Last night a client visiting D.C. took me to dinner at a local upscale restaurant. It was a nostalgic and bittersweet evening in addition to being, you know, yummy. (Stone crabs!) My late wife Grace loved going out to eat at a great restaurant, dressing up, feeling like this was an event and not just a meal. Since she died, my business crashed and my finances went to hell, I haven’t had a single meal at such an establishment. Oh, I’ve had some meals at decent places with excellent food, but the staffs are casual and a lot of diners—even me— are in jeans. That’s fine; it doesn’t interfere with the social experience or my enjoyment of the meal. And yet…
The Ruth’s Chris restaurant chain recently posted about the steakhouse’s dress code, reminding patrons that the desired atmosphere is “business casual” and “proper attire” is mandatory. Guests are to remove hats when entering, and if you have a baseball cap on, you will be stuck at the bar or the lounge.The main dining room will be off-limits. Dining rooms will not allow “gym wear, pool attire, tank tops, clothing with offensive graphics or language, revealing clothing, or exposed undergarments.”
Well, good. Civility, etiquette and respect for others are always victims of entropy, as air travel and theater-going have proven. Ruth’s Chris wants to hold the line, and that takes courage and a sense of responsibility. Being with other diners who care how they present to everyone around them is part of the positive experience of dining out at an excellent restaurant.
The slobs, as well the progressives, socialists, working class heroes and aspiring termites in the foundation of society, of course, do not agree. One critic on social media wrote, “Ruth’s Chris isn’t fine dining, it’s like one step up from Outback. This is going to make a lot of people not go.” I agree the restaurant is not The Prime Rib, but it’s about five steps up from Outback or Applebee’s. What’s the matter with classing up the joint a bit? The whole idea of maintaining levels of personal deportment is that it makes everyone feel better and behave better.
Thne some marketing whiz at Chili’s (which I would place a notch below Applebees’, but it’s close) saw an opportunity to virtue-signal man-on-the-street virtues. “The only dress code at Chili’s is that you have to be dressed,” it tweeted, setting off a tweet war.
Victory Girls, the right-ish blog, notes that “a general disdain about dressing for the occasion is a bit more indicative of an illness our culture cannot afford to ignore” and quoted writer Robert Heinlein, who once observed,
“A dying culture invariably exhibits personal rudeness. Bad manners. Lack of consideration for others in minor matters. A loss of politeness, of gentle manners, is more significant than is a riot.”
Bingo.
Ethics Alarms 