chapotraphouse

Not a raging argument as such but still a opinion from a relative.

My mother in law does some off the books housekeeping work for an aristocratic family. They're the kind of upper class people who are utterly helpless when it comes to practical stuff and who can afford never to have learned to cook, clean and do laundry. My mother in law has assumed a weird kind of parental relation to the wife and talks a lot with her.

This Christmas my in-laws were going on and on about how poor these aristocrats were and how bad it was for them. My in-laws are as working class as it gets, they are both on disability, they don't own property, they've broken their bodies doing manual labour all their lives, they have to resort to off the books work and black market trading to enjoy just a little financial comfort and here they are feeling sad about the finances of someone who owns a fucking castle, a sizable amount of farmland and several rental properties. They can afford to serve their kid to some fancy foreign elite athletics school and to employ a housekeeper and I'm supposed to feel sorry for them for having no money?

False consciousness is one hell of a drug.