W. K. Lis
Superstar
Worse would be those who follow the letter of the law, instead of the spirit of the law.
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Dress codes on city owned golf courses?
- Thread starter Silence&Motion
- Start date
Worse would be those who follow the letter of the law, instead of the spirit of the law.
Johnny Au
Senior Member
Roy Thomson Hall (especially when the Toronto Symphony Orchestra plays) recommends smart casual.
Orchestral concerts with music based on video game franchises have even less of a dress code (as they often wear costumes of their favourite video game characters and cheer between musical compositions like a rock concert). I wish all orchestral concerts have a dress code.
sixrings
Senior Member
There was a video game symphony not too many years ago. I really wish I would have gone to that. My wife thinks Im a total geek but to be fair not many adults have Donkey Kong machines in their basements.
fiendishlibrarian
Active Member
[old fart rant]Take a look at the crowd in an old Leafs game on Leafs TV, where even into the early 1970s virtually all the men are in jackets and ties. Maybe I watch too many Mad Men reruns but would I ever love to see formalism become mandatory again in places like theatres, opera, high-end restaurants, etc. Something about formal wear lends a certain...dignity to people (and to occasions), I can't describe it, maybe because suits, for men at least, are designed specifically to hide shortcomings and accentuate postive attributes as opposed to modern, casual clothing which seems to inevitably highlight the opposite (to say nothing of a lack of taste) and panders to people's worst aesthetic defects in a misguided appeal to individuality. You can call it conformist, you can call it elitist, but I will always find it jarring *not* to see people dressed up in certain contexts. I may have been the last generation of kids that were dressed up to go on airplanes, for example, and to this day I still wear at least a dress shirt and sportjacket when flying unless it's to a tropical destination. But I guess that's the age we live in, where 50 year old men walk around in Chuck Taylors and hoodies...[/old fart rant]
ShonTron
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The TSO has the pops concerts (the video game music concert was one of them) where it is more casual. I go to the TSO about a dozen times a year, and except at the BNL/TSO pops show, I wouldn't feel right without dressing in work-a
I'm certainly one of those who dresses down, but I'm not one who likes wearing either a suit or a tie, though I do like to wear a jacket if going somewhere nice. I'm very happy - and often most comfortable, even - with "smart casual" attire - khakis or slacks, no jeans (except Fridays), collared short or long sleeve shirts (golf shirt on Fridays), simple clean walking shoes. Usually when I travel, on a plane (always has been economy or economy plus) or business class on VIA, it's smart casual for me. I only wear T-shirts if I'm outside all day, like going for a ride.
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typezed
Active Member
I no longer golf, but I grew up playing on mid-level public courses elsewhere in Ontario (same course as Mike Weir was the last place I had a membership). I always played in jeans and a t-shirt, and mostly running shoes. Never had a problem. I'm completely surprised that a public (and publicly-owned) par 3 course would have a dress code beyond 'you must wear a shirt at all times'. It seems absurd. Collared-shirts aren't a necessity for playing golf everywhere. But where I grew up there was one snotty exclusive private club and a whole lot of clubs open to the public. Maybe in the GTA, due to density and a greater number of wealthy people, golf has retained its elite character, with many more clubs that are moneyed and private and a scarcity of opportunities for working class people to play, so everyone just accepts arbitrary rules as par for the course.
nfitz
Superstar
A simple, clean, single colour, unlabelled tee-shirt is a problem, but the same clothing item with a collar is fine, and a real experience?
Personally, any "golf" shirt I have is so old and ratty, that the tee-shirts look far more respectable (what with the number of moths that have had a chance to nest in such shirts in the quarter-century since they were in fashion).
With some of the ugly clothing I've seen golfers wearing, I have to wonder ...
I haven't played much golf in years, and I haven't in Toronto ... but it's never crossed my mind to worry about what I wear. I'm sure I've played in a tee shirt at times.
Silence&Motion
Senior Member
The reference to Mad Men exactly captures what has gotten me so angry about the golf course thing. These dress codes come from an era in which all of these places we're talking about (theatres, golf courses, symphony halls, even hockey arenas) were dominated by a relatively small group of upper/middle class W.A.S.P. males. This is the whole point of Mad Men: a look into this world of white male privilege that is visually coded right into every aspect of life back in the 1960s. Dress codes were a way of symbolically sealing off certain areas of public life from the working class and ethnic populations. As I said, based on the people I saw at Dentonia last weekend, there are still echoes of this today.
As for private theatres, restaurants, etc, they are free to impose whatever dress code they want. However citizen-owned public spaces are a different story. Toronto's motto is "Diversity, Our Strength" - that should include diversity in attire (and the deeper forms of diversity that attire often reflects).
fiendishlibrarian
Active Member
I wouldn't be too sure that it was restricted to the upper class, or WASPs. I'm of Latin American descent, and I remember quite vividly growing up in a then-largely Italian neighbourhood in Downsview and for occasions like nice dinners out, church, school functions, etc. even working class Italian, Argentinian, and Portuguese men of my father's pre-boomer generation put a jacket and tie on (and expected their sons to do the same) so I don't buy that argument at all based on my experience. I've seen pictures from the mid-late 1960s, just before my parents left Argentina, where the crowds at soccer games had many men in ties, and when they flew on Pan Am in 1968 to Australia all the men on the flight were formally dressed (and my parents were the farthest thing from wealthy, many people had co-signers for airline tickets in those days).
The men in jackets and ties at Leafs games in old photos were far more likely to be middle class, or even lower, than not. Even working men had at least one suit they put on to the rare treat to a restaurant, or a hockey game, or what have you. Dressing up is what made these occasions even more memorable. That was what was expected, both formally and informally. This goes back to what I said earlier that even "mundane" occasions prompted people to dress up for them even into the era when I was growing up (late 1970s), and not down which is the case now. Also take a look again through the Then and Now pics, look very carefully, and you'll see even into the 1960s men engaged in professions as varied as shopkeepers, bartenders, butchers, clerks, etc. all formally dressed, to say nothing of how much more formally dressed TTC motormen and policemen used to be. Suits were cheap, very cheap relative to income back then, and so to say that only upper class men dressed formally is false, when some street scenes from those earlier eras show *everyone* dressed formally, unless we're saying that no one beneath a certain income level ever stepped outside or happened to ever be photographed. Even Mad Men shows this if you pay attention to the background.
This entire notion that you "put on your best face" when stepping out of the house is almost completely gone now. I saw a Collector at King station yesterday who wasn't even wearing *socks*. When my dad started at the TTC in 1973 that would have been inconceivable, they only *just* got rid of the requirement to wear hats, so there you have it.
I have no dog in this golf course fight, as I don't golf and don't care for it, but I can't say the expectation of having at least a collared shirt doesn't surprise me at all. I suspect the requirement is something based on a combination of inertia, self-interest, and a lingering sense (hope?) that maintaining *some* sense of decorum will prevent a slide towards shabbiness and outright vulgarity and thus maintain the appeal and solvency of the entire enterprise.
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tdotdaver
New Member
I live next to Dentonia in Oakridge and golf there quite frequently. The land would not really be ideal for a park with the hills and elevation changes it would be quite difficult to keep it a safe and family friendly park. The city operates the golf course but the pro-shop and golf school are owned by a 'franchisee' who is typically a golf pro (I believe Dentonia's franchisee is a gent named Gary).
The dress code is not a classist issue as much as a moneymaker for the pro-shop - sorry sir, you'll need to grab one of our lovely Dentonia golf shirts for only $20!
As mentioned up-thread the Toronto muni courses are in un-developable flood plains that provide accessible golf and recreation to the city. I would never have taken up the sport if I didn't have access to Scarlett Woods and Dentonia where I can spend a few hours on a weekend for under $50.
The dress code is not a classist issue as much as a moneymaker for the pro-shop - sorry sir, you'll need to grab one of our lovely Dentonia golf shirts for only $20!
As mentioned up-thread the Toronto muni courses are in un-developable flood plains that provide accessible golf and recreation to the city. I would never have taken up the sport if I didn't have access to Scarlett Woods and Dentonia where I can spend a few hours on a weekend for under $50.
Silence&Motion
Senior Member
You misinterpret my point. I'm not trying to imply that only upper/middle class WASPS wore suits. I'm saying that with strictly enforced dress codes, it was easier to visually distinguish social groups and therefore enforce segregation in public places. A working man might have had his one suit that he brought out on special occasions, but if he wore it into an upper-middle class restaurant he would immediately be distinguished as an outsider. "Maintaining *some* sense of decorum" and "preventing a slide toward shabbiness and outright vulgarity and thus maintain the appeal and solvency of the entire enterprise" would be the exact justification that the maitre d' would use in telling this working class man in his old, ill-fitted suit that they had no tables available. It's not that these upper class people are discriminatory - oh, no - it's just that the restaurant tries to hold its patrons up to a certain level of formality. And if no working class people are able to live up to that level of formality, well, that's not the restaurant's fault.
The post-war period, while being more economically equal, was extremely stratified in terms of culture. Imposing strict homogeneity on people allows them to be ranked in relation to some cultural ideal, which is necessarily established to reflect the culture of the upper class and therefore for rig the game before it even begins.
The post-war period, while being more economically equal, was extremely stratified in terms of culture. Imposing strict homogeneity on people allows them to be ranked in relation to some cultural ideal, which is necessarily established to reflect the culture of the upper class and therefore for rig the game before it even begins.
ShonTron
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The one complaint I have about Toronto's golf courses is that they take up spaces in ravines that prevent a through path. Dentonia blocks was could be a useful path from the Taylor Creek Ravine through Warden Woods and far into Scarborough.
I'd really like to see a path through the public Don Valley GC to get under the 401 too. The private Lambton GC sits where a path along Black Creek could connect with the Humber River Trail.
Silence&Motion
Senior Member
It wouldn't be much different from the rest of the valley system in which it is located. It would be a hell of a lot cheaper to maintain if it was left to naturalize. And as ShonTron mentioned, the land that many of these courses occupy could be put to great use in building up our network of recreational trails (which can be accessed for free and with no dress code restrictions).
I think it's an admirable goal if the city wants to maintain golf courses as part of a larger effort provide a diverse array of accessible recreation opportunities to Toronto (along with swimming pools, ice rinks, etc). That's why it annoys me that they then impose arbitrary dress codes as a way of throwing up additional barriers to the existing (and probably unavoidable) financial ones.
James
Senior Member
I believe that dress codes should only be in effect if it affects the safety of the players or the playability of the sport.
gabe
Senior Member
Yes i agree. i wish musicals, theatres even fine dining restaurants had dress codes. Back in 50s, 60s and even early 70s there was strict dress code rules. The higher-end restaurants in Toronto wouldn't let men in the door without a suit or sport coat. If you didn't have one, they would give you a card and send you to the nearest Men's clothier shop, where you could rent a sport coat and tie for dinner. Back in the early 60s my grandfather was too poor to afford suits for his 3 sons, so he used to rent sport coats and ties every time they went out for a nice dinner. It's funny even though they were so poor, they were always well dressed in every picture. My grandpa had to wear a shirt and tie to work and he was just a janitor!!