Salon-Worthy

For the upwardly mobile — mostly young people — the salon was the ladder. 
To where, you ask? 
To good society, of course. 
By "good," they meant not only a well-padded bank account, but manners to match. 

How deflating it must have felt, back then, to belong to the "lower" society of average earners. 
Exclusivity, after all, means exclusion — particularly for the majority.

Where does the expression "salon-worthy" actually come from? 
The term has roots in the 19th century, when bourgeois and aristocratic circles opened their so-called salons for social gatherings.

Today, the term is used broadly to describe what society considers acceptable or socially recognized — not just among the nobility or the bourgeoisie. 
The salons weren't only for the well-heeled, sipping tea in elegant rooms while waiting for something to happen. 
No — the intellectual artists and the artistic intellectuals held debates and discussions. 
Yes, with tea on the side.

The evolution of the attribute "salon-worthy" is often a mirror of social change. 
The mirror of society is the yogurt of cultures — because even a cultural society submits to change. 
Not always willingly, but nonetheless. 

What counts as acceptable or even fashionable today may be labelled outdated or taboo by tomorrow. 
And yet there was always a well-kept salon with culture that was equally well-maintained. 
So at least the story went, for centuries. 

Until the bulldozers arrived and took to the salons much the way they took to the East Wing of the White House. 
The former East Wing, that is.

Does anyone still know what gets labelled salon-worthy today?

My salon looks more like that field at Woodstock — half a million people living culture peacefully, audibly, visibly, and mostly stoned. 
A salon where aggression, defamation, dehumanization, fascist tendencies, loudmouths, repeat offenders, and sexual predators have not yet been bootlickingly ushered in.

Yes, I'm asking for far too much — on a foundation of naive yogurt. 
So what? 
I like cultures. 
The more different, the better.