Podcast Summary: The Review of Mess — "Ambient Eugenics"

Hosts: Jessica DeFino and Emily Kirkpatrick
Date: August 29, 2025
Main Topic: A critical exploration of the undercurrents of eugenics in beauty and pop culture, centering on recent celebrity controversies, marketing tactics, and fashion/beauty industry trends.

Episode Overview

Jessica and Emily dive into the idea of "ambient eugenics"—the often-unspoken but pervasive valorization of genetic “superiority” within pop culture, beauty marketing, and celebrity discourse. They dissect the controversial Sydney Sweeney x American Eagle campaign, rage-bait marketing trends, the complicated intersection of beauty sponsorships in the WNBA, Kim Kardashian's Face Shaper, and the latest pop culture messes. The tone is critical, sharp, and irreverent, with frequent asides and cultural history.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Updates & Community Projects (00:15–03:22)

• Jessica announces the debut of her newsletter, Flesh World, and teases the launch of the Lowbrow Book Club.
• The book club event (Sep 10, NYC) will include live readings of “unhinged” beauty/fashion essays; attendees receive gift bags with handmade face oils and exclusive merch.

2. Skims Skull Shapewear & Kardashian Marketing (03:32–17:41)

• Kim Kardashian’s Skims “Face Shaper” seen as a medical-looking but ultimately useless garment (“a corset for the face that does literally nothing”—Emily, 04:23).
• Discussion of Kardashians’ medicalization of beauty and refusal to acknowledge true cosmetic interventions.
  • “It’s Kim selling her medical interventions back to us in the form of overpriced spandex.” —Emily, 05:03
  • The “beauty as labor/work” narrative vs. quick-fix cosmetic procedures (07:00–08:24).
• Critique of missed marketing opportunities: Kim not wearing the mask in public to generate controversy, and failing to cast Anthony Hopkins (“Anthony Hopkins... why is he not the face of the campaign?” —Emily, 09:32).
• Jessica relays her relief at Kim’s marketing missteps: “As a beauty culture critic who thinks this is, like, a horrible thing for us... I’m glad she’s not a great marketer.” (13:48)
• Parallel between Skims Face Shaper and Persian nose job culture—wearing bandages as a status marker.

3. Beauty, Glamour, and the Grotesque: Old Hollywood Parallels (16:46–17:41)

• Emily references Sunset Boulevard’s portrayal of beauty rituals as a harbinger of today's normalization of “body horror” in beauty.
• Jessica notes: “The grotesque kind of always becomes glamorous over time.”

4. New Celebrity Beauty Products: Alicia Keys and the Magic "Like Skin" Concealer (17:41–25:16)

• Alicia Keys' new concealer branded as “it’s like skin” triggers a discussion on transparency, beauty labor, and feminist contradictions.
• Jessica recounts her failed attempt to discuss Keys’ anti-makeup era in a 2021 Allure interview, revealing how celebrity PR blocks any scrutiny or narrative evolution.
• Critique of publications’ tolerance for PR stonewalling: “Why are we interviewing this person at all if they refuse to cooperate?” —Emily, 24:17

5. Anna Delvey and Bunnygate: The Monetized Micro-Scandal (25:48–38:31)

• Emily narrates the viral “Bunnygate” scandal: abandoned bunnies in a Delvey photoshoot, Delvey’s defensive legal threats, and eventual merch sales.
• “She’s living up to the scammer origin story because she has... figured out how to monetize this whole Bunnygate thing to her advantage.” —Emily, 26:37
• Delvey’s symbolic “Bungazi” T-shirts: only 20% of proceeds (to an unnamed nonprofit), and a Change.org petition to outlaw pet abandonment (which is already illegal). The episode lampoons this as performative, ineffective activism.
• Notable: “She then sent her a string of hieroglyphics.” —Jessica, 28:43

6. Beauty Sponsorship and Feminine Optimization in the WNBA (39:03–48:56)

• Jessica lists a surge in beauty sponsors for the WNBA, including Maybelline, Fenty, Glossier, and… Vagisil.
• Hosts discuss the double-edged sword: necessary funding vs. reinforcement of “feminine duty” even in athletic excellence.
  • “No woman, no matter her achievements, is exempt from her feminine duty to perform beauty.” —Jessica
• Critique of the gender binary: Why don't men’s teams get beauty sponsors? “Why aren’t they working with the Knicks?”
• Beauty as compensatory femininity for women excelling in “masculine” spaces.

7. Stretch Armstrong: Fashion’s Grotesque, Unwearable Maximalism (49:23–56:51)

• Emily introduces the “Stretch Armstrong” fashion trend: exaggerated proportions, unwearable pieces (giant jeans, elongated shoes, etc.).
• She frames this as both a restriction and assertion of (female) physical space in an Ozempic-shrinking era: “Fashion is maximizing our bodies while we’re told everywhere else to minimize ourselves.”
• Jessica comments on the irony: “Some of the giant garments are on very tiny and getting tinier bodies... responding to both things at once.”

8. “Ambient Eugenics:” The Sydney Sweeney x American Eagle Controversy (56:51–90:12)

• Full deconstruction of the ad’s wordplay on “genes/genetics,” its allusion to the infamous Calvin Klein/Brooke Shields campaign, and the not-so-subtle evocation of white supremacist aesthetics.
  • “Anytime we’re talking about a blonde-haired, blue-eyed person’s genes, we’ve already strayed too far.” —Emily, 58:09
• Explicit references to recent right-wing appropriation of Sweeney’s image as “good genes.”
• Context: climate of mainstream eugenic rhetoric (Trump’s “low IQ” jabs, anti-immigrant statements, Gaza genocide).
• Marketing opportunism: “American Eagle looked at our current political climate and they thought we could absolutely get away with a white supremacist dog whistle.” —Emily, 63:54
• Jessica links mainstream beauty standards (blonde hair, blue eyes, small noses, “facial harmonization,” undetectable surgery) to deep roots of eugenics.
• “Sunday Riley Good Genes” and Gwyneth Paltrow’s “Goop Genes”—everyday reminders of the ideology.
  • “The joke [in the ad] only works because of the ambient eugenics that are already in the air.” —Jessica, 72:44–73:54
• Rage-bait works: American Eagle’s sales bump, and similar trends (Skims Face Shaper, Matt Rife/ELF).
• Marketing’s “labor-saving device”: Brands exploit outrage rather than invest creative effort (“The labor that the rage bait gimmick is saving is the labor of making a good campaign.” —Jessica, 85:47).
• The Kardashians, Goop, and Gwyneth Paltrow as case studies in profitable controversy.
• Final call: Channel outrage about explicit eugenics ads into confronting the deeper, subtler structures of beauty and race in everyday culture (“Channel it toward the less noticeable ways eugenics and white supremacy shape our day to day lives.” —Jessica, 74:09).

9. Mess of the Month Segment (90:18–98:27)

• Emily’s Mess: “The Summer I Turned Pretty”—addictive, rage-baiting “teen romance slop” about beauty and sexual awakening (“Hotness ruins lives.” —Jessica, 92:25).
• Jessica’s Mess: Botched restoration of a Virgin Mary statue in Seville. The Macarena received a “modern glow-up” with longer lashes and a smoky gaze (“Not even our religious icons are safe from beauty as a moral imperative.” —Jessica, 97:53).
• Both messes underscore how beauty, spectacle, and standards invade every level of culture.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Kardashian’s Face Shaper: “It is a corset for the face that does literally nothing.” —Emily (04:23)
• On Beauty Labor: “She has leaned into this idea of beauty labor being work.” —Jessica (06:52)
• On Rage-Bait Marketing: “The labor that the rage bait gimmick is saving is the labor of making a good campaign.” —Jessica (85:47)
• On American Eagle Ad: “Anytime we’re talking about a blonde-haired, blue-eyed person’s genes, we’ve already strayed too far.” —Emily (58:09)
• On Sweeney’s Ambivalence: “She’s using the vagary to her advantage.” —Emily (67:10)
• On the Overlap of Eugenics and Beauty: “Eugenics really is kind of the basis of beauty culture and the beauty industry.” —Jessica (69:52)
• On Everyday Eugenics: “Sunday Riley Good Genes, Goop Genes—these are everyday reminders of the ideology.” —Jessica (72:44)
• On Fashion Maximalism: “Fashion is maximizing our bodies while we’re told everywhere else to minimize ourselves.” —Emily (55:41)
• On Bunnygate: “She then sent her a string of hieroglyphics.” —Jessica (28:43)
• On Madonna Restoration: “Not even our religious icons are safe from beauty as a moral imperative.” —Jessica (97:53)

Important Timestamps

• 03:32 – Skims Face Shaper & beauty labor
• 17:41 – Alicia Keys skincare and “It’s Like Skin”
• 25:48 – Bunnygate breakdown (Anna Delvey)
• 39:03 – WNBA beauty sponsorships and gender binary
• 49:23 – “Stretch Armstrong” fashion trend
• 56:51 – “Ambient Eugenics” and American Eagle/Sydney Sweeney ad
• 90:18 – Mess of the Month: The Summer I Turned Pretty, Macarena makeover

Conclusion

This episode dissects the deep, everyday integration of eugenics thinking in pop culture—from the overt dog whistles in beauty advertising to the performative activism of celebrity scammers, and the subtle but persistent valorization of white, Western beauty ideals. Through humor, cultural criticism, and sharp personal anecdotes, Jessica and Emily connect the dots between reality TV, beauty marketing, sports, history, and everyday life. Their call to listeners: scrutinize not just the loud controversies, but the ordinary, “ambient” ways beauty standards reproduce oppressive ideologies.

For more: Visit jessicadefino.substack.com

(All ads, generic intros/outros, and non-content banter have been excluded.)