As usual, this week had its share of bad news. Norm MacDonald died, and Gavin Newsom’s terrible reign in CA did not, to start with.
But it’s Friday, and time to unwind. Thus my weekend thoughts have turned away from politics, and toward social commentary, and the stunningly rich fodder for mockery it has provided this week.
I’m thinking, of course, of the ridiculously tone-deaf celebration of wealth and bad taste that is the Met Gala. This shin dig has been called “the fashion world’s equivalent of the Oscars” – so you know it was going to be shallow, smug and stupid, with ratings to match.
And it cost $30,000 for a ticket to this mess!
Members of CO nation know me as a man of wealth and taste, but even so, that number is unthinkable to me. Even when I’m taking my smoke-show of a wife out for an anniversary dinner – and she puts all of those freaks in ludicrous, over-priced fabric monstrosities to shame, no matter what she wears – I am hard pressed to spend more than $5K, and that includes appetizers, drinks, desserts and an extra order to take home for Cassie the Wonder Dog!
Some of the usual narcissists made fools of themselves in predictably banal ways. One of the Kardashians draped herself completely – face included – in some kind of black fabric, so that you couldn’t even recognize her.
If I can speak for all normal Americans – and I think I can – we appreciate that. Do that more.
Moanin’ Megan Rapinoe – fresh from leading America’s Olympic soccer team to defeats at the hands of teams from Sweden and America’s Hat – carried a stupid little purse with “In Gay we Trust,” written on it. Which is so, so brave, considering what a hotbed of homophobia the Met Gala is!
I can only hope that after a long, self-involved and preening life, Rapinoe gains some measure of self-awareness, and realizes that maybe a life spent doing Gay’s Work wasn’t such a great idea.
On the other hand, maybe in an Act of Gay, she’ll be struck by a bus, or crushed when a mirror falls on her, and at the moment of her death, she’ll experience some measure of Gay’s Grace. And her deluded fans will gather around in mourning, and say, “There but for the grace of Gay, go we all.”
Or something equally dumb.
But Rapinoe wasn’t the most egregious example of a self-satirizing dope wearing clothing with words on it. No, that honor goes to everybody’s favorite innumerate, incompetent bartender: AOC.
Unlike Hester Prynne – here comes a reference that would fly right over Sandy’s tumbleweed-filled head – AOC wasn’t satisfied with one scarlet letter on her clothing. She had to have three scarlet words that, taken together, are a lot more shameful than a little bout of adultery: “Tax the Rich.”
When I first saw the picture of her looking back over her shoulder while wearing that dress, I had several thoughts:
First, contrary to the fever dreams of AOC, Bernie and the Pale-Face Pocahontas (#wemustneverstopmockingher), the rich are already taxed six ways to Sunday, with the top 1% paying more than the bottom 90% combined.
Second, you’re at an event that costs $30K a plate, you moron!
Third, I wish some paparazzi jerk would have called out, “Who are you wearing?” so that Sandy could have said, “Karl Marx!”
Fourth, I remember a similar fashion trend from the past that this reminded me of. In past years, many young women regularly wore a variety of sweats pants and yoga-style pants with words printed on the seat. In particular, the words, “Juicy” and “Pink” seemed to make frequent appearances there.
I found several things about that trend to be odd. For one, I don’t think women generally need to call attention to that particular body part. There doesn’t have to be reading involved: your average straight guy will notice.
In fact, putting words there might be considered counter-productive. When dealing with the typical neanderthal male — in a half-hearted defense of my toxic brethren: we’re just as God made us — women very often need to say something along the lines of, “My eyes are up here!”
Conversely, they’d never need to utter the sentence, “My butt is down here!” Because this is how that conversation would go:
Reasonably attractive woman: “My butt is—”
Straight guys (interrupting): “Yeah, yeah, we got it.”
Anyway, AOC is a fairly attractive woman, assuming your turn-offs don’t include, “Googly eyes, life-threateningly low IQ, and toxic political beliefs.”
But the fact that she has a trim figure represents a real lost opportunity, message-wise. Her petite, thin stature (very fat-shaming, by the way) required the briefest of texts.
But if a former first lady (hint: CAW CAW) wore that kind of dress, you could print the introduction to Das Kapital across her beam, with room left over for footnotes. (I was going to say “cankle-notes,” but I am too mature for that.)
Speaking of which, the Video Music Awards were also last week, and they were also a dumpster fire, with terrible “music” and worse ratings, and they also featured a vapid celebrity making horrendous fashion choices.
Madonna wore a goofy dominatrix outfit, and when she had said her piece, she turned and strutted backstage, showing off a cartoonish set of butt implants.
Ugh! That outfit would have been in bad taste, but might have had some kind of frisson of naughtiness, back when MTV had music videos, and Madonna was a young, moderately talented but ferociously ambitious ingenue.
But she’s 63 years old now! Who is this supposed to appeal to? Also, having seen a few clips of the VMA awards on Steven Crowder’s show – and I think those guys for taking that bullet for me! – I think we all owe an apology to ancient Rome.
Because when I was a youngster reading about the fall of the empire, there was a lot of decadence talk: this emperor made his horse the pope, and this one bedded his mom, and that one pulled a Hunter Biden and jumped his dead brother’s widow, and on and on.
But after watching someone called Lil Nas X – and it makes me feel a little sheepish just from typing those characters – simulating some kind of gay/shower/orgy scene, and poor old Madonna wobbling her geriatric fake butt off of the stage, I am feeling a little of the ol’ “don’t point out the speck in ancient Romans’ eyes when we’ve got a plank in ours” brand of shame.
So Caligula, sorry about all that judge-y talk about how decadent you guys were.
Mea culpa, and we-a culpa.
Avenatti/Caligula’s Ghost 2024!
Martin Simpson 