There's also a distinctly offensive element in the "camping-as-playing-poor" argument in that it seems to make the assumption that anyone who is poor came to be poor because they had no alternative. The comment locolobo13 made about his parents being "hillbillies from the Ozarks and Ouchitas" made me think about this. My family is from West Virginia and as far back as I've been able to trace (1810 census), I had an ancestor living in a cabin in the exact same part of the Appalachians where my grandfather was born. My grandfather used to tell me stories about his Uncle Virgil getting upset when people tried to put his house on the electric grid. You can probably picture it. Would Uncle Virgil be upset to see people camping? No way! He might not understand why you'd pack up and go home on Sunday though he'd probably be glad to see you go, but he certainly wouldn't think you were mocking him. I realize there are a lot of people who are homeless because of circumstances beyond their control, but that doesn't mean they wish they had a house in the suburbs with a white picket fence.

That said, I think the original question is pretty interesting. My wife took a class recently where they had her reflect on inadvertant classism, and it turns out it's everywhere in most of our lives. As I understand it, my choosing to ride a bike to work when I could be driving a shiny new SUV (or zero emission electric car, if that's your preference) isn't classism. My coming on this forum and suggesting to random people that they should try Schwalbe Marathon Supremes definitely is. If I smile and wave at a guy riding his old department store mountain bike to work because it's his only form of transportation, that is probably OK. If I suggest that he oil his chain once in a while, that's probably not OK. If I pull up beside him and say something like "Great day for a ride, huh?" that's a gray area and could be reasonably interpreted either way.

Also, as in the case of the aforementioned hillbillies, there are a lot of subtleties to be considered. For instance, it may be true that the guy riding that squeaky old Hardrock can't afford a car and "has to" ride a bike, but that may very well be the result of a series of free and well-reasoned choices he's made in life. He may be living exactly the way he wants to live, and there's a very good chance that he sees my shiny new bike with all its expensive accessories and thanks God that he isn't locked into the cycle of work and consumerism that so obviously dominates my life. He may not judge me for it, but he certainly doesn't envy my station in life.