The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #120427   Message #2621469
Posted By: theleveller
29-Apr-09 - 05:10 PM
Thread Name: BS: Is the new age of folk upon us?
Subject: RE: BS: Is the new age of folk upon us?
"it is a bit sweeping to say that only the working classes had grievances"

Indeed it is and that is not what I said - once again you are twisting what I say to try to fit in with your own opinions. What I said was: "Nor did they have the grievances to air that the 'common folk' had."

The grievances of the middle class were very different - often associated with property, taxation and religion.
Here is a passage from Hill's Liberty Against the Law:

"The Parliamentry electorate comprised a small minority of the population, and it seems that the majority were inarticulate....and though they did not write manifestos some of them managed during the revolutionary 1640s and 1650s to express points of view different from their betters. When I was young we used to be told that there was a great struggle for liberty in England. What has always worried me was that the question 'libery for whom' was never asked. 'Liberty and property' were always associated in the minds of Parliamentarian proagandists during the civil war and the propertied did, indeed, get liberty. But one man's liberty is another's slavery. A quite different English tradition, whose popularity is supported by its presence in so many ballads, held that the law is the enemy of freedom. It is this alternative tradition - or these altyernative traditions, for there is no single tradition - that I intend to look at."

Rifleman said: "Most assuredly I am not ignorant."

You have said nothing so far that demonstrates that.

Disagree with me, by all means, that's the whole point of a discussion, but justify your opinions with something other than your own prejudices and arrogance. As for patronising - perhaps you should read you own posts again.