Dress clothes are nicer than regular clothes. This is a simple truth that nobody can deny. One’s choice in wardrobe sends a message, so if you decide to wear something nice for the occasion, you’re signaling your respect for the event. Whether it be for a wedding, a funeral, a mass at church, or even a night out at dinner, wearing dress clothes instantly makes you look serious and respectful.
Growing up, I thought that blue jeans were considered “nice clothes” because we wore them every Sunday to mass. If Church was so important, and I was wearing blue jeans to mass, then blue jeans had to be respectful, fancy clothing, right? Imagine my surprise when I was told one day that blue jeans are not fancy legwear, but something “semi-casual.” Dress pants were what I needed to wear to impress job recruiters in interviews. Talk about embarrassing!
Nowadays, people don’t even bother wearing semi-casual clothing. When I went to Sunday mass for just a few days, I found people wearing baggy hoodies, t-shirts, and sweatpants. With my tucked-in collared shirt and blue jeans, I felt like the odd one out. I was almost offended by the sight of it. Didn’t these people realize this was a house of God?
Throughout my childhood, my mother always urged me to dress up on special occasions – the first day of school, parties, and, of course, church services. These seem like a distant memory to me now. It seems like, ever since I started getting into college, people have become way more casual with their dress. This remarkable change in attitude seems to have crept up on all of us.
That’s right, people used to treat traveling by plane as an important occasion.
I think that there are two main causes of this reign of the casual. First, people nowadays are lazier than they have ever been. While in some ways, people spend more time at work than ever before, getting stressed out, as a result, they put less effort into everything they do. I’ve talked before about the tendency among millennials to engage in “busy work” – that is, unproductive work that takes up a lot of time. The main reason why is the mental effort and commitment productive activity would require of them. Similarly, choosing to wear nicer clothes is tougher than just throwing on shorts and a t-shirt.
In addition, most people nowadays prioritize comfort and convenience over all else. The ease of the Internet age has conditioned them into it. Let’s face it: dressy clothes are uncomfortable to wear even on a good day. Wearing dress pants and tuxedos in the summer or a sleeveless dress in the winter can ruin your entire day, and dress clothes are often tighter than normal clothes besides. Dress clothes are also more expensive to buy and clean. The average person nowadays is so inundated with comfort that he is loathed to give it up just to look a bit nicer.
The second cause of the reign of the casual is the expansion of the popular idea that “only inner beauty matters.” There is some truth to this – appearances are deceiving, after all. A pretty woman might be envious and cruel, a handsome man might be a scoundrel and backstabber, etc. And likewise, someone who is kind-hearted might have an accident that deforms their appearance or grow old and wrinkly. Everyone has heard of the tale of Beauty and the Beast. However, there are many ways in which one’s appearance is a reflection of inner character. A person who has an unhealthy, intemperate lifestyle will become obese. A slob will not take care of his hair or posture. And a person who wants to show their respect will wear dress clothes. If someone chooses to wear casual clothing to an event, what does that say about them?
Without any standards for outward appearance, there are only two rules that guide a person’s dress code: practicality and consumer preference. The way a lot of people think, if you can wear it comfortably and it’s to your liking, it’s acceptable to wear. This kind of attitude leads to beautiful, traditional cathedrals being replaced by utilitarian, modern buildings. Is this the kind of world we want? One in which beauty has been evacuated?
What inspired this post was my mother observing the casualness of everyday living. The fashion from just a generation ago might as well be alien from what we have today. Standards have declined. Thankfully, there is a solution to this problem: it was people’s freely-made decision to dress casually, so people can freely choose to dress nicely. One has to be the change that you want to see in the world.