It's more interesting that in the UK there's sort of a bell curve of passivity.

The working and upper classes have more similarities socially than do the middle and upper classes in a lot of ways.

Interesting. Fussell, in his Class, also calls out the US middle class as a kind of outlier from the rest of the class system, cursed with an abundance of class anxiety but also a distinctive class identity and slew of misconceptions about the higher classes that often leave them looking silly in their attempts to imitate the higher classes (which they're very interested in doing thanks to the aforementioned intense class anxiety), including on matters of what proper or polite behavior & activity looks like.

It probably just seems that way from a middle class vantage point.

Outgroup homogeneity bias — they’re both unlike us, therefore they’re both kinda the same!

Bad assumption.