October 12, 2018

A new political costume? A sad-faced girl with 2 bruised eyes, imploring us to vote to save her from further violence?

That's what I wondered, when I opened my email and saw this (click to enlarge and sharpen):



Maybe that's supposed to just be a pretty way to do your eyes — all purple, with glitter.

Decades ago, it was a cliché of feminist critique to say that eye shadow looked like 2 bruised black eyes so if you think it's attractive, what you are finding attractive is the violent subordination of women. Despite the mass quantities of feminist critique on line these days, I can't find anyone saying that.

So what's going on with that girl's eyes? (I'm saying girl because she looks about 12.)

Is it a deliberate effort to look as though she's been punched in the face a couple times? If so, it's not like in the old feminist critique, a misguided effort to look sexy by looking like a beaten-up victim, but a misguided effort to lend credibility to a message that — because violence against women is bad — you ought to vote (presumably for a candidate that cares about women's rights).

I expect many of you to say I'm going too far. She's just supposed to look like a cool young rock music fan.

AND: I am reminded of last week's New Yorker cover, which used lipstick to represent violence against women:



The woman with the dulled eyes has what seems to be a lipsticked mouth, but it's a hand. She's being silenced... by her own makeup. The New Yorker's art editor, Françoise Mouly, explains that the cover, by Ana Juan, is commentary on the Kavanaugh hearings.

IN THE COMMENTS: Commenter BJK says that the person I called a girl is in fact a 31-year-old woman, Lauren Mayberry and that she's the lead singer of CHVRCHES, one of the groups listed in the email I received. Here, you might enjoy her music:

103 comments:

Henry said...

I admit, the first thing I thought was cosplay.

Jupiter said...

"I expect many of you to say I'm going too far. She's just supposed to look like a cool young rock music fan."

She's supposed to look like someone whose experience, prudence and good sense qualify her to participate in selecting our political representatives.

Darrell said...

Left wing agitprop hiding the fact that they are Left Wing.
Close your eyes and smell the sulfur.

Jersey Fled said...

Wonder what those "fun activities to plan their election day" are.

Nonapod said...

"Headcount: Music-Democracy-Action"? You probably aren't the target audience (despite being on the email list). Getting younger, white liberals who are into Minus the Bear and Sir Sly to actually vote has got to be challenging.

FIDO said...

If they wanted to make bruises, they would have been better done.

Any young person saying 'go vote' means 'go vote Democrat'.

I am not her target Democrat graphic either

FIDO said...

Damn autocorrect.

Demographic

Jim at said...

Being pathetic. Yeah. That'll turn out the vote.

Fernandinande said...

I've heard of Bob Weir and have two songs by Gov't Mule, "War Pigs" and "Effigy".

mccullough said...

An update for Subterranean Homesick Blues.

Look out kid,
You’re gonna get hit

Hashtag Go Vote

n.n said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

I want to know what on earth is going on with that gentleman's weird signature.

Except I'm pretty sure it actually just says I'M COOL LOOK AT ME

n.n said...

She looks like a geisha or a mime. #EntertainTheVote, #SilenceTheVote, respectively.

Ken B said...

I always get in trouble for it, but my advice to people who haven’t registered to vote is, don’t. High turnout is a pernicious goal. It is promoted by those hoping to use their recruits as vote fodder.

I'm Full of Soup said...

I think her girlfriend beat her up. Is that a #METOO issue or is that just for guy on girl assaults?

BJK said...

The woman in the image is Lauren Mayberry, the lead singer of CHVRCHES (pronounced with a 'u', but spelled with a 'v' so as to be Google-able), a Scottish alternative rock band, and one of the bands mentioned in the picture.


While she may look 12, she's 31 years old, with a law degree (undergraduate, because that's apparently a thing you can do in the UK).

I much prefer her music to her politics. Can't really speak to the eye makeup (since I'm a guy), other than to say it's a variation on her current look.

TrespassersW said...

The unquestioned assumption is that, if young people/women vote, the will undoubtedly vote D.

I've tried pointing out that assumption to some Facebook friends. The normal response is to not respond.

mccullough said...

So we have some fucking subject of the Crown registering voters in the US?

Mueller will have to look into this.

TrespassersW said...

"...they will...," not "...the will..."

eric said...

Like the Mona Lisa, I can't decide if she is smiling or not.

Rabel said...

Cool young rock music fan or just a slow learner.

Rabel said...

Nice work, BKJ.

gspencer said...

No, what I saw was a zombie Democrat. Like Lisa Simpson's brainwashed neighbors, chanting in drone-like voice as they brought their stuff to the curb, "[Monotone] But you told us to recycle. [Monotone] You convinced us it was good."

from, The Old Man and the Lisa,

FIDO said...

If you have to explain it, it isn't effective.

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

If your shadenboner lasts for longer than 4 hours, seek medical attention, or watch an old episode of Girls.

https://lithub.com/mia-the-liberal-men-we-love/

Jess said...

According to the internet, Head Count is a nonpartisan organization that works with musicians to inspire people to vote. That's a good message, but it would be better if they inspired people to learn some history, pay attention to current events, and avoid voting if you like being ignorant.

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

We speak of it like an infection: "has it spread to your household yet?"

Has the man in your life become sick and tired of your lamentations?

chuck said...

These days you could add "bullshit" to most of your tags and they would still work.

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

When they say that Democrats are putting their stock in Millennials, I just think of the recycling that was insisted on, that I always somehow end up being the one to load it into my pickup and take to the dump, err, I mean recycling center.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

Is it a deliberate effort to look as though she's been punched in the face a couple times?

Maybe the makeup is to cover up actual black eyes. Does anyone know if she recently dated the Deputy Chair of the Democratic National Committee?

hombre said...

Wait! Ford was silenced? What was all the hullabaloo about then?

Oh I get it! If the lamest accusation ever was not taken at face value by all, the female accuser is said to have been silenced. LOL!

Democrat lunatics!

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

My husband worries about our daughter, she told me recently. That I’m only "teaching her she’s a victim."

One day, while she was picking their children up from daycare, he burned a handful of her possessions: her Nasty Women shirt, her Hillary Clinton pins.

My husband filed for divorce, another confided a few days later. He said he loved me and shared in some of my frustrations, but “could no longer tolerate,” he said, the level at which I felt them.


That link is like an Ali Baba treasure cave of schadenfreude.

bagoh20 said...

I would add a bloody lip and carry a jello shot made to look like an ice cube.

"Mr Clinton persuaded Mrs Broaddrick to have coffee with him in her hotel room during a conference of nursing home administrators in 1978. She alleges that he then forced her on to the bed, where he held her down, bit her lips and raped her.

When it was over, Mrs Broaddrick claims, Mr Clinton told her that she should not worry because he was sterile due to a bout of childhood mumps.

She added: "This is the part that always stays in my mind - the way he put on his sunglasses. Then he looked at me and said 'You better put some ice on that'. Then he left.""


Yet, how many Democrats would support Bill Clinton as President over Trump or on the Supreme Court over Kavanaugh? I bet over 90% easy.

Mary Beth said...

Getting younger, white liberals who are into Minus the Bear and Sir Sly to actually vote has got to be challenging.

They've got no time for "what if"s and "what if not"s.

Francisco D said...

Wait! Ford was silenced?

Go to YouTube and listen to snippets of her testimony and cross examination.

Her lawyers are going to wish she was silenced. They were complicit in her blatant perjury.

The more you watch her demeanor, listen to her voice and appreciated her changing testimony, the more obvious the whole melodrama becomes. They were trying to manipulate women who have been sexually harassed and assaulted.

Unless Republicans pursue a perjury charge, CBF will become the next Anita Hill - a heroine for the Resistance.

Big Mike said...

@Althouse, feminists weren't the only ones critiquing the fashion trend towards heavy, dark eye shadow. A couple thoroughly masculine male writers that I read referred to it as the "my boyfriend regularly beats the crap out of me but at least I have a boyfriend" look. You'd know that you and your fellow feminists (yes, I wrote that deliberately) weren't alone in thinking that the heavy dark eye shadow look was not a good one if you read more widely. Just sayin'

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

My daughter's liberal, Bernie Sanders bumper sticker sporting boyfriend winked the other day after telling me he was reading up on the evils of the white male gender. I didn't hit him with my White Peril shtick, but I am hoping it catches on.

Molly said...

I think this is relevant here and I'd love to hear comments from althouse readers:

https://lithub.com/mia-the-liberal-men-we-love/

Lots of liberal women are shock to find that their men are fed up with 2018 feminism -- so bailing out of relationships, or just saying "I'm fed up with what you've become". And don't forget to read the comments which are about 99% men saying, "yeah that's me too; what did you expect; it's not that men don't like angry women sticking up for themselves, what we don't like is women who make blanket generalizations about men, and women who apparently can't think in a coherent way for themselves, but would rather wrap themselves in the comfort of feminist solidarity."

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

Molly, I think it's a movement!

Foolishly, I hoped things would eventually turn around, only to see things get worse over time. Yet it wasn’t until I witnessed the Me Too movement snowball into an all-out, anti-male witch hunt that I realized good men were in real trouble. Astonishingly, after having been an advocate for women my entire adult life, I quickly learned I was still considered the ‘enemy,’ simply for being a man.”

http://thefederalist.com/2018/10/12/kavanaugh-smear-war-broke-decades-long-support-feminism/

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Modern female pop music does nothing for me.

send Josh Hawley some $$$. That's the hip and cool thing to do.

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

For more than two decades, I traveled the country facilitating rape and assault prevention lectures, seminars, and workshops for women of all ages. I was passionate about this work, committed to the cause, and believed wholeheartedly that what I was doing was a wholly virtuous endeavor. I considered myself a feminist. But that was then, and this is now.

Look, I think that rape is up there pretty high in the list of crimes, maybe not as high as murder, but right up there. I just support due process because if that bulwark fails, rape will be one of the least of the problems.

campy said...

"I've tried pointing out that assumption to some Facebook friends. The normal response is to not respond."

They're too polite to give you a "Duh!"?

Bilwick said...

I guess the message is supposed to be, "This is what Republicans do to young girls."

You know, unlike the glorious, benevolent State, which would not only blacken her eyes, but kill her. (Google "Democide.")

The Crack Emcee said...

I don't trust HER.

FullMoon said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Big Mike said...

I watched the video. The singer looks better without the heavy eye shadow.

Her signing sucks.

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

She looks about Bob Menendez - D New Jersey age in the picture.

stlcdr said...

The assumption to go out and vote is that you will vote Democrat. I don’t know why that is. I think it has to do with the fact that a lot of younger people are ignorant of how the real world works, but are fanatical about their ideals (or, the ones they have been told to be fanatical about). The have to be told to actually, you know, vote.

With all the cat-wailing over the 2016, I suspect they don’t understand how it all works, and believe that by voting that should simply be enough to make it happen (hence the ‘it must have been The Russians’).

Bay Area Guy said...

The New Yorker cover is a Lie. And we should call it as Lie, because it is so frequently promoted by the Left.

If I conclude that a particular woman (say Julie Swetnick) lacks sufficient evidence to support her rape claim, it doesn't mean that I conclude that all women lack sufficient evidence to support their claims.

Memo to the New Yorker: It's a case by case basis, baby!

How hard is that to understand?

Darrell said...

Don't be a fuckhead and vote Democratic.

Buttons can be made available.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

I don't trust HER.

#MeNiether

Darrell said...

Memo to the New Yorker: It's a case by case basis, baby!

Like the 1400 woman the FBI says called in to report that Kavanaugh had raped them. I suspect those are liars, but who knows?

Jersey Fled said...

I must be losing it. I find myself agreeing with Crack lately.

n.n said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
n.n said...

The evidence is silent on the allegation(s). Ironically, The New Yorker hopes that justice is blind, mute, and deaf. That said, warlock trials are still unconstitutional. So are witch trials. So are summary judgments and cruel and unusual punishment. #HateLovesAbortion

n.n said...

make blanket generalizations about men

Diversity or color judgments.

women who apparently can't think in a coherent way for themselves

Again, diversity or color judgments. #MeToo has captured both women and men.

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

I have a weakness for Black comedies, and they get off some pretty funny lines. One of them was "Didn't you know all bitches is crazy?!"

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-teacher-suspended-stephen-miller-20181011-story.html

looseweb said...

I noticed the black eyes and the word "impact" in the first line: not an accident.

n.n said...

teaching her she’s a victim

Don't disenfranchise women. It's Choice, Sex, Responsibility. Pro-Choice is two choices too late. #DiscoverYourDignity

Men, too. #MenToo

n.n said...

Modern female pop music does nothing for me.

The feminine female voice is appealing; but, yeah, the content may be irreconcilable. #DearFemen

CWJ said...

Nothing says stop violence against women like promoting a band named "Death Cab for Cutie"

Michael K said...

Now, the war is shifting to white women as enemies.

Do black women understand they are 8% of the population and pissing off the majority is not a good life affirming plan?

Darrell said...

As a white man, I am totally shocked that they would come for white women. That would appear to make it racial.

Char Char Binks, Esq. said...

The New Yorker woman is being silenced by Trump's tiny red-state hand.

Darrell said...

Silenced by lipstick.
If only. . .

McCackie said...

Lets see, white women hate white men (and it's now reciprocated) whilst simultaneously they are now on the outer with the rest of the Grievance Groupies. Have fun losers.

Kevin said...

Yeah it's Lauren Mayberry. It's a shame she's a quintessential SJW. She's probably my #2 most beautiful woman in the world, after Karen Gillan. Apparently I have a thing for Scots.

eddie willers said...

Same crappy millennial whooping autotuned mindless ditty (with drum machine).

JaimeRoberto said...

If she's from a Scottish band, doesn't that count as foreign meddling in our elections?

Kevin said...

I'm really blown away that you would post about her. I try to keep my musical fandom away from my politics, because every single musical artist I love is very far left and never ever ever shuts up about it ever. So this is like worlds colliding for me.

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

Bitches ain't crazy?

https://www.dailywire.com/news/36316/watch-feminist-pours-bleach-over-60-mens-crotches-amanda-prestigiacomo

Kevin said...

She doesn't autotune and they don't use a drum machine. Here's a full concert from just this weekend. Note the major SJWing around 5 songs in. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8NY-nmxdOc

Kevin said...

Sorry here's a live link i forgot we could do that. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8NY-nmxdOc

Kevin said...

I give up. Go to the url or don't. I do IT stuff for work but not HTML stuff.

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

When you've lost Slate....

https://twitchy.com/dougp-3137/2018/10/12/good-luck-with-the-tour-slates-juanita-broaddrick-interview-even-has-ezra-klein-stunned-by-the-clintons-decades-too-late

I code the live links myself, BTW.

Michael K said...

Nice example of using kids as political props and a good rebuttal.

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

Folks. This is Slate. Doing a Juanita Broaddrick story and interview. Listen to the interview. Klein is right. It will probably cause you a physical reaction. It's stunning.

That "physical reaction" you are feeling, those of us who believed JB based on the massive amounts of corroboration years ago have gotten over it, now we are just still sort of pissed off at the hypocrisy, but you guys, realizing that you have been complicit in thirty years of lies and part of a conspiracy of silence, I am sure that is pretty gut wrenching.

FIDO said...

feminists weren't the only ones critiquing the fashion trend towards heavy, dark eye shadow. A couple thoroughly masculine male writers that I read referred to it as the "my boyfriend regularly beats the crap out of me but at least I have a boyfriend" look.


As Ally Sheedy famously said on "The Breakfast Club": "I like that black shit."

JackOfClubs said...

Those purple eye shadow bruises work as a metaphor for the ones Christina Blasey Ford got when Diane Feinstein threw her under the bus. They were supposed to be all blue, but they got tinged with a whole lot of red.

FIDO said...

Phoebe Cates has certainly aged far better than Ally Sheedy.

eddie willers said...

Sorry, Kevin. I went there and they may have a live drummer for the occasional downbeat, it is the drum machine taking center stage.

If you want to see REAL musicians at Austin City Limits, give this a go.

Rhiannon Giddens Austin City Limits

Howard said...

Clinton Dominates end of term approval ratings since Truman... not all democrats, but the non namby-pamby republicans as well.

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/data/final_approval.php

tcrosse said...

Clinton Dominates end of term approval ratings since Truman.

That's a lot of knee-pads.

FIDO said...


https://lithub.com/mia-the-liberal-men-we-love/


"Dear Men,

We are going to destroy Due Process and the Presumption of Innocence for ALL men because we hate Trump and we love abortion, even for our testosterone bereft beloved Liberal men. It is, alas, a price you have to pay.

So we are happy that you are willing to help us...guys? Where are you going?"

Seeing Red said...

Ezra is a stopped clock. When will his 2nd time make him right?

Seeing Red said...

Maybe they should have added carrying mattresses.it might have been so much more effective.

Unknown said...

this is a pure objectification, and this is a child. nobody even gets to say boo anymore, oh don't judge, don't judge, like that replaced all the commandments.

William said...

Juanita Broderick never claimed that she felt Clinton might beat her to death. Ford claimed that she felt she might be suffocated and killed by Kavanaugh's hand over her mouth during the alleged attempted rape. Kavanaugh was not, to her mind, just an attempted rapist but a possible murderer......Here's something you can only say on the internet. It's possible Ford is exaggerating the assault on her person and is doing so for political purposes. I just don't think Ford ever truly felt that she was going to be murdered during the assault, if, in fact, the assault went down the way she claims.

William said...

Pauline Kael claimed the Last Tango in Paris was the greatest foreign film ever made. That film featured a rape scene. The rape scene was not a dramatic reenactment of a rape but something very close to an actual rape. Brando and the director Bertolucci felt that Maria Schneider' s reactions would be more authentic if they didn't tell her how the scene would be played. Brando threw her to the ground, ripped her clothes off, and dry humped her while the cameras were rolling. Well, they got an authentic reaction from her.......I was thinking of Pauline Kael's remark when I read Adam Gopnick's review of a book about Frederick Douglass. Gopnick wrote in his review that Douglass was the greatest American who lived in the 19th century.

Seeing Red said...

Is she an American citizen?

Anthony said...

I really like Chvrches.

Freeman Hunt said...

That New Yorker cover looks like it came from a teen lit mag. Heh.

Darrell said...

We need Scottish Bolshies telling Americans to vote.
Hey, isn't that foreign interference in our election process?

LA_Bob said...

Well, thank you for the embedded video, but, no I don't really for her (or rather, CHVRCHES') music.

But, then I'm an old guy. My tastes in pop run more to Cat Stevens, Elton John, Crosby Stills and Nash...people who I think were better songwriters.

Oh, and also a whole bunch of classical masters...

Ms Mayberry's politics and her music are both pretty run-of-the-mill.

Just asking questions (Jaq) said...

I yelled at my husband last night. Not pick-up-your-socks yell. Not how-could-you-ignore-that-red-light yell. This was real yelling. This was 30 minutes of from-the-gut yelling. Triggered by a small, thoughtless, dismissive, annoyed, patronizing comment. Really small. A micro-wave that triggered a hurricane. I blew. Hard and fast. And it terrified me. I’m still terrified by what I felt and what I said. I am almost 70 years old. I am a grandmother. Yet in that roiling moment, screaming at my husband as if he represented every clueless male on the planet (and I every angry woman of 2018), I announced that I hate all men and wish all men were dead. - Washington Post Op Ed

I wonder why men are backing away from liberal women.

Michael K said...

I am almost 70 years old. I am a grandmother.

Bye. The world is full of younger women. All it takes is some guts.

James K said...

So Inga got a WaPo op-ed?

Big Mike said...

@William, or if it even happened at all.

Big Mike said...

In case you check back, Althouse, I wanted to add that being almost twenty years too low in your estimate of another woman’s age may be a sign that you might just be getting old. Just sayin’

Matt said...

I grow weary of idiots imploring the idiots who follow them to go vote.

No. F you. Stay home, idiots.

Stephen A. Meigs said...

I remember about twenty or twenty-five years ago on a plane trip seeing a young brunette woman with heavy dark grey eyeshadow that was done with perfection in the gradations of darkness, etc., and thinking, wow, that eyeshadow makes her look a little like she has black-eyes, and so Why is that the best job of eye makeup I have ever seen? I didn't think it was a panda look. The eye-shadow made her look business somehow (not necessarily with me, of course). Somehow she sort of looked like she was a guardian of some ancient knowledge in some important mostly forgotten repository of a lore of an importance that she along perhaps with a few others was alone in justly appreciating. The rest of her appearance was very clean-cut (not to say her eyeshadow wasn't clean cut) and like she was moderately more well-off and independent than average. Perhaps she at times didn't feel quite as independent subsequent to the right sort of male looking into her eyes in the right sort of understanding way, and she didn't mind that, nay but perchance it even made her set about to feel like encouraging more of the same, which she perhaps undertook to do by showing herself a little dark about the eyes.

There's something to be said perhaps for eliciting emotional responses in males that serve to differentiate captivating males from brutes who wish to give women black eyes, at least in safe settings like the secure side of airline security. Kind of reminds me of pretty 10-year-old girls who make you wonder whether they are indeed girls rather than boys so that they can differentiate the handsome and reassuring "that's pretty but eeeek she might be male" looks from the repulsive "not sure what sex that is but I want to sodomize it regardless" looks.

rcocean said...

"Brando threw her to the ground, ripped her clothes off, and dry humped her while the cameras were rolling."

He never "Rips her clothes off" after "throwing her to the ground"

At least not in the final cut.

rcocean said...

I have a hard time caring about an actress who gets upset over a pretend rape, when she agreed to appear nude, and be in a pretend rape - but not a pretend surprise rape with no 5 seconds of dry humping.

Talk about splitting hairs.