How do you define "middle class"?

[Lucifer Box]

I'll have an absinthe and port snakebite please, barman.

I hope you drink "proper" cider, Alexei, not electro-fizz like Strongbow or Woodpecker? Or, even worse, the tramps' friend, Diamond White.

[hyperD]

Wot, you mean in case of a gentleman it would be somehow different?

No no no...just kidding! Here it is...

Traditionally, port decanter is passed clockwise around the table, from right to left. There are many repeated reasons for this tradition but the one most accepted is very practical. Most people are right handed and it is easier for right handed people to pass the port to the left.

[AtW]

I tried cider few years ago and hated it every since, but recently decided to give it a go again - tried a few brands and Olde English seems nice, ruby port is nice too

Most people are right handed and it is easier for right handed people to pass the port to the left.

But suuuuuuuuuurely this is not logical for UK where percentage of left handed people is higher than normal, and was it not used to justify different wheel positioning in cars?

[hyperD]

I tried cider few years ago and hated it every since, but recently decided to give it a go again - tried a few brands and Olde English seems nice, ruby port is nice too



But suuuuuuuuuurely this is not logical for UK where percentage of left handed people is higher than normal, and was it not used to justify different wheel positioning in cars?

Have you been reading Merton council's manifest again Alex?!?!?!

I didn't know to be honest but Googled this - quite interesting...

http://users.pandora.be/worldstandar...the%20left.htm

[AtW]

Yes its pretty interesting, in Japan particularly gaining sword advantage must have been a factor.

[hyperD]

Yes its pretty interesting, in Japan particularly gaining sword advantage must have been a factor.

Still is for the Knights of the Suburus

[DimPrawn]

The answers here

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4974460.stm

Basically if you have shed loads of savings and investments, own a very expensive house then you are middle class.

Otherwise, I'm afraid, you are working class.

Sorry.

[NoddY]

Economically it's more straight-forward. Those who have to sell their labour are 'working-class', and that would include just about everyone, from shelf-stackers to surgeons. Those who live from accumulated assets are not working class because they have no need to sell their labour. When they say the 'rich are getting richer the poor poorer' it's really this division that's being talked about rather than the differences within the working class (the shelf stacker and the surgeon).

Socially 'class' is even more facinating. Social nuances such as etiquette where probably used by the plutocracy as code - enabling other members of the plutocracy to spot their own - remember before the era of mass communication there was no other way of knowing anything about someone except via dress, word of mouth and behaviour. Hence the importance of what you wear, who you know, how you speak and what you eat and drink.

The middle-classes in England are essentially a Victorian invention (although some of the mercantile classes pre-dated them) in which certain members of the economic working class prospered more than their peers, and bought into some aspects of aristocratic behaviour. Their success was based upon knowledge and enterprise rather than assets, but their ability to acculumate assets and marry-up was restricted, as it is today. They also created their own identity though an appreciation of the aesthetic, arts, language and education. Something for which the working-class and aristocracy didn't care much for (nothing changes!).

Lecture over.

[AlfredJPruffock]

Was going to comment on the ownership of the means of production etc but its far too nice a day, Im off for a spot of polo.

[threaded]

Sgt. Wilson was upper class.
Capt. Mainwaring was middle class.
Private Walker was working class.

It is nothing about work or money, it is quite another thing.

HTH