[Jack_]

Originally Posted by Oliver_W

What opportunities are some people missing out on, and why?

A working class white boy from a single-parent family and a failing school in Bradford will never have the same access to opportunities that a middle class white girl from a nuclear family and attending a private school in Chelsea will. Whether it's access to extra curricular tutoring, a better-performing school with fewer internal issues, a better locality that isn't a hotbed of crime and/or anti-social behaviour, exposure to a wider and richer vocabulary, as well as high art, or being well-travelled. All of these things and more have a significant impact in later life.

Yes, there are ALWAYS exceptions to the rule, no doubt there will be people who respond to this with their own anecdotes. But that's all they are, exceptions to the rule. In general terms, one's background, social status, cultural and social capital, financial (in)stability, geographic location (both on a national and international scale), and often gender, ethnicity and (dis)ableism - or all or some of these at their intersections play a huge and undeniable role in one's life chances. To pretend otherwise is disingenuous.

Originally Posted by Alf

I never thought I'd ever vote Tory when I was around your age, but at the last election, I saw no other option. Don't get me wrong, I'm no fan of May, but there was no other option for me.

Didn't you once say you'd never voted Labour though? Or was that someone else? Because if so, I don't think we're starting from the same position.

Originally Posted by Oliver_W

Even when I was "left wing" I still believed in things like flat+low taxes, capped immigration, and maintaining the countryside. I guess it didn't occur to me that letting people keep the money they earn, not overcrowding ourselves, and environmental conservation fell on either side of the political scale

That sounds like a centrist.

It always makes me laugh when I hear people who are passionate about conserving the environment also being proponents of capitalism. You cannot be a capitalist and care about the environment. It's a walking contradiction, and misses the fundamental link between environmental damage and the pursuit of capital at any cost.