Let's continue the topic of taste and distinction.
We have seen this figure. There are two groups at the top and the bottom.
Now about the intermediate group.
The cultural struggle is not complete without an intermediate group that strives to become dominant.
If the dominant group is bourgeois, this intermediate group is petit-bourgeois.
This group has an ambition.
Their behavior is often pretentious.
Bourdieu explains this in the following way.
Here, petit-bourgeois refers to the intermediate group.
"...the petit-bourgeois experience of the world starts out from timidity, the embarrassment of someone who is uneasy in his body and his language."
Because petit-bourgeois has not acquired the taste,
which again takes time to acquire, he is timid and anxious.
Embarrassment is the starting point because he needs to define himself vis-à-vis more sophisticated bourgeois.
He is uneasy in his body and language
because he cannot properly behave or speak just as bourgeois people do.
Therefore, he is always concerned about how he looks by observing himself from outside.
He then tries to correct himself too much.
As opposed to this anxiety, we can talk about ease of the dominant group.
Ease presupposes the self-assurance
which comes from the certainty of being able to objectify that objectification,
appropriate that appropriation.
This is what the dominant group is like.
This group is self-assured.
They have certainty of themselves.
They can objectify that objectification.
This objectification means observing.
One is objectified when one is observed and examined.
This means that they are observed and examined by others,
but they can counter this examination by the confident manners.
This ease has an interesting twist.
If one tries to distinguish oneself from others, then one is not exhibiting ease.
Ease is achieved when one does not care about distinction.
Bourdieu wrote, "Those who are held to be distinguished have the privilege of not worrying about their distinction."
The intermediate group reveals its own intermediateness by their conscious efforts to become part of the dominant group.
[The] dominant group has the ease that allows it to distinguish itself without such efforts.
The dominant aesthetic is characterized by ostentatious discretion, sobriety, and understatement.
This is why the dominant aesthetic is the combination of ease and asceticism.
Now we understand why the high-end apparel store and the upscale restaurant were organized
such that customers are continuously observed.
Customers were put under pressure.
This pressure intimidates the petit-bourgeois or the intermediate group,
while those in the dominant group can behave with ease in that contentious situation.
Here is our conclusion. Simple relaxation is not the answer for service.
I suggest that many customers appear to be in the intermediate group trying to match the dominant aesthetic.
But again, this is a self-defeating process
because as long as these customers try to match the dominant aesthetic, then they cannot achieve it.
The services claiming high value should have this tension.
On the other hand, popular services seek to hide this tension.