Reading The Age article about the attacks on fashionable new places in Footscray, my 14-year-old son's response was "cool". It's ironic because we've been to and enjoyed two of the places that have been the target of recent "anti-hipster" sentiment, including graffiti that reads "F--k off hipster scum". Burger joint 8-Bit is 500 metres from our home, the bar Littlefoot even closer.

I reprimanded him, emphasising that destruction is no way to make a statement. Even so, I knew that his reaction reflected our own sniping about the "hipster" takeover of the neighbourhood.

I don't agree with the attacks on these venues, let alone think they're cool. But I do think another "C-word" is relevant and consider my son's unsubtle response an indication of his adolescent appreciation for the "up yours" the aggression seems to represent. As inner city suburbs like Footscray and Brunswick are progressively remade through consumption, no one is as left out as those who can no longer afford to live here. And while consumerism is one relevant C-word, class is the real elephant in the room.

As Tim Winton writes in his latest book, The Boy Behind the Curtain, the word class has largely disappeared from public lexicon. Consequently, mentioning it is seen as "awkward", even "provocative". Discussing a conversation he had with a journalist in which he mentioned class divisions, Winton writes: "Having uttered the C-word in polite company I felt, for a moment, as if I'd shat in the municipal pool."