Seán Ruth and I wrote a pamphlet, Ending Class Oppression: A Draft Liberation Policy for Middle-Class People. It was published by Rational Island Publishers. 


More recently, we wrote a non-RC version: Class and Activism: The Role of the Middle Class. Among other things, it discusses how classism can spoil or prevent relationships and how it can get in the way of effective activism.


I have been selling and giving away this pamphlet in the Green Party of England and Wales and in my local Extinction Rebellion (XR) branch. People like it. Recently, because of the pamphlet, I was invited to do an in-person event for Bristol XR. There were thirty-seven of us attending. I had about an hour and a quarter of time—not long to cover such a subject!


I knew that most of the people present were in middle-class roles, whether or not they were raised that way. I decided not to get side-tracked into identity politics—I simply acknowledged that other oppressed identities can make people feel they aren’t part of the class system or are at the bottom of it. 


I said the following:


The class system is a massive driver of climate breakdown. It encourages greed as a motivation for action and encourages consumption as a way of numbing ourselves from pain, anger, and anxiety.


It’s not our fault. We were born into this system. We had to find a place in it. That applies to everyone, the richest and the poorest.


The ways we were hurt as young people typically left us with feelings of being small, powerless, and alone. This is a major factor in our vulnerability to hurting others. 


We were, and often still are, confused by the massive, inhuman systems in which we must find a place in order to survive. These systems are “the only game in town,” so we have to play it. 


This is true of all of us. The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Shell oil company is not inherently a worse person than someone who is poor. We have been manipulated into playing various roles in the class system. We were very young when the process began, and so we had to accept the lies that it offered us.


We split into pairs for the first listening exchange. I suggested they might talk about when they first were told that some people were “better” or “worse” in terms of money and resources than their own family, and what they felt about it. 


Then I said the following:


What is class? It’s not useful to think of it as putting different coloured marbles in different boxes, or getting too hung up on [preoccupied with] identity. Class is about how people are positioned in the economy and how that affects their life chances, their attitudes, and how others see and judge them. It’s about “better than” and “worse than.” It’s about how long you live. (I named two suburbs in Bristol, one predominantly poor and working-class and one affluent and middle-class, in which there are very different life expectancies.) It’s about economic inequality, inequality in power, and inequality in control over our working conditions. It’s about access to resources, including health care and education. It is about cultural differences. There’s a global class system, and class works differently in different countries. We are touching on a massive subject. As activists in the UK, it makes sense to focus on the country we’re in.


I described the three broad classes (owning class, middle class, working class). I said there are big differences of culture and income within each group, and in movement between them. I showed how working-class incomes may start higher than middle-class ones but typically plateau and then fall, when age or impairments make it impossible to carry on as before, and there’s no occupational pension. Middle-class incomes tend to rise over a lifetime and fall less abruptly after retirement. I spoke for five minutes. 


Next, we told our class stories in three-way sessions for a total of twenty minutes. Before that, a Co-Counsellor who was present came up front and gave me attention while I told my story as a model [demonstration]. As usual, there was a good enthusiastic noise during the exchanges, and people seemed to be listening to each other with interest.


Then I asked the following: 


• “Who has lost relationships because of class?” A couple of people described the divisions imposed on them as young people by streaming [students divided by academic ability] or being made to change schools.
• “What messages were you given about yourself and other people? What messages were you given about who’s ‘better’ or ‘worse’?” We agreed that climate activists sometimes think we are better than people who aren’t facing facts—and the people we talk to can probably tell [notice] we think that.
• “How can class affect your outreach? Who is it difficult to talk to?” Individuals told brief stories about mistakes and successes.

We came up with [produced] a list of ways to stop classist recordings interfering with our activism:


• Listen more than talk. No need to instruct people about the details of climate breakdown, unless they ask. They are already worried. Listen.
• Remember that other people know things we don’t know.
• Be interested in them as they are, unconditionally.
• Assume everyone wants you, just as you are.
• Be friendly and relaxed when you disagree, but no need to listen at length to conspiracy theories!
• Look out for [avoid] triggers [things that restimulate people]: In general, working-class people are told what to do by middle-class people, for example, by teachers and social workers.
• [In the UK] people who work hard can sometimes be triggered [restimulated] when activists engage in dancing or drumming. Ask what they think about it.

Listen to each other. Support each other. Mistakes are fine; we can share them and laugh.