When people talk about being classy, they usually aren’t classy. One thing you need to know about classiness is the fact that it comes naturally from the people you were raised with. You can call me an ignorant idiot, but what would that make you for calling me that based on only my opinion?
If you are born with no class, you’ll die with no class. You can make billions of dollars and still be the person who you are.
What is Being Classy?
Classy is having the balls to be strong enough to handle tasks. Classy is knowing what needs to be done, doing it, and handling it all adequately. In today’s world, to my generation, the real classy ones are the ones everyone uses and lets go of. You know those friends who will cancel their daily tasks just by receiving one phone call from you telling them you need them? Those are the classy ones. I’m lucky I grew up around people with heart. I’ve noticed that poverty tends to put some good in a person because you learn what it is like not to have.
Although not rich, growing up in District 906 has taught me many things. The main thing, and one of my most favorites out of Iraqi people, is the hospitality. If you show up at a stranger’s door, you’re invited for lunch. If that family only has one, not a car, not a house, but a calf, they will kill and cook it for you. I’m talking about people suffering from poverty, letting go of their most valuable belongings in a single day, just to welcome a guest in.
Moving here, however, to L.A., I noticed that things aren’t as such. People call themselves classy because they can afford a $200 jacket. People call other people classy because the “other people” drive a fancy car. Instead of the human value, your mind is already linked to the materialistic side of the world. Now don’t read this and go “Wow.. I needed to read that!” This isn’t a small reality check. This is an outcry for change. People need to learn how to be human beings!
I met many friends here who just didn’t understand the concept of hospitality. I’ve worked with many, for years sometimes, and it’s just the opposite of being classy. Now, those same people look up to others, who screw other people around and drive fancy cars, and want to be them. I might understand the fascination of wanting to be rich, but what’s rich when you’ve got no fucking soul?
Put me in a $3,000 suit and watch if I don’t pick up my spray cans and work on the canvases in my garage. Watch if paint doesn’t drip on the suit like it’s a cheap, dirty white t-shirt for someone else. That’s because I have no sense of materialistic value. I was born with the idea of “If you like it, it’s good.” That’s how it always went. If I liked a car because it was safe and I liked its looks, then that’s the fancy car for me. It doesn’t need a $150,000 price tag for it to make someone classy. My own friends, still here working minimum wage, busting their asses, are more classy than most people I’ve met who handle their financials much better and have much more higher incomes.
Being classy has become a pain on the person carrying that label. People abuse the classy so much that they try to turn to something else just to not be bullied and used anymore.
When a guy, being a gentlemen, holds a door for somebody, that’s them showing what they are. No, it doesn’t need to be practiced and done on purpose only to specific people. It needs to come out of you whoever the person behind you is! The whole point of being classy is for it to come from yourself. You can’t fake class. You might pass with faking it once, but the second you make another move your fake attempt will be loud and clear. Just the other day I held the door open for a young, in-her-late-20s-girl at a gas station, and she passed right by with no thank you or a smile. We made our transactions after being in line as we walked in, and as I was leaving, I held the door open again, knowing someone was behind me. It was the same girl. She walked out again with no single word out of her. An older lady walked out after her and thanked me, and said that sadly today’s generation is too into themselves. I wasn’t exactly happy about the girl’s response, yet again you need to understand that what you do is optional. Just because you’re nice doesn’t make everyone obligated to be nice back to you. If you’re being nice, be nice for being nice. Don’t be nice to show that you’re nice. That’s fake! I’m telling YOU right now. Please, do not do something nice and ask for attention for it. A lot of people would’ve not held the door open when they noticed the girl behind them is the same girl who ignored it the first time. A lot of people would’ve made a sarcastic remark behind her back. I just held the door open, and yes you may call me an idiot for this one, and let her walk out like I had never seen her before.
Be good. As long as you do good, things will come back as good. Please don’t lose your values over money. Close friends to myself went and did some work with people who’ve brought so much negativity to them and to their careers, and now for a little, two second lime light, they dropped their balls and forgot their manhood somewhere and went that low just to be there and say they were there. Being classy is something you earn as your classy parents raise you. Don’t be disappointed by people not appreciating it. You’re not doing it to be appreciated. You’re doing it because that’s what the damn bar should be set to in the first place. If everyone was as half classy as the word means, we wouldn’t be in war right now. Men, be men. Boy, try to be men. Being men doesn’t mean build up muscles. Being men means build up character before hitting a gym. Ladies, be ladies. Girls, try to be ladies. Being ladies doesn’t mean hit clubs and party on a Tuesday night. Being ladies means holding your honor and getting a degree and doing something worthy with your life. You guys are too good to be wasted at this age. Some are potential scientists who just don’t study because of peer pressure. Peer pressure is a bitch. Thinking you’re classy is a bit more bitch-er.
Good night,
Apo Avedissian
