Loading summary
Transcript614 lines
- [00:16]
A
Hello and welcome to Mess World, a podcast dedicated to discussing the highs and lows of pop culture every month. I'm Jessica Defino and I write the newsletter Flesh World.
- [00:25]
B
And I'm Emily Kirkpatrick and I write the newsletter I heart Message.
- [00:29]
A
And we're back. We're back for another month of Mess World. We just had like a pre podcast podcast just talking the two of us. So I hope this man episode is as juicy as our initial.
- [00:41]
B
Wow. Yeah, we really had a warm up for this podcast. We literally just talked for an hour about YouTube drama and now we're ready to begin the show.
- [00:49]
A
Yeah, I'm. I don't know, I feel like I'm really happy for February to be over. February has felt like my flop month and I'm just hoping, I'm just hoping that March is better. Even like coming up with what, what, what did I want to discuss on the pod today? I was like nothing. Nothing's happening. And then of course I thought about for one second I was like, oh, I have so much to talk about.
- [01:14]
B
So I know I've. I've also felt very empty brained this month.
- [01:18]
A
Yeah, I think that's it. Like there's so, I mean especially which we'll get into with the clavicular of it all and looks maxing. There's so much happening in the beauty. So much of it just feels so boring and obvious to me that it hasn't like it hasn't made me want to write or talk about it.
- [01:36]
B
But yeah, I was telling you this too earlier this month is I made. I think this is just what happens to me every year at the beginning of the year. But yeah, everything feel in fashion feels a little like reductive and dull and like we've, we're retreading the same old ground. But I know I don't know, things are coming. Things, things always come for me when I least expect it. And I also feel like once award shows we kind of get behind us and we're into the Met gala, we'll
- [02:02]
A
probably have some, some rich tests, then we'll be working.
- [02:06]
B
Yeah.
- [02:07]
A
The big news of February was of course the lunar New year, of course, which according to the Chinese zodiac, it is the year of the fire horse, which has been providing some, some beauty entertainment for me personally. It's so fun to see how beauty PRs are trying to like shoehorn their wares into like horse relevancy.
- [02:28]
B
I am, I'm always amaz the way that beauty PRs are shoehorning themselves into literally anything and everything. As I sent you earlier today, that Carol Kennedy headline, I'm just amazed how they get in, how they finesse their way in there.
- [02:43]
A
I know Emily just sent me a text of a, of a PR headline that was like, carolyn Bissette Kennedy would have loved these skincare products, which is just insane.
- [02:51]
B
I love, I love that framing and I love that we can just describe anything to like dead people. We're just like, they actually would have loved this.
- [02:58]
A
They definitely.
- [02:59]
B
This would have been their favorite thing if they were alive today.
- [03:01]
A
They can't say that.
- [03:02]
B
They would tell me. And you can't defame the dead famously, so you can say anything you want about them. So maybe it's true. Maybe she would have loved that skincare
- [03:11]
A
actually hoping for some more like mane and tail esque horse shampoo type.
- [03:16]
B
Wow, they're missing out.
- [03:18]
A
Well, actually, I wrote an article about the dog beauty boom at the end of last year for cnn. And one of the brands that I highlighted in there is this brand called Bich by former beauty editor Alexandra Pauly. And she had said in an article about her dog products be that they were looking to move into horse products. And I was hoping makes sense for
- [03:39]
B
some news that money.
- [03:41]
A
I know, but. But no, I think, I think actually the funniest press release that I got is from this brand, this fragrance house called Maison d'. Eto. And the whole brand is actually inspired by horses and has always been. They say it is, quote, built around the profound symbolism of horses, freedom, movement, intuition and inner strength. And the scents act as metaphors for the horse's spirit of endurance and independence,
- [04:11]
B
which I think is metaphor.
- [04:13]
A
Very charming, if ridiculous, but so they, for Chinese New Year were promoting this one particular scent called I Dream, which is inspired by specific dead dressage horse that was named I Dream.
- [04:30]
B
I believe I was going to say do horses dream?
- [04:33]
A
The horse's name was was I Dream, but the description just made me laugh out loud of, like, how this scent is inspired by a horse. Listen to this. Opens with carrot seed. Perfect. Horses love carrots softened by warm milk. I don't know. Do horses drink warm milk?
- [04:51]
B
I don't think so.
- [04:52]
A
I don't know.
- [04:53]
B
I mean, maybe when they're babies from
- [04:54]
A
their mothers and then deepens into. It deepens into saddle leather.
- [05:00]
B
Where's the hay?
- [05:01]
A
I know. We need a note of hay. We need a note of grass. There's no, nothing to replace that milk. I feel like the carrot seed milk saddle leather. And they say the result is subtly animalistic. And so I read this actually yesterday. And I was like, wait, I have a sample of this exact perfume. They had sent it to me a while ago. And I was like, I gotta spray it. I gotta see if it's giving horse. And it was not. It was really overpowering. But I did not pick up on any horse. It like felt. It smelled like the floor of a fragrance factory or something. You know when you like smell a perfume and you're like, oh, yep, that smells like just perfume. I cannot identify any notes. Just like alcohol and aldehydes and like that specific like chemically scent, which is all that it smelled like. I would have preferred horse. I wish it was. I wish it was horse scented.
- [05:53]
B
But I feel like a something, a perfume that actually smelled like horse would actually become like a really interesting cult product. Because I feel like there are so many perfumes that are like cold and product. Yeah. But you know what I mean? I feel like there's a whole genre of like exclusive, like high end fragrances that like smell kind of terrible because they're going after something very specific and weird. And I feel like, I don't know, an animal. There's a whole category of like animals, animal, like that. Right. And I feel like a horse one actually would have kind of like fit perfectly into that category in a way that would have maybe even been more financially successful for them probably.
- [06:32]
A
I. Yeah, I don't know. I'm waiting, I'm waiting on, on a perfume that really does smell like horse.
- [06:40]
B
I mean, I'm with I dare to dream where maybe I dream.
- [06:44]
A
I dream of horse.
- [06:46]
B
That's very exciting. I never, I didn't notice that. I mean, I guess I wasn't really paying attention, but I haven't noticed that much Lunar New Year stuff happening in fashion. I know there's like red capsule collections and stuff. I did see one photo. I don't know that it was for the Lunar New Year or Vogue just. I think Vogue just posted it to celebrate. But it was Kendall Jenner in a red dress riding a horse. Did you see that one?
- [07:08]
A
I did not see that one. But it sounds like something that like probably existed already. And they were like, yeah, oh yeah.
- [07:14]
B
It's definitely like, yeah, they're repurposing their own intellectual property, I guess to fit the occasion. But I just thought it was so funny to just put Kendall, a white woman in a red dress, on a horse and be like, there you go. Chinese New Year. You got it.
- [07:28]
A
I know. I opened up.
- [07:29]
B
Check the box.
- [07:30]
A
One PR email that was from like a company that does bubble baths and it was just a black and white image of a white woman next to a horse. It might have even been a gif. It might have been a moving image. And then just like links to buy bubble bath. Like that was it.
- [07:47]
B
Where's my horse bubble bath?
- [07:50]
A
I would, I would use that.
- [07:52]
B
I want to be in a barnyard. I want to be transported to a stable.
- [07:56]
A
There's definitely got to be. There's barnyards. There has. I know there's a stable.
- [07:59]
B
There has to be.
- [08:00]
A
I will do more research. I'll put my favorite horse scented perfumes in the show notes.
- [08:06]
B
I'd love to know. I'd love to discover. I just wanted to share it. This month it was the avnot Awards, which are my favorite, probably my favorite red carpet of the whole year because of course it's where, where the porn industry is celebrated. One of the handful of occasions that the porn industry is celebrated, but may perhaps the most famous one. Although I do think the Pornhub Awards are coming. Coming for the AVN's throat.
- [08:31]
A
These are always my favorite of your red carpet roundups.
- [08:34]
B
I do love them. Well, I also recently suggested, I don't know if you saw Playboy joined substack recently. And I tagged Playboy and I said send me.
- [08:44]
A
Oh my gosh, you absolutely send me,
- [08:46]
B
send me to this red carpet because the final frontier, like I love covering these red carpets. I think they're so interesting and people are such interesting dressers. And you also get like these little previews as we'll discussing in a moment. You get these little previews of like kind of what trends are coming for a celebrity red carpet. Because of course this was where celebrities get all of their like, I know
- [09:05]
A
a year later, every year later you point out from the AVNs, yes, you
- [09:09]
B
will see this stuff. But. But my top complaint about this red carpet is that no one is covering them in a way that's helpful to me as a fashion reporter because like even people get very mad at me that I don't say the names of the, the adult entertainers. But that's literally because I can't find them every single year. Yes, there's like one dude who covers all the one photographer dude and I always go through him to find all of these red carpet foes because he takes the most and he like the most extensive collection of them, which is what I need for my work. But he never ever credits the people he's taking photographs of. He never writes the name of, of the entertainer. So I can't find Them. And let me tell you, when you reverse Google image search porn stars, it's not helpful.
- [09:55]
A
No, I can imagine.
- [09:57]
B
Because I try to do that sometimes to figure out who these people are. And it's maybe one in every 20 times I figure out who it is and it's ultimately not worth it. It's not a good experience for me to discover who they are. So I'd like a simpler way. And anyway, so I can barely find out the names of these people, let alone like, I want to know, who are you wearing? Yeah, where did you get this from? Like, what was the thought process behind this? Like, what are you trying to do in this outfit? And no one's asking them those questions.
- [10:23]
A
This is why we need you on the red carpet.
- [10:26]
B
Get me there. I'm ready. I'm ready. Playboy. Playboy put me in. So anyway, because I love this red carpet so much, I just wanted to quickly share a handful of little micro trendlets from that night that I. That I noticed that I thought might be coming for the rest of us soon. For starters, we saw another shibari inspired fit where this was a look that I also called out last year at the pornhub Awards. Yeah, the pornhub Awards. An entertainer arrived in kind of just a bra and underwear within the rope lashed across her body. Shibari fashion as the dress itself. And I was like, that is stunning. And she did it with this full fur coat. It just looks so major. We'll put in the video edit. And then this year we got another. She was just wearing kind of like a latex mini dress that she'd done a shibari like pastel rainbow rope over. And her date was wearing a matching bolo tie made out of the same strip.
- [11:25]
A
Oh, that's cool.
- [11:27]
B
And I thought that was very cute and cool. And I still think that we're not. I find it odd that we're not using ropes like this on celebrity red carpets. It seems like such an easy addition to like any boring dress, to like it sexy and scandalous. Anyway, I also saw a hell of a lot of protest fashion, which is a staple of like porn related red carpets in a way that it's like not on normal red carpets. And I find so interesting because on normal, I say normal celebrity, like a list. Red carpets, I guess is how I should put it on a list. Red carpets. We're getting a lot of like, pins.
- [12:01]
A
Yeah, everyone does the little pin, which
- [12:05]
B
I'm always so torn over because it feels very like. Of course I want them to be making a public political statement. And I want. You know, of course, it's also a signaling to their fans, like, hey, I'm on the right side of things here. Don't come for me. But at the same time, it also feels like a little like Ryan Gosling wearing the Darfur T shirt. Yeah.
- [12:25]
A
I mean, yes, of course. It's a very, like, yeah, performative little.
- [12:30]
B
Right.
- [12:31]
A
I mean, it should be the starting point of. Of your activism. Not like.
- [12:35]
B
But it's usually the ending point of the activism that I just find very interesting. And anyway, adult entertainers do not play around like that. I love that they are much more aggressively in your face with their protest fashion. So the first one I noticed that I thought was very fun is an actress was wearing kind of like a Ren Faire take on Chapel Roan's Statue of Liberty costume.
- [12:59]
A
Ooh.
- [13:00]
B
It was pretty gorgeous. She had, like, the full crown and everything. And then her purse was actually Trump's head.
- [13:08]
A
I saw this in your newsletter. Incredible Kathy Griffith vibes, Right?
- [13:13]
B
Very Kathy Griffin vibes. But no one said a peep about her. And I also just. Again, so I was like, it's funny how far we've come as a nation. Like, just how far the, like, the Overton window of, like, acceptability has moved that, like, Kathy Griffin would get canceled for something like this. And then this porn star is actually kind of wearing, I guess, kind of an equally gruesome one. Because actually, I went back and looked at the Kathy Griffin one. I'm like, oh, it was quite gruesome. It is a head covered in blood in a pretty, like, kind of carry kind of way. But this one, it is. Yeah. Just Trump's head as a clutch, and then his ear is dripping bejeweled blood, which I thought was a beautiful touch. Yeah. So I loved that. I didn't. And no one talks about these red carpets either, which I think is so funny. We had another male actor dressed as a founding father kind of situation.
- [14:06]
A
This is reminding me of the George magazine covers that are starting to come out everywhere. JFK Junior's political pop culture magazine George,
- [14:17]
B
which had, like, George mag cover.
- [14:19]
A
A lot of, like, glam founding father cosplay.
- [14:22]
B
It had. Yeah. Was it not Cindy Crawford, George Washington cosplay on the car? I think that was the first cover of George ever. Yeah, it's very, very famous. Again, we'll. We'll insert it in the video version of the podcast. But, yeah, so someone showed up as a founding father, which my readers might recall is something that also happened kind of vaguely at the XMAS last year, which is another adult entertainment industry award show. But a couple dressed up in like kind of Louis the 16th, like FOP. FOP vibes. Yeah, they had like the. But they had the white ringlet wigs, you know, and the powdered faces and the, I don't know, similar. Similar energy in their outfit. I thought that was interesting. And. But the guy this year who dressed up as a founding father, his. One of his dates for the night was wearing a completely sheer hoop skirt that was printed with the 14th amendment. It. That was kind of radical and awesome. Like such a simple, like easy. I don't know. That's kind of always. What I'm struck too by this red carpet is nothing is kind of like wildly impossible or over the top. Like these, these people are doing things like very much within their means, I guess you'd say. You know, like these aren't multimillionaires, these aren't billionaires.
- [15:32]
A
These aren't like couture houses creating one kind garments.
- [15:36]
B
Right. But they're still like so to the point and effective. Yeah. And they're totally making it happen in a way where I'm like, oh, like a celebrity. This would be the simplest thing in the world. Like if you put your mind to it, like you could really, I don't know, you can make this happen. And I think the ultimate proof of that is there was another performer at this award show who like just made their body like a billboard, essentially. Like they wrote fuck ice across her tits. Which I thought, brilliant, brilliant. People are looking at your cleavage. Anyway, use it as a sign. Tell me something. Give them something to read. Absolutely. And then across her abs she wrote Minnesota Strong. And then was wearing a shirt that was the outline of the state of Minnesota with a trans flag across it. And then just wearing a gas mask. And I also think gas mask, that's powerful stuff.
- [16:22]
A
Yes. And, you know, very relevant to your prediction at the beginning of the year of face obscuring fashions.
- [16:31]
B
Well, well, well, well. And as. And as we saw at the AVN Awards, we got more face masks. Face masks aplenty. In fact, I would say on that red carpet. Yes. There was one creator who did kind of. I don't know what else to call except like the 2020 Shiesty esthetic, which I don't know if you're familiar. That's a very TikTok.
- [16:51]
A
I don't know what that is.
- [16:53]
B
It's a very TikTok thing. Young men, especially young black men, are often wearing kind of these ball. These skin like spandex, black balaclava.
- [17:05]
A
Okay. Yeah.
- [17:05]
B
Within, like a little tracksuit. And that's just kind of. There's the look of the tie, and it's like, you know, avoiding the implication is that you're kind of tough, you know, that you're doing tough stuff, which, like, whether you are or not, I don't know. It's not the case. It's just an aesthetic. But so this young man did the balaclava, the black spandex balaclava, but he paired it with this kind of like, elegant black tie suit. And I thought that was very interesting. Yeah. And a little cowboy hat, I believe. If I'm not. If I'm not mistaken. And then another young man brought back what I've been waiting to come back for a long time now, which is the Kanye Margiela mask.
- [17:45]
A
Oh.
- [17:47]
B
And so he was wearing some sort of gold blazer, I believe, shirtless, and then a gold spiked full coverage head mask, as in the Bargella style. And I love those masks.
- [17:58]
A
Yes.
- [17:59]
B
They're so beautiful. I hate that they're associated so deeply with Kanye.
- [18:02]
A
I know.
- [18:03]
B
They're gorgeous. They're absolutely stunning and gorgeous and people should start wearing them again. And I find the effect so compelling.
- [18:11]
A
Yeah.
- [18:11]
B
I don't know, I just think there's something about turning your head into a mannequin head. I don't know. I've been struck with it since Margiela did it. I really like the idea. Yeah.
- [18:21]
A
In like, a much more extreme and statement making way than say, like, mannequin skin, which was on, like the runways last year and became a big, like, Mac makeup trend that they were trying to push.
- [18:33]
B
Just like kind of fully anonymizing yourself, but also making yourself a bit of an automaton. I don't know. I find it very compelling stuff. And then there was another actress there who was wearing kind of a Teyana Taylor. I don't remember if I talked about Teya Taylor in the last podcast.
- [18:50]
A
Yeah, I think we did.
- [18:51]
B
She wore that, like, big hipped, ashy studio dress with the built in turtleneck. And this woman, similarly was wearing this like rhinestoned, semi nude dress and then had a neck gaiter that matched it perfectly, like a really glam neck gator. And I just thought that was very fun and random. And yeah, again, if. If adult entertainers are telling me it's happening, it's like, definitely happening. And another thing I had to accept from this awards that seems to be happening is a type of dress that I call toxic dresses, because they always remind me of Britney Spears's catsuit in the Toxic music video.
- [19:27]
A
Bedazzled catsuit.
- [19:29]
B
The bedazzled catsuit. That's like, all illusion meshed to the max. There are so many of those dresses. It's very. Beauty pageant.
- [19:38]
A
I was gonna say it's very, like, Miss America vibes.
- [19:41]
B
Yeah. I'm trying to think of when I first moved to New York. One of my most nightmarish jobs of my entire life is I worked in a. Like, a beauty pageant dress emporium. What? Yeah. This is a piece of my lore that I don't bring up often because
- [19:58]
A
I believe I don't know this lore.
- [20:00]
B
Yeah. It was such a hellish two weeks that I worked there before I had to quit because it was so nightmarish. But anyway, I saw a shitload of dresses that looked like this. And I'm trying to think of the name of the brand that the Emporium owned. I'm not going to come up with it. Anyway, they. They, like, literally specialized in exactly this type of dress. And all day long, it was beauty pageant queens and girls going to prom.
- [20:24]
A
I need, like, a. Like a diary style accounting of these two weeks in an essay form.
- [20:32]
B
I'm so traumatized by this event. I don't even know. Actually, very sinister as well, because it really.
- [20:38]
A
I can imagine.
- [20:40]
B
Well, like, beyond my experience and my treatment and what I was doing there, everyone else I worked with, every single other employee was an immigrant.
- [20:49]
A
Okay.
- [20:50]
B
And that fact was held over their head every single day. And they were threatened with their work visas. Every single day. Yeah.
- [20:59]
A
Wow. I mean, that's kind of surprising, but it was really.
- [21:04]
B
Wow, really scary. Yeah. And also that's. But also him, like, threatening everyone else with their work visas is what kind of made me realize that I could just walk away from this job and I didn't have to put up with his treatment because he didn't have any leverage over me like that that would keep me in such a heinous position as that. Also, he. That job, low key, ruined Love in a Hopeless Place for me. The Rihanna song, because it played so relentlessly all day over the radio. That, like, that is the soundtrack of me, like, furiously writing, like, 50 dress captions a day.
- [21:39]
A
Oh, gosh. Wow.
- [21:42]
B
So.
- [21:42]
A
Wow.
- [21:44]
B
Anyway, that was a tangent. But he sold. They sold a lot of the. They sold a lot of toxic a lot of times. Needless to say, I'm intimately familiar with the product in the market. There's also a lot of arm warmers. Oh. On that red Carpet arm warmers. Yeah. With gowns. With sleeveless gowns. I thought that was just interesting and not like coordinated with the gown, if that makes sense. So it'd be like, like a faux fur arm warmer with like a pink metallic gown.
- [22:13]
A
Interesting. Actually, after we went we. Emily and I went to an event for Dries Van Noten fragrance the other day. And then I fell in love with all the clothes in the store. And then I've been like scouring the real real for old Dries ever since. And there is like a pair of of arm warmers is like one of the most recent interesting of the site acquisition. So I've been thinking about Snapple.
- [22:39]
B
Yeah.
- [22:39]
A
Not for me, but I love them in theory.
- [22:42]
B
I love Dries Van Noten. I've also been using that perfume. Heavy.
- [22:46]
A
It's so good.
- [22:47]
B
It's so good. Did you look at the prices of it?
- [22:49]
A
$400.
- [22:52]
B
Not so good. Not so.
- [22:54]
A
It's like rare for me to find a perfume that I like, as evidenced by our previous segment. But yeah, the. The new.
- [23:01]
B
They're all good.
- [23:02]
A
Is really.
- [23:03]
B
The whole sample set they said was. Is good.
- [23:05]
A
I only like one of the four.
- [23:06]
B
Oh, but loving them all.
- [23:08]
A
It's. Yeah.
- [23:09]
B
I'm mixing and matching. I'm dipping across. I'm loving everything I love and I hate that I love it.
- [23:14]
A
You know?
- [23:15]
B
I know.
- [23:15]
A
Well, maybe they'll. They'll send you some free stuff now that we've given a shout out.
- [23:19]
B
Maybe. My friend and I always talk about the. The burdens of having exquisite taste like this. This is the downside people don't talk about is when you have exquisite luxury taste. You're p. By your own bank account that you. That none of it's accessible to you. And that's the burden I have to live with. It is so sad. Anyway, my last couple of notes from the AVNs. Just super strappy dresses. I don't think that's anything surprising, but I just was kind of noting they're garments that are like more cut out than garment. And it's also like tip to tail, I guess I would say like you're getting a cut out from the beginning to the end.
- [23:58]
A
More absence of dress than dress.
- [24:00]
B
More absence of dress than presence of dress. Which I just thought was interesting and notable. Yeah. And a lot of loose tendrils in general. Just kind of like stringy. Stringy bits. Dangly bobs of the dress. Yeah. Just coming off the dress. Yeah.
- [24:13]
A
I thought. I thought maybe you're referencing hair for a second.
- [24:16]
B
No, that would be that would be more interesting. Honestly. No. Just kind of like little, like jelly. Jellyfish esque tendrils.
- [24:24]
A
Yes.
- [24:25]
B
I would say little spiraling coming off their body, which was something I also. I noted in my Grammys recap for id. I think that was at the beginning of this month. Yeah, yeah. And there was. There's a country singer. I'm not going to remember her name right now, but she had a bunch of little tenderly bits coming off of her dress and she was tossing. She knocked my microphone over. I got so excited. She was tossing them at the camera the whole time. She's going down step and repeat. So it was like attacking the camera with her tendrils. And I thought that was fun. Elf ears.
- [24:57]
A
I sort of love this. I've been waiting as a woman with sticky outy ears.
- [25:03]
B
Now's your time.
- [25:04]
A
I'm ready. I'm ready for this.
- [25:05]
B
Go further, Push them farther if they don't stick out enough is what I learned from this recovery. Because there were two separate performers who both had elf ears who. Who didn't seem to be there together as, like, elf performer. This also just opened a question in my mind that I'm not sure whether or not I want to Google, but I guess this isn't keeping with my trend prediction for the year that we are going to get into, like, weirder, more esoteric kinks. Because I don't know about an elf ear kink. I don't know about, like, a Lord of the Rings thing going on out there, but I presume that's what these two ladies are like, performing for.
- [25:39]
A
Or I have to imagine, considering, like, the Romantasy books that are very big right now, like, there's probably some sort of.
- [25:46]
B
Right. And there's like alien porn and stuff, too. And so I imagine that elf is in there somewhere. I just wasn't previously aware of them. But it does seem like what these two ladies are catering to. And I'm here. I'm curious. My interest is piqued. Now, last two points. One. One of my favorite and most confusing looks of the night was there was an actress who arrived in a. What I've since learned is an unlicensed Pom Pom Purin Lolita costume. Are you familiar with Pompom Perrin?
- [26:14]
A
I am not.
- [26:16]
B
Okay, well, I. I was. I knew of the character. I did not know his name, but I kind of. I kept Googling, like, pudding dog. I don't know. I was like, using all the context clues I had from this costume, which was pudding and Dog, because it says Pudding on the apron. And I was like, okay, okay. And I. And it led me to Pompompur and Who's just kind of a dog that doesn't wear. It's just a little cartoon dog. Kind of a hello Kitty situation. Maybe it's affiliated with hello Kitty actually.
- [26:42]
A
Okay.
- [26:44]
B
Hello Kitty vibes. Just a dog. But then I learned from my Googling that Pompompuran. This is actually the most interesting thing about Pompompurin. Pompompurin canonically has a butthole.
- [26:54]
A
Oh, okay.
- [26:56]
B
Yeah. The cartoon dog has a butthole that is visible.
- [27:00]
A
This. This fits everything that's happening in the fashion.
- [27:03]
B
I know.
- [27:04]
A
Lately.
- [27:04]
B
It is.
- [27:05]
A
Everything's been about holes.
- [27:07]
B
I know. I was so charmed to learn that. I was like, oh, my God. Icon. But I. But my problem with the Lolita costume is there's no butthole.
- [27:14]
A
Okay. I gotta look.
- [27:16]
B
So are you familiar with the. The Lolita subgenre? Do I need to explain that to people or do it. Do they get the gist of, like, what that is?
- [27:22]
A
I'm familiar.
- [27:23]
B
Okay. But we'll put a picture. We'll put a picture. It's like a Japanese subculture where it's just like, froofy Little Bo Peep type of little girl costumes.
- [27:31]
A
Yeah.
- [27:31]
B
Anyway, this one was Pom Pom burn themed, and she's wearing it. And then my last point is that we. We got official Pagliacci core on the red carpet, which is. Yes, confirming everything. There's. There was a woman who dressed up as kind of like, I don't know, a medieval times clown, I guess. I would say, like, kind of armored jester. Yeah, Jester. Max saying as we'll get into orange and black stripes, but. But down to. Did the vertical eyeliner, just as. Just predicted.
- [28:00]
A
So I was so excited to see that. I think it's coming.
- [28:03]
B
Very exciting. Yep. That's my trend report.
- [28:07]
A
It was great.
- [28:08]
B
Thank you.
- [28:09]
A
I will be keeping an eye out. I feel like the ropes is going to be the most likely to make the jump to celebrity.
- [28:15]
B
How can we not? There's been. There's been some, like, dabbling, but it hasn't been full on rope. Like, there's this dress that keeps being worn. That's McQueen. We can insert it. It's like a red dress that's knit, but the way that the. The knit is, you know how like a fisherman's sweater, like, it has, like, a pattern knit into it. It's kind of that, but with a shibari rope pattern knit into it. And a couple People have worn that. Millie Bobby Brown wore it. Someone else I'm not thinking of at the moment wore it as well before her anyway, so it's like percolating out there. But I haven't just seen straight up rope applied to an outfit. It's like, why not? Seems so easy.
- [28:50]
A
It's coming. Okay, we have to talk about the. The Curious case of the faked Florence
- [28:58]
B
Pugh Botox photos you sent me on such a wild goose chase through the Internet.
- [29:04]
A
You sent me because. Okay, what's happened here is Emily sent me this post on Reddit, like weeks ago. It was from the pop culture chat thread and it was images that looked like Instagram story grabs from Florence Pughs. Am I saying her name right? That's how you say it, right?
- [29:20]
B
I think so.
- [29:20]
A
Okay, Instagram story grabs from. We'll say Pew. Florence Pughs know Instagram where she appeared to be in a doctor's office getting Botox injections. And the caption was Mama Pew freezing her forehead like a responsible adult.
- [29:39]
B
I would just like to add that is how she writes on Instagram.
- [29:41]
A
Is it?
- [29:42]
B
Okay, yes, that's exactly how she.
- [29:43]
A
Because I don't follow. And I was like, okay, interesting. It seems like her vibe, but I, I couldn't confirm. There were also pictures of her getting lip injections. One photo of like the post injection swelling had a caption that said, I wasn't stung by a bee, just had some talking and fillers. And I was like, oh, this is interesting. So like a week later I went to go click on the link again because I wanted to write about it as like the move towards celebrating aesthetic labor and sort of laying it bare. And the post was gone. Reddit was like, we have taken this down. It didn't meet our standards. So I Google Florence Peault talks 2026 and a few articles pop up. One from MSN, one from a site called Ground News. I click on the links, the articles are gone. These are just like dead links Googled
- [30:30]
B
around, wiped, totally wiped.
- [30:32]
A
And there was no evidence from the archive of these photos ever existing. You looked too, actually, and you found some images left over from an article in the Irish sun about her getting Botox and fillers.
- [30:45]
B
But they just didn't wipe it. Well, like, no, the article's completely wiped. It's gone Internet archive. They just did a bad job of erasing the their trail.
- [30:53]
A
So it just, I mean, I guess it appears that these photos were faked by this Reddit user. And why, why Florence? Why any of this at all? I tried to do some digging into the user, but they're private. They've only ever commented on Reddit 17 times. So I'm like, why? Why was this?
- [31:14]
B
Yeah, but I think that's kind of. I mean, we'll get in to my topic in a. In a moment. But I think this is kind of like a new. How do I put it? There are. There, like, the way I think about, there's like certain weird jobs on the Internet that only exist on the Internet. I don't know if I'm going to lay this explanation, but, you know, like, there are people who just. Their job is just clip shit from other, like, podcasts or videos or stuff, and they just aggregate that. Or there are people who just like, show you red carpet photos or you know what I mean? And there are people who are just Stan accounts and they just follow some. And I think that a new, like, Internet job is just like making fake photos of celebrities and just like going viral and spreading them around as we'll talk about in my section in a moment. But I think that's just like kind of a weird new online career for people. Like, it's the new way to go viral that's like, really easy. And you like, yeah, you're like, lying. Yeah, but on the Internet, Like, I don't know, lying is this kind of nebulous thing anyway.
- [32:16]
A
Well, that's kind of what's fascinating to me about this whole thing. Like, the most interesting part of it is the speed and thoroughness with which these articles and images were scrubbed from the news. Like, Florence's team must have been working. It's her time to make this happen. I actually reached out for comment to her reps, but they did not get back to me. But if they do, obviously I'll keep everyone updated. But it just seems so bizarre that in this age of AI image generators, where there's a ton of fake shit that doesn't get removed from the Internet. And even, like, you know, young women are having a hard time getting fake AI generated porn of them taken off of X. Like, this is hard to do. It just seemed, like, strange that this was handled so swiftly with barely a trace left and, like, no disclosure from the outlets either. Like, oh, we published a fake story. It was just wiped.
- [33:08]
B
That's what I find kind of odd about it. Like, on the one hand, like, that is what a celebrity's team should be doing. Like, that's an effective team. Like, you're paying them to, like, they should be able to wipe fake stories about you off the Internet for sure. But it's odd to me as her team, especially if someone like you is reaching out for comment. Why wouldn't you give us pat statement that's like, yeah, it was AI and like, this is so dangerous and like, we want to protect our client like that. To me, it seems like you should be raising awareness that this did happen to your client. Like, you're doing good. Like, on the one hand, you're doing good PR work of eradicating this, but you're doing bad PR work on not raising awareness that you had to go out there and eradicate this because people are spreading fake AI about your client. Like, I would. Yeah, more. I don't know. As a celebrity, I would think you would want to speak up about that and be like, be careful about, like, what you're seeing on the Internet.
- [33:57]
A
Right.
- [33:58]
B
Check sources and stuff, like, raise awareness. This is happening to people. I don't know.
- [34:03]
A
I don't know either.
- [34:05]
B
I also feel like I don't know. There's something interesting about choosing her as the subject of content like this too, because it's like, it feels very intentional in that, like, Florence is someone who's like, pretty open with her followers and does share, like, kind of like private, personal type stuff like that in a. In a transparent kind of way that I. You know what I mean? That would make people believe it to begin with. Yeah. Oh, yeah. It didn't strike me as odd when
- [34:31]
A
you sent Totally Link. At first I was like, oh, okay, let me look into this. But I do think that in some ways it does fulfill my prediction that we're going to start seeing faux lip injection marks a la Carolyn. Leave it in the Washington Post. This is one way of faking lip injection marks. I don't know.
- [34:51]
B
That's very true. That's very true.
- [34:52]
A
But yeah, no, I will update everyone if I hear back from. From her representatives of, like, how and why this was removed from the Internet so swiftly.
- [35:01]
B
I think they're just happy that nobody saw it and it got erratic. I don't think they're ever going to speak about it again, but I hope that they get back to you. I know this tie. This ties into my next topic. My great. My great pet peeve is I'm once again waging war with De Moi.
- [35:17]
A
It never ends. It never ends with you too.
- [35:19]
B
It never ends. It never ends. Longtime listeners know we have beef. There is beef betwixt. Betwixt myself and this massive celebrity gossip account that spreads fake, fake information endlessly to no end. So I just thought maybe if people don't know. I just briefly say how our beef truly began in earnest, which is that I guess maybe two years ago now, I noticed that she had started publishing paparazzi photos from Backgrid, which I. You know, on the one hand, it, like, wouldn't be so notable. I mean, you can pay for those photos. I just had a feeling she wasn't paying for those photos. And then I started noticing, and Backgrid's very litigious, so if she was publishing those photos, they would be making her take them down or suing her. And then I noticed that she started publishing exclusive backgrid photos. So those are. And as someone who's worked at tabloids, I know how exclusive backgrid photos work, which is. That's a deal that's offered to kind of, like, the biggest publishers or the biggest tabloids is you're offered kind of, like, first look at these photographs. They're premiumly priced because obviously you're gonna get the exclusive on them. And they're usually Backgrid puts exclusive on stuff that, like, people want.
- [36:35]
A
Yeah.
- [36:36]
B
You know, so it's like, here's Kim Kardashian making out with her new boyfriend. These are exclusive backgrid photos. You're gonna pay a million bucks for them, but you're gonna get, like, a billion clicks on this because you're gonna be the only one who has them for 24 hours. And then they sell them to the rest of the tabloids.
- [36:51]
A
Yeah.
- [36:52]
B
So you get all the traffic and you get all the attention for 24 hours, which is all that people care about. So anyway, Deuxmoi started publishing exclusive backgrid photos. And I was like, okay, so she has a deal with them.
- [37:02]
A
Yeah.
- [37:03]
B
That she's working some sort of angle with them. And I was like. And that is a position that's typically reserved for big, massive, traditional publications. And so I simply reshared the image of the exclusive Backgrid photo that she had posted to her account, and I wrote on my Instagram stories, and when will she start being held to the same publication standards, journalistic practices as all these traditional tabloids that publish the same type of imagery? Because that. Because her publishing imagery like that conflates her as a real news source.
- [37:30]
A
Right.
- [37:31]
B
With these real news sources that are bidding to. To publish the same exclusive photos was. Is my argument. And she psychotically, in my opinion, replied to that My Instagram story, and said that she is held to the same journalistic practices, which. That is an insane thing to say to A former professional tabloid journalist. Bitch. No, you are not. No, no, you are not. No, you are not. And if you are, show me. Show me your legal team. Show me your legal team that you vet all of these posts through. Show me the emails where you reach out to the celebrities team for comment on everything that you post. Show me them. Right, because that's what real tabloids do. That's how real journalism works, right? Show me where you're held responsible for defamation. Show me where you publish all these lies that never bear out. All of this gossip that you. That you swear up and down is real and then somehow never manifests itself. Do we not recall that Taylor Swift is already secretly married to Joe Alwyn because Dunmore was ready to die on that hill. Dumont did die on that hill.
- [38:29]
A
Yeah.
- [38:30]
B
Yeah, that's interesting. I didn't see any divorce papers when she got engaged to Travis Kelsey. That's so interesting. Anyway, so that's where. That's where our problems began. And then, of course, last year at the super bowl, she published that American Eagle ad that's just a full fabrication about Kendrick. We've discussed it on the podcast before.
- [38:50]
A
There are a lot of weird undisclosed ads presented as gossip.
- [38:54]
B
Remember she did one with like, Violet.
- [38:56]
A
With Violet Gray. Yeah.
- [38:58]
B
That made no sense at all.
- [38:59]
A
I don't even remember what it was
- [39:00]
B
about, but I don't even remember what was about either, but didn't make any sense. And it was a completely unmarked ad.
- [39:05]
A
It was like, all the celebrities are wearing blah, blah, blah, beauty product or something.
- [39:11]
B
And then she's like, no, this is real. This is a real gossip story. This is like, super important. Definitely not an undisclosed closed ad on Instagram that I could get sued for again. Anyway, and then. So these are some of my many problems with her. And then recently. Oh, and then also, I mean, just generally, more broadly, she's literally always publishing fake things that. Not just fake things, but, like, things that people will then be like. Lol. I sent this as a joke to De Moi and she published as was really like, people literally calling out that they lied to her. And she published it as fact. And she. She does it all the time. She's like the biggest patsy for bad, bad fabricated gossip. Anyway, so her new thing recently that's driving me out of my mind is she keeps publishing AI photographs, undisclosed AI photographs, as though they are real. And it's confusing everyone. And it's just. It's insane to me. So. So it started with last week, I believe it was last was the super bowl last week. Oh, my God. No, it was like two weeks ago. It started at the Super Bowl. She published a photograph of Kim Kardashian and Lewis Hamilton at the super bowl kissing, which didn't happen. Didn't happen. Yeah, Everyone knows it did. Happens.
- [40:30]
A
Too good to be true.
- [40:32]
B
Well, so they did attend. This was their big outing as they're like, official, unofficial, like, we're dating announcement. They did absolutely did not kiss at the event. They barely touched each other at this event. But she has a photo of them kissing, and she defended it as a real photo. I actually learned this today while I was looking for the comments. Fantastic question. And that's a question that's going to come up again before we're over with this conversation. Where the hell are these things coming from to begin with? Which I think explains a lot of what's happening here. Anyway, so she posted an AI photo of them kissing. It's still up to this day. She has not retracted it. She has not deleted it. She simply updated the caption to say this photo. Yeah, you can look at it right now. I was looking at it this morning. She just updated the caption to say, this photo is AI And I just want to say, first of all, as someone who runs, like, a medium large Instagram account, no one fucking reads the caption. No, no one reads the caption. Because in every single caption I write, I say, you can find out more about my opinions on my substack and my YouTube channel. And every single day I receive comments being like, oh, my God, where. Where can I find.
- [41:41]
A
Where can I find more about your opinions?
- [41:43]
B
Yes. Literally the other day someone said, like, it's so funny. All these clips seem like they. They come from a longer video essay. And I'm like, it's almost like they do.
- [41:52]
A
So funny.
- [41:53]
B
They literally do. And it's on YouTube. If you read the caption, you would know that it's on YouTube. And these are clips from YouTube. Anyway, so I'm just saying updating it in the. And as you can look through the comments on that post, the writing that it's AI in the captcha has not deterred people from believing that this is a thousand percent a real photo. And I was looking through the comments this morning, and she actually was defending it. It as not AI to a lot of people before she admitted that it was AI and she hasn't deleted comments up. That's what I thought was crazy. I'm like, girl, girl, you're not gonna, like, cover your tracks. Like, come on, man. Let me see. Yeah, Someone commented on the AI photo and just pointed out that we haven't seen Lewis. Not to say that he hasn't dated people, because he's absolutely been dating people this whole time, but we haven't seen Lewis Hamilton kiss any woman in public since 2015.
- [42:42]
A
Wow.
- [42:42]
B
And they're like, oh. And yet here he is doing it in front of millions of people at the Super Bowl. Yeah. Like, so they're kind of, like, already, like, it's not really adding up to me. And they also highlighted the quality of the photograph in that it's, like, radically better than any other photo that we saw of them from that night. Which is true. It is radically. It's okay. What? Dumois defended it, saying the pics were not poor, which they were. I don't know why she's trying to say that. We all saw the other pictures. There is a very clear video of them, which I agree. There is a very clear video of them. And in that video, they are not kissing.
- [43:17]
A
Yeah, exactly.
- [43:19]
B
Like, so this could not have been taken from that video that we all saw. That was very clear, because it didn't happen in that video.
- [43:26]
A
Well, it's also like, oh, this moment. That would create a lot of.
- [43:31]
B
Right.
- [43:31]
A
Media.
- [43:32]
B
Right. You found it exclusively. You're the only one who found it and picked up what's happening. Cool. Yeah, that makes sense. Makes sense. And then let's. Let's talk about the image itself for a moment. His hair is completely different. His hair is completely different than it was at the night of the Super Bowl. His tattoos are wrong. His tattoos on his hands and his neck are incorrect.
- [43:56]
A
That's so weird.
- [43:58]
B
And if you really look closely, if you really start thinking about it and you zoom in, there is a house reflected in Kim's sunglasses. Oh, a home. A suburban home at the Super Bowl. So not. Not really adding.
- [44:15]
A
It's one of the replicas from Bad Bunny's halftime show, you know?
- [44:20]
B
Yeah. And then so someone else commented, it's AI. Lol. And she responded to that and said, I really don't think it is. Oh, okay.
- [44:30]
A
Then if this is your job, you gotta get a little better. Oh, at.
- [44:34]
B
No, she doesn't think it is. Plotting the telltale signs, but she doesn't think it is. So it's not. It's good to publish, then. Oh, okay. All right. And so then ultimately, finally, she realizes it's AI How? I don't know. But so. And someone says. Someone comments. Said, hey, so if it's AI, don't post it. Which I think is A pretty good suggestion. Yeah, I think she replied. She handled it. Don't worry. She said, I wasn't sure, but found out it was and updated the caption.
- [45:04]
A
Perfect.
- [45:05]
B
Perfect. And I would just like to say, so that's not good. Standard journalistic practices. That's actually not how traditional tabloids would have handled that at all. From the beginning to the end. They wouldn't have posted. Perhaps you noticed they didn't post it. None of them posted it. But if they were to post it, they certainly wouldn't leave it up with an edited caption because that's how you get sued. So I was already kind of at my wit's end with this. And yeah, someone. Oh, yeah, someone also pointed out in the captions that the only source of this image is a Twitter account that only posts AI images. And that, to me, seems like something one would discover after a simple reverse Google image search.
- [45:46]
A
Search, yeah.
- [45:48]
B
And would that be your first step? That's what I keep coming back to with all this AI slop she's been publishing is like, why is your first step not a Google? Mine would be a Google. Right? And just like, hey, where'd this photo come from? Like, that's weird. Why is no one else picking up? And I would reverse Google and instantly see it's from an AI account and be like, oh, okay. And that doesn't seem to be happening here at all. So then she did it again last week.
- [46:14]
A
There are no standards.
- [46:16]
B
Well, there's clearly no standards because she published AI, got called out for it, and then did it again this time. This was an AI video.
- [46:23]
A
Okay.
- [46:25]
B
This was an AI video of Lily Rose Depp and a girl named Aaliyah Bonani, who seems to be the person who made the AI video to begin with to generate attention for her singing career. And so Deuxmoi posted it as though it's real. And then that prompted Lily Rose Depp to comment on the video. And Lily Rose wrote, I've never heard of this person, never been to this place. These are doctored video images and super violating. And the other girl, Aaliyah, also commented on it being like, these are fake. These are not real. And once they both commented that and De Moi was called out for publishing a fake video, she then wrote on her Instagram stories, I went to check the Aaliyah girls tick tock earlier when the rumors first started going around, and I noticed she posts AI videos of celebrities and acts like they're real. Just strange behavior.
- [47:24]
A
That's what you do, girl.
- [47:26]
B
Exactly. That's your Whole job. That's literally the foundation of this account. Like, who's the weirdo here?
- [47:36]
A
It is. She's correct. It's strange.
- [47:39]
B
It's both of you. You're both strange. You're the strange behavior for both of you. And as though this girl is solely to blame for generating AI videos, as though she is not sharing them, as though they're real to her 2.2 million followers.
- [47:54]
A
Yeah.
- [47:55]
B
Who treat her account as though it is the gospel. As though she is publishing real credible news, and she's never been publishing real credible news, and it's so dangerous. And now she's got AI in the mix. It's insane to me. Me it's. And again, where did you get this video to begin with? What do you mean you checked her Tick Tock account? When I find the. The wording so strange. When the rumors first started going around. The rumors of what? These two people.
- [48:22]
A
Feedback to your work.
- [48:24]
B
That's what I think she's implying, is that when people start calling it, then she checked this girl's account. So you could have checked this girl's Tick Tock account before. Why wouldn't you? Because if someone told me, here's a video of Lily Rose Depp and the singer Aaliyah Bonani, I would think to myself, oh, I don't know the singer Aaliyah Bonani. Who's Aaliyah Bonani? Let me do a quick Google to see who she is. Because also, it's like, as a journalist in good journalistic practices, you would want to find out who is she? What does she do? Are they friends? Did she maybe post other content on her social media of the two of them together that I could wrap into this. That would create a full story.
- [48:58]
A
Yeah.
- [48:59]
B
A full picture of what's going on here. No, I'm gonna publish it and then.
- [49:03]
A
Not what Dumois does.
- [49:05]
B
I'm well aware.
- [49:06]
A
Which you know and she doesn't.
- [49:10]
B
It's just so crazy to me to find yourself in this position at all. And I don't know. My takeaway from this. These. This month full of, like, bad AI slop is De Moi is walking ass backwards into, like, the lawsuit of the century over AI social media. Like, I don't think she realizes that or, like, how dangerous what she's doing is. But. But I think she's going to find herself at the center of some crazy AI misuse lawsuit that's going to, like, set case precedent. I think that, like, how we handle it. I think that would be the best positive outcome.
- [49:44]
A
Possibility is that there is no lawsuit because this just becomes the norm for how totally even news outlets behave. And the difficulty of discerning AI slop from real media. Like, yeah, the scary option is that this is just normalizing.
- [50:04]
B
Yes. But also it's like if.
- [50:07]
A
I mean, send her the Florence Pew Botox photos and see if she.
- [50:12]
B
We should. We should send them. That would be fun. She would publish them a thousand percent, I guarantee you.
- [50:17]
A
Okay, maybe I will.
- [50:19]
B
She'll publish them.
- [50:20]
A
Not that I want.
- [50:21]
B
She won't be. She won't be. But she won't be smart enough to realize that. That the. What we realized the way they are wiped from the Internet.
- [50:26]
A
She'll take them as real experiment.
- [50:28]
B
Be like, oh, I screenshot these. They disappeared already. They're just not up anymore. It's already been 24 hours. You just. You just missed those stories. They were definitely, definitely up. But anyway, I was just going to say, like, even in the worst case scenario where like, she doesn't get called out from this, like if a real tabloid did pick up these stories that she's fake posting and publish them as real, the same thing would happen that we're talking about the flare. Florence Pugh.
- [50:54]
A
Right? Yeah, exactly.
- [50:55]
B
They would get wiped that and they would get sued as they should.
- [51:00]
A
Like, yeah, I don't know.
- [51:04]
B
That's my rant. I'm just. She's maddening to me. It's just crazy to me that. That she is taken as the gospel of celebrity journalism and she couldn't be worse at her job. No, she just go to take one journalism class. I beg you. I beg you. Just learn like one fact about how journalism works. It could save you so much pain and money down the line.
- [51:23]
A
Someone else who couldn't be worse at their job. Deepak Chopra.
- [51:29]
B
Yeah.
- [51:30]
A
Iconic segue New age wellness guru who's been preaching about yoga and meditation and mindfulness for decades. Deepak Chopra is in the Epstein files and too surprised. I guess I was. I guess I was.
- [51:49]
B
But you know anyone, any man who's like, guruing himself, I assume you're doing something bad.
- [51:56]
A
Yeah, I think that's.
- [51:57]
B
Any famous man, I guess is kind of my going. Any man with any notoriety. I assume you're up to some shenanigans behind the scenes. And I'm not surprised when I find out about those shenanigans. Right.
- [52:08]
A
So I bring this up because there is a beauty tie in. A couple weeks ago, I did a little roundup of all of the beauty executives who have been implicated in the Epstein files. In some way. And I didn't include Deepak Chopra because I wasn't aware of the beauty tie in, but now I am. So in June 2025, Deepak Chopra partnered with Augustinus Badr, the skincare brand Badr Bader Bader,
- [52:41]
B
because it's like bau.
- [52:43]
A
And so they announced that they would be collaborating and launching something called AB Chopra Epigenetics, which is an AI wellness platform to teach people how to modify their genes via epigenetics to live better and more beautifully. Yep, I know. We're already getting into interesting territory. So a key selling point of AB Chopra Epigenetics was something they called your AI well being twin.
- [53:14]
B
So.
- [53:15]
A
Yep. So this digital twin would be created via at home epigenetic testing kit that you took and then like an AI twin is generated.
- [53:25]
B
No.
- [53:26]
A
Your twin then becomes your coach. It gives you advice on sleep, exercise, diet, spirituality, even your relationships. I know.
- [53:36]
B
No, my brain literally was like. And then it becomes you. And then it takes your life over for you.
- [53:43]
A
And it does. It evolves as you evolve. Like the twin gets updated as you better yourself through whatever AB Choprap agenda X is telling you to do. It's like very Naomi Klein doppelganger. Very like tech era Dorian Gray. Very scary. Well, and then as I brought up in this piece that I wrote about AI beauty mirrors a couple weeks ago, like, we have some evidence already that AI chatbots are inducing AI psychosis in a small portion of users. And like, that is attributed to the way that it mirrors you. And it's like, what are the potential consequences when the AI chatbot is literally a mirror? It's literally you. Like, what kind of potential mental health effects might that have? I just think that's very scary.
- [54:35]
B
Absolutely.
- [54:36]
A
But anyway, so this proposed epigenetics AI platform would also include in person events, in person wellness retreats with of course, Augustinus batter treatments folded in.
- [54:51]
B
Is your. Is your doppelganger there?
- [54:53]
A
Like your doppelganger would probably.
- [54:55]
B
Does it come with you to the in person event?
- [54:57]
A
It's with you everywhere. It's your digital twin. It's wherever the Internet is.
- [55:01]
B
It's very sinister. I don't like my epigenetic doppelganger and I don't even have one. I don't like her.
- [55:08]
A
I know. I don't trust her. I don't want one. So the founder of Augustinus Potter, Charles Rosier, told British Vogue about this. Everyone's obsessed with longevity right now, but no one is really talking about happiness. That's the key that's missing from the biohacking conversation. And so this platform was about happiness, supposedly. And then Deepak Chopra says in that same article, his keys to happiness are a joyful, energetic body, a loving, compassionate heart, a quiet, creative mind, and lightness of being, which is just so absurd considering what happens next, which is that he shows up in the Epstein files, of course. So this was in the latest, like, dump that came out toward the beginning of February. So the new batch of Epstein file shows hundreds of messages between Deepak Chopra and Jeffrey Epstein between 2016 and 2019. And again, for context, Epstein pled guilty to soliciting minors in 2008. So, like, people out there.
- [56:14]
B
Yeah, people knew what he was up to. Yeah, his reputation preceded him for sure.
- [56:19]
A
So Deepak Chopra invited Epstein on like, multiple vacations to Israel, to Switzerland, with the directive, quote, bring your girls.
- [56:28]
B
Yeah.
- [56:30]
A
When emailing with Epstein about philosophy, Deepak Chopra said, God is a construct. Cute girls are real.
- [56:37]
B
That's the one I saw. Yeah. Disgusting.
- [56:42]
A
And then when, like, Epstein was complaining to him about, quote, another round of very bad press, Deepak Chopra said to stay silent and meditate. And when Epstein complained about the toxicity of the press around him, Deepak Chopra said, I am not concerned about that. So he has since. Chopra has since come out and said, like, his emails reflect poor judgment and that he was never involved in criminal or exploitative conduct. So that's his official statement.
- [57:14]
B
I know it.
- [57:16]
A
I know. But anyway, apparently this, according to Puck, the files were released like the day of a launch event that was supposed to happen for AB Chopra Epigenetics in New York City, and it was canceled. So, I mean.
- [57:34]
B
Oh, my epigenetic twin. I lost her. No, no, you didn't.
- [57:39]
A
Because, listen, even though Augustinus Badder has canceled the whole partnership and taking the site down, they say it will continue the longevity program just without Deepak.
- [57:51]
B
Well, a good idea is a good idea, you know, whether it came from Chopra or not. It's a powerful.
- [57:56]
A
Yeah. It will be interesting to see how they rework this to take out his influence. Because I have to imagine his influence was a big part of the entire program. And it's like, okay, what. What values of Chopras have been instilled in this program that are sinister? But anyway, I think my ultimate thought here is like, making this like, so called wellness spirituality platform that promises to optimize the body in part through skincare treatments really is another way to say God is a construct. Cute girls are real. Like, make your hotness your religion. You know, you're in control.
- [58:38]
B
That's so true.
- [58:39]
A
And you got to control the body, so.
- [58:42]
B
And how do you eradicate that ideology from like the core of this all?
- [58:46]
A
It's kind of the entire ideology of beauty culture. I don't know. It's wild, but yeah, that cuteness.
- [58:54]
B
Cuteness. Cute girls are the God, you know,
- [58:56]
A
Cute girls are real. God is not. Should we get on to our more bleak topics? Even more bleak topic. Well, I don't think it's bleaker than the fd.
- [59:06]
B
It's just a continuation of the. The darkness. Yeah, absolutely. We're gonna talk about clavicular. What everyone's been waiting for.
- [59:13]
A
Everyone's been talking.
- [59:14]
B
There's not enough looks maxing dialogue. No, I haven't heard and read enough about looks maxing this week.
- [59:21]
A
So there have been so many profiles of clavicular that have come out like in the past two weeks. A lot of press around. You know, clavicular is like a 20 year old looks maxer extraordinaire. He is like the main influencer associated with the looks maxing movement.
- [59:36]
B
I actually haven't read looks maxing.
- [59:39]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, look, do you want to.
- [59:43]
B
Should I? Do you?
- [59:45]
A
I don't care. I'll.
- [59:46]
B
I can explain as someone who's like, not in beauty, who's like, this is my understanding of looks maxing and you can elaborate if I'm wrong. My understand of looksmaxing is. Looksmaxing is something born out of like incel culture, like 4chan in cell culture. So like, because incel culture like starts this language of like chat, you know, Chad's and Stacy's basically, which is like hot people of the male and female variety. And that the reason that they're incels and like that women won't give them the sex that they have so rightfully earned and deserve as men is that they only want chads and women are only. They're very, very shallow and they're only attracted to chads. And so you have to make yourself into a chad in order to like trick women into having a lot of women into having sex with you. And little do they know that you're like a former incel. So you're just gonna like burn through them and you don't give a fuck about women. And so to become a chad you have to look smacks which is basically you have to do like everything humanly possible to make yourself hot. And that includes like getting, I mean obviously it's like get all the plastic surgery, all the steroids, all the testosterone, all Whatever to do to make yourself that way. But it's also involves this component that I find very fascinating, which is that, like, you want other men to, like, like, brutally assess your appearance and, like, give it. To give it. To give you the real facts about, like, how I look. Like, real facts. Like the.
- [61:10]
A
It's like emotional bdsm.
- [61:12]
B
Like, yeah, it's a very emotional bdsm. Like, tell me how ugly I am. Tell me everything that's wrong with me so that I can fix it. And, like, don't hold back.
- [61:20]
A
Right.
- [61:21]
B
And that. And that they are receiving some, like. Like, authentic truth. Like, something authentic, the more truthful it should be. Yes. And. But it's power, because then it gives them the, like, framework to go out and correct those things through surgery or the gym.
- [61:39]
A
Well, through what they call soft maxing or hard maxing. So soft maxing is like diet, skin care, exercise. Hard maxing is like, the extreme end of looks maxing. So it's interventions beyond skincare and workouts. It's like, more permanent, invasive body mods. Bone smashing.
- [61:59]
B
I am obsessed with bone smashing. I can't get over it. I think about it often.
- [62:04]
A
Yeah.
- [62:05]
B
Which I guess for those don't know. They're literally trying to smash up their bones. They're, like, hitting their jawlines with hammers to, like, make their jawline sharper.
- [62:12]
A
I doubt, like, remodel the bones, because
- [62:15]
B
the idea is that, like, the bone takes trauma and then comes back stronger. I believe. And so that you could, like, max. Maximize your cheekbones and jawline through hitting it over and over. I love it.
- [62:27]
A
It's kind of like the. The science of, like, building muscle where you, like.
- [62:33]
B
Yes. Yes.
- [62:34]
A
As applied to bone, which, like, you.
- [62:36]
B
Yes.
- [62:36]
A
You can't do that.
- [62:38]
B
There's a lot, right?
- [62:40]
A
Nope. Like, there's a lot of risks to bone smash. Nerve damage, like, obstructing your airways, blindness, suffocation, like. Like painful bone growths. Like, it's not.
- [62:50]
B
I mean, see, this is why I need you here, because I find myself waiting out into the depths of looks maxing and then being like, that can't possibly be true. Right. But I refuse to Google it to find out more. So this is very helpful to me. I do need these reality checks where I'm like, you can't bone smash. Yeah. And then you're like. I mean, you cannot bone smash. Do.
- [63:06]
A
It's. I mean, right. You can. You should not.
- [63:09]
B
Right.
- [63:10]
A
People are.
- [63:11]
B
I guess it's effective, is my. Is my question. It's not a lot.
- [63:14]
A
I know. I would Not.
- [63:15]
B
But you're right, it is the muscle. It is gym logic. It's like tearing down the muscles so they build back stronger. Tearing down your bones to make.
- [63:22]
A
You know, the female dominated skincare industry has been applying muscle logic to skin for a very long time where it's like the more painful it is, the more it's working. And that's like not. You can't just do this whole, this
- [63:35]
B
whole movement is just female beauty industry run amok in a, In a masculine.
- [63:41]
A
Well, yes, I mean I, I wrote about this a while ago for like last year in the Guardian. But it's like ideally the entrance of these CIS straight men into a traditionally like female and queer dominated space, like beauty would like.
- [63:56]
B
Yeah.
- [63:57]
A
Expand their minds, open them up to new possibilities. Instead, what they are doing is just like using cosmetics as power tools for alpha males and like making it as masculine sounding as possible. Like none of this is new. Like looks maxing is beautification.
- [64:15]
B
Yeah.
- [64:16]
A
You know, longevity is anti aging. They call wearing perfume scent maxing. It's just like applying like really stereotypically, like cartoonishly masculine phrasing to concepts that have been around for like a really long time.
- [64:34]
B
Yeah. And that is, that's a note that I put in our doc too, is like, I. It is kind of fascinating the way that they're embracing these like traditionally feminine things like wearing makeup, you know, to like make themselves more beautiful and stuff. Or a note that I put in there is there's another looks maxer that I don't see a lot of people talking about called Androgenic. Androgenic. I always forget his name and I want to say avuncular because of clavicular. I merged them in my brain.
- [65:04]
A
The new licks looks maxer called avuncular who's just like a really fun uncle who like tries to get these guys away from the harsh realities of looks maxing.
- [65:17]
B
Oh, that's a good. Someone should. If anyone out there wants to become avuncular, I bless. I bless you with.
- [65:24]
A
Maybe I'll convince John to infiltrate.
- [65:27]
B
That would be a great job for him. Anyway, this guy's name is Andrew Jennick. He's a very famous Australian look smacks her. But I don't know, I was thinking something similar with him with the makeup thing because he wears wigs and he like. And he recently on a live stream, someone like snatched his hat off his head while he was live streaming in public. And I guess his wig was attached to his hat. So the whole thing went and people were like using it as, like, oh, he got, like, mogged, which is stunted on, for the uninitiated, to this vernacular. But he got mogged because it, like, was revealed that he was bald. But actually, he's been talking about going bald for years. Like, very openly talked about balding, getting hair transplants, wearing wigs. He's always wearing wigs. And, like, they're all. They're like a brunette one day, a blonde the next day. Like, he's not trying to, like, create verisimilitude. Like, he's very, very forthcoming with it. And I was saying that that's kind of like the, the makeup and the wigs and the transparency about all the stuff they're doing to Mafia and stuff is. It's. It's odd because you start to feel like, oh, like this is positive in this way. Because it's like, it's the same thing we talked about last month with, like, celebrities being transparent about their cosmetic surgery. There's this gesture towards, like, oh, look at this good thing I'm doing. Like, I'm revealing how much labor goes into looking this way, how artificial the construction of my beauty is. As though that. As though that transparency doesn't still encourage people to go and make it easier for people to go and replicate that new beauty standard. Right.
- [66:56]
A
I think it's like a pushback to this idea that, like, obvious aesthetic labor signals, like, inner immorality, which is like a subconscious judgment that exists. Like, we have a lot of data about people who, like, we see those who do obvious cosmetic enhancements as being morally inferior. And it's like adding this layer of honesty and transparency to make it, like, a moral pursuit. But again, yeah, like, we've been seeing, like, with the cosmetic transparency movement. This has been happening in the woman's beauty space for a really long time, too. Like, there's been pushback to this idea of even calling somebody a natural beauty. There's like this whole genre of, like, Instagram video and tick tock that's emerged where it's like, you think, I'm a natural beauty. This isn't natural. And then you list out everything you've had done. Like, people want people to know it's not natural because it's like this reframing of aesthetic labor as worthy labor. It's a new form of work ethic.
- [67:58]
B
Yeah, I was going to say there's something very classist in that as well. Yeah, what I can afford.
- [68:03]
A
Yes. There's, like, more valor, too, in, like, putting in the time, enduring the pain, paying the bill.
- [68:10]
B
Like, These are all having the time, having the money to pay those bills.
- [68:14]
A
It's very like beauty as a form of capital. And yeah, there's a lot of like glory in that for the looksmaxer and
- [68:26]
B
for everyone, for everyone involved.
- [68:29]
A
I don't know, I have like actually not read a bunch of the clavicular profiles yet. I have, I have been wanting to stay away because I do want to write about it and I don't want to infect my thinking with other thinking at this stage in the process yet. But from what I. The little clips I've picked up are not particularly compelling. I don't know what have you.
- [68:54]
B
What kind of. The little clips are kind of telling you the whole story because those are the most interesting things that are happening. As I began our doc about this topic. I find these people so radically, unbelievably boring. It is just flabbergasting to me that we're talking to them at all. They have nothing to say. They have no point of view. They stand for nothing. They're completely wishy washy with whatever the tie, I don't know because even talking about, they're talking about their racism, right? It's like obviously everything they're doing, this is eugenics, this is white supremacy. Like it's very obviously racist inherently. And then you have Clavicular who's actively saying the N word all the time on his streams and they bring this up in the New York Times profile and he's like, I'm not racist. It's just a fun word to say. And honestly I kind of believe that he does just think it's a fun word to say. Like it's just like edge lordy behavior stuff where like nothing means anything. This has no ramifications on anything. Like I can say what and do it whatever I want. Like you're a pussy basically if you don't say these words or think that they hold some power over you.
- [69:57]
A
Well, even one thing that I picked up from the press cycle was just like clavicular being like, oh, I, I'm not a Republican, I'm not right wing. I would vote for Gavin Newsom because he's handsome.
- [70:09]
B
Not handsome exactly.
- [70:10]
A
So it's just like. That's what I mean by like come the politics.
- [70:14]
B
Yes, that's exactly what I mean. It's like there's just no center there. You know what I mean? Like they're willing to. There's no there. There's no there there. They're willing to become whatever they need to be in the moment to, to capitalize on the moment. They're capitalists, I guess is the easiest way to put it. Like there's no politics, there's no agenda. It is just money and attention and, and looks maxing.
- [70:35]
A
Yeah.
- [70:35]
B
I mean to the end of their day.
- [70:36]
A
Optimizing, endlessly optimizing is like inherently currently capitalist aesthetic. And I also think like the boringness that you're talking about is like such a good example of like the existential trade offs of optimizing for economic opportunities. Like the things that we funnel into perfecting our appearance. Time, money, energy, attention, headspace. Like these are finite resources and clavicular is probably a great example of like someone who has funneled all of those resources into a very superficial aspect of himself and there's nothing else there because the resources weren't spent on these other aspects of development.
- [71:20]
B
Yes. And there's nothing else there to the point of like having no personal life even. Again, I don't know if you watched the Adam Friedland interview with him. I didn't nightmarish. But, but within the Adam Friedland interview, he says that he doesn't even like having sex because it takes away from everything else he wants to do and that he actually he only has sex to come as quickly as possible. He like premature ejaculation is the goal because then he can go back to doing the stuff that really matters, which is like bone smashing and like taking steroids obviously.
- [71:53]
A
Yeah.
- [71:54]
B
And I think that's so interesting. And I just think it's interesting that all of this is. Is sexless at the end of the day. Yeah. That this started from this, this again fantasy concept of attracting a woman who doesn't exist. Right. And becoming a type of man that doesn't really exist to attract that woman to like women are not the point at all at this point and to the point that you don't even want to have sex with them. But especially in that like all of this is about appealing to other men and being the most manly man to other men. And so like the homoerotic nature of all of it is also like, like so striking to me. And always like, I don't know so much seems like it could be solved if men just felt comfortable telling each other that they're like looking hot today. You know what I mean? Like man, your abs are looking really good today. And I feel like a lot of this like anxiety and, and weirdness might be dissipated.
- [72:44]
A
Do that online. I don't, I don't know. I don't know. I just Did a podcast about looks maxing that isn't out yet, but. But the host of that podcast was questioning my choice last month to place Clavicular's looks maxing on my flesh matrix chart, which maps, like, beauty trends on cosmetics, power, attractiveness and health. And I put him in the power and cosmetics quadrant. And the host was like, why not the cosmetics and attractiveness quadrant? And I was like, this is not about being attractive to the opposite sex. Like, this is more than anything a bid for power or just a bid to be good looking in and of itself. Like, as it's grown, the goal is less and less to attract a partner or to use your looks toward, you know, erotic ends, but just to be better looking. Like, the effort to reach the goal is the goal. Like, I.
- [73:41]
B
And I don't think the goal here is ultimately even attractiveness, like you said. I think it's domination.
- [73:46]
A
I think it's like a male supremacist eugenic domination. Like, that's where the ideals, like, I want to make it clear that like, body modification in and of itself is not always white supremacist, eugenics, capitalist, whatever, but the ideal that they are glorifying, that's exactly where they, they stem from.
- [74:09]
B
And then they're doing eugenics, face masks, math.
- [74:13]
A
Oh my God.
- [74:14]
B
Yeah, they're literally doing pseudo science Nazi math.
- [74:19]
A
Add up. But one thing on like, the sex point is like, we talked about this in a little bit, a little bit in our last podcast, but like a lack of interest in sex or like attention from the opposite sex, especially when paired with like, obsessing about your own body is like, like a kind of a classic hallmark of eating disorders.
- [74:41]
B
Like, and they eating source is also very much part of this culture. I don't think you mentioned it so far, but that is very much also,
- [74:47]
A
like, it's not about being sexy or sexual a lot of times it's just about control of your own body. So it, like, does not surprise me at all that this community is not particularly focused on like, smashing.
- [75:00]
B
Unless. Yeah. And also that it's. And that young men are drawn to this so much. I also feel like right at a time where like, like your body is changing, things are confusing, you're interacting with the opposite sex for maybe the first time in your life. Of course, this type of, this type of ideology where it's like, oh, like actually it's just math. All of this, like, nebulous stuff can just be reduced to like, controlling your body through math. Yeah, right. And that's what beauty is and beauty is finite and you can definitely quantify it. And there, you know, exact amounts that people possess and do not possess. And that is reassuring in a weird, oh yeah up way. You know, he was like, oh, it's something I can control and I can monetize and I can figure out the numbers of it. And it's also game the system.
- [75:42]
A
Rational and masculine. Like rational and masculine. This like, follows the science of skin care movement that has been building for like over the past 10 years. I would say, like this sheen of science on beauty standards, like, makes them seem rational, makes them seem masculine, makes them seem like this is not frivolous or feminine. This can't be dismissed. This is his science. This is health.
- [76:05]
B
It's hard fact.
- [76:07]
A
Exactly. And this has been popping up in the beauty industry for like over a decade. It's not new to looks maxing. Looks maxing is just like taking it to the extreme and looks maxing.
- [76:19]
B
I feel like we should also mention looks maxing has like been around for a minute without that title. Like, I don't know if you remember the, the Cut profile and maybe like 2017, 2018. Gotta be 2018, because I worked at the New York Post. But the Cut did a big profile on the plastic surgeon who was working with Incels, like his entire clientele. And Incels were like recommending this guy specifically as like the chad maker right to in their forums. And so this has like been around for quite, quite a while. As a part of the INCEL committee. We just haven't labeled it as looks Maxine to know and like how to figurehead of the movement. I also just wanted to say, like, on the, the attractiveness quadrant, it also. So like clearly isn't about attractiveness. Well, I mean, because one, these guys are not attractive. Like what they're doing is not attractive. Like they're, they're morphing themselves into something very strange. And they all seem to have profound body dysmorphia. So they're not even seeing themselves clearly or what. There's a new word that I just learned the other day that I, I had never heard before. But it's. And I forget what it is now, but it's body dysmorphia specifically for muscles. There's a new, there's new psychological studies looking into the specific type of body dysmorphia that relates to a muscular physique and not seeing your muscle body clearly. And so like bodybuilders would, would often fall within this category where you're thinking you're you're, you're reaching for some impossible, unachievable physical goal that, like, you're always going to fall short, which I think is just beauty in general, but. Right. They're applying it specifically to, to musculature, which I thought was interesting, and look back to being a part of that. And also to me, it reminds me of, of what I've talked about before with like, the use of facetune and like, AI faces on social media is you keep getting farther and farther from this, like a true natural representation of the body. And so the standards becoming a realistic version of the body. And. And so the standards keep becoming more and more insane and warped until you kind of lose all sense of what a natural body looks like to begin with. And so, like, yeah, it's not attractiveness. It's like some weird, psychologically warped version of the, of a body that doesn't exist that you're going after, I don't know, completely.
- [78:33]
A
And I think taking like, attracting women out of the equation here in looks, maxing is like, so related to the parallel in the women's space, which is like, I do it for me. Not the male gaze.
- [78:46]
B
It's the female gaze, Jess.
- [78:48]
A
It is not, as we know, but, like, it's a, it's a classic example of, like, men interior internalizing the male gaze as well, and how beauty is not the same thing as attraction and the two often have very little to do with each other. And I think it's also really interesting the way, I don't know, like, doing it for you rather than to attract a partner is clearly in this case, not a nobler or more moral goal. But that is how it's often framed in the beauty space for women. Like, I'm doing it for me. I'm not doing this for the male gaze. Like, totally. Okay, does that make it healthier? I don't, like, I truly don't know.
- [79:36]
B
There's also something interesting in that, like, the fact that clavicular is a streamer and his primary income is streamer. I don't know. And there's something interesting about, like, the direct laying bare that, like me, this guy, like, improving, improving his appearance, like, focusing on his beauty makes him more money. Like, the more he does this extreme isa, the more money he gets. And it's just like the laying bare of, like, what all influencers, like all public figures, all women who are consumed via, like, screens are, like, acutely aware of. There were reports this week, speaking of his streaming, that Clavicular and Lena Velez who we can talk about in a second. The fashion designer who shows he walked in are receiving funding from Peter Thiel. Yeah, that was a reporting, I believe Ryan Broderick in his newsletter reported that out. But then according to an interview that Clav did with GQ also this, this last week, late last week, he says that's not true. Okay. And GQ corroborates that apparently that's not true.
- [80:41]
A
Okay.
- [80:42]
B
I don't. I don't know. I haven't seen Ryan Broderick's full reporting, so I can't say whether that's or not. But they said it's actually that basically Clav says that that rumor started because he got his charges dropped really quickly when he was in Arizona. He got arrested.
- [80:57]
A
Yeah.
- [80:58]
B
And he says the charges got dropped so quickly. So people started speculating online that he must have like connection like Peter Thiel money or about something like that, which I don't think is like totally unfounded thinking. But GQ says that he is only getting financial support. He's getting $133,000 a month from Kik, which Kik is the social media platform of Stake.com and as anyone who knows me, my special interest is steak.com which I blame for everything. I think they are the number one bankrollers of the greatest evils in this world and are single handedly responsible for like destroying an entire generation of young men, in my opinion. And if you ever needed another reason to hate Drake, it's steak.com.
- [81:47]
A
wow. Yeah, I did not realize that fascinating about him. I am conflicted about Clavicular on the Elena Velez Runway.
- [81:56]
B
I'll explain, I guess the situation. And also Elena Velez a little bit for those who don't know, because I wrote about her in 2024 a little bit. And I find her uninteresting. As uninteresting as the lookmaxers as. As pathetic of an edgelord as well. So Elena Velez is a fashion designer who shows at New York Fashion Week and she in this, her most recent show, I believe spring 2026 is the season we're in. She cast clavicular and another controversial influencer, Liv Schmidt. For those who don't know Liv Schmidt, she just basically promotes old school eating disorders on the Internet. She is just a banned pro for doing it. Yeah, she's just the face of the pro anorexia movement, I would say. And I'm actually deeply disturbed by the number of other seemingly normal women she manages to convince to join her skinny club, I believe is what it's called On Instagram, which is just Cher's tips about not eating food and, like, being addicted to exercise. So Elena Velez cast both of them in her most recent show and I this got her a lot of attention. I personally think it should come as no surprise because if you know anything about Elena Velez, like, this is very much her M.O. this is what she does. She loves to court controversy and in my opinion, is going to edge Lord herself into oblivious oblivion. In 2024, I wrote an article called Fashion's Alt Right Flirtation. People might remember this from the podcast because it's the one that the Face aggressively edited to the point of it being nothingness and, like, took a lot of the Nazi stuff out of it, which I think is funny in hindsight, given the Nazi dom that we live in in America currently. I think it's very interesting that they wanted to make that post almost to nothing. Anyway, so in that, in that essay I wrote about Velez and I. I wrote. I'm just going to read it. She is a woman who has been dubbed the Donald Trump of emerging designers and fashion's problematic fave because despite her inflammatory stances on cultural issues, Velez has also been heavily lauded by the industry, winning American American Emerging Designer of the year at the 2022 Council of Fashion Designers of America Awards, being inducted as a member of the CFDA in 2023, and being named a semifinalist in the 2024 LVMH Prize, which is a very big deal in the fashion world. But her recent or recent at the time, fall 2024 collection was widely criticized for taking inspiration from the 1936 novel Gone with the Wind, a book as well known for its glamorization of the antebellum south as its abhorrent racial stereotypes. In other words, a rich text for Velez, a creative fellow of the Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism, which the name is misleading. A group founded in 2021 that campaigns against diversity and inclusion programs, ethnic. Yeah, it's. It's the exact opposite of what you think it is.
- [84:51]
A
Oh, okay. It's all coming back to me now.
- [84:55]
B
It's. Yeah, again. Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism. For anyone who wants to Google that interesting group of individuals. Campaigns against diversity and inclusion programs, ethnic studies curricula, and anti racism and anti racism initiatives that it refers to as critical race Theory. The designer told the Free Press, iconic of the media fallout after the show. What's exciting is to create a postmodern fashion brand. A post woke fashion brand A post beauty fashion brand. And. Right. And right now, it's rubbing up against some really sensitive walls. We live in a time when everything is possible and nothing is allowed. I think the only way to be punk in 2024 is to have a component of dissent. So she's punk. That's what you're gonna. You're not understanding about the situation. It's punk, anti woke and punk rock. Because punk rock is famously anti woke. Everybody knows punks hate being woke. That's like, not what the movement is based on entirely.
- [85:53]
A
Oh, my God.
- [85:55]
B
Anyway, so I've hated Elena Velez for a long time. Time. I'm glad everyone's kind of, like, seeing what she's up to, which is, like, a lot of nothing. And, like, I mean, I think it's always easier to do stunt casting and get quote unquote, canceled online than it is to make good clothes.
- [86:11]
A
Oh, completely. I think my feeling about her having Clavicular and Liv Schmidt on the Runway and, like, the uproar that it has created is like looking at the state of American beauty culture. Like, these are our icon. I would like. If there is an uproar about, like, platforming these people or glorifying them on the Runway. I think the. The media and people in general, I would like that to be matched with, like, a skepticism about the values they promote. Because right now, what's happening is, like, Velez is being honest about who we are.
- [86:51]
B
Yeah.
- [86:52]
A
Valorizing or something glorifying in the culture. And the rest of the fashion and beauty media is upholding these values, but, like, vaguely denouncing the icons as if you can separate the two. And I actually think, like, Clavicular made an interesting point about this. There was, like, a clip of Clavicular and Liv Schmidt talking about, quote, starve maxing backstage at the Runway show. And. And he starved maxes by doing meth, actually. Oh, yeah.
- [87:27]
B
We haven't mentioned the method.
- [87:28]
A
Yeah. No, no. Part of looks maxing is meth. That's how we forgot to say that.
- [87:33]
B
Yeah. You gotta stay skinny.
- [87:34]
A
That's like. Yeah. Part of his whole thing.
- [87:36]
B
Skinny with your method. Focus. He said that the. Well, I don't know. You haven't been watching the interviews, but he said that specifically that meth has a similar molecular structure to, like, Adderall, but it's just, like, better. It's more effective. And so he's like, why? Like, just cut out the middleman. Just go to the sore. And so I love that it's both a skinny aid and a study aid. For him.
- [87:56]
A
Right.
- [87:57]
B
You know, famous, famously multitasking. Yeah.
- [88:02]
A
So, yeah, he's, like, talking about this to Liv Schmidt, who says, like, oh, I mostly do, like, skinny maxing diet, exercise, sort of thing. Starve maxing. And what Clavicular says is like. But that's like, all models, right?
- [88:14]
B
Yeah.
- [88:15]
A
And. And it is like, so it's like they are not rejecting the ideology of these people. They are just rejecting the obviousness. And we like to lie to ourselves, and we would like to continue the lie by not having these people platformed by designers that we otherwise do not agree with on, like, a moral or political level. So I don't know.
- [88:41]
B
I. I was thinking about with Liv as well, is I was like, I'm just curious, like, if you took Liv's body measurements and you compare them to every other model working during Fashion Week, I don't think you'd see much of a difference.
- [88:57]
A
No.
- [88:57]
B
And I compare their diets. I don't think you'd see much of a difference, to be quite honest. And that's. That is the problem. Yeah. Fits right in.
- [89:05]
A
Like, bristle against is like, the obviousness and the level of transparency, but, like, the aesthetic that these behaviors, like, enables is still very much glorified on all. All at all points on the political spectrum, I think.
- [89:24]
B
I also just want to say that I like the lingo.
- [89:27]
A
The lingo is fascinating.
- [89:29]
B
That, I think, is the only thing looks maxing has going for it is I. I do think it's funny. I mean, it's the same. This is like just a. A seasonal. I think linguistic thing is like, we get a new word and then we just abuse it to death, you know? Like, I'm thinking about gorp. Core, the rise of core. And when we started going cores, all the cores, everything was a core. I feel like maxing is just the new core.
- [89:52]
A
Maxing is the new core.
- [89:54]
B
And there is, like, I don't know. Of course, it's an Internet culture. Right. So there's, like, a certain amount of, like, satire baked into it as, like, plausible deniability that, like, any of this is real. Like, we're not taking this seriously. Only. Only losers would take this seriously and think we really mean that. You need to, like, take meth and starve yourself, even though they are taking meth and starving themselves. But I think that, like, that silliness inherited makes their lingo kind of, I don't know, like, jester maxing is a powerful idea. To me, as someone who's Jester Max is jester maxing. I Know, it's a negative that they're putting it. They're framing it as. But I do think it's a powerful way to. To just identify something that's happening in culture or jester maxing.
- [90:36]
A
I'm sort of, like, intrigued by the suffix maxing as being appropriate for what's being described in a lot of looks maxing behaviors. Because the behaviors themselves are sort of, like, ascetic and punishing. Like, it's all about denial and sacrifice and abstinence and, like, no pleasure or hedonism. It's withholding. Like, I think starve maxing is the best example of this. Like, it is reframing minimization as maximization. So it's very strange to me. And I also think it's inherently submissive. Like, it's submitting to this ideal, which is sort of the opposite of how it's being presented as, like, this very, like, aggro, alpha male thing.
- [91:22]
B
They actually are subbies.
- [91:24]
A
Yeah. I think the language does a lot of work in transforming this ideology into something that appears to be masculine and
- [91:33]
B
even, like, putting your self worth and self evaluation into the hands of other. Oh, yeah. Like a subordinate position. Like, you guys know what beauty is. Like, you guys know the objective truth about me that I could never possibly perceive or understand.
- [91:48]
A
Totally.
- [91:49]
B
That's just my little. Yeah, looks maxi.
- [91:51]
A
I know. I don't know, Daddy, tell me what
- [91:54]
B
I should look like. Tell me what's pretty. You tell me what's good, what makes me strong.
- [92:00]
A
The last thing that I want to include in the language is like, are you familiar with the scale they use to rate themselves? The PSL scale?
- [92:09]
B
No.
- [92:10]
A
It is kind of terrifying. So great. The PSL scale in looks maxing forms is the rating framework. And it's, like, very complicated. You get, like, a rating of, like, 1 through 8, and then to get up up to a 10 rating, you have to incorporate, like, two points that, like, take into account things like your job and how much money you make and, like, these unquantifiable other things. Like your aura. Your aura. Exactly. But anyway, so the PSL scale is what it's called. It ranks people from subhuman.
- [92:47]
B
I'm sorry, can you first just say, is PSL an acronym for something? Okay, it's pumpkin spice latte. Because do they know that that already exists? This.
- [92:55]
A
Okay, psl. The P stands for PUA Hate, which is short for pickup artist hate. The S is short is for slut hate, and L is for lookism. So PUA Hate.
- [93:11]
B
Terrible acronym.
- [93:13]
A
I know, but Listen, PUA Hate gained notoriety online as this group online after one of its, like, users and posters, Elliot Roger, murdered six UC Santa Barbara students in 2014 on a shooting rampage and described being inspired by this forum in his manifesto. So PUA Hate Community online rebranded as Slut Hate from the negative media attention.
- [93:42]
B
Sure, sure.
- [93:43]
A
So that's where the P and the.
- [93:44]
B
What's the point? I feel like too, like, Slut Hate to me, gets to the heart of what we're doing here versus kind of pickup artist dances around it.
- [93:51]
A
Yeah. And then the L is lookism, which is like the way that they use it, this idea that your appearance determines your destiny. So, like, there is, like, intense misogyny and hatred, like, baked into just the naming of the PSL scale before you even get to how the scale functions, which is that the lower end of the scale is literally labeled sub human. That's like ugly people, subhuman. And then it goes up to low, mid, and high tier normies. And then there's Chad Light or Stacy Light.
- [94:28]
B
Those are names. I know.
- [94:29]
A
Yeah. And then Chad Parlin at the top or a Stacy at the top. But I just. I don't know. When I, like, read what PSL stood for, I was not surprised, but just like, oh, okay, so it's like blatant. It's like, yeah, well, all of this
- [94:49]
B
is born of incel culture. Like, this is all part and parcel to me of like, yeah, women. Men bonding around, hating women and. And wanting to punish them with. By looks maxing. And then the. Then the women can't have them. The women that once rejected them. It all seems about that.
- [95:06]
A
And now I can't.
- [95:06]
B
It all seems about beauty. To puzzle. Punish women.
- [95:08]
A
Yes. Punish, like, any sort of minority or marginalized person. I like.
- [95:17]
B
That's another thing that. Clavicular. Again, you didn't read the New York Times, but Clavicular spoke a little bit about. Well, because they were talking about him saying the N word and. And being potentially racist in general. And this whole movement being potentially racist. And clap has also admitted that it's. It's impossible to be like a black chat, basically. Because the. The math. The math of looks maxing doesn't work for black people. It's like. Right. Because it's almost like the Nazis invented it.
- [95:43]
A
Yep. And for anybody who wants a breakdown of how that math evolved, I wrote about this last year in my piece on facial harmonization.
- [95:52]
B
Yeah.
- [95:52]
A
Which was also not published where it was supposed to be published because the platform wanted me to take out a lot of the references to eugenics and Nazis and now it's like, oh, look how relevant it has become.
- [96:07]
B
This is. I just.
- [96:08]
A
Yeah, I didn't, I didn't put two and two together about both of our articles about Nazi influence in fashion and beauty.
- [96:14]
B
I think that's very funny.
- [96:15]
A
Getting cut from mainstream media outlets.
- [96:18]
B
I think that's very funny that we've come full circle now that it's both our pieces about the Nazi influence in fashion and beauty has now come to a head.
- [96:28]
A
It's so wild. Not wild, not surprising, just.
- [96:32]
B
Yeah.
- [96:33]
A
To be expected in, in the media right now, I guess. But yeah, I did a breakdown of like where these ideas of harmony and symmetry and the math of so called symmetry come from, which is just horrible. But I also, I did go on looksmax.org and look at some of.
- [96:53]
B
Tell me more.
- [96:55]
A
The chats that had been started, some of the threads and just a sampling of the eugenics influence. We got skin mega guide thread from a user, Aryan Incel. We have a thread.
- [97:10]
B
The best source. What? Who else do you want us to talk about it? He would know, wouldn't he?
- [97:14]
A
Of course. We had a thread called I hate my genetics so much, I might as well overcome that.
- [97:22]
B
Okay, I don't. All right. I don't really know how that's possible,
- [97:25]
A
but okay, Deepak Chopra knows.
- [97:27]
B
He's gonna. Oh, he knows.
- [97:30]
A
And then. And then a thread called should we genocide all women under 52 to avoid the birth of manlet incels.
- [97:40]
B
Interesting. That's an interesting thought. Yeah.
- [97:43]
A
That's extreme white supremacy, extreme eugenics, extreme misogyny.
- [97:49]
B
Sure.
- [97:51]
A
That was just one day. I just scrolled through one day of posts and those were like the most egregious, but sure not weird for the platform, I think.
- [98:00]
B
Pretty classic, pretty standard. And also, I mean, because I think anyone who's been in our book club who's read cultish knows that I. It's pretty clear that these guys are in a cult.
- [98:13]
A
Yes.
- [98:14]
B
These are like. They are. They've made up their own language and
- [98:16]
A
I think that's one of the least linguistic markers of.
- [98:19]
B
Of cult formation. Yeah. Yeah, they're in pretty deep.
- [98:24]
A
Oh, gosh.
- [98:26]
B
Yeah. My final thought is. Is just, you know, I. I'm looking forward to them aging. Yes, I know that. I know that you have some qualifiers about that, but I really am looking forward to them getting old and grappling with age. And I do think we're cruising towards a Bogdanoff twin situation.
- [98:42]
A
I would love to see what aging does to these men's minds but I just worry that technology is going to keep up with them. Brian Johnson is saying immortality is possible by 2028. Like maybe these men will never age. Maybe they can look max forever.
- [98:58]
B
Well, Brian Johnson first of all certainly isn't looks maxing. He's age maxing.
- [99:01]
A
He's trying to look smack.
- [99:03]
B
Now I know he's trying to look smacks, but he's not, he's age maxing. And I agree with you that I do think technology will keep up with them to a certain extent. But my thought about that as someone who's like, like looked at celebrities for decades and the work that they've had done, you know, as good as the technology can ever be, it's never going to be as good as the technology of the future is kind of how I think about like you like a facelift 20 years ago is not a facelift you're receiving today. So even if you are getting the best possible technology at your time, the nature of beauty in the industry, you're going to look dated in the future and you're going to have to grapple with it. And again, I think think it's the same as the AI face. The more work you have done, the farther you get removed from your original face, the less you remember what a real face looks like and the more bogged enough twin you become. Right.
- [99:49]
A
Well and that's kind of what we didn't touch on in this conversation at all is just the mental health impacts of these kind of behaviors which thanks to research on beauty culture which has traditionally been aimed at women for a very long time, we have a ton of data about how these sorts of ideals and the pressure to optimize the body to an unrealistic and inhuman ideal, what it does to the mind. And yeah, it's not, it's not looking good. Like there's yeah, appearance, anxiety, depression, dysmorphia, disordered eating, obsessive compulsions, obsessive behavior, self harm, even suicide associated with these kinds of standards and I do think that we're going to see some very sad outcomes for some famous looks maxers in the not so distant future.
- [100:44]
B
I think so as well. And that's also something I didn't bring up in this conversation but something that I've just mentally had floating around that I'm having trouble placing this piece of information about clavicular within this larger thing is clavicular self identifies as an autist. So like look smacking is his special interest as like a person on the spectrum and so like, he's kind of. I don't know, I just think it's very interesting that this is. Is his like, special interest, that he's roped this generation of young men into pursuing him down. And he also has said that he views his autism as like a blessing because it changed how he has an outlook on life and it's made him very rational and factual about his beauty. That's how he views it.
- [101:30]
A
That's.
- [101:31]
B
He sees his autism as putting like a rational, like the kind of math masculine framework we've been talking about onto aesthetics. And he credits that, like, point of view with being on the spectrum. And I just think that's very interesting. I don't know what to make of it. I just find it very interesting.
- [101:46]
A
Very interesting. I think it also shows how there is no real, like, ideology, ideological through line for a lot of these people. Like, that really does stand at odds with the, the eugenics of it all.
- [101:59]
B
Yeah, yeah, totally, totally.
- [102:01]
A
In a strange way. Yeah. I don't know. That is a good point.
- [102:07]
B
Just like an additional complication to this deeply complicated sub genre.
- [102:14]
A
Well, is it time for the rest of the month?
- [102:17]
B
I think it's mess of the month time. Although I feel like we've been talking about the mess of the month.
- [102:21]
A
I know that was the true. These are just like the lighter.
- [102:26]
B
The lighter. My mess of the month is quite simple. It's Brooklyn Beckham and it's specifically Brooklyn Beckham's cover up tattoo that he got of his tattoo that's dedicated to his dad.
- [102:36]
A
I know you showed me this the other day and I. I love it. Jaw on the floor, you know?
- [102:41]
B
Yeah, I love it. For those who. I don't know how you wouldn't know this as it's my, my top interest of the moment is that Brooklyn Beckham is fighting with his family over. Well, he claims it's because his mom danced inappropriately on him at his wedding, while Marc Anthony called her the most beautiful woman in the world, which is what we have from tabloid reporting of this event. And it was supposed to be his and Nicola's first dance at their wedding that his mother, like, stole from her. And it really just seems like there's a lot of bad blood between his wife and his family ultimately, and that he's kind of exiled himself from his family because they don't like his wife. So anyway, this came to a head when he posted a bunch of Instagram stories kind of like calling out his family and saying they're doing everything for like, PR and for like, Looking good on Instagram and they don't really care about him, etc. And we've kind of noticed this for a while because. Because it's like he unfollowed all of his brothers and his parents on Instagram and stuff and he. He didn't show up to. David Beckham had like a big documentary release for like Netflix that I do think they came to it, but it was like very tense and weird. Photographs were being taken on the red carpet and then they didn't go to his birthday party and whatever. A lot of inter family drama. And now we. Now we have photographs showing that Brooklyn has covered up a tattoo on his bicep. The original tattoo was like a traditional anchor tattoo with like the. The banner across it that said dad. Yeah. And the anchor is still there, but on the banner the dad has been turned into these like runes. I don't know what to call. It's like weird symbols. Huh. That I don't think mean anything at all. But like in the act of getting the word dad covered up, the symbols somehow make the dad, I think, more apparent than it ever draws attention to
- [104:40]
A
the dad that was.
- [104:42]
B
It somehow darkens the dad beneath in a way that I can't explain. But it's highlighting rather than obfuscating, which I think is very funny. And also I. This is also confusing part to me about this tattoo. Cover up is directly below the anchor tattoo. He has like a script, a tattoo and script that says love you bust or love you buster, which is like his dad. That's from the point of view of his dad. Like his dad calls him that. So that is a. A message from his dad. And also like, all of his tattoos are vaguely related to his father because I remember the process of him getting these.
- [105:20]
A
And there's like a lot of family
- [105:22]
B
lore and there's a lot of family lore and his tattoos and even getting totally covered in tattoos. Like all of the children are like all the sons of age or whatever. The daughter is much younger, but all have a lot of tattoos because they all are inspired by the fact that their father is completely covered in tattoos. And all of them have like cherubs and stuff, which is like very David Beckham coded. They all have his like Jersey numbers tattooed on him. They all have like deep family symbolism stuff. And so I think it's just very funny to like, like single out your one tattoo that says dad, but not like your entire body is covered in tattoos dedicated to your father and his wife. At this point, I believe he said he has over 50 or over 60 tattoos for Nicola, which is also a little scary. I know I including her eyes on the back of his neck, which is my favorite.
- [106:09]
A
I remember that one.
- [106:10]
B
Iconic.
- [106:10]
A
A classic.
- [106:12]
B
Classic.
- [106:13]
A
Damn. Okay, Brooklyn. I'll be excited to see how he covers up or modifies the rest of them.
- [106:19]
B
He's my eternal mess of the month though I have to say he is like an eternal. Him and Nicola are just a mess icon. They're so boring. I love them so much. They don't do anything at all and they fail at everything. And I think that's amazing when you are given every humanly advantage on this planet. When you are given every gift, every opportunity, every connection in Hollywood and still you can't make anything of it.
- [106:40]
A
No.
- [106:41]
B
Iconic. Yes, I want to follow you. Yes. I want to see what you're up to. I want to check in on you constantly.
- [106:47]
A
It's beautiful.
- [106:48]
B
I love them. They're beautiful. They call. Did you see them calling the. They called the paparazzi on themselves the other week and they were just carrying their dogs. Oh, I love them. They were literally just walking down the street and each of them had two giant like bichon frises in their hand that are just immaculate, immaculately groomed dogs. Like usually those types of dogs I feel like are very like tear stained and like yellowy because just the nature of the dog. These dogs are pristine white and they were groomed like to show like they're ready to go on the Westminster dog show or something. Just floofy and perfect. And they're each carrying the one in each arm just walking down the street and they called the paparazzi on themselves for that. And I'm like, I love you guys. Like that is exactly what I want to see.
- [107:30]
A
I do have to say, like, I know that it's wrong. I don't have a justification for this, but I don't trust somebody with a small floofy dog.
- [107:39]
B
Of course not. You shouldn't try. I didn't say trust them. Nicola. There are rumors that Nicola pushed her maid down the stairs on her nanny or whatever. Don't. Don't trust these people. They're billionaires. Yeah, I'm just.
- [107:50]
A
No, no, it makes sense. It makes.
- [107:52]
B
I'm just saying I want to see.
- [107:53]
A
I don't have a small floofy dog. I don't care to see them. I don't care to see them either.
- [107:58]
B
How dare you?
- [107:59]
A
I know, I know.
- [108:01]
B
Take it back.
- [108:02]
A
No, I mean, Fran's a big dog, so it doesn't. It doesn't apply to Fran even with all of her floof.
- [108:08]
B
I wish the paparazzi would take pictures of Fran.
- [108:10]
A
Oh, they will. I know that Fran is going to be a dog model at some point and I still think that you should contact or Lil Love Dog, one of the many dog beauty brands that have popped up and. And submit Fran because yeah, that's.
- [108:25]
B
That's on me. I'm not being enough of a.
- [108:26]
A
You got to be more of a stage show mom.
- [108:28]
B
I gotta be more of a stage mom. And I'm just. It's not in my nature. Like if I really was Fran was. Have already had an Instagram account and she would be. Business would be booming. I did meet Susan Alexander this month though, so.
- [108:38]
A
Oh yeah, I'm very cool.
- [108:41]
B
I'm gonna slide in her DMs and say I do have a dog model for you. Just fy. I know you like doing that dog show.
- [108:46]
A
It's gonna happen.
- [108:47]
B
But the star has yet to arrive.
- [108:48]
A
I know she's coming. Oh, also plenty of opportunities I think for you in and Fran in Chloe Mal's Vogue because she loved the weird dog thing, right?
- [109:00]
B
She did the doge.
- [109:02]
A
She did Doge.
- [109:03]
B
She did Doge. And that seems to be like why Anna thought that she was like this seems. Have you heard the way that Anna
- [109:09]
A
Winfrey likes about Chloe Mao is.
- [109:13]
B
But it's also.
- [109:14]
A
She likes weird dogs.
- [109:15]
B
But it's also so confusing to me because she like really heaps praise upon her for like the genius of the dog issue idea. And I'm like, girl, you're clearly not on the Internet because that was. That's like a 10 year old me. By the time you guys did it as a real magazine, it had been around the Internet like since Tumblr. Yeah, she come up with that. And I wonder if Anna thinks that she came up with that and that's why she gave her the job.
- [109:38]
A
She must. She mentions it quite a bit.
- [109:41]
B
Yo. That interview of them together. I also just have to say I'm not even talking about the content. I'm purely talking about the aesthetics of the two of those two sitting by side by side is everything to me. Everything.
- [109:51]
A
It really is.
- [109:53]
B
Anna insisting on the sunglasses and like having her hair and like slumped over the whole time.
- [109:57]
A
Like, I just have to say we have very healthy budgets.
- [110:02]
B
It's incredible. And that's also like, that's why one of you is an icon.
- [110:05]
A
Yeah.
- [110:06]
B
One of you has yet to prove yourself to be an icon because the way she's acting in that video, that's why she's a meme legend. You know what I mean? Yeah. You got to bring some insane psycho personality to the. To the party. I know that we want normalcy, and we think that we want normalcy and we want. Want transparency, but I think we want a little bit of diva, that's for sure.
- [110:28]
A
Okay. My mess of the month, Love is Blind. Are you watching Love is Blind? Do you watch?
- [110:33]
B
I tried. I. I do watch love. I. I should preface this by saying I do watch love is why I've watched many seasons of Love is Blind. Yeah, I did give up on it. I don't know if it was last season or two seasons ago, because I just find it so dark and bleak,
- [110:46]
A
and it's so dark and bleak, and
- [110:47]
B
this is not working for me.
- [110:48]
A
And I did many others.
- [110:50]
B
I dipped in this season because I saw people talking about TikTok and I hate to be excluded from an online conversation. And so I did want to see what I could see. I tried to watch the first episode, and I found it to be excruciating.
- [111:01]
A
I'm glad I couldn't do it yourself. I think you should save yourself. I think. Don't go any further. This season is in Ohio. Most of the men are awful. Some of the women are awful. There's a lot of, like, confirmed Trumpers. But my mess of the month centers on Chris, who got engaged to a Jessica in the pod. So Chris is 33. Jessica's 39. She's a doctor. She's, like, very accomplished. After the reveal and a few weeks after, like, being together and sleeping together and being in the real world, Chris sits Jessica down and he says he's not attracted to her because he actually wants a woman who does pilates or crosses CrossFit every day.
- [111:46]
B
Oh, you said she's a doctor.
- [111:49]
A
Which is like, exactly. And that was, like, one of the first things she said. She's like, I don't have time to go to the gym every day because I'm a literal doctor saving lives in these excruciatingly long shifts. Like, what are you talking about? And the other sort of bizarre thing about this proclamation from Chris is that, like, Jessica's very small. Like, she is a, like, of course she is looking woman. There's, like, nothing you could point to about her and be like, oh, this is not in line with, like, normative body beauty standards.
- [112:22]
B
She's not the right kind of small. That's where you're wrong.
- [112:25]
A
Exactly. So then Chris goes on to say that he's actually attracted to his number two pick, Bri. And it's just like again, even more bizarre because Brie is not smaller or more fit looking than Jessica. Like I don't know if he knows that Brie is working out every day and that's what he likes about it or something, I think.
- [112:44]
B
But this is like a constant love is blind trope also is they. They make these choices in the pods that are like based on real attraction, like not physical appearances. And then they go to those like mixers once everyone's partnered up and then they see their number two choice always. And then they're like, oh shit, she's really hot. Like I should have picked her. And then they make up some weird ass excuse for the partner they're currently with about how they're falling short and what they' not me. Oh, couldn't you just be a little more like this gal over here? And it's totally fictional and based on nothing. They just want to the other one. They just realize they want to the other one that they think is hotter completely.
- [113:19]
A
But also I do think there's like expressed preference for a woman who like is doing Pilates or CrossFit every day.
- [113:27]
B
That's such a specific want.
- [113:30]
A
I know, it's like it seems to be a preference for a woman who is putting. What if she went running into optimizing her body? Well, it kind of reminds me of like this era of GLP1s protein maxing and lifting are becoming more popular. Like getting ripped is sort of this like idealized aesthetic because GLP1s make being thin not as hard. So like.
- [113:56]
B
Well, also GLP1s degrade muscle tone.
- [114:00]
A
Yeah, exactly. So there's like this preference that's like blossoming for like a toned and muscular body. Because that is now how you can show that you've put in this effort. And I think, I do think. Interesting. Yeah, you gotta labor.
- [114:16]
B
Otherwise what's it worth? What's the point?
- [114:19]
A
Nothing to crack.
- [114:20]
B
Almost like it's. It's almost like it's pointless.
- [114:24]
A
But it's interesting because what he's like describing is an aesthetic, a certain associated with strength. But I think to him it signifies like feminine submissiveness. Like putting this energy into your body and your beauty like a woman should instead of work. Yeah, exactly. I don't know, it's just super bizarre to me. And then the other thing, like I have a big.
- [114:51]
B
I'm sorry, I'm so stuck on Pilates or CrossFit being the specific workouts that she has to do. Like, because there Are. Does he know that there are other
- [114:59]
A
ones he might not like? It might be completely arbitrary. It might be because of, like, what these. Like, specific aesthetics.
- [115:09]
B
Yeah, well, Pilates, certainly.
- [115:13]
A
If it was just Pilates that he said, there could be a lot to be said about, like, this softer, more feminine aesthetic that is associated with, like. Like, CrossFit, to me, doesn't have that. Crossman's, like, a pretty masculine, coated workout.
- [115:29]
B
So what's. What's he doing? What's his routine?
- [115:32]
A
Well, I don't.
- [115:33]
B
What's he lifting? What's he lifting in the box?
- [115:37]
A
Have no idea. He. Well, because. Okay, here's my. This is my problem with a lot of the disc. The Antichrist discourse that has popped up is so much of the commentary on what an asshole Chris is. And he is. Is an. Is centered on, like, how dare you suggest that Jessica isn't hot enough for you. You are ugly because you have eczema. Like, this man clearly has eczema. He has, like, redness on his cheeks and nose.
- [116:07]
B
I even did the doctor last month tell us about dermatitis. He's evil.
- [116:13]
A
Evil baby of eczema and acne. Dermatitis.
- [116:16]
B
He has an evil baby on his.
- [116:17]
A
Yeah, exactly.
- [116:18]
B
That makes sense.
- [116:19]
A
Well, I've even seen dermatologists comment on the love is blind discourse and be like, chris, you can't be saying anything. You're covered in eczema and you're not treating it. And it's just like, this isn't good either. Like, why can we just not.
- [116:33]
B
This is kind of what we were talking about, though, too, earlier, with, like, beauty brands, like, inserting themselves in places they don't belong. Like, the Internet has made us believe that everyone has to be a part of every type of discourse. And so you have to find your angle on the discourse and insert yourself. Yourself. When actually, you don't need to talk about this at all.
- [116:49]
A
No, no.
- [116:49]
B
And just be a dermatologist.
- [116:51]
A
Actually, the beauty industry's angle on this has been. Eczema is proof that you're a bad person.
- [116:57]
B
You're evil.
- [116:58]
A
Exactly. So, yeah, that's my mess, actually. As soon as we get off this, I'm gonna go binge the last two episodes of Love is Blind. You're sick today. I am. I'm sick. I'm not.
- [117:08]
B
Well, are you watching the Beauty?
- [117:11]
A
I had to stop.
- [117:12]
B
Are you? No, No. I watched the three episodes I had to watch for this goddamn podcast, and I was like, let me out of here. I'm never coming back.
- [117:21]
A
Did you watch another episode I watched another episode. Not good. I watched Love Story. Very good.
- [117:30]
B
Have you watched People? No, actually.
- [117:31]
A
Good. And I'm like, Ryan Murphy is capable of producing good television.
- [117:36]
B
I know. Is it wrong of me? I just kind of don't care. No, I think that these.
- [117:40]
A
I think that's very right of you.
- [117:42]
B
And as a fashion person, I'm like pretty familiar with the looks that I'm gonna receive. So it's like I'm not watching for that because they're just, they're creating one to one replicas of outfits I know intimately. Right. I don't know, I'm just not. I'm not really intrigued by the. Their love story. But I'm glad that he's making something that's good because he's made everything that's trash for a million years and he's already threatening more trash. I already see him on the, the Internet talking about what's next. You know, he's doing some. Oh, I meant to send it to you because he's doing some new plastic surgery show.
- [118:13]
A
I did. I saw this newsletter, Rich People.
- [118:18]
B
It is rich.
- [118:20]
A
That makes sense that apparently Ryan Murphy is teaming up with the beauty broker who is. I forget her name. But it's. She's like kind of a go between for patients and doctors. She's like a matchmaker for patients and plastic surgeons. And apparently Murphy will be producing some sort of TV show about this, which I guess I'm looking forward to in like a.
- [118:43]
B
That premise sounds. I'm going to seem really boring. That sounds insanely boring to me.
- [118:48]
A
Watch it.
- [118:48]
B
You're the middleman between a patient and a doctor. Like what is the narrative there? Like what is the plot? I don't care. I don't care about that experience.
- [118:56]
A
It's probably going to be like a, a reality Nip Tuck.
- [119:00]
B
Yeah, it's going to be a reality. He's returning to his roots of something good that he made, which is Nip Tuck.
- [119:06]
A
Like, how could I make this bad?
- [119:07]
B
Yeah, how can I make a bad version of my good show? Well, a good show that became a horrible show.
- [119:15]
A
Okay, we've done it. We've tapped out. It's two hours. We gotta.
- [119:19]
B
That's plenty. You've had enough. Everyone's had enough of us. Of podcast.
- [119:24]
A
Thank you for listening. You know, like review it on Apple podcasts or wherever. Leave us comments on Spotify recently realized or on YouTube. People are. Oh yeah, on YouTube if you're watching.
- [119:36]
B
Yeah, we recently found out about comments on Spotify and it's been a real eye opener.
- [119:40]
A
Real treat. Yeah.
- [119:41]
B
You guys are nice. You're leaving nice things. I. I just literally don't know how you're leaving comments on Spotify, and that's because I'm old. I know. Problem.
- [119:48]
A
That's, you know, I got to get with it. It and start commenting back. But we read them. We like them. Thank you. Okay, well, I'll see you next month. Bye.
- [119:57]
B
See you then. Bye.