#middle class privilege

Now, I’m sure many people do, but personally, I don’t see Young as a nepo baby just because her aunt chucked out The Gruffalo. I see her as a nepotism baby because of that success, conjoined with growing up middle-class around successful creatives, in a city that has removed barriers like travel and has an abundance of creative communities.

To put it simply: artists like Lola Young have connections to the creative world that the vast majority of working-class people simply do not have.

Working-class people aren’t disappearing from the arts because they’ve gotten less creative—it’s because wealth inequality and poverty have grown. And the even more uncomfortable truth? Benefits helped that. They levelled the playing field when the cost of living wasn’t so bad.

They gave working-class creatives the time and space to make art. They could move to major cities like London and Manchester, access creative communities, build their craft. Maybe even attain a career and wealth through that, and pay back into the tax system that made it possible to fulfil what is, ultimately, a pipe dream for working-class people now.

The cost of living makes it impossible to get through the whole month with money in your account. And we’re not talking about not being able to go out with the girlies and sip on Aperol. We’re talking about not being able to buy food. Late bills. The mounding fear of how much worse things will get.

There is no ‘safety net’ for working-class people. No hotel of Mum and Dad. No life where you can ‘opt out’ of stress. You can’t just take a deep breath and free fall into your art—there is NOTHING that will catch you. No reassurance that if you fail, you’ll still be fine.

You know what doesn’t mix with creating art? Exhaustion. Panic. The kind of stress where you’re not just choosing between paying rent or eating, but actively wondering if you’ll have a home in six months. Creating art requires time, and time is a luxury for people who aren’t stretched to their absolute fucking limit.

It’s not just about making art—it’s about accessing it. Want to go to a museum? Sure, if it’s free entry. But how much is a train ticket if you don’t live in a city? What if you have kids—how are you paying for their tickets? What if you want your kids to access art but literally do not have the money to do so?

Want to go to a gig? Cool. Except our music venues have been gutted—replaced with ugly fucking flats owned by developers. Worse yet? Said abhorrent developers build opposite a music venue, and the complaints from residents build and build until the council threatens to close these community hubs—often the only means of hope for young people. Plays? Forget about it. And even if you do scrape the money together, do you want to be looked at like you don’t belong there?

Now, you want to make art? Okay… But you probably don’t know anybody else who actively pursues it. Not only is the idea of making art foreign, but the world where people actually do it feels untouchable—filled with privileged people who’d rather argue about that reality than look around and realise working-class people are ceasing to exist in those spaces.

But hey, TikTok exists, right? You can home-record using just your iPhone, GarageBand—if you have those. If you have the time, the mental headspace, the ability to do so while life as a working-class person feels like a ticking time bomb.

Want a manager? They only scout in places like London, and those ‘creative communities’ are just people who went to Brit School or had industry connections before they ever picked up a guitar. If you live in an army town in England, you’re not exactly bounding between music venues, casually networking your way into the industry.

And the most laughable thing? The argument that going to Brit School doesn’t mean you’re privileged. I would just like to add that I have literally not been able to take internships because they didn’t cover travel expenses. There is no reality where I could have afforded the train fare, eaten, and still paid my bills. The assumption that accessing these institutions isn’t a privilege in itself is fucking wild to me. Yet again, ignorance is screaming.

Nothing speaks to the lack of class consciousness of middle-class folk more than them desperately shaking you by the shoulders, trying to get their ‘struggle’ credentials by telling you they ‘had hand-me-downs too!’ Real. Struggle. What they exhibit, time and time again, is an unrelenting ignorance of the actual working-class experience. We aren’t struggling with hand-me-downs. We’re struggling with generational poverty and the complete demise of social mobility. What little stability we had is now forever up for grabs.

It’s frankly fucking exhausting seeing middle-class people perform mental gymnastics to pearl-clutch that they aren’t the problem, when in reality, they aren’t even listening to working-class people. They’re just circle-jerking other middle-class folk, convincing themselves they aren’t part of the problem while excreting ignorance at every possible opportunity.

I know why this is a touchy subject—because for those who put effort into their art, it feels like the accusation of nepotism takes away from that. And maybe it does. However, if you’re truly committed to equality, committed to class consciousness, you wouldn’t prioritise those feelings of unfairness. You would be able to put yourself in a working-class person’s shoes and think… fuck… what would I have done if I had been born into a working-class family with manual labour jobs, in a small town with no music venues, expensive train fares, and all of my friends abandoned their dreams because reality smacked them around the face?

And fundamentally, I believe that people’s defensiveness about this topic is just their mind screaming at them that they don’t know enough to engage thoughtfully in the discussion.

And perhaps it’s just me, but I personally feel the industry’s alleged desire to ‘fix’ these issues is complete bullshit. Why? Because I’m still seeing music venue after music venue shut down. I’m still seeing privately educated folk dominate awards season. I’m still seeing these same people get on stage, chat absolute bollocks about diversity for over a minute, then go on tour with—shocker!—other incredibly privileged artists. You’d think platforming new voices would be the easiest way to change things, but no. Because it’s not about talent. It’s about social climbing, bum-licking, and birds of a feather sticking together.

The middle class is an economic class that is neither impoverished nor wealthy, they are between the classes we would traditionally consider "the poor" and "the wealthy" or which earlier eras might have classed as "commoner" and "gentry." For the remainder of this post, please understand that I am talking about the modern (and recent historical) U.S. American Middle Class, and not Canadian, English, French, or any other nation's middle class, which may have its own different circumstances.

The middle class is typically composed of laborers who earn a wage suitable for:

Raising a family, and even if the family requires two incomes, the combined wages of two middle-class adults are enough to support this

Owning a home, though actually owning a home is not a requirement

Possessing some degree or level of disposable income, or money which can be spent on luxury items like attending concerts, taking vacations, or home improvements. Though this list is not exhaustive, these are things lower-income homeowners may not be able to afford readily.

The typical, traditional, sitcom family represents the middle class: Owning a house with a yard for children to play in, often with a garage for storage of excess possessions (and often also a car), and one or two working parents. Traditionally, the middle class is also white, and because of intersectionality, white middle-class individuals benefit from white privilege too.

Middle-class privilege includes things like:

Being seen as a more socially acceptable type of company than the poor (which may be represented by renters or residents of trailer parks) or people of color. This applies to social and financial situations!

Children having the stability to wait until 18 (or older!) to seek out a job, or being able to choose to seek a job for disposable income rather than supporting their family.

The expectation of children getting a car, or at least access to one, sometime between the ages of 16-18, and of them being more reliable and trusted drivers.

The idea of having a stable income.

The ability to attend college or university, and the freedom to do so as a matter of choice. The poor often need to rely on grants or scholarships to achieve this, and the wealthy are often expected to go.

(In the USA especially,) The expectation of a suburban, or suburban-like, lifestyle in a detached single-family house which they own (or at least have a mortgage on) because their job pays well enough to afford it.

Some of the negative aspects of

The ability to ignore the economic problems in the inner city and trailer parks, because they are primarily out of sight to middle-class citizens. When they are recognized, they are seen as problems of the structure of the city rather than symptoms of the economic issues the residents of these areas live under. The common solution is to kick the poor people out through gentrification or political force to make the city look more friendly to the middle class.

The ability to think that anybody in a better economic position than themselves earned their position and that anybody in a worse economic position deserves it as a punishment for not working hard enough. The typical middle-class response to people complaining about having a low income is usually, "get a better job," with a close second being, "work harder and earn a raise."

The ability to armchair quarterback what people in less privileged positions ought to do. While it's true that anybody can look at a situation and think of what they imagine they would do in such a situation, part of middle-class privilege is acting like every situation they see can be solved from the perspective of just being middle-class (and usually white.)

For example, if a person of color is pulled over for a traffic stop, then runs from the police because they don't have a valid license, and is killed for running, the middle-class response is that the victim, "just shouldn't have run." There is no recognition of the fact that the victim, not having a valid license, would likely be arrested on charges of theft, simply for driving while black and unlicensed. There is the assumption that the middle-class experience of simply* getting a ticket (or maybe even a warning!) would be shared by people of other social and economic classes.

So: What is Middle-Class Privilege?

A glaring example of privilege blinding itself to oppression:

The other day, I casually mentioned the Big Game coming up at work and my boss said that he hasn't watched a game since Colin Kaepernick started his activism for civil rights on the field.

This is white privilege. This is male privilege. This is what remains of middle class privilege.

He doesn't like things getting political, so he tunes them out.

He makes fun of both side of the political spectrum.

But he has the luxury of being in the position that the politics being discussed by Kaepernick and BLM don't affect him or anybody on his team.

As MLK Jr. said, the greatest enemy of progress isn't the Klansman -- it's the white moderate. The white people who look out and see people protesting, and say, "Quiet down and be patient, you're disturbing my comfortable life."

Earth Friendly Products… Is saving the earth a middle class privilege?

The past few months have been an eye opener for me in regards to the products I use. Since having my baby I’ve become a lot more aware of how my lifestyle is contributing to the demise of our beautiful planet. I have always been fairly eco friendly but now I realise just how eco friendly I could be if I put some more thought into my choices. I really want to preserve the planet as much as I can…

He’s Eighty Seven. Eighty-seven and look at all he’s accumulated in eight-seven years, strewn in the snow like chicken guts, and we’re law-abiding, slow-to-anger bunch of folks turning the other cheek every day in the week. What are we going to do? What would you do, what would I, what would he have done? What is to be done?

Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man

“Drink up guys. There will be no Kenya on Tuesday!”

I’m at happy hour with a bunch of friends. We’re the group of queers, or artsy people to the severely untrained eye, loudly arguing about feminism, racism, politicians and existential crises while also talking about someone’s mean under bite. I am often asked if I am on drugs, ‘She doesn’t need drugs’ a friend will often say ‘I am drugs’ I will add with a wide smile. This is my cult. ‘So are you worried about Monday?’ someone asks me. ‘Please don’t feed her; this is what she’ll blog about on Tuesday’ Bubble butt predicts. Congratulations Bubble Butt. You’re right! I have to interrupt my scheduled session on Myths of Black Beauty, and my Tom Mboya tribute (he was murdered on the 5th of July, Kenyans did a pilgrimage to his house on the 7th) to talk about middle class privilege, something not a lot of middle class Kenyans seem to know of or maybe just simply ignore.

Middle class privilege is consenting to silence oppressed people who are over 80% of your country’s population because well…they might burn your precious shit while expressing their oppression.

Middle class privilege is the fact that these invisible 80 actually feel that the only way they can get the message across is via burning your precious properties.

Middle class privilege is giving an actual price to other people’s freedoms by saying ‘You who wants to talk to them will be liable for all the monetary harm they cause’ and actually feeling nothing about the government’s statement of ‘Control your fucking animals’ or rather agreeing to it.

Middle class privilege is not bothering to understand why someone is pushing for national dialogue, or there was curfew in Wajir or that terrorist attacks are now being targeted at the invisible 80 who don’t really have government protection, and that this is a recipe for a civil war waiting to happen.

Middle class privilege is basically living in George Orwell’s animal farm and being content with being more equal than these animals that need to be controlled so they don’t harm our precious monies

Middle class privilege is demonizing the one person who tries to tell them ‘Maybe we should talk about it first’ and saying ‘Oh well there’s constitutional channels if you want to address these issues’ when you know clearly they don’t know much about this constitution apart from what your leaders (you) told them, that you yourself have flipped through the constitution maybe once at most and aren’t too sure what it says until it’s made relevant to you. That once the hoopla about the ‘best constitution in Africa and the world’ died down no one bothered to translate the legalese into contemporary forms understandable by the cows of Turbi. And that a new constitution does not hide past scars. An abusive partner’s promise to ‘never do it again’ is always tentative, so I wonder sometimes why we suddenly expect that people will be running to courts they have lost billions and years to because of corruption, or police they have been formerly harassed by, or institutions that have failed them time and again.

Many presidents, especially third world presidents, do not live in their country. One of the penalites of exalted power is loneliness. Harnessed to the trappings of protocol and blockaded by a buffer of grinning courtiers and sycophants, even a good and intelligent leader will gradually begin to forget what the real world looks like.

When a president of Nigeria sets out to see things for himself what does he actually see? Highways temporarily cleared of lunatic drivers by even more lunatic presidential escorts; hitherto impassable tracks freshly graded and even watered to keep down the dust; buildings dripping fresh paint; well-fed obsequious welcoming parties; garlands of colourful toilet paper hung round the neck by women leaders; troupes of “cultural dancers” in the sun, and many other scenes of contented citizenry.

Chinua Achebe, The Trouble With Nigeria

As a visual artist who comes from where I come from, there was a bit of turbulence at the beginning of my art ventures, meeting other artists from different socio-economic classes, I was often asked what my pain was. Why would someone who had what I had have pain? What did I have to say to the world? Art, like writing, is political whether you like it or not, and most times Art is about struggle. So what was a middle-class privileged girl struggling with in a country whose governments catered solely to the middle-class, and not just the middle-class but a particular middle-class.

“How is Kenya?” you will be asked in certain parts of the country. I am yet to see if devolution has brought Kenya to these places. Places the media visits only when they are on fire, not when matches are being readied. Who knew where Mpeketoni was, or even cared about what was happening there before, as Parselelo Kantai aptly put it, ‘Westgate went country’. I would love to know how many people actually believe in Nation State Kenya. Really believe in it, now that Moi is no longer shoving Uzalendo songs down our throats and we can step back and think about it. What is Kenya? Is it the amalgam of privileges you receive by virtue of living in government hubs and making a certain amount of money that you can pay for your freedoms with? Is that why you are scared for your money? Because without it you have no freedom?

‘Dispossessed,’ eighty-seven years and dispossessed of what? They ain’t got nothing, they caint getnothing, they never had nothing. So who’s being dispossessed? Can it be us? The old ones are out in the snow, but we’re here with them. Look at their stuff, not a pit to hiss in, not a window to shout the news or an alley to sing the blues! They’re facing a gun and we’re facing it with them. They don’t want the world, but only Jesus. They only want Jesus, just fifteen minutes of Jesus on the rug-bare floor…How about it Mr. Law? Do we get our fifteen minutes worth of Jesus? You got the world, can we have our Jesus?

Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man

A revolution is coming.

A friend once drunkenly declared with the kind of heaviness you don’t take for granted. I wasn’t shocked to hear it, not even scared. I felt like a ruthless dictator watching the crowds break through his palace doors to take his head. You saw it coming, you are sort of proud that your people are finally done drowning in the shit you deal them and you are somehow ready to offer your head. It’s been a good run; you didn’t think you could keep it up forever anyway. Maybe that’s why I wasn’t scared for SabaSaba either. Some people say that we are now in 2014, but is time really linear when there’s no difference between your house-help leaving her children upcountry with her sister so that she can work for you and the same thing that used to happen during colonial times? Is it different because you’re not a settler?  Do you treat her better? Do you fuss when she has a dead relative? Do you even care about her life past what’s for dinner and what needs washing? Are you trying to help her further her education or do you think that’s disadvantageous to you because then you’ll be out of a house-help? And how is that different from the settlers pushing for Natives to be educated enough to work for them efficiently but not so much as to work for themselves?

Middle class privilege is wielding economic inequalities as guns to muzzle and perpetuate the constant suffering of others around us and then holding a national prayer day about it when they start to complain about their suffering

It is unfair to ask me to subsist on mission school sermons about Christian conduct and passive resistance in circumstances where it is considered a crime to be decent; where a policeman can run me out of my house at the point of a sten gun when I try withhold my labour. For years I have been told by white and Black preachers to love my neighbour; love him when there’s a bunch of whites who reckon they are Israelites come out of Egypt in obedience to God’s orders to come and civilize heathens; a bunch of whites who feed on the symbolism of God’s race venturing into the dessert among the ungodly. For years now I have been thinking it was alright for me to feel spiritually strong after church service. And now I find it is not the kind of strength that answers the demands of suffering humanity around me. It doesn’t even seem to answer the longings of my own heart