A Pear Shaped Demon: Fashion Shows
A Pear Shaped Demon: Fashion Shows
Sanhedrin 109a and the Tower of Babel story from the Book of Genesis: "Let us ascend to the top of the tower and wage war, become apes, and spirits, and demons, and female demons."
A demonic beauty galore awaits you, my beloved, brave, curious reader of impeccable taste; a true festivity of sights and sounds will be presented on a lavish, rather opulent virtual dinner table like an insightful spread of truth about the world taken over by demons, but worry not. While an occasional succubus may be hurled your way, nothing sinister like the Latin version of the Ghâyat al-Hakîm, The Picatrix, Taylor Swift's music, Malleus Maleficarum (The Witch Hammer), Marvel or Disney movies, Hostage to the Devil (The Possession and Exorcism of Five Contemporary Americans) or “Rosemary’s Baby” is to be found on these true pages.
Trust me, after all, I wrote Jung's Demon (A serial-killer’s tale of love and madness), a deeply disturbing psychological thriller in which I truthfully stated, “I’d be happy if my memories would help even one single human being to either heal or kill,” but herein I only want the world to heal.
”Wer immer strebend sich bemüht, den können wir erlösen.”
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
"Whoever Strives with All His Might, We Can Redeem"
Sandy Liang, in September 2022, after she launched her square-toe Mary Jane shoes, used the word 'princess' 13 times in 15 minutes. It's a small wonder Disney’s princesses are now square-toed, heartless heroines mocking men and love alike, as any decent modern girl wants to find liberation in an office space, working under the soul-killing neon light, and not being loved by a man and a child instead. Try living as a square-toed princess even for an hour, and not even white gloves would help you gain love and respect, unless you’re in the fashion show bubble with those better than the others.
Get lost Pablo Neruda with your sugary words; If you forget me does not work any more. We’re forgetting who we are, on purpose. They are making us forget ourselves.
Only those who forget why they
came to this world will lose their
way. They will disappear in the
wilderness and be forgotten.
Swooce Over, Beethoven: Irish Are Black Too! (I am not being flippant, only truth and nothing but the truth was promised to you and will not give on inch to fantasy or lies. Ireland did indeed have their own African “king”, Matthew Emeka Ezeani of the Nigeria's Igbo tribe, dubbed king Igbo of Ireland.) But I digress.
The Devil's Advocate
At this point, the Devil tried mightily to compel me to add a paywall to this essay, given that almost no one pays for my work. This makes me, a scribe living in abject poverty, feel like a worthless, albeit revengeful warrior of squalor, and made me want to become an anti-hero like Superciuk (una leggenda alcolica) and go on stealing from the poor in order to give it to the rich.
Then I realized:
that’s how the world works anyway;
I’d be succumbing to the sins of greed, vanity, and, if someone would give me a buck or two for a Tyson Food’s poison, gluttony.
Awoken and ashamed of my temporary weakness, I’ve realized that the Devil wanted me not only to get paid but also to conceal the truth. And the truth is that I am an aging white male, a pear-shaped scarecrow that would, should I commit a crime that lured me, fit perfectly in the lineup of other white males, like the supermodel-like justice impaired gentlemen below.
This confession alone disqualifies me from writing about demonic, pear, or otherwise shaped fashion shows, and I will hold no grudges if you abandon this essay this very moment and go on a buying spree of some Balenciaga demonic products instead.
Nothing regales a parent like buying bondage-themed gifts for their 3-year-old daughter or a 6-year-old son to appear with what seems to be photographs of paperwork from a Supreme Court case that upheld part of a federal child pornography law. As you can see, the happiness shines brightly from the faces of Balenciaga’s children models.
On the Road without Jack Kerouac
Alternative seems, if not dead, in a deep retreat, in America. Literature consumption is reduced to glancing at not-too-long tweets, and movie magic is replaced by TikTok—ah, the crime—vertical videos. Ugliness rules everywhere. And yet the beautiful persists." ~ Gregory Bateson.
Recently, as a flicker in the medieval tunnel of suffocating repression, Matt Taibbi, Miranda Devine, and Jay Bhattacharya were the inaugural winners of RealClear’s brand-new Samizdat Prize. Now, many an American, in their child-like innocence, is not aware of the concept of samizdat that flourished during Stalin’s Soviet Union and is therefore needed in a Sovietized America. Alexander Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago is the most famous example of an samizdat. The Gulag is “The greatest and most powerful single indictment of a political regime ever leveled in modern times,” per George F. Kennan and America still waits for its own Solzhenitsyn. And its Gulags, it seems, unless the overlords would be content with the whole country becoming one big, ugly-as-hell, smelly-as-a-skunk-with-diarrhea, slumping squalor.
Let me elucidate the concept of the samizdat.
Samizdat is derived from the Russian words ‘сам’ (sam - self) and ‘издательство’ (izdatel'stvo - publishing house), referring to the underground self-publishing of dissident literature in the Soviet Union. It emerged as a response to the strict censorship and suppression of free speech under Stalin's regime and continued to flourish throughout the Soviet era.
During Stalin's rule, the Soviet government, unlike ours /s, maintained strict control over all forms of media, literature, and art. Publications were heavily censored, and any material critical of the government or deviating from the official Communist ideology was banned. As a result, many writers, intellectuals, and political dissidents found themselves unable to publish their work through official channels. Recently I wrote an article, “Tic-Tac-Toe: Deep State's Victory Assured! S. 686: RESTRICT Act - will restrict Americans rights” but we already live in a samizdat era in America; Substack is a samizdat, for example. Twitter the same.
What their digital coldness reveals is a lack of dungeons, a smell and sense of danger, a camaraderie. A human touch. Eyes that tell you—'We can do it! We will prevail!' Matt Taibbi—deservedly so; after all, I pay him also, and on the day the money is taken from my account, I skip one meal—makes a bundle. I myself, like almost all others, squeezed sidekicks to the Pareto Principle's superhero duo (Matt has Walter Kirn to talk to); the ones that never get the spotlight, the fame and fortune, not to even dare to mention a fiery dark-eyed South American revolutionary girl, and yet do the heavy lifting, alone typing, bleeding from our fingertips as we fight for freedom, but are alone. We don’t fear Gestapo’s boots approaching as we hold our breath and encourage each other; we don’t hide from Stalin’s NKVD bravely resisting and are not (yet) hauled away to Gulags, all that takes is a faceless woke geek’s click on the algo that removes us from everyone’s sight.
The powers-that-be fear only a mob of enraged people ready to burn their mansions down and hang them high; dealing with our writing is easy: we’re all deplorable Russian agents as long as we don’t bow to the God Mammon and his disciples in three-letter agencies of doom and, as such, subject’s of the said geek’s click.
Our samizdats are not enough. Our alternative lives, our alternative world cannot be built if it stays only online. It seems we don’t know how to get out, stay out, and tear the walls of tyrannical madness down and live free.
Back to Fashion Demons: “IDGAF Sexiness”
But, the “alternative,” rather a parallel universe of delusional superiority is still alive and well and, lurking in the darkness of undeserved opulence, shapes our daily reality best seen in Balenciaga’s kid fashion. There are “elite” incubi and succubi prowling the minds of young girls and an occasional boy taught that he’s indeed a girl. Let me share a glimpse from their world, writing of someone named Liana Satenstein, and kindly forgive me for it:
“I scored the juiciest, most in-demand accessory at New York Fashion Week. It wasn’t a new intrecciato Bottega bag handcrafted in some storied factory in Italy. Nor was it a butter-soft leather jacket from the latest Phoebe Philo drop, with a price tag equivalent to a mortgage payment. No, it was a pale pink 40-ounce Stanley Cup with a thick protruding straw, officially named the Adventure Quencher H2.0 Travel Tumbler, that retails for $45. Okay, maybe it wasn’t the hottest thing at Fashion Week, but it certainly has been the hottest accessory on social media.”
See, that sorry rug, sorry, an intrecciato bag—is BS lingo for nothing more than a bag that’s hand-woven, but how to justify its grotesque cost of $7,200.00 in its Maxi Cobble Messenger version unless you write, in italics, intrecciato—but Liana tells us that another thingy, not even a “Phoebe Philo drop” no matter what that means, some Adventure Quencher is “hot.” Well, the whole purpose of Liana’s nonsense is to sell that freaking tea cup. Ah, the ‘adventure’ offered to the cool, obscenely rich youth of New York City dwellers.
I heard a siren song of the world foreign to me and had to explore it. As it happens to be I currently read A Skeleton Key to Finnegans Wake (Unlocking James Joyce's Masterwork), trying to understand the book I otherwise daren’t to even start reading but after carefully pouring through Ms. Satenstein oeuvre I have a feeling James Joyce’s monstrosity—someone called it genius gibberish—is a much more enjoyable read than her smug musings. James Joyce’s “I was babbeing and yetaghain bubbering, bibbelboy, me marrues me shkewers me gnaas me fiet, tob tob tob beat it, solongopatom” is likely insane but Liana’s writing is an insufferable and otiose torture, something only Disney's Snow Brown princess, Rachel Zegler, can match in its monumental annoyancabilness.
For Liana and her ilk of demonic succubi, it’s all about the fashion appeal and selling cheap trinkets, it seems. She persists in her excruciating diatribe, culminating with what feels like a thunderous final eulogy to the entire human race.
“But what about its [Adventure Quancher’s] fashion appeal? Is it comfortable to haul along to a fashion show? And more importantly, does it hold up as any kind of status symbol there? Would sipping sink water from it while sitting front row at Thom Browne, watching model Alex Consani shed a jacket that took months to hand-stitch, to a recitation of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven,” enhance the Stanley Cup’s power or diminish it? If no one notices your Stanley Cup, do you even have one? Or if they do notice it and hate it, what does that mean?”
Did you notice a deep existential anguish those fashionistas are facing over a tea cup? If so, imagine a cockroach dipped in vanity juice. Give him voice and let him blather about sipping sink water to a recitation of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven” and you’ll find out how far the haughty stupidity goes. Have him visit you in dreams as a succubus from hell, and you’ll see how Gregor Samsa had it easy. May Belgehor, the demon of sloth and vanity, and all the gods of mediocrity help me survive this exposé of these whoops of pompous vanity that pass for wit in fashionable cycles.
She’s even being funny and uses appendage to describe a Made in China plasticky Adventure Quencher.
“My first day with my new appendage, I took an electric Citi Bike from south Brooklyn to the Eckhaus Latta show in TriBeCa with it nestled—except for the straw—into my vintage Y2K-era Louis Vuitton Multipli Cite bag. At stoplights, I’d lean over and take a swig. By the time I got to the show, a thin layer of water was sloshing around in the cap. No big deal.”
Alas, while sloshing water did not upset her, despair was settling in me. I had no clue what any of that nauseating tommyrot meant. I kind of got it—Citi Bike is cool and appropriate for Manhattan maniacs, that other bag is there to be sold for all the gold looted from Fort Knox, and so on; self-admiring status-symbol seeking of someone firmly throned as arbiter elegantiarum of TriBeCa’s overpriced lofts—but unstoppable disgust overwhelmed me. I had to force myself to navigate through the shiny turds of Liana’s world. And, in the end, my adventurous bravery was amply rewarded. I finally got it. Manhattanite succubi loves Anacott Steel as much as Gordon Gekko loved Wall Street’s basic bitches.
“And it was a hit—a mini celebrity, or maybe a sideshow freak. Showgoers loved to take photos of it. Interview editor Taylore Scarabelli gleefully wrote ‘subverting the basic bitch’ in response to a photo of me sipping from it.”
Taylore of the IDGAF—”I don’t give a fuck” for MILFs among you, unfamiliar with the lingo of those well versed in coolery and mind-fuckery—world gave her blessing for the bitchy appendage.
“Sexiness” part of IDGAF is best seen in this image.
But with Taylore’s entrance I had something to work with.
The Revenge of the Surreal
I wish I came up with this sub-title. I did not. It came from Liana’s school of thought by the Bazaar editors and someone named Thom Bettridge, whom managers from "a creative agency representing artists for commercial work" describe as a creative director and editor from New York City. Thom served as an editorial leader, something that used to be a simple "editor" but is now also a "leader." Thom joined the Canadian luxury retailer SSENSE as its Head of Creative and Content. Damn! I feel humbled, a mere wwriter facing a HCC at the OK Corral of Fashion.
Thor, I know it’s Thom, never a simple Tom, Tommy, Thomas but Thom and yet, Thor’s has more gravitas even than Thom, no matter what creative content head has in his head, damn, sorry, I myself have gotten Lianized—Thor teaches us, remaining men among us, how to be a man!!
He knows what we’ll want to be.
Don’t Tell Me I Did Not Warn You
“Since the series finale of Succession,” Thor wrote, “menswear day traders have been short selling quiet luxury. But unlike GameStop, the annoyingly viral ethos just won't go bust. Even in my own head as I think about what FW24 holds for dudes everywhere, the term still uniquely describes the moment.”
WTF?
Taylore, what basic bitchery is Thor subverting here? Help me out, will you? Kindly, please, with sugar on top? Nope, she did not. They never cross a line; they never venture into the world of less fashionable, rather famalamadingdong bums, jadrools and rossers. My 11 ½ sized foot would not fit well in Prada satin high-heeled mules shoes even if I lost my mind, forked out $940.00 for that monstrosity and tried to appease the gods of fashion by an ‘affirmative care’ surgery and call myself an Ellen. So I’m left alone to cope with my uncut phallus and something dark and unknown—a pinnacle of bullshit, a verbose heap of hogwash no Liana or Taylore would ever be able to attain. This is what makes Thom Thor.
“I realized in Paris that quiet luxury reminds me of ‘the end of history.’ The latter phrase was coined in 1989 by the political scientist Francis Fukuyama to describe the world after the Cold War. ‘The end of history’ and Fukuyama have been derided mercilessly ever since because, well, history didn't end after 1989. But I always admired The End of History for its spunk, and because it clearly captured a feeling that was very much present. In that sense, both quiet luxury and ‘the end of history’ also remind me of normcore, another idea that aged badly yet felt palpable in the air when it was coined.
In 1989, we thought history was over. In 2013, we thought dressing like Jerry Seinfeld was transgressive. In 2023, we thought luxury might actually be about being rich. Those kinds of genies don't go back in the bottle.”
Thor greeted us with grandiose comparison between the menswear market and the stock market, as if we're supposed to believe there's some profound connection between day trading and "quiet luxury." Then we're treated to a blast from the past with references to "the end of history" and normcore. Because nothing says "fashion statement" like dredging up old political theories and dressing like it's laundry
day.
Truly, those people are trying to sell us a peach-colored overshirt as the second coming of the Mona Lisa, a rotten fish wrapped in a newspaper sold as an attempt at intellectualism disguised as fashion commentary. But, without further ado, let me introduce you to the men you’ll want to be.
Thor: Manly Kittycore
“What's the difference between a pattern and a trend? Maybe it's that a trend feels like it's doing something, whereas patterns don't trend in any particular direction. Two patterns I noticed in the menswear collections that don't feel like trends: giant faux-fur coats and tops with cats on them. But if you take these two patterns together, the inklings of a trend begin to coagulate: an emergent recoupling with kitsch, a humanist desire to feel fuzzy in a cruel world, a subversion of masculine youth via its granny opposite.
Welcome to kittycore.”
After Thor’s out-pour of nonsense, I needed some old good Taylore Scarabelli to introduce me to mainly Gangstress.
From the fly eavesdropping on their world.
RAUL LOPEZ: Hello?
TAYLORE SCARABELLI: Hi! How are you feeling?
LOPEZ: I’m so exhausted.
TAYLORE: I’m literally drinking an energy drink out of a Steluar goblet right now. [Laughs]
LOPEZ: Chic.
TAYLORE: The door was so crazy last night, like it always is. I was trying to get one of the PR girls to get me in through the side and she’s like, “No, you got to go around the front.” I was really proud once I busted in, I was like, “I’m not waiting in line.”
LOPEZ: I’m screaming.
“Raul Lopez is New York City’s final boss,” wrote Taylore’s Interview, thusly, likely Taylore herself. “He’s a tastemaker, fashion influencer, and the creative director of Luar, a brand he established after cofounding Hood By Air with Shayne Oliver. His latest hit design is Ana, a new “It”-bag inspired by ’60s mod shapes that’s been spotted on the wrists of celebrities like Dua Lipa and Troye Sivan. He spills on clout demons, ballroom culture, grannies, and of course, taste.”
These people, Thors, Taylores, Rauls and Liannas of this world drifted so far away from any of us and our world, and their utter BS would not make any sense but it trickles down from the upper classes—that creates ugliness or regurgitate fashion of the old—to the masses below. The Devil Wears Prada cerulean sweater monologue is a perfect example of it.
Meryl Streep's acting, exuding utter superiority over—miscast as ever—a 'commoner,' is a masterpiece in the reality they've been crafting for us.
They are, after all, better than us.
Why do I bother you with a world so removed from myself and, presumably you? The absolute conformity of bland, pseudo-cool, self-absorbed blathering, devoid of anything interesting aside from intrecciato triviality, as seen in the examples above, is a horror we'll bestow upon future generations, and therefore, screw it completely.
If we allow that we’re nothing but idiots, paying $7,200.00 for a damn ugly bag thinking it’s an expression of ourselves. Well, if we do so, it is.
[i] Albert Camus’s The Myth of Sisyphus can be read for free here.
[ii] A nod to Camus and adopted from his novel The Plague rather it’s last sentence, a damnig alegory of fascism: "but he alone knows what the crowd does not, that the plague bacillus never dies or disappears, that it can remain dormant for decades in furniture and bedding, can wait patiently in rooms, in cellars, in trunks, in handkerchiefs and paper, and that perhaps the day would come when, just to teach men a lesson and make them unhappy, the plague would awaken its rats and send them off to die in some happy city.”
Source: Struggles from the Dark
Comments
Post a Comment