Champagne Socialist Edit Meaning

1.

A champagne socialist is a derogatory label for a person who vocally and ideologically expresses support for democratic or radical socialist beliefs, but lives a lifestyle that contradicts these values.

Wealthy politicians, celebrities, academics, entrepeneurs and the refined urban middle-class are often accused of being champagne socialists.

Variations of this British term include "Limousine Liberal" in the USA, "Chardonnay Socialist" in Australia and New Zealand, "Gauche Caviar" in France, and the more obscure "salon Bolshevik".

"John Smith is a champagne socialist - he moans continually about capitalist greed, but have you seen the size of his house?"

2.

Billy Bragg, a folk-punk performer. Best known in England for espousing the virtues of being a working class man and then moving the fuck out of his blue collar 'hood in Essex asap. Certainly a fine musician, widely acclaimed for killer albums such as Back to Basics and his respectable tributes to Joe Strummer (of the only band that matters, the ClashTM), he is fond of "pontificating on a South London council estate when we all know he lives in a lovely big house in West Dorset".

GI Dave: OMG Billy Bragg! Dude, I'm your biggest fan!

SJ: OMG PLUS ME TOO!

GI Dave: You should come play at our school's music festival Culture Shock in April!

Billy Bragg: I would love to but unfortunately April is the month that I arbitrarily fire half of my waiting/serving staff at home and hire new servants that I can pay less. If Joe Strummer were alive I would recommend you to him because he squatted almost his whole life and definitely never lived in Dorset. However, he's dead so you'll probably have to go watch some totally unremarkable over-hyped hipster headliner for Culture Shock.

GI Dave: man, CL was totally right, you really are such a champagne socialist.

See billy bragg, essex, ldn, working class, joe strummer