that I’d been suckered into a marketing wheeze; that Kronenbourg Blanc is not a revival of an old classic but a recent launch dreamt up by a committee tasked with brand stretching, its fine flavour the result of extensive market research, and that I was really drinking little more than an expensive and cloudy lager and lime.

It was though merely a minor discomfort that passed with the numbing of the senses as another beer was imbibed, and I decided that I was more than happy to be a willing dupe. Mine’s another pint.

We awoke in Bowness on Thursday to the same news as everyone else; that there had been a string of terror suspects arrested and that the airports were in chaos. We watched the news for a bit then set off, as planned, to the rather splendid South Lakes Wildlife Park. I’m familiar with Chester Zoo, a fine place to be sure but a bit overwhelming; you can lose the will to live there before you are even half way round. At South Lakes Zoo though we seemed that bit closer to the animals, and it was far more compact, as I imagine London Zoo to be (perhaps; I’ve never been but it looks neat on the map. Last time I was in Regent’s Park I kept seeing signs for the zoo but I couldn’t track it down; until, strolling up The Broad Walk I looked to my left and started when I saw an ostrich, keeping up with me, pace for pace, just the other side of a fence, and I realised I’d found it).

So we had a great time, and it wasn’t until we were sat having a drink in the Hole Int’ Wall pub that we thought again about the morning’s news, and that for all we knew the plot may not have been foiled and thousands of people could be dead.

Of course, we know now that that didn’t happen, whether because of excellent police work or because there was no such plot. I think some scepticism is understandable, after the ricin, red mercury and chemical vest plots that apparently weren’t; but until we find out for certain what the quality of intelligence was this time I’m prepared to give the security services the benefit of doubt.

Some of the conspiracy theories expounded have been pretty outlandish; I can’t see the entire aviation network being buggered just to manipulate public opinion, or to put the squeeze on Blair when he is out of the country. Some questions disappear into thin air the moment you have thought of them. Why, for example, keep the terror threat level at critical if the plot has been disrupted and the suspects detained? Simply because perhaps we can’t be certain all the suspects are in custody, and if those at large are no longer under surveillance they are free to regroup. That said, I deny anyone not to have experienced a shudder when they first viewed that hideosity John Reid making his horrible, horrible address to the nation from his Home Office bunker. There really was a chilling coup d’etat vibe about the whole thing, if not a full-blown “we have commandeered all your puny Earthlings’ broadcasting frequencies” feel to it. Thankfully, our Deputy Prime Minister’s address later on brought some welcome, if unintentional, comic relief.

Our last day in the Lakes was Friday, which brought the sports news that “Hatchet” McClaren had swung into action, axing David Beckham from the England squad for some pointless midweek friendly in the next week or is it the week after against oh-I-forget.

I think it is fair to say that even Steve McClaren didn’t want Steve McClaren to be the England manager, but we are all stuck with him now as he tries to make the best of bad job, the first act of which obviously has to be to make the visible break from the ancien regime, to appear the daring and decisive new broom rather than just the same old damp and tired mop as you move into the top job; and dropping Beckham surely proves it.

Or does it? After all, Beckham laid the groundwork himself by resigning the England captaincy after the World Cup, and getting shot of him is something the media and supporters have been crying out for for ages. If I had a penny for every time someone has said to me “Beckham’s not played well for England for four years” then I’d be halfway to affording a bag of crisps by now (I don’t have the widest circle of friends) but most people would probably have enough for a down payment on a Maserati, or could buy a Kia Pride outright, if you allow a discount for cash.

So I don’t have a great deal of optimism about the McClaren reign; even when he apparently stamps his authority by telegraphing a brave and bold decision, the reality is that he has made the obvious, plodding and unimaginative move. But while the Beckham “sacking” has taken the headlines, I think a more telling decision has been buried in the small print.

When Beckham gave up the captaincy battle raged over who should replace him; John Terry or Steven Gerrard. In this regard, McClaren has completely bottled it, by making Terry captain but giving Gerrard the consolation prize of the vice-captaincy (and a colouring set). Now, we all know that, unlike in cricket, football captains do fuck all really, other than clapping their hands together a lot and shouting “come on lads” (which Terry is very accomplished at); so what on earth does a vice-captain do? In this case it appears he lets Steve McClaren off the hook; it is an administrative weaselling that means he doesn’t really have to choose between two players from different well-supported clubs, coached by vocal managers who seem to have an enmity for each other. It doesn’t bode well; even on a basically irrelevant decision McClaren has chosen the road of timidity, or at the very least the timorous politician’s path.

We’ll see how things develop from here on in, but rest assured that following any successes for the England football team under McClaren’s stewardship this post will be radically rewritten in the Stalinist style; but I’m not anticipating any such action.

Tuesday 8th August 2006

Gone Skiing

The news over the weekend announced that more people than ever are having to pay inheritance tax. It is a subject that invites strong opinions, with, apparently, very little in the way of middle ground.

I think that there may be some good arguments about what the threshold for inheritance tax should be, but other than that I don’t see there being any criticism of inheritance tax that doesn’t equally apply to other taxes. A popular complaint is the fact that with inheritance tax money is being taxed twice; but most peoples’ income is taxed the once only while it stays in the bank; it is taxed a second time the moment you go to the shop and pay VAT on your purchases. I have also read people attack inheritance tax because a bequest in itself is supposed to assist in social mobility, and so taxing it reduces this desirable outcome; but this is a counter intuitive argument if ever I heard one. Many supporters of the tax argue in favour of it for redistributive reasons; and whether or not you feel this is just, inheritance tax surely helps iron out some of the inequalities in wealth that can be passed down through the generations to those lucky (or unlucky) enough to have had rich (or poor) parents.

Personally I’ve never really seen the problem with inheritance tax. The government is going to have to take money off us at some point to pay for services; what better time than when we are dead, when we don’t know anything about it? It seems pretty painless extracting government revenue from me when I am six foot under, and once there are no longer any concerns about marginal rates of tax leading to a disincentive to work.

But I think most complainants about inheritance tax are not the ones paying the tax, but rather the ones planning on receiving the inheritance; or what’s left of it following the state’s “smash and grab”. Normally, if one were to argue against a tax that you don’t personally have to pay it would be a seen as a selfless act; but on this occasion it can seem entirely selfish and self serving, a grievance that the government is interfering with your projected revenue stream of the macabre.

For myself, I remember a few years ago my parents telling my brother and me that we needed to get together sometime with their financial advisor to arrange a trust fund to avoid paying the tax. My brother and I responded in the same way; ignoring the requests, keeping on changing the subject until it was eventually dropped. In short we thought that it was my parents’ money and they should do with it as they wished; if they wanted to set up a trust and needed something signing then we would do so, but that was about it. I don’t especially like thinking about my parents dying, but if I am around when it happens I’m pretty sure I won’t be thinking about the dosh. They can leave me something – or nothing – for all I care; I wouldn’t mind if it all went to the cats’ home.

It all reminds me of a news story a few years back about the tendency for retired people to be Skiers; Spending the Kids Inheritance. There was criticism in some quarters that retirees were having the nerve to spend their pensions on holidays and cars, when they should have been thinking of leaving a nest egg to their offspring. Incredible; surely the only reaction to the news that people in their twilight years are spending their own money on themselves is “good on you, have a great time, you’ve earned it”. All the kids should expect is a post card from St Tropez.

I can understand why some people resent giving money to the government, but not why inheritance tax specifically should be such a bogeyman. The reality about complaining that the government is taxing your inheritance is that you are looking forward to the day when your parents are deceased so you can grab their money; that you are frustrated that you won’t be getting your hands on even more of this unearned windfall from beyond the grave. It is an attitude that I find very, very odd.

PostScript: Two posts in two days! Welcome to the new look, frequently updated Obscurer? Not likely. I’m off to the Lakes for a wee break. No more posts here until Saturday, at the very, very, very earliest.

Monday 7th August 2006

Spamalot

I was delighted yesterday when I discovered I’d received an email from Jason Alexander, the actor who played George in Seinfeld; until I noticed that he was trying to sell me Viagra and I decided that it wasn’t that Jason Alexander after all. In fact not only was it not from that Jason Alexander – I think he’s busy – but it wasn’t from any Jason Alexander, just an e-pistle from a random name generated by a computer that has been spitting out spam emails recently to no good effect.

A brief history of email spam; I used to get stuff allegedly written by Mike, or Stephen, but recently that has changed. To be more realistic I guess the spammers started sending emails from people with a forename and a surname; but if it is unlikely that I will be fooled into thinking an email from Tony is really for me, how more unlikely is it that they will stumble upon a forename/surname combination of someone I actually know; or who is even likely to exist?

I’m reminded of an old Alexei Sayle sketch; the world, he said, was being dominated by people who’s names are made up of either two Christian names (like Jason Alexander), two surnames (Cameron MacKintosh) or two non words (Meryl Streep). I think the new spammers have taken this idea too seriously.

So, looking in my deleted box I see I have received emails from a Josh Matthews, a Wilson Porter and a Hallam Curry; but they are some of the more believable names. I am fascinated by the possibility of a Jeruvis Giles, a Moises Brown, a Brett Sherpard and a Trying Whitley walking the earth and writing to ask me if I want to buy a restaurant paging system, even though I don’t own a restaurant. My favourite email comes from someone called Guy Ransom who has surely just wandered out of a Martin Amis novel. I have also received stuff from a whole slew of unlikely Hispanics; Ernesto James, Enrique Bailey, Colton Lopez, Ashton Diaz and his/her brother, Sven.

With my more recent spam, however, I think the name generator has blown a gasket completely; perhaps aware that it has created some unlikely name combinations it has gone back to single names; but with a crazy twist. What are the chances that I know a Marumi, an Ernestine, a Winfred or a Fidel, and so be suckered into thinking they have personally emailed me asking for cash? What about Lupe, Cobb, Boggs, Darnell and Moran; do you know them? If so then I may have received your advert for Windows Office in error. And I really don’t know what it was thinking of when it churned out emails from Diary, Butter, Discriminant and Nautical Chassis.

I hanker for the halcyon days of old, believable spam; will we ever see their like again?

What have I been up to recently, you’re not asking? Some readers may be under the impression that I’d started my paternity leave way early, although regular readers will not be at all surprised that I haven’t written anything here for a week or so. There are all manner of things that can keep me from blogging; being busy at work, catching rays in the fine weather, popping away on a short break, being drunk (or recovering from being drunk), messing about with my brand new mobile phone. All these and more have applied over the past few weeks, as well as the fact that I don’t really want to write just for the sake of it, whatever you may think. However, I have also been in one of those moods where I feel jaundiced and disenchanted about blogging. While I have previously said that I will never quit blogging because I will always shout at the telly, so on the contrary when I find myself shouting at blogs via the computer monitor it puts me off the whole business.

Sometimes trips around the blogosphere (someone please come up with a better word!) can be very rewarding, as you discover new blogs and great examples of well-argued writing that you think you should keep tabs on. Recently however my journeys have been depressing, unedifying descents into the bowels of the ’sphere, reading posts so insane that you can’t argue back because you don’t know where to start ; and I haven’t even bothered to visit Devil’s Kitchen.

I think one day a couple of weeks back was the nadir; try as I might I couldn’t avoid stumbling upon blogs written by moronic trolls spouting their ill thought out prejudice and bile, with even more repulsive views in the comments. As in the real world, it seems, the whole crisis in Lebanon seems to bring out the worst in both sides. Whatever side of the fence the blogger stood, he or she thought that their side was entirely justified in acting as they chose, while the other side was wholly to blame and deserved what they were getting, and obviously moaned about the media – and of course the BBC primarily – as being either a leftist front or Zionist propagandists* (*delete according to stupidity).

But the nasty, one eyed spite and bigotry wasn’t confined to the middle east situation; that day I also kept encountering stuff written by the same authors that showed they could be just as idiotic when discussing other subjects. The terrible case of Jean Charles de Menezes was back in the news at the time, concerning the CPS’s decision to charge the Met under Health and Safety laws, and with the vigil held to mark the first anniversary of his death. I found it (and still find it) quite incomprehensible that sentient beings can respond to his death by questioning his innocence due to him “being an illegal” and to bemoan his family mourning and demanding answers to what happened a year ago; but that day everything I read was either of that opinion, or else viewed the police as laughing butchers who knowingly pumped (always pumped) seven bullets into an innocent man’s head for a laugh because he “looked a bit foreign”. I came across no middle ground. I could also see no sensible connection as to why it was that the Israel supporters were anti-de Menezes (can anyone really be “anti” the poor bloke? Sadly it seems so) while those most critical of the police were also the most stridently anti-Israel; but that was the way it seemed.

I am not suggesting of course that everyone who is pro-Israel is anti-de Menezes, and so on, and I know there are many thoughtful and reasonable writers out there covering Lebanon and other situations; this fed up feeling will soon pass. One of the best antidotes I’ve found is to read Tim Worstall. It can be refreshing to read the opinions of someone with whom you disagree and yet don’t think is a complete cunt.

Call me naive, but it is grim to realise there are so many apparantly intelligent people out there who subscribe to such nasty views; but are there, really? My one hope is that the offensive drivel hurled out recently is in fact just another development in the spam industry; that the posts are not intentionally evil, just nonsensical, generated by the same computer that believes Varette Fake is a likely name, and all part of an effort to screw money out of Google AdSense. What do you reckon?

Let’s hope so; keep thinking happy thoughts.