I'm thinking about home and all that that means and a place in the winter for Dignity

I'm going home.

I'd pretty much made the decision but when I emailed my landlord to tell them and ask them to confirm exactly how much rent I was paying over the summer, they emailed back and told me they'd jacked up the rent because I'm no longer a student. It never said anything about that in the contract. I'm going to look at the tenancy agreement and make sure it doesn't anything about it in there, then I'm going to seek help from Citizen's Advice and see if I'm allowed to break my contract because of it, because I'm sure this must be a breach of their side of the contract.

I will be devastated to leave Manchester, but it's not going anywhere and it's the only logical option at the moment. I miss home and I can't afford to stay here - it's just not feasible. I wonder if maybe it was silly of me to even try and escape. Maybe I should've done what everyone else on my estate did - have a couple of kids before they're 20 and get a job in a shop that will close down in two weeks, because that's what all the shops there are doing. The thing is, I don't think having a couple of kids and working in a shop would be that terrible, really.

Anyway, that's not what I came here today to write about. Because I now have a Sociology degree, I'm allowed to ramble on about class privilege and gender privilege and that's what I'm going to do.

I am wondering what it means to be female and to be working class. On one hand, these things can actually benefit me - there are bursaries, funding, scholarships that they give to people just for being female and working class. But does that make up for the things that I'm denied?

Of course, these days nobody in power is going to say I can't have or do something just because I'm female or working class, and that's why it's so easy for people who aren't female or working class to deny that they have any sort of privilege.

This kind of discrimination is the kind that slips in under the door. It's things that seem little - you get a job and all your male colleagues are going on a night out. You can't afford a taxi, so you have to walk home. But you can't walk home at night without having to be afraid. And if, God forbid, you did walk home alone at night and something happened, people would try and blame you for it for being stupid enough to do it in the first place. So you can't go on the night out, and because you can't join in when they socialise, work is awkward, simply because you're female and poor.

It's not being able to feel 100% safe and comfortable walking down the street at any time of day, and having to put up with comments, and having to be constantly conscious of where you go, and how you dress.

It's having to spend hours grooming in order to be 'presentable'. It's plucking your eyebrows and painting your nails and shaving your legs and armpits, and making sure you haven't got lipstick on your teeth. It's having to be up an hour earlier than the men at work to make sure you look appropriate.

It's constantly worrying about the length of your skirt and the height of your neckline, and it's constantly wondering if you got (or didn't get) that job because of your boobs, or how you look. It's constantly having to wonder if the men who do the same job as you are getting paid more.

It's being told by your male boss to wear smart and comfortable shoes to work because you're going to be on your feet all day and not being able to find smart shoes for women that you can comfortably spend 8 hours on your feet in and especially not for a decent price.

It's not getting the job because you couldn't afford to buy new smart clothes for the interview and your old ones are beyond repair or don't fit.

It's not even being able to afford to get to the interview.

It's not being able to join in their conversations about skiing holidays in the Alps, or their en suite bathrooms. It's them looking at you in horror when you tell them, fondly, about how you used to play next door and your mum would bang on the wall when it was time for ypu to come home, because no classy person lives in a house with a connecting wall like that.

It's people assuming that wealth and intelligence go hand in hand and thinking you're stupid as soon as they hear your accent or see your house. It's never being given a chance to prove yourself.

It's people with more money apologising for the way you grew up, even though you were perfectly happy growing up that way.

It's the day you can afford to buy some eggs and being made to feel guilty for not buying free range eggs, even though you can get 12 caged eggs for the price of 6 free range.

It's people assuming they know all about you (and it's all bad) because of where you're from and how you talk.

It's so many other things, but especially, it's being told by privileged people that privilege no longer exists, because they've never seen it.