Getting back on track, the lack of cultural unity was not in fact generally a problem a few decades ago, before the internet. Each community could have its own standards and this wouldn’t pose too much of an issue, and this is more or less the way things worked. This system dissolved long before television, which was heavily regulated (hell, they weren’t allowed to show belly buttons), became able to seriously impact standards of provocative clothing.
I think you are overestimating pre-internet uniformity here. If for example one spent time in Crown Heights one would have Orthodox Jews, generic African-Americans (mainly Christian), and some Muslim African-Americans. Each group has different ideas of what would constitute provocative clothing. Or to use a different example: when I was an undergrad I was involved in an interfaith Jewish-Muslim group. One thing that struck me was that among many of the Orthodox Jews, women wearing pants was considered what you would probably call provocative, but hair covering wasn’t an issue. In contrast, for many of the Muslim women, the reverse held (pants fine, uncovered hair immodest).
I’m not sure what your point is with those two quotes. Are you trying to say that OrphanWilde already addressed what I was saying? If so, the points are different: Orphan was discussing was how distinct groups have different standards. The point I was making that in small geographic areas one can have a large number of groups with different standards that all have to interact with each other. And the example of the Modern Orthodox showed, even within a small, superficially uniform group, there can be a lot of variation.
I think you are overestimating pre-internet uniformity here. If for example one spent time in Crown Heights one would have Orthodox Jews, generic African-Americans (mainly Christian), and some Muslim African-Americans. Each group has different ideas of what would constitute provocative clothing. Or to use a different example: when I was an undergrad I was involved in an interfaith Jewish-Muslim group. One thing that struck me was that among many of the Orthodox Jews, women wearing pants was considered what you would probably call provocative, but hair covering wasn’t an issue. In contrast, for many of the Muslim women, the reverse held (pants fine, uncovered hair immodest).
ಠ_ಠ
The reply:
I’m not sure what your point is with those two quotes. Are you trying to say that OrphanWilde already addressed what I was saying? If so, the points are different: Orphan was discussing was how distinct groups have different standards. The point I was making that in small geographic areas one can have a large number of groups with different standards that all have to interact with each other. And the example of the Modern Orthodox showed, even within a small, superficially uniform group, there can be a lot of variation.
Sorry I thought you were pointing out something Orphan had acknowledged already—that’s a different point. Retracted & upvoted.