I keep wondering why class prejudice is treated as so normal in the UK, especially when most people are working class themselves. The slur “chav” shows this clearly. It gets used so casually, almost like it’s harmless, even though it’s aimed at an entire social group. What I can’t figure out is why so few people call it out for the classism it is. Media and politics seem to reinforce the idea that mocking the working class is acceptable, but it still feels strange that so many people go along with it without questioning it. It makes me wonder how something so openly dismissive became such an ordinary part of everyday language.
A few poignant examples I’ve read are things such as “anyone else cross the street when they see chavs (working class people)”? Or “I hate chavs (working class people) I wish they were all gassed”. Often, such phrasings will earn a lot of upvotes or likes, as well. It’s 42 million people, that is a lot of people some people want to be “gassed”, that other people are upvoting/liking.
Ok, I think I’ve worked out what the issue is here.
First of all, let’s go back to where Owen Jones starts off.
The term chav refers to a specific subset of young people who spend a disproportionate amount of their money on fashionable clothes and hang around being a nuisance to other people.
He also argues that the term is used by right-wing media outlets as a broader generalisation of working-class people as a whole, to further push their arguments.
These two things can be true at the same time.
But I’d definitely agree it’s not a slur. It’s just lazy journalism presenting a caricature of the working-class because it’s easier for their deranged arguments.
The majority of people are born into working class families, but only a few become chavs.
It’s a sad reflection on the country that the right-wing media is able to get away with presenting absolute rubbish with abandon, and it’s unfortunate that a lot of people consume this media without realising that they’re being told lies and half-truths.
But that’s what the problem is. It’s not that the term itself is bad, it’s that bad people use the image it conjures to caricature the working class in general.