Is class a major issue in Australia? Unlike the “mother country” (England not America) where class is irrevocably needled into your forehead at birth, where you are a marvel of society if you’re dad was a chimney sweep and you’ve dusted the soot to ascend class and become a quiz show master.
Now I had a relatively comfortable up bringing, I grew up in a three bedroom house, sure it was made out of the same stuff as a caravan that would expand three square metres when temperatures exceeded 31°. But we had a car, an extraordinarily large tube television, a microwave, a broken dishwasher and a dog. For my generation we intrinsically linked our status to the size of our televisions. Ours was massive! If you had a big tele then you had luxury and with luxury you had a sense of self esteem. I didn’t know at the time that it was a radio rental, if I had, it probably would not have made any difference. It never occurred to me in my sheltered youth that there may be whole swag of people that were better off than me and what’s more who knew that were better off than the likes of yours truly.
It wasn’t until I was forced into the wider world to supposedly get a life that I started becoming aware that there was more to defining your place in the world than having a big tele. I went to university to study something or other, I can’t remember what it was now but I have been assured that it was a significant part of my education. It was during this period I started to come into regular contact with the middle class and people from other diverse backgrounds. Diversity was not something I had been accustomed to in the small rural community in which I was raised. To me and others diversity was a packet of arnold assorted biscuits, the opening of a chinese restaurant or being able to order a pizza without pineapple as one of three toppings.
It was when I started interacting with people in my new circle that I was a bit of a square peg. They spoke of things like cuisine, family holidays at the holiday house… I should note that most of them still lived at home. On occasion I was invited to these homes situated in leafy suburbs that I hadn’t heard of before in houses you couldn’t even transport on a truck, a flaw in my opinion. Their televisions were modest to say the least and they were kind of out the way and very rarely switched on. These homes were much larger than my childhood pad, the ceilings were ordained with ornate cornices. The walls were cluttered intricately crafted framed botanical drawings of rare species of bird that weren’t magpies. These drawings seemed pointless when compared to the poster sized and framed print of John Wayne that rested on the veneer wood panelled walls of my country crib.
Or were they? I started to wonder whether these non-moveable homes and the people that lived in them actually didn’t care too much about the size of the household television they seemed more concerned with the size of their house, the make of the family car which were almost always practical european sedans or monstrous four wheel drives that were passed off as “people carriers” that were used to transport children to hockey training and 2am swimming lessons.
I don’t mean to deride any of this but it was very different to what I thought I was – well off. As it turns out I’m lower or working class. The linesman salary of my father couldn’t afford an immovable house or people carrier but it didn’t disadvantage me either. I did develop a cap in hand inferiority complex for about three months but I got over it. This was over a decade ago and since then a lot has changed.
I have a sneaking suspicion that class is becoming more and more of an issue in this big wide, geologically stable land.
Your thoughts?
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As a working class person myself who’s rented family homes were fixed to the ground yet double-digit in their number, I can relate to your observations of class in Australia and the ‘trinkets’ through which such status is displayed by the species. More interesting for me was that race and class are close partners in the Australian social hierarchy. Even at my family’s lowest resource point we were never poor AND black – like many of those around us. No number of giant plasma TV’s would overcome this double burden in the ‘working mans paradise’ that was 1970′s Australia. And to think that from a broad socio-economic perspective that was about as good as it got for Australia and the developed world in general? Income inequality and the increasing ‘ghetofication’ of wealth in Australia have ensured the realisation of ‘the Mathew effect’ in our once great (and racist) society, as those with capital look to sure up their defences against the inevitable consequences of globalisation – a flat world in georpolitical, trade and income terms. All of this has occurred in Australia despite valiant efforts by successive governments though the transfer payments system to ‘civilise global capitalism’ – a term popularised by Australia’s last great class warrior, former Labor leader, Mark Latham. Nice try Mark, but you must have known it was never on? One great perennial feature of the working class (whatever their TV size) is denial of own situation. Who knows, with a bit of luck we could be middle class after all. My TV said so.
Back in my early days it was more the question of acres or how big their woolshed was. All the youngsters were always impressed with the woolshed where the shearers were up on a platform, like they were on stage. Always seemed to be that the kids who lived in town wanted to live on farms and vice-versa. Used to always like Wednesday night cricket training where you got to stay in town a few extra hours, have a bucket of chips, can of coke and a paddle pop, couldn’t get that high quality cuisine at home. Once we moved into town it then it was the daily journey to high school in a slightly larger town 30 kms away which always took an hour to get to on the bus. Slightly bigger towns seem to have so much more, so the bunch making the daily trip there always felt like they were missing out on something, which became evident a couple of years later when discovering it was a 4 pub town compared to our 1. Video players were the big thing, if you had one of those, which we didn’t, then you were one classy family, but things changed even more when the first playstation was released well that was another thing altogether.
I’m one of those people that managed to climb the ladder from poor, migrant working class to comfortable middle class with a working class heart. I agree with you, Uni is a weird time where you get to find out how the class live. People use to think I was cute cos I was a kid from the wild West. It was cool to be working class amongst my circle of friends cos they were all mad middle class lefties. I think there are many good things about being working class. For instance, we are more generous than upper-middle (tight) class folk. I’ve noticed this through very simple things like your middle class friends always keep track of who’s buying coffee next whereas your working class friends buy you a coffee machine for your birthday. I never realised that my suburb was different until I caught a tram one day to Surrey Hills. Wow! Tree lined streets and opulent houses. It was like heaven. The good thing about being middle class though is not worrying too much about paying bills and getting food on the table. P.S Our TV wasn’t that big when I was growing up so I’ve made up for it and have a big TV now
I’ve grown up in an upper middle class family and as both my parents have high education in sociology, have been aware of who is ‘middle class’ and who is ‘working class’. For us it was defined as a cultural thing. middle class people go to art galleries, the theatre and own many books. they are senior and well respected in their field of work. The kitchens are situated carefully so the morning sun comes in, they don’t eat fast food and they don’t own instant coffee. my parents were very open minded and left wing, another ‘middle class’ trait. they never looked down on anyone or thought they were better than other people. I dated 2 boys, both typically working class and they were welcomed to our family. there were obvious cultural differences between us, and while i never tried to sell myself as middle class, they were both very proud to be working class and thought middle class people who took holidays and owned art were snobs. they also tended to be right wing and thought that our relationship would last forever and were in a hurry to settle down. They also had a large TV which they kept on through dinner time. my family rarely sat down to dinner because my parents worked late and i trained for sport late at night, but this family obviously valued ‘quality family time’. and yes, they were more generous than my family and thankful for what they had.
Enjoyed looking through this, very good stuff, regards .
I’ve been working class, under class, middle class and upper class… I’ve also been a crook, a respected person, an entertainer, an idiot and a parent. I have four university degrees, many trade qualifications, I know loads of stuff, I’ve been round the world and I’m enjoying my life… One thing I don’t give a **** about is class, it’s not important… be yourself and do your stuff!