Who will speak for the working class? Everyone, apart from the working class.
I say this because Owen Jones has been speaking up for the working class again, like a big hypocrite.
Who will speak for the working class? Everyone, apart from the working class. Brendan O’Neil on the members of the 1pc posing as proles: https://t.co/XL2xZFj3Er
— Fraser Nelson (@FraserNelson) August 29, 2018
This week, he’s had a bee in his bonnet about the lack of opportunities for working class people within journalism. He’s suggested that the prevalence of unpaid internships, and expensive degrees, makes journalism one of the most exclusive professions.
The national media is riddled with unpaid internships – with no promise of a paid job after working for free – and ripoff postgraduate degrees are a critical gateway in. Most can't afford to do either which is why *the actual data* shows it's one of the most exclusive professions https://t.co/FTnkpF4Rh4
— Owen Jones (@OwenJones84) August 29, 2018
And although he might have a totally valid point, backed up by statistics, that point is invalidated because he himself isn’t working class. He’s actually a rich author, having sold lots of books. The rich author Owen Jones, believe it or not, inherited the Guardian column of the poor non-author Owen Jones when he started selling lots of books. Owen Jones, it could be argued, is directly responsible for a working class journalist (his younger self) losing a job in journalism.
How might one define working class, anyway? It’s very difficult to do, but that won’t stop me trying. I wonder, does Mr Jones like mushy peas; carp fishing; saying “Ey up” to his mates; training his pet kestrel until his brother kills it; dying of a preventable disease; Antiques Roadshow? Does he buy scratch cards? Enjoy a bit of “How’s yer father”? Call strangers love/duck/treacle/corncob/cocker/Terry? Know his local colloquial term for a ginnel/snicket? Work darn t’pit and come home covered in soot, where his partner has prepared him a hot tin bath in front of the hearth? Does he do other things I imagine the working class do that I just thought of off the top of my head?
Exactly. Owen Jones is and does none of these things, I’m guessing. Owen Jones is not working class, but he tries to speak for them. This is hypocritical. He is rich, and if he’s anything like me (also rich) he will have zero empathy for anyone other than himself. So what’s he doing trying to help others? I just don’t get it.
In my book, the only people who should speak up for the working class is the working class. But I won’t be listening because I don’t know any, and they don’t have a media platform so I probably wouldn’t hear them anyway. And if I did listen to them, they’d probably be moaning about something because of the politics of jealousy.
You see, if you’re middle class and speak for the working class, you’re a hypocrite. If you’re working class and speak for the working class you’re jealous. Nobody should speak for the working class. Because their problems are not mine, and I don’t want to be bothered with them.
