Status is more taboo to discuss openly than sexuality

Evidence

The author Tom Wolfe concluded in the 1970s that status was the “fundamental taboo, more so than sexuality and everything of that sort. It’s much easier for people to talk about their sex lives in this day and age than it is to talk about their status.” Open discussion of social hierarchy is unpleasant and impolite. When the British novelist Nancy Mitford mused on the subtle differences between upper-class and middle-class speech in a 1955 essay, “unprintably violent” letters poured into her publisher’s editorial office. … In fact, the modern word “villain” derives from the status-related sin of lowly villein feudal tenants daring to seek a higher social position. — W. David Marx, Status and Culture, 24

Categorization

• CANDY: The etymology of ‘villain’ from ‘villein’ seeking higher position is a light, tweetable fact; also the Mitford letters anecdote.
• DEFINE: Explains the surprising etymology connecting ‘villain’ to low-born feudal tenants who aspired upward.
• XREF: The rise-then-resentment of social climbers echoes the author’s own work on fashion/cultural hierarchies.