Tonight 8pm Channel 4
# 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
...........................
and
Michael Colllins Book
'The Likes of Us'
http://books.guardian.co.uk/extracts/story/0,6761,1252913,00.html
# 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
...........................
and
Michael Colllins Book
'The Likes of Us'
http://books.guardian.co.uk/extracts/story/0,6761,1252913,00.html 
Comments
Hide the following 7 comments
disappointed by programme
10.07.2005 20:42
Planners got blamed for breaking up communities - fair enough, but he had already pointed out the extent of the WW2 bombing in the area.
Thatcher got mentioned - Council Houses sell off.
Immigration got mentioned (in as unracist way as he could manage) - problem being that the white working class had to put up with immigration and multiculturalism without being consulted by the ruling classes who didn't have to live with the consequences. Would have been better if more of the programme examined this.
Lots about working classes being despised/patronised by middle classes - the people who wanted to 'help' them and those who merely laughed at the upwardly mobile ex-WCs when they moved to suburbia (like he seems to have done) and didn't quite know how to 'behave'.
Too anecdotal.
ch.
and history started in 1860...
10.07.2005 22:25
he has devoted no time to the paradigm shift of the enlightenment, or the effect of industrialisation on the worker.
not even a glimmer of recognition towards the levellers, the chartists, or any of the other peoples movements that have occured in the last 1000 years.
How can you have a program about class in the UK, that has not established the importance of the vote? I have not read his book, but i hope he has given some time to the issue, or his conclusions may be founded on sand.
sparta
Disappointed but not surprised
11.07.2005 07:43
It's discussion of the 'White' working class, immigration and multiculturalism and council/govt representation of that through it's keen interest in 'diversity' etc. Ignores WHY some groups might be ignored while others are celebrated. It ignores Irish imigration as well. It of course also ignores why racism is usefull to those in power by dividing the class along racial lines.
The bit about the aristocratic socialist coming to live with the leaders of the revolution and being hugely dissapointed was amusing though.
JS
An awful program
11.07.2005 15:36
Red Pepperista
Homepage:
http://www.redpepper.org.uk
Britain poor
11.07.2005 17:11
Francis-Marie Arouet
a question unanswered
12.07.2005 10:43
however no one has answered my central point, which may be revealing in itself, which related to the programme: what sort of movement is it, that is prepared to travel aound the world to fight its causes and champion its beliefs, bravely risking arrest, yet totally(and i mean totally) ignore the sort of poverty, despir, exclusion and oppression people face here in the uk? Instead, all the talk is of the next spectacular at DSEI, of fetishing direct action as a way of life rather than a tactic. For instance, why not fight for decent pensions for our old, if i could save a persioner from dying of the cold this winter, by lobbying/protesting an mp then i would do so and have done. As i said above, have a long look at the 'movement'and think, why are such 'class issues' being ignored? why are the most vulnerable in the uk left to defend themselves, perhaps you may have to question your outlook, backgrounds, why you have got involved in global social change, it may be a salutary experience.....
Agitated!
those in need of aid within britain
22.09.2005 18:03
So, yes we do need to do our bit to help those countries overseas that are less fortunate than ourselves but there are many thousands of people within britain at the same time who are suffering from poverty right now. Not just single parent mothers, and the physically and mentally disabled though, these groups certainly need our help too but there are also those who are working two jobs just too pay the rent, and that's if they can get a job of minumum wage amongst the vast amount of unemployment. Maybe we need to start helping those closer to home aswell.
lucy
e-mail:
eileen.comerford@ntlworld.com