KEY POINTS:
"Did you see the dress she was wearing? Above the knee! I mean really, people these days, they've got no sense of decency..."
"I know. And half the men didn't have ties on."
"And what about those bare shoulders? Just because it's black doesn't mean it's appropriate funeral-wear."
No, I wasn't eavesdropping on a group of old biddies.
This was a real-life conversation amongst a group of 20-somethings last night.
A conversation I took part in, before realising I had metamorphosed into a cantankerous old woman, getting my knickers in a knot over the declining standards of society.
The conversation came about when Out-of-Work-Actor mentioned a recent chapel service he went to (God knows what he was doing there, he's hardly the religious type...)
He was appalled to see several men wearing open-collared shirts.
This then led us to discuss a recent funeral we attended, where several of the women arrived in little black evening dresses, baring vast amounts of skin, including ample cleavage and bare legs.
When I joked to one of them, a friend, about her inappropriate attire, she was genuinely offended.
Apparently, she saw nothing wrong with her plunging neckline, which revealed not just her cleavage but her entire bra.
It got me thinking. While I would not dream of entering a church with bare shoulders or exposed cleavage, clearly not everyone upholds the same standards.
So my question is this: Do they not know, not realise or not care that they are inappropriately dressed?
I don't mean that in a pompous way, I am genuinely curious.
Have some people never been taught how to dress for different occasions?
A friend was recently telling me about a workmate, who arrives at the office each day in jandals, ripped jeans and mid-riff baring tops.
Admittedly, theirs is not a strictly corporate environment, but it's fair to say the workmate's attire is on the extreme side of casual.
Despite the fact she clearly stands out in the chino-wearing office, she has made no attempt to adjust her personal dress sense.
Now fair enough, diversity is the spice of life and it would be terribly boring if everyone was the same, but there's a vast difference between being unique and being inappropriate.
A bare midriff in an inner-city law firm is just not appropriate.
So, is this girl oblivious to the fact she stands out like a sore thumb, or deliberately flouting the unspoken dress code?
And do her workmates have the right to say anything or are they - as I realised I was - just being whiney old biddies?
