Here again we see the fruits of a cultural revolution, beginning in the 1960’s, which encouraged people, especially the young, to view themselves through an optic of victimhood and identity politics, as Mary Eberstadt’s recently published Primal Screams explains. It was “the man,” who represented tradition, patriarchy, government, and corporate power, that was responsible for people’s and society’s problems. Thus woke parents who promote such thinking now witness their children asserting their own victim status, even if they attend the very best schools, grow up in safe neighborhoods, and have unprecedented professional opportunities. And who exactly are the ones victimizing these poor, upper-middle-class, insulated teenagers? Their erstwhile woke parents, of course, who impose archaic dress codes upon them.

Complaints about wayward youth are almost as ancient as history itself. Aristotle complained of young people who were “high-minded because they have not yet been humbled by life, nor have they experienced the force of circumstances.” These youth “think they know everything, and are always quite sure about it.” Horace likewise lamented: “Our sires’ age was worse than our grandsires’. We, their sons, are more worthless than they; so in our turn we shall give the world a progeny yet more corrupt.” Yet what differentiates our post-1960s culture is that now parents have joined their children in the hatred of traditional mores. These parents’ own Baby Boomer mothers and fathers sought to explode social norms of behavior, including dress, in a temper of radical revolt. Now their children race to define deviancy down, lest they be labeled misogynist, backward, or bigoted, by an intolerant society and their own kids.