Standard & Poor's

Taste is a relative thing. How I feel about a particular food could be wholly different from how you feel. I hate black olives, for instance. And raw oysters. Does that invalidate my other tastes? Because I don't like raw oysters, is my taste for macaroni & cheese or sushi? Of course not. And we can safely say that taste varies widely around the world. I heard a story about a fruit named durian that tastes fine but has the odor of soiled diapers. Or hell, watch any episode of Taboo about food and you'll find something disgusting - to you. So I think we can safely say that there is no "standard" of what is good or bad food.

So there is no standard for taste. It depends on the person. Does that lack of defining standard then extend to other tastes? Music? Art? Literature? If people can have hugely varied tastes about food and it is considered acceptable, then shouldn't that hold true for other aesthetics?

Yet we have music critics, art critics, book critics - all sorts of critics, including food critics. These are people who make their living pointing out flaws in other people's taste. Ostensibly they're doing it to provide the wider public with a preview of what's worth doing and what's not. Yet they're still operating off of some standard of what's good and what's not. A critic cannot be purely objective by virtue of he or she being a person.

So then what to make of people who judge and criticize others' tastes? Is it appropriate to tell someone that they have poor taste? From what position could they possibly be in granting them the right to abuse another's taste? And even then, what would accomplish? Why bother telling someone that what they like isn't cool, or appropriate, or good?

We should all be comfortable enjoying our own particular tastes. Music, books, food, all that. But there is some advantage in listening and following to these social cues. It helps people get along and fit in to groups! By agreeing to like the same things, or just not speaking judgments aloud, we can be more comfortable in our tastes. Certain people may join certain groups because of common tastes, or by a desire to be in accepted by that group. By establishing a hierarchy of acceptable taste, people can define where they stand among their peers. The flip side is simply ignoring any criticisms and enjoying what you do regardless, but this could be isolating.

Hmm... I'm sorting of losing the thread here. I guess the idea here is while standards are used in different areas, they don't need to be. Now I sound like a happy hippie, all you need is love kinda thing. Whatever. I like Spike Lee movies and Huey Lewis and the News. Booyah!