A class act?

Polly Toynbee’s piece in the Guardian this morning is what one might expect – telling us class is not dead in Britain and inequality is more of an issue than ever. Maybe so, but she still waxes lyrical about phenomena she doesn’t seem to understand. She writes:

“there was nothing cool about Sunday’s picture of Prince Harry’s girlfriend Chelsy holding a “chav” fancy dress party, where royal hangers-on dressed in (very expensive) shell suits, hoop earrings and gold necklaces. What’s hip about hoorays mocking their idea of the working class? The new classlessness is just the yob rich shedding all class embarrassment.”

If Polly Toynbee believes that ‘hoorays’ can’t discern between the cultural phenomena which are chavs and the genuine working classes then she’s either equally class-ignorant – or very arrogant.  I guess its class-mocking when the rich laugh at Shameless and Little Britain – but acceptable when everybody else does.