A recent post by another teacher on social media expressed the hope that children supposedly being “deprived” of their education by lockdown will use the opportunity to learn about wider life experiences, and the growth to be gained from appreciating simple and immediate things, such as the natural world, the value of human relationships, creative activities, basic domesticity and cultivating one’s inner awareness. In a wider sense, it suggested, perhaps those who are learning this are not “falling behind” – but are in fact ahead of the rest.

It was followed by predictable comments about this being “all very well for the privileged middle classes” – which seems to be becoming the default criticism of anything that does not meet the approval of a certain right-on sector of the profession, and indeed society more widely.

It increasingly strikes me that there is a huge hypocrisy going on here, which – well-meaning or not – actually serves to perpetuate the social divisions that such people claim to decry. It is based on the assumption that everyone else subscribes – or should subscribe – to the aspirations of those expressing them, and that if they don’t then they are to be pitied or fretted about.

Such views are in themselves a form of social condescension; charitably, perhaps an expression of bleeding-heart guilt at the motor of middle-class social climbing, but which in the process serves to embed perceived social exclusion in those not able or not wishing to follow them. Even if I am wrong about this, the plight of the under-privileged is, in any case, surely not the only benchmark against which everything should be judged, any more than is the achievement of middle-class values the only indicator of success.

Many of the ‘simple’ things mentioned in the original comment actually have very little to do with middle class privilege; it struck me that most of them would be eminently realisable in the average African village, and it is perhaps not beyond the realm of credibility to suggest that people in such a place might indeed know more about the simple pleasures of life than many in the West credit. There have been plenty of studies suggesting that, barring the presence of food shortages, conflict, natural disasters or ill health, happiness levels often hold up quite well in the materially poorer parts of the world, perhaps even better than in places where Status Anxiety is more rife. The belief that it cannot but be otherwise is itself a privileged middle-class conceit.

In just the same way, it is entirely a middle-class conceit to believe that “poor people” in this country inevitably suffer from not being able to access the hyper-competitive, hyper-materialistic world of those who occupy it. I would not for a moment wish to underestimate the impact of real deprivation and hardship where it exists, but reaction to this serious problem is in danger of becoming used as little more than an inverted expression of middle-class angst, or a form of virtue signalling. I suspect that ‘the poor’ may suffer as much from the effects of the social pressures that such attitudes apply, than from their own circumstances. Happiness is largely a product of relative expectations.

When it comes to education, who are really the deprived? Middle-class servitude to high levels of material consumption – large vehicles, large mortgages and the large incomes needed to service them – are also a form of slavery, and those in hoc to it see education as little more than the process of validation needed to ensure their offspring continue in it. I have seen too many bad effects of hot-housing and competitive parenting to believe that it is only benign; and the cries of children ‘falling behind’ with their education are only based on assumptions of what is “not behind”, that are dictated entirely by the exam calendar and achieving the “right” (exam) results to ensure they can progress to the next stage of the conveyor belt, and ultimately to their own position in the social pecking-order. Those doing the complaining often seem to be those most locked-in to the hot-housing mentality – and perhaps least able to see the harm it can cause; the hysteria with which they often react is, to me, more indicative of those addicted to Status Anxiety than those of an excessively tolerant disposition.

Education in the U.K. (if not elsewhere) has long been dominated by middle-class social climbing, and it seems at least as bad now as ever. Widespread assumptions about the nature and necessity of education are themselves culturally dependent, and still remain driven by the societal advances that it can deliver, rather than any kind of self-development.

The teaching profession is just as guilty of this as the materially better-rewarded parts of the middle class – and their concern is now compounded by the pressures brought to bear by a system that determines their own career and income prospects by crude measures of exam outcomes.

The problem is, by perpetuating angst about Status Anxiety, and stressing about things that may compromise it, those doing it both exaggerate the divides between those who do and don’t subscribe to it and perpetuate their own captivity to a set of values that may not be as beneficial as they believe. And then they compound the matter further by insisting that there is no other valid perspective. This is not, of course, to suggest that formal education is not important, nor that the loss of specific tuition, for example in basic skills such as literacy is not seriously concerning – but there is still more to education than that.

It may be that early appreciation of “the simple life” came from privileged and rather precious members of the Very Rich who had little concept of what it really means. But that does not need to diminish the concept itself; there is plenty from cultures around the world to suggest that the deluded ones are those who continuously chase material advancement, whereas true fulfilment lies in much simpler and more eternal truths, the rediscovery of which the slowing of our hyperactive world may indeed have created space for. This need not only be possible in overheated, over-anxious middle-class environments; indeed, it may be more possible elsewhere. Who are the real prisoners here?

The most regrettable thing for me is that Education has been not only misappropriated by those in society who advance its use for fuelling Affluenza, but that that now includes the educational establishment itself. One might have hoped that it would not have sold its soul in this way and would have retained more enlightened and pluralistic views about its purpose. For me, education has always been about liberating people to make their own informed decisions about life, not about tying them into a socio-economic rat-race that does at least as much harm to people’s wellbeing as good.

If we set aside the sometimes-precious tones of those who are suggesting that lockdown may not, in general, be as educationally catastrophic as others are claiming, then the message may be worth considering. As with everything, this should be a chance for reflection: does education as it currently is, have its objectives, processes and methods right? Or should we at least be considering more fairly the alternative views? To my mind, the dogmatism with which they are currently being rejected is itself evidence of the failure of education as presently configured to develop sufficient open-mindedness with respect to what is really desirable in life.

As I said, who are really deprived?