What was most revealing to me when I saw the documentary was the world of the "old rich". I think I'd always assumed that I could, chameleon-like, fit in to any social class if necessary. I hadn't realized how foreign that world was to me and how much of a sore thumb I would be in it. Really, a different world.

You never SAW conversations end so fast as when I explained that I was a technical writer, not an analyst. I was bearing The Dreaded Production-Class Cooties.

Heh. It's very interesting to see reactions to the answer "Where do you work" when you work for the Giant Software Company I do. People from the area ask "Full-time or contract?", while a lot of people outside the immediate area assume I'm one of those software millionaires they've read about.

(Also, I agree the games are a little silly and obvious--I think the site was designed for teachers to use with students.)

Chintz vs. Shag said I was ecclectic and made it nervous and would I please take the test again.

I remember back in 10th grade, one of the teachers asked what class each of us thought we were in. Now this was the only public highschool in town, and the only private schools were religious ones, so unless you were shipping your kids off to prep school, they went through this high school. Everyone said middle class. The kids who were expecting to get new cars when they got their drivers' licenses, the ones who were living with grandparents because their folks hadn't had a job in years (~30% unemployment in that town at the time, so that wasn't terribly uncommon), all of us.

I eventually started using "I'm job-free at the moment" and then explaining that I was looking for work in X or whatever it was at the time.

I think i could do this now, but at the time I had just figured out that the career I'd been preparing myself for for 4 years was not for me, and I didn't know what I was going to do next. Big old black pit of despair to start, with standard small talk shovelling coals on my head.

It built character, I'm sure.

Chintz vs. Shag said I was ecclectic and made it nervous and would I please take the test again.

Oh, now I have to take it again and see if I can get this answer.

Well this is part of the problem in America - without clearly defined classes people don't know where they fit. For loads of people the assumption is that they should be living at a standard higher than they are based on their idea of what class they are. Therefore unsatisfied and disgruntled populace. resentment and a culture of victims gets developed. the lines between wealth, lineage, talent, fame, notiriaty are all blurred and a generation or more of people are stubbling around feeling lost and uncomfortable in their own lives.

I had almost no class consciousness growing up. I remember being impressed because our family doctor had a Cadillac - he was the only person I knew that I considered "rich."

Also, some farmers could be quite wealthy and others could be on the verge of bankruptcy and there was usually no way of telling (except my dad was on the loan committe of our locally-owned bank, so he knew) - because almost all of a rich farmer's net worth would be tied up in land, livestock, buildings and equipment. I knew a family who owned five farms with a net worth of over a million dollars - they dressed like all the other farmers and drove beat-up cars until they fell apart.

Chintz vs. Shag said I could probably get ringside seats to the WWF. I don't know if that makes me high-class or not.