William and Catherine, Prince and Princess of Wales

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#26,881
A1aGypsy said:
We might all be playing a game of semantics. How do you define class system?
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dictionary definition of peasant

a poor farmer of low social status who owns or rents a small piece of land for cultivation (chiefly in historical use or with reference to subsistence farming in poorer countries).
"peasants left the farms to work in industry"

Do you think Katherine or William would classify her parents in this way?
 
#26,884
sdkitty said:
I think this conversation started with that.....post #26,866
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Okay, but you asked me? I was trying to find common ground, with someone else.

To answer your question, I do imagine, given some of their actions, the Middletons are very class conscious and taught their children as such but they would see themselves in a higher social class now given their proximity to the Crown.
 
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#26,892
sdkitty said:
dictionary definition of peasant

a poor farmer of low social status who owns or rents a small piece of land for cultivation (chiefly in historical use or with reference to subsistence farming in poorer countries).
"peasants left the farms to work in industry"

Do you think Katherine or William would classify her parents in this way?
Click to expand...
Well her family aren’t peasantry - they owned ancestral properties and hosted the royal family. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Middleton_family&wprov=rarw1
This idea she is working class is part of the fairytale marriage myth making.

Her parents have also been elevated to a higher status of nobility by virtue of her marriage. She herself changed social status through her marriage and her husband’s change in the line of succession more than once.

The royal family has a social order and ranking based on succession (to the extent we’ve heard multiple stories of 2nd sons or occasionally daughters spending their entire lives stewing in resentment) but they can completely divorce that when looking at people who are their ‘subjects’? Ok.

People seem really hung up on this word peasant. Tough, it’s what the vast majority of the world is. The idea it’s associated with idiocy is an example of elitist snobbery which is what I was conveying in my original comment while implying the irony that for all their expensive tax-paid education the BRF are total philistines. I’ve made a similar joke about Andrew putting his cigs out on their personal Rembrandts before.

If you don’t like the word peasant why not substitute it with subjects? Taxes are still paid to the royal family for the upkeep of their personal property because the British are their subjects and are subject to the crown. Even if you no longer work in a field it’s still fuedalism.
 
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#26,893
Bagatha Christie said:
Well her family aren’t peasantry - they owned ancestral properties and hosted the royal family. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Middleton_family&wprov=rarw1
This idea she is working class is part of the fairytale marriage myth making.

Her parents have also been elevated to a higher status of nobility by virtue of her marriage. She herself changed social status through her marriage and her husband’s change in the line of succession more than once.

The royal family has a social order and ranking based on succession (to the extent we’ve heard multiple stories of 2nd sons or occasionally daughters spending their entire lives stewing in resentment) but they can completely divorce that when looking at people who are their ‘subjects’? Ok.

People seem really hung up on this word peasant. Tough, it’s what the vast majority of the world is. The idea it’s associated with idiocy is an example of elitist snobbery which is what I was conveying in my original comment while implying the irony that for all their expensive tax-paid education the BRF are total philistines. I’ve made a similar joke about Andrew putting his cigs out on their personal Rembrandts before.

If you don’t like the word peasant why not substitute it with subjects? Taxes are still paid to the royal family for the upkeep of their personal property because the British are their subjects and are subject to the crown. Even if you no longer work in a field it’s still fuedalism.
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The relationship between taxes and upkeep of royal family isn’t that straightforward. I’m also not aware of taxes going towards personal property of the royal family - my understanding was the RF personally paid for upkeep of Sandringham and Balmoral.
 
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#26,894
Daily Mail are reporting Marlborough College has been chosen for the Cambridge children. Kind of thought the move to Windsor was a strong indication George would go to Eton, but presumably not if the Mail are correct.
 
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