DRESS CODE

 

DRESS CODE

I see there is a big hoo-haw in the US Senate over the relaxing of a long-standing dress code.

It brings me back to my College Fraternity days.  

Our House had a dinner dress code which required a tie and jacket in the dinning area during meals.  I don’t recall for sure, but I believe pants were also required.

This code went back to the old days of snotty wealthy ass-hats being the only people who went to college.  In the 60’s, only two-thirds of college young men were snotty wealthy ass-hats; still the dinner dress code prevailed.

Of course, the other one-third, at least in our House, rebelled.

Surprise, I was one of the one-third.  I admit to being an ass-hat, but I was not that snotty and was less wealthy than many others.

It is easy to challenge a dress code.  In those days our house rebels would don wrinkled shirts matched with a clip-on gravy-stained poor taste tie and a cheap ratty sports coat.

Dress codes are a joke.

Recently I attended our annual reunion with these now less snotty, less ass-hattery, many still wealthy Fraternity Brothers.

At our Friday dinner, I wore a nice button-down shirt with a nice sports jacket and tie. 

I was over dressed. 

I was given a friendly fraternity BOS (bag of s___) over my attire.

A dress code like many laws or rules in society is just a “legal” way to enforce generally accepted standards.  It does not need to be strictly enforced except to subvert egregious behavior. 

Show up to a function in your underwear and you may not be allowed entry.

“Sorry sir, we require everyone to wear clothes…it is in our by-laws.”

This rule should not be needed, except there is always some jerk who cannot meet normal minimal standards of decorum. 

The alternative to a dress code is social banishment.  If you dress like a clown, you get treated like a clown.  You are ignored, you are marginalized. 

Acceptable attire can’t be legislated.  Any code can be mocked, especially if it is antiquated, much like wearing a clip-on gravy-stained tie back in the old fraternity days.

We don’t have rules against picking your nose in public, that behavior is patrolled by the mutual disgust of your peers.  If behavior or “dress” is unacceptable, society has ways of dealing with such behavior.

If an elected US Senator chooses to legislate dressed like a clown, he should not be stopped by any rule.  The “rule” should be unwritten common sense.  The consequence of “weird“ behavior should be censure, lack of respect, ineffective legislating, and ultimately a loss in the next election.

If a Senator can legislate effectively and be reelected while dressing like Uncle Fester, it is no gravy off my clip-on tie.