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<p>If you worked in my office and showed up looking too “pulled together,” people would think you were going to sneak out at lunchtime to interview for another job.</p>
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<p>How do you know this?</p>
<p>The fact is, the clothing/fashion industry and all it entails is a HUGE part of our culture. It amazes me that people can live in our world and assume that no one gives a flip about what other people wear. </p>
<p>It is one’s “right” or “entitlement” (as phrased earlier) to make the choice not to care about one’s own appearance, but do not expect that others will not be cognizant of, or even offended by your lack of attention to appropriate attire.</p>
<p>Proper dress is proper etiquette. People (especially educated people) who are unaware of proper etiquette may do themselves a disservice in the long run. If you don’t care about the impact of your own lack of etiquette, at least learn about it for your children’s sake, so they can make an informed choice about whether to be penalized for it or not.</p>
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<p>I actually have much respect for those who are like that even though I don’t consider myself that cerebral nor fit the counter-culture stereotype. On the last point, dressing countercultural if you mean hippie/neo-hippie…too much effort required on the maintenance side from all the bright colors they seem to prefer wearing. </p>
<p>Black, grey, navy blue, or dark green tend to be my preferred colors. Easy to maintain and launder as needed. I’m also ok with khaki…but that’s a bit more work. Bleh!</p>
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<p>I’ve done that so many times to gleefully irk the upper-middle class haute clothing sensibilities that they’re actually surprised when I do wear appropriately matched socks with black dress shoes. I do wish they made more varieties of black/colored socks which are as durable as white athletic socks. </p>
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<p>I wonder how a fighter pilot flightsuits would fit into this scheme. Actually had a HS classmate and a co-worker wear that to school/work. Got admiring reactions from the former crowd, odd WTH double-takes from colleagues with me giving him a grinning “I understand the in-joke” smirk.</p>
<p>Bay–first, this thread is about a kid wearing sweatpants to class. No one here is saying they dress like a slob to go on a college visit with their child, but many of us are saying that dressing up for such visit is equally frowned upon. Dress for the weather and activities during the tour. EVERY school (40+ schools over the years) we have visited has said to wear comfortable walking shoes and usually specifiy tennis shoes/sneakers whatever you call them. Most people on the tours we have been on have worn shorts or carpris and a nicer shirt (polo or dressy t-shirt). Every once in a while we have run into someone in a dress and heels and you see the ad comms just shaking their heads :D. Proper dress doesn’t always mean dressing up.</p>
<p>I have a PhD and have had a successful career as a psychologist. I now serve on non-profit boards and do volunteer work in my community. My son was accepted at every college to which he applied and graduated Phi Beta Kappa. My husband is an extremely successful businessman. We have lived all over the country and casual clothes have never been a problem. Wall Street is not a place where we work, but a place we Occupy. Maybe that’s the difference. The kids all watch tv and are online. You don’t think they can figure out fashion if they want to? I’d rather my son learn how to be kind.</p>
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<p>Why not teach your son both?</p>
<p>SteveMa,</p>
<p>Not once in this thread have I advocated “dressing up.” I have talked only about dressing appropriately, especially with regard to wearing sloppy sweats, which is the subject of this thread.</p>
<p>Actually, the thread is about sweats. Period. Not sloppy sweats.</p>
<p>^Yes, romanig, that is what tends to muddle it.</p>
<h1>225 - nice post.</h1>
<p>re etiquette of clothes: etiquette, imho, = manners and manners = “being kind” I think you can kind of transfer that to clothing but it is a rather difficult task. It probably has nothing to do with wearing sweatpants on campus.</p>
<p>cobrat: of course you understand that counter-culture cerebral disdain of fashion is just as much a stereotype/cliche as the upper middle class suburban mom fashion stereotype/cliche.</p>
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<p>Recently I was sitting in a campus coffee shop when an extremely attractive mom and her son walked in from their campus tour. She had on a very expensive black summer suit and had taken the jacket (because of the heat, I presume) off to reveal a white silk shell. Big Pearls. Expensive black flats. Expensive BAG. Very expensive hair… you know both the cut and the coloring. I was vaguely interested to see if she headed over to the President’s office after their cool drink. I imagined her dress meant she had other things on the agenda that day besides the tour.</p>
<p>I’m not sure how it’s muddled. There are such things as sloppy jeans, too. And tattered flats. And ripped up blazers. But no one seems to muddle those up.</p>
<p>Some people who don’t care about their own clothes sure care a lot when someone else wears the “wrong” thing!</p>
<p>romani,
If the question is, “is it appropriate to wear sweatpants to class everyday?” Some say yes, anything comfortable is appropriate; some say no, sweatpants are never appropriate unless going to the gym; and some say it depends on the sweatpants. That is how it gets muddled.</p>
<p>I think alh was onto something in post #219.</p>
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<p>I know I sometimes purposely dress down as a test to see how I am treated … is it for my words and actions or my look. And, for me frankly, if it is an environment that frowns about my dress I probably do not want to work there, go to school there, shop there, or eat there … and I’m fine with that. I know I have 3 kids who want no part of a school where wearing jeans, sweats, or pajama bottoms to class is not OK.</p>
<p>Those dressing up to maintain a good impression are probably doing that with a subset of the population … however, ironically, their dress probably sometimes creates a negative impression with a different subset of the population.</p>
<p>(PS - I few years ago there was a very entertaining thread about appropriate dress on college tours … it was essentially the same thread but my memory is of it being longer)</p>
<p>Bay–
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<p>Pretty sure you are telling us here that by not dressing up we have bad manner :D.</p>
<p>Well put, 3togo! </p>
<p>To go back to something that was said earlier, I want to have the memory that some of you seem to have. I went to the store last night and can’t remember a single darn thing anyone wore. If my future boss or MIL sees me for less than a minute at Meijer wearing sweats and can remember me among the few hundred other people shopping just on that day, well then I tip my hat to them! Better than I could ever do :D</p>
<p>I am pretty sure that jeans, sweats and pajama bottoms to class at elite schools is not only okay but another sort of stereotype/cliche. Doesn’t everyone assume these students know how to address appropriately for all occasions? I do. Someone made a good point, way upthread, that a student might want to dress in restaurant appropriate clothing if there was a possibility of being taken out to lunch with a visiting VIP.</p>
<p>edit: imho dress can definitely be bad manners. Wearing something wildly inappropriate to a wedding or funeral is bad manners because it can hurt the family.</p>
<p>Nope, I never said “dressing up.” Wearing sweats at the gym is proper dress and that is not dressing up.</p>
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<p>Yes, cobrat, I have never met anyone who cares so passionately about what other groups of people think. Guess what? I don’t CARE if you wear white athletic socks with your dress pants and shoes. You’re the one who is going to look like a dork, which is your problem, not mine. </p>
<p>BTW, the neediness in “gleefully irking others” is something you should think about. Do what you like and be confident in it; why would you possibly want to go about gleefully irking others? What do you get out of it?</p>
<p>Once there was a grad student doing research at a very important library and every day he wore the exact same tattered blue jeans, ancient tee shirt, hoodie, nasty sneakers. There was going to be an international conference, with a black tie dinner, and the organizers wanted to include the young scholar. One of them was designated to very cautiously approach the student with the invitation and to offer that the conference would pay for him to rent appropriate clothes. The young man replied that wasn’t necessary. He always traveled with his tux. That is how his father had raised him. :)</p>