The white working class is dehumanised, even in death

If you want an example of just how bad classism is in the UK, look up the name ‘Paul Lumber’ on social media. You will see lots of jokes, laughing emojis and snide remarks about a man’s death. Why? Because Lumber suffered fatal injuries after falling from a ladder while hanging flags near his south Bristol home in November.

Lumber was a prominent figure in and around Bristol. He shot to wider prominence after writing several books about his time as a ‘football casual’, specifically for Bristol City’s notorious ‘City Service Firm’ in the 1980s. I have known hundreds of working-class men just like Paul, most working-class communities know a ‘Paul’, too – outspoken, patriotic and enjoys recounting a war story or two about football.

His death has exposed the cruel and the dehumanising aspects of the class system. Because Paul had fundraised money from his local community to buy flags for the ‘Raise the Colours’ campaign, when it emerged in early December that he had been pronounced dead, the response on social media was grim. There was an outpouring of gloating, with many commenters claiming this was ‘Darwinism in action’ or ‘karma’.

There have been many hours and column inches handwringing about the motivation behind these flags. Some have called the flag flying unwelcome, and even racist. Although I am not a patriotic flag waver, I know that for most people in these communities the flags have been a welcome sight. Where I live, in Nottinghamshire, the flags are on every lamppost throughout the county. Despite claims that the flags are ‘xenophobic’, there has been no increase in racism. Speaking to people about the flags, most have enjoyed them, and think they have cheered up many communities that have suffered serious decline over years. They have brightened up some of the poorest neighbourhoods and empty, dilapidated high streets.

The fears and the arguments against Raise the Colours were never really about the flags – they were against the people who were raising them. The white, working class has always been feared by the middle class. It is the fear of the mob, which in the middle-class imagination is racist, uncontrollable and violent, and whose patriotism must always be viewed with suspicion. You can see this in the unashamed cruelty and derision towards Paul Lumber, even in death, especially from those who think of themselves as virtuous.

This kind of contempt for the working class is nothing new. We saw it rise around the 2016 Brexit referendum, when it became clear that the deindustrialised areas of the UK had voted to leave the EU. The levels of class prejudice at the time were shocking. White working-class men were viewed as little more than knuckle-dragging animals.

These narratives are as damaging as they are nasty. It is no coincidence that white working-class children underperform in the education system, and are most likely to struggle in finding decent employment, or that some of the poorest communities in the country are likely to have high percentages of white working-class people living in them. If you dehumanise groups of people, whether they are white or black, it is easy to victim-blame them, remove and withhold resources from them, and allow inequalities to be justified.

When a man dies from his injuries because he was hanging the national flag from lampposts, and the middle-class response is laughter and joy, how is that not the same dehumanisation we see from the far right when refugees die in the sea? In Britain, the class prejudice of our elites has been given a free pass for far too long.

Lisa McKenzie is a working-class academic.