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Comments on the class war
'All of us want to live in a society in which opportunities are open to all. What stinks about Prescott's vision is that he wants to make sure that if one kid can't have something, nobody else will get it either…..'
People such as journalists are very keen on these generalisations about what we all want. I don't. I would just like to live in a world in which people like me were not deprived of all the opportunities which they might have if left alone.
'The class war is over.'
It isn't over. It is just that only one side, the majority side, is allowed to strike any blows and has ideological weapons. The other side has its hands tied behind its back and can do nothing but retreat into increasingly unfavourable positions.
'We have left behind, thank goodness, a Britain in which someone receives respect because of who their parents were or how they talk or which school they attended.'
You really mean to thank goodness that we have left behind any possibility of any individuality being respected?
'Boys who went to Eton tend nowadays to conceal the fact rather than boast about it, lest it damage their career prospects.
That's what you mean by the class war being over? That your career prospects can be damaged by your social origins?
'All that matters nowadays is that effort and ability should have their chances, and be rewarded.'
This is rubbish. Effort and ability are recognised as an indication of the wrong social antecedents, and punished, not rewarded.
'We want our children to have the best, and to be the best.'
You mean that there must be no one better? So of course standards must decline to the lowest possible level, as they already have done, and continue to do.
(Words in quotation marks from article in Daily Mail, 20 December 2005, entitled 'Return of the class warrior' by Max Hastings ).
Celia Green
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