Electronic Music is for Chavs.

[clifford_-]

As clothes they came from sports, them as fashion items came from Hip Hop. Nobody was rocking their Dunlops to Ronnie Scotts in the 60s...

I disagree with this, the mods were rocking fred perrys and dunlop tennis trainers in the 60s....!

[leyenda]

It's not just based on wealth though. Go back 7ish years or so and it was kinda fashionable to dress like a chav (my school was a bit of an anomaly as it was a grammar school you got a greater mix of wealth background than a normal state school or a private school). It was mostly the kids who wanted to appear as if they were hard who dressed like it. The ones who got kicked out, no matter what their daddy was earning, dressed like that. Some of them even came from fucking Sandbanks which is one of the most pricey bits of real estate in the world. Take it back 2 years before that and everyone was wearing skater clothes because it was fashionable including those who would turn into the chavs. It was always a fashion thing to me more than anything else. No different to how you have people from all different backgrounds dressing like hipsters now.

[BonerJams04]

used to think the same thing when i was 11-14 or so
before that had a few Kiss FM compilations which were starting to head me down the right track but then it went downhill, became some fucking idiot child listening to stuff like Limp Bizkit and Korn when UK Garage was at its peak, wish i could go back in time and slap myself

Same story here :/

[JBoy]

As clothes they came from sports, them as fashion items came from Hip Hop. Nobody was rocking their Dunlops to Ronnie Scotts in the 60s...

I disagree with this, the mods were rocking fred perrys and dunlop tennis trainers in the 60s....!

Yeah but mod culture doesnt really have anything to do with chav culture

[kay]

They're all cultures and labels.

Deep down it's all apeman tribal instincts.

[clifford_-]

As clothes they came from sports, them as fashion items came from Hip Hop. Nobody was rocking their Dunlops to Ronnie Scotts in the 60s...

I disagree with this, the mods were rocking fred perrys and dunlop tennis trainers in the 60s....!

Yeah but mod culture doesnt really have anything to do with chav culture

you could say theres many similarity's...

working class, mostly white, but quite often a mixture of races, a problem with authority, mopeds, dressing in designer clothes mostly for the lables, do i need to go on?

mods were the original chavs.....

[magma]

As clothes they came from sports, them as fashion items came from Hip Hop. Nobody was rocking their Dunlops to Ronnie Scotts in the 60s...

I disagree with this, the mods were rocking fred perrys and dunlop tennis trainers in the 60s....!

Yeah but mod culture doesnt really have anything to do with chav culture

Hmm, I'd say there was a fair old lineage there - Cliff's pretty on point... working class culture from an awful lot of the same areas and social situations. Most of the lynchpins of 'Chav culture' didn't exist back them, but Mods were driving modified cars and scooters in the same ways that Chavs do today... society doesn't stop and start afresh every decade or so, it's a continuum.

Cliff's sportswear comment is right too and crossed my mind yesterday, but I stopped short because it was always a very British take and the watch-word was always "Smart" as a direct reaction to the Hippies and Punks and included lots of shirts, proper trousers, braces and even tailored suits. Mods might have been going out to kick the shit out of each other, but their Mums thought they looked well presented as they walked out the door - a very British uniform... HipHop fashion had more in common with Punk in that as considered and careful as its looks were, it was a massive middle finger to Mums - "You're not going out like that, you look like a bloody hoodlum!"

edit: or race. when people misuse the word or intend on using it as an insult they are just being ignorant. that isn't endemic of anything other than people being ignorant, which we can all agree we don't like but also that it probably won't go away.. so this is kind of socio-philosophic wishful thinking at its most redundant.
sorry Magma

Again, I agree from a personal point of view. Chav can be used as a perfectly positive term, just like the right person can make the N-Word a positive term, but the ignorance you mention is widespread and has root causes... in the same way that it's not particularly progressive to keep the N-Word in society's vocabulary because it perpetuates the ignorant use as well as the "positive/conscious" use, I think it's time we probably started to think about retiring Chav. We won't, obviously, it's just a point for discussion... you're absolutely right that it stems from ignorance, but that doesn't mean it should be ignored.

Scally strikes me as a little bit more lighthearted and much more acceptable... a scallywag is badly behaved and mischievous, but he's not the scum of the earth and he's likely regarded to be lovable and intelligent, at the very least quick-witted and with a flare for winning against the odds - similar to the classic Cockney Sparrow. It's not a wholly negative association. "The Chav" has been turned into the scum of the earth by constant abuse from society for over a decade now, largely thanks to Chavscum.co.uk... it's a different beast...

They're all cultures and labels.

Deep down it's all apeman tribal instincts.

Very much so... but you could equally say the same about disliking fans of a rival football team or style of music (harmless) all the way to holding a race in slavery (harmful)... most human behaviour boils down to instinct, especially the instinct to raise our own and our family/friends' standing in society... but it doesn't mean that all the behaviours should be treated the same.

I'd better do some work. The list of people I need to buy a pint at System is growing.

[clifford_-]

ill have one if your getting a round in, mines a dragon sto....... oh wait

[noam]

we call em 'scallies' in manchester cos of the word 'scallywag' and fuck off i live in wythenshawe i know a fuckin scally when i see/hear one

its a way of behaving and an attitude that you dont lose by swapping trackies for designer gear or by rediscovering 'th' instead of 'ver'

i have an inner-scally, but i keep him in check, bless him...

Shaw mandem, Woodhouse park & Benchill soldiers 4 lyfe

posh wythenshawe mate - baguley...

used to live on jolly butcher/shady lane estate, now we moved across the road, social climbin n dat G

[kay]

They're all cultures and labels.

Deep down it's all apeman tribal instincts.

Very much so... but you could equally say the same about disliking fans of a rival football team or style of music (harmless) all the way to holding a race in slavery (harmful)... most human behaviour boils down to instinct, especially the instinct to raise our own and our family/friends' standing in society... but it doesn't mean that all the behaviours should be treated the same.

I'd better do some work. The list of people I need to buy a pint at System is growing.

I think that's where we differ slightly in viewpoints. I view ALL of these behaviours as being the same and having the same root causes. There are no fundamental differences between ostracising/labelling people who dress differently, people listen to particular types of music, people who come from specific backgrounds or races or have different sexual preferences, or ultimately even bullying the new kid or nerd in the school playground. The only differences are the extents to which such ostracisation is taken to. But, it all boils down to "You are different from me, and I don't like it" or "You are not in my pack. Foe."

And that is what needs fixing/changing. As long as that mentality persists somewhere, labels will persist and nothing ever changes. Great strides have been made in the last 100 years towards changing the mentality towards specific instances (racism, homophobicity, gender equality), but society is still pervaded by seemingly low-level labelling which is taken as acceptable because it is supposedly relatively harmless. However, as history has shown, it does not take much to bring something from the level of jovial fun-poking to full-blown anger, hatred and violence.

We agree that this is a bad thing and needs to be stamped out. The only question, really, is how to go about eradicating this mentality completely. Is it due to cultural/environmental factors or is it hardwired into our genes? Some parts of society find such behaviour abhorrent, so we know that at least part of humanity does not have it hardwired or that the hardwiring can be overridden in some people. A cultural/environmental change would be much easier/quicker to effect, compared to a change in the genetic make-up.

Of course, there is another ethical/philosophical question to ask: Who are we, the ones who see such behaviour as being deplorable, to say that such behaviour is unacceptable? It's almost the ultimate question of "Us vs Them".

[Laszlo]

I'm going to pipe up at this point with a super worth while post saying "Kay is on point".

Thank you, that is all.

Oh, actually, if you want something to bond us all we need something we can all hate together.... alien invasion?

[Laszlo]

Of course, there is another ethical/philosophical question to ask: Who are we, the ones who see such behaviour as being deplorable, to say that such behaviour is unacceptable? It's almost the ultimate question of "Us vs Them".

I've often wondered about this sort of thing. 'Right' and 'wrong', 'good' and 'bad'. The value of morality. Who decides what is 'right' when, most of the time, judgment is based on feelings and not logic/empirical evidence. An example being the U.K governments decision on drugs policy being contrary to the scientists recommendations.
Perhaps an unwarranted tangent best left for the random thoughts thread

[noam]

its a frequently asked question in philosophy and translates to real life in a way not many philosophical issues do, even down to the actions of police, courts/judges/judicial system and questions concerning moral relativism and other cultures i.e. the way we would look at say, Islamic Fundamentalism and find fault in the treatment of women

fact is, you're dealing with questions that concern the well-being of people in general but there will always be massive area's of grey - with a population in the UK of nearly 70million thats a lot of people to consider and you have to prepare to deal with non-scientific/non-factual answers... i.e. put up with and accept the grey and work with it, society and culture is always changing and moral and ethical thinking must change with it or risk alienating everyone

[Laszlo]

Times may change but standards must remain.

[noam]

nice phrase but i disagree

[phrex]

Times may change but standards must remain.

you really think so? or did i just not read the context of this?

[kay]

its a frequently asked question in philosophy and translates to real life in a way not many philosophical issues do, even down to the actions of police, courts/judges/judicial system and questions concerning moral relativism and other cultures i.e. the way we would look at say, Islamic Fundamentalism and find fault in the treatment of women

fact is, you're dealing with questions that concern the well-being of people in general but there will always be massive area's of grey - with a population in the UK of nearly 70million thats a lot of people to consider and you have to prepare to deal with non-scientific/non-factual answers... i.e. put up with and accept the grey and work with it, society and culture is always changing and moral and ethical thinking must change with it or risk alienating everyone

I begin to think I should've studied philosphy instead.

However, my posts would probably be even longer and more boring.

I think I will have to read more on the subject. Not quite serious philosophy, but I'm quite enjoying Ursala Le Guin's "Dispossessed" which has as its premise an almost completely anarchic society.

[phrex]

i'm studying philosophy.





you will hate logics

[noam]

yeh i hated Logic it sucked balls, was actually fairly good at it but just hated learning it and fell asleep in lectures and seminars every week

[kay]

A friend did philosophy and he'd occasionally try to tell us stuff he'd learnt. He was dead keen on logic. Bored the shit out of me. I could do it, but I'm really lazy that way.