Alex Phillips@ThatAlexWoman
📖 Here's a story...
...It's a story of our white working class 🇬🇧
Once upon a time, we respected the backbone of our society. Our brave men went to the trenches. They mended stuff, and made stuff.
They joined the army. They worked in mines. They manned production lines. They drove lorries. They didn't make much, but they made enough. And they'd be the first to turn out to carry your bag, offer a pint and defend the nation. They knew your name. They helped you with stuff around the house. They laughed the loudest and made the sort of jokes that were so close to the bone, our sides split!
But we gave their jobs away. We cut the army. We never replaced heavy industry, and, where there were still jobs, we gave them to other men, from other countries, because they cost less.
Instead we gave them benefits. We took their dignity, their ability to provide for their families and replaced it with a handout. We robbed them of all opportunity and also robbed opportunity from their kids, too. Their kids who now have kids of their own.
We told them they can't make their jokes anymore, not even for light relief. We told them that everything they were once loved for, and indeed loved, was now considered thick, racist and out of touch. Wake up! we yelled. Get with programme! Get woke, you neanderthal! You've had it your way for far too long, and messed it up! It's only right that you are now punished. You're relatives enslaved us! You are a patriarchal beast! You fragile, over-privileged moron!
When they now turn on the telly, they no longer see people like them. The songs they once sang together are cancelled. Nobody like them writes songs any more. Well, nobody that would get a recording contract, anyway.
We called them lazy, after they had made the humiliatingly necessary calculation that to provide for their family, maybe even give them a holiday from their shithole neighbourhood, it was better to not work and claim benefits instead.
When they tried to tell us how much they were hurting, how they felt overlooked using the only words they had, we called them racist. Because they didn't get the latest memo from an overpaid London PR consultant about what language was acceptable and which viewpoint was allowed to be aired. How to work the ever changing system to fit in. Slow learners!
But they didn't have protected status. They were the monsters.
So they tried at the ballot box to change things. Three times they voted Tory who promised to cut immigration. They backed Brexit: it would put them first. They saw that those in charge who hadn't listened for decades were made to listen at last!
Oh! They listened. And did everything in their power to bully and shame, to silence their voice, to frame them as a threat, to intimidate and censor.
Day after day, night after night, they watched their towns change irreparably. They watched people from other countries being given houses and doctors' appointments. It must be their turn next. Surely.
These other people were also showered with the loving glow of not just being wanted - yes! WANTED! - but actively cheered for! Refugees welcome! Black lives matter!
Who are they? Well, they can't get to know them. They don't learn English. Don't go to the pub. But it must be their fault for not welcoming them enough, understanding them enough. They must be racist.
Then they saw members of those communities complain and witnessed superhuman efforts made by those in power to listen to them. And yet, some still riot when they don't get their own way. Some commit crimes, but it's not their fault. They just need to be better understood. They've been through things none of us can relate to. They're disenfranchised. They have mental health issues. And it's probably your fault, you lazy white racist.
That, dear friends, is the story of working class England. I hope you enjoyed it.
Some might call it 'lived experience'
For those in it; it's an experience barely worth living.
The End
