IT, JARVIS? RECLAIMING CHAV

WORDS BY MORGAN MCMILLAN IMAGE BY TILLY ROBERTS

The word ‘chav’ was birthed in a town in Kent called ‘chavs’. The McCanns, however, were from a ‘respectable’ Chatham and became mainstream in the 1970s as locals background - they were both doctors and middle-class, and would refer to the working class residents of Chatham as were enjoying a holiday in Portugal with their middle-class chavs. It was a derogatory term used against the working friends. The media deemed this child more newsworthy class for their mannerisms and outfits. When researching than Shannon Matthews, whose mum was constantly what a chav is, you will often find it defined as referring to under spotlight in the media for her appearance. In the someone who is working class, wears branded sportswear, nine days following their disappearances, there were 465 exhibits loud and violent behaviour, and also uses Jamaican press stories on Madeleine, compared to only 242 about patois in their slang. Shannon, proving the classism in the media. More evidence The word chav is frequently used by the media with found – £20,000 for Shannon, compared to £2.6 million for seemingly no repercussions, despite it being a derogatory Madeleine. These children were both abducted, but due to term to describe the working class. Sketches like Little their class their lives held different values. Even when it was Britain’s Vicky Pollard exemplify what the public perceive discovered that Shannon’s mother had staged the whole a chav to be. Pollard is a young working class woman who abduction, the media still focused upon her class and how has had ‘6 kids with 7 different men’. Whilst watching Little it was a prime example of a ‘chav’ trying to con the system, Britain, we are confronted with the use of the word chav and despite the fact that the McCanns have made thousands of laugh at the expense of serious working class issues. Vicky pounds from the disappearance of their child. is violent and had her first child at “12”; we laugh at this, despite knowing that the idea of a 12-year-old having a child These examples show the harmful nature of using the is worrying. word ‘chav’. The more we use the word. the more antiThe word chav diminishes the fact that working class Allowing the term ‘chav’ to flourish only enables the upper individuals are more prone to teen pregnancies and violence classes to laugh at the expense of the working class, whilst due to the direct link between poverty and a poor education. also making the lives of those who are not working class This is most evident in a recent survey which showed that by more important than the lives of those from working class the age of 11, only 3/4 of children from the poorest fifth of backgrounds. families reach the expected level of education by the end of Primary school, compared to 97% of children who reach this level from the richest fifth of families. Though this statistic is worrying and shows that children in poverty have fewer opportunities than the rich, we still laugh at the expense of the working class.

The media helps to further push the chav caricature, as demonstrated by comparing the media’s response to the Madeleine McCann disappearance with the response to the disappearance of Shannon Matthews. The Shannon Matthews case has now been solved, but the media’s portrayal of Shannon was vastly different to their portrayal of Madeleine. When the story of Shannon’s disappearance was released, the media paid an excessive amount of attention to her background, focusing on how she was from a council estate and her mum had multiple kids with multiple different men. Her mum and her family were deemed is shown in The Sun’s offered award for the children being working class sentiment we are spreading without realising.