5 Comments
User's avatar
Kellie Spano's avatar

‘beauty in the absence of safety is a mask’ 👏🏼

Expand full comment
Caroline's avatar

I think it has a lot to do with the construction of appearance as "effort." The look for contemporary metropolitan working women is minimal and "clean," effortless. They're supposed to be focusing on more important things and be taken seriously as a result (even if, of course, they're also supposed to be doing the labor of upkeep just offstage). The fake tan bleach blonde Fox newscaster look is about drawing attention to the effort. They see the superficial performance of femininity as an inherent good, so it doesn't need to be subtle or understated.

Expand full comment
Sara's avatar

As a democrat myself I am shocked by you talking about people’s looks and relabeling it as “it’s really their policies”. You called it mean girl and then continued to talk about it? I’ve followed you since Covid this is not ok.

Expand full comment
Charlotte Palermino's avatar

Mean Girls is a movie. Commenting on someones contour, to me at least, isn’t shocking. The policies being enacted are. It’s not relabeling it to their policies, it’s commenting on the trend (like a celebrity trend which everyone seems very comfortable to do) and realizing how we choose to show up is going to vary. Ultimately, we’re all performing drag daily. In a safe society, ideally, you’re being yourself. Can’t say that’s what’s happening in America.

Expand full comment
Stephanie Flere's avatar

If that is your take you have entirely missed the point. I am not trying to be a jerk, but please read it again because it’s actually such a smart and deep point of view about beauty standards and choices.

Expand full comment