Vulgarity being held up to admire

Is vulgarity criminally culpable?

It would seem so. When rich people are in trouble and stories about their wild spending habits come out in court, you know they are headed for the slammer. This involves some unseemly chortling about how people who have been living soft lives will fare in prison.

But perhaps the public just wants to be protected from people who pay more for their bathroom fixtures than most people pay for their houses, use private airplanes to go up the block, and eat caviar, truffles, lobster and pheasant all in one meal.

What she fails to understand is the widespread disapproval itself. If people don’t approve of vulgarity, why is there so much of it around?

Let’s not always hear the same answer. The commercial world, as including and expressed by the media, responds to public taste. When there is a genuine outcry against the violation of public standards, say in expressions of bigotry, or worse, yet, violations of the latest health precaution, it retreats.

Miss Manners finds herself in the peculiar position of defending those whose legal troubles are exacerbated by their ostentation. Although there is often a relationship between cheating others and spending on oneself, vulgarity itself is not illegal

But that does not mean she believes that vulgarity should pass uncondemned. Outside of the legal system, there is a social system that is supposed to maintain standards. When it greets excesses of display with laughter, show offs tend to calm down.

Society has fallen down on the job. Or rather it has held vulgarity up to admire. Flaunting over-the-top dry goods is considered to be an outward sign of deserved success. Lewdness is redefined as sexiness. Celebratory extravaganzas for weddings, birthdays and coming-of-age ceremonies are considered to be signs of family affection.

This sort of thing was once ridiculed as the characteristic of the newly rich – an unfortunate slur in a society where we are supposed to admire enterprise over mere inheritance. But it had the effect of alerting those who had gone wild that modesty, understatement and philanthropy were more admired by those who had the wherewithal to behave otherwise.

Many of today’s newly rich have belied all this by sticking with their old habits and possessions and taking up philanthropy. Meanwhile, the older rich did not have notable success in passing on the downscale style to their heirs. And a surprising new group began violating its previous standards: academics, members of the clergy, and philanthropists, when put in positions of authority with access to expense accounts and trusted with other funds.

It all looks ugly when it comes out in court. What Miss Manners wants to know is why the public doesn’t regard the same behavior in law-abiding citizens as tasteless and silly.