Considering That Slippery Beast, Good Taste

What happened a few decades ago to good taste in the English speaking world?  It evolved.  Why?

 We all remember our parent's and grandparent's manner of dressing back then.  I acknowledge  a big level of conformity.  People really did look like this walking around in the city.  They always wore the "best" they could manage to church, weddings and funerals, or any important meeting.  Children wore leather shoes to school. Girls were in dresses.  Boys were in buttoned shirts or uniforms, though I do remember some t-shirts.  But then I lived in the suburbs, almost the sticks.  

Realistically speaking, as a child I remember my mom in jeans or pedal pushers usually, but that was for home.  My father was not a white collar worker either, he was for the longest time of his career a Boiler Maker. But when he went to town it was not in  his work clothing. My grandfather, a farmer, worked all week in overalls, but he went to church in a suit.

This is what I think happened.  Post War Youth Culture.  Hollywood, the music companies and magazines etc started selling to youth.  My question is why did this market arise. Maybe it was a kind of generational depression or lostness, after the big war.  All of a sudden there was this huge body of a market that did not want to look like "that".  It took as its model people like James Dean.  Non-conformity became a virtue to most of us who were of the Boomer generation.  I remember well the early 60s.  My main thoughts about clothing were practicality and whimsy.

Style is exquisitely sensitive and morphs easily now.  Style used to take much longer to change.  The regular man's suit has been substantially cut the same for a couple of centuries.  It expressed social status and wealth, or was supposed to.  Women's dress varied more, but dresses are still dresses.  Mom went to town in a dress, not her jeans.  

Clothing is a language.  Or maybe I should say their are several languages of clothing.  We express what is meaningful to us by how we look.  A lot of it is faddish.  Right now, if I am correct, pop black culture reflects a taste for a certain type of "work" clothing and boots, and certain brands.  This is the height of ephemeral, so quickly changed.  Among young white people I see a kind of hipster look still in the young men, with beards and so on.  Girls could be in anything.  Tight leggings, certain tops, etc.  It tends toward the fantastic and theatrically glamorous. Informality is the flavor of the day.

Then there is the whole business of going everywhere in the clothing of athletes, even if an athlete is the very last thing one could be.  Now we all wear what used to be called runner's shoes or some such.  I do, when I'm not in my sandals.  some of this is just for practicality. 

But mistakes can be made.  It's easy to look at a man in a black t-shirt and jeans and think he is "dressing down".  But, some t-shirts are costly, easily costing hundreds, same with the jeans.  This is where taste comes in.  You have to know what you are looking at, or you just don't speak the language.

I mostly like the freedom we have now.  It might be nice if we could show a little more respect in certain venues.  Maybe not wear the revealing dress to church.  Maybe don't go to the wedding in shorts, unless it's on the beach, if it's very informal. Once again, good taste might dictate.  Does that sound old, or reasonable?

What is good taste? What a subject.  Maybe you readers should tell me what you think good taste is.  I think it shows style, with restraint maybe.  It shows agreeable intentions toward others who will be around you, possibly.  It's fun.  It's an infinitely variable game, or art.  It's a language of it's own.

I laugh because this process has been going on as long as man has been making written records!  But here we go again!