Something distasteful is unpleasant, off-putting, or morally ugly — the kind of thing that gives you distaste. It can be a smell, a sight, a joke, a job, or a way of talking about people. Food can be distasteful if it turns your stomach, but the word is used at least as much about manners and morals: a cruel remark, a greedy boast, a story that should not have been told in that room. It is stronger than I don't fancy that, and a little more formal than gross or nasty. Though actually, people stretch it. One person calls a rude joke distasteful; another saves the word for something they find wrong, not merely unfunny. Tasteful is the cleaner opposite in the manners sense: in good taste. Distasteful is not the same as tasteless, which can also mean food with no flavour.