On Sunday I had fun confessing on Facebook, but it wasn't really a confession that I like restaurants where a jacket and tie are required.
I agree, there aren't many of them – it's almost an eccentricity today. I don't even know if we still find them in Montreal – they still exist in certain large western metropolises.
But I like the poles of resistance that withstand the flattening that all too often accompanies modernity, that hold on to a certain verticality, that preserve traditions.
I admit, but again it is not really an admission that I am sorry for the aesthetic decline of today's society, a society that seems to have forgotten that aesthetics is also an ethics, that beauty is not strictly relative and that For men and women it is important to have clothes (let's admit that men often lack it!).
Evolution in a society that is no longer able to distinguish beauty from ugliness and even confuse them comes at a cost, something that the fashion industry is often guilty of, as if indulging in a nihilistic fantasy. with creators who believe they are all-powerful and want to deface the world while believing they are liberating it. The ideology of authenticity attacks forms and in fact drives the deconstruction of both – to the point of celebrating the flaccid and soft, the formless and unstructured.
This ideology has an impact on life in society, even if that is not enough to explain it: relaxation becomes the law, behavior the exception.
All this to say that after I wrote this message on Facebook, I noticed a strong reaction. Certainly not a storm, we should not exaggerate anything, but what is clear is that there is something passionate when we touch the world of clothing, as if everyone feels negatively judged when we advocate for elegance or at least for a slightly more elegant society.
Some saw this somewhat amused appeal as a form of advocacy of elitism – and seem to forget that barely two or three generations ago citizens and workers were concerned with dressing well, each according to his abilities. Means, that goes without saying.
To be clear: I am not advocating for the compulsory tie everywhere, even if I think that it becomes once again the symbol of a form of aesthetic affirmation: it becomes the symbol of a small individual revolt against the tyranny of the formless.
But it is good that it is still required in some places, and it would be even better if they inspired other places even more so that the taste for beauty is brought back to life in everyday life. Anyone who leaves the house should always dress up a little.
Of course, elegance cannot be limited to a single model – fortunately, and I don't have the ambition to bind half of humanity to myself! But it contains some codes that we can learn – at any age. Anyone who masters these codes can then play with them.
And whatever anyone says, it's a fun game for adults that also allows you to correct some natural imperfections, unfortunately only incomplete!
And perhaps that is the point: we must finally understand that a society that uses the adolescent as a role model instead of using the adult as a role model for the adolescent is a society that will lose itself in childishness.
Masculinity needs to be restored in a society where we often try to deny it or reduce it to a form of primary and animal aggressiveness. It is inextricably linked to the concern for forms. It's not just about each individual's outfit – but we can't pretend that there is no connection between one and the other.
On your ties, gentlemen!