April 17, 2008
-
Memes
I don’t Meme often, but Fibermom tagged me, and then she posted another nicely interesting one. So.
7 Unusual Things about me (Iteration unknown).
- I am determined to read all of the “1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die”. This is doing grand things for the quality of my reading matter.
- While I am a member of the Carlton Club, politically I am both a Libertarian and Undecided. I have a sneaking admiration for Margaret Thatcher, and I think Boris Johnson is great. I ought to be a dyed-in-the-wool, true-blue Tory, but really, I’m a bit of a Socialist at heart.
- I have been on Facebook ever since it first opened up to the UK. It was really boring until about May last year, when everyone suddenly joined.
- I don’t do running, or jogging. My natural distance is the fifty-yard-cross-rugby-pitch dash. However, I’ve signed up for a Race For Life (message me if you’d like to sponsor me, and I’ll send you the relevant link).
- I work in an office that’s entirely male from Wednesday to Friday. I counteract this by decorating my noticeboard with a batch of pink fluffy fairy lights. They have been electrically safety tested.
- My education was almost entirely funded by winning scholarships. It was a shock to the system to do a Masters degree and actually have to pay the full fees.
- The vast majority of men will not apologise for coming out with the most appalling language in front of me. They will, however, suddenly start apologising if another woman appears.
The meme below comes from What Privileges Do You Have?, based on an exercise about class and privilege developed by Will Barratt, Meagan Cahill, Angie Carlen, Minnette Huck, Drew Lurker, Stacy Ploskonka at Illinois State University.
If you participate in this blog game, they ask that you PLEASE acknowledge their copyright. To participate, copy and paste…then unbold my responses to make your own.
Bold the items that apply to you:
1. Father went to college
2. Father finished college
3. Mother went to college
4. Mother finished college
5. Have any relative who is an attorney, physician, or professor
6. Were the same or higher class than your high school teachers.
7. Had more than 50 books in your childhood home.
8. Had more than 500 books in your childhood home. We made good use of the library.
9. Were read children’s books by a parent.
10. Had lessons of any kind before you turned 18
11. Had more than two kinds of lessons before you turned 18
12. The people in the media who dress and talk like me are portrayed positively.
13. Had a credit card with your name on it before you turned 18.
14. Your parents (or a trust) paid for the majority of your college costs.
15. Your parents (or a trust) paid for all of your college costs.
16. Went to a private high school
17. Went to summer camp
18. Had a private tutor before you turned 18 I had extra French for a while at A-Level – it was either that, or have a nervous breakdown.
19. Family vacations involved staying at hotels Sometimes: but mostly not.
20. Your clothing was all bought new before you turned 18
21. Your parents bought you a car that was not a hand-me-down from them
22. There was original art in your house when you were a child One piece was/is by Mum.
23. You and your family lived in a single-family house
24. Your parent(s) owned their own house or apartment before you left home
25. You had your own room as a child
26. You had a phone in your room before you turned 18
27. Participated in a SAT/ACT prep course
28. Had your own TV in your room in high school
29. Owned a mutual fund or IRA in high school or college
30. Flew anywhere on a commercial airline before you turned 16
31. Went on a cruise with your family
32. Went on more than one cruise with your family
33. Your parents took you to museums and art galleries as you grew up.
34. You were unaware of how much heating bills were for your family.Yes, I am privileged. And jolly aware of it too. I am exceedingly lucky….xxx
Comments (3)
Don’t read all them books Jane! I want you to LIVE!!!!!
Thanks for playing! It is an interesting one, isn’t it? We have my mother’s original art in the house, too. And here I had the impression that the government sponsored higher education in the UK.
@fibermom - Well, I was lucky: I was the last to go through with my Local Education Authority sponsoring my Undergraduate degree. Anything more than that, and I believe you paid anyhow. Now, however, the Labour Goverment that came to power in 1997 has imposed tuition fees (which have trebled, at least, in cost since 1997) and taken away the Student Grant system – you get a Loan instead. This I find deeply hypocritical, as a. part of their manifesto was to oppose the introduction of tuition fees and b. every last man jack of them who had any sort of Higher Education had been the beneficiary of a Student Grant (i.e. given money to support their living costs) and had not had to pay tuition fees. I can’t remember if they turned the Government Assisted Place Scheme for private high school education over, or not. That was handy: instead of going to State School, if you got a place at a private school, and your parental income was below a certain level, and you hadn’t won a scholarship, then you could get state assistance. Bizarrely, this was something that the Tory government had brought in: I’d always assumed that it was a Labour thing.
I think it was round about the age of 18 that I started getting a bit Very Socialist round the edges. It wore off when I started working…and completely wore off when the Socialist Alliance became the Respect Party under George Galloway (I can’t stick him!).
~x~