# The British Working Class – writer Michael Collins explains how the white working class has been left disenfranchised and disenchanted
http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/C/class_in_britain/
Perhaps a programme for the many (not all) indymedia readers who sadly ignore class as an issue, and where posts about poverty, exclusion, deprivation of british working class people are as rare as a cuckoo in spring*. While activists/leftists quite rightly seem to travel around the world fighting for global social justice, they seem to ignore the fact that here in the U.K 1000’s of pensioners die of the cold every year, that our estates are sinking into a miasma of poverty and crime, a lack of hope and despair, our once strong unions are emasculated with millions in dead end jobs, otherprogressives incorpoaredinto the blair /brown Quango state. Meanwhile, how many people on here know that over one million disabled people are about to lose a significant portion of their meager benefits. The G8 campaigners at the Niddrie made some effort marching around the estate making links and claiming solidarity, but there was only 100 of them, where were the others, too scared to go on the estate for fear of 'chavs' or not bothered.
and no , I’m no fascist, bnp or any other kind of reactionary, I just think injustice is also present here in the UK.are I would suggest the movement in the u.k has to take a long look at itself, it’s activists background, assumptions and prejudices and values. If we ignore these issues, then others like the above mentioned will benefit to the detriment of all in society.
*for instance, why are the no topic headings such as class or even welfare.etc.
Sundays from 10 July, 8pm
Channel 4's Class in Britain series features three authored films that scrutinise the history of Britain's class system and discovers that class and the friction between the classes can still be vibrant and valuable forces in modern Britain.
The three films are:
* The British Working Class – writer Michael Collins explains how the white working class has been left disenfranchised and disenchanted
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and
Michael Colllins Book
'The Likes of Us'
http://books.guardian.co.uk/extracts/story/0,6761,1252913,00.html
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