It's Fascism...LITERALLY
The inherent conservatism of rigidity.
People in power are super-ugly right now. Through surgery and fillers and botox and terrible makeup, they’ve pushed their faces into a kind of uncanny valley between human being and ghoul.
Objectively, they look like shit. And the populace is noticing: it’s why J.D. Vance’s grotesque face has become a meme.
And yet more and more oligarchs and their supporters are adopting this bizarre look—enough that there’s a super-viral TikTok trend about “Republican makeup” and foreign newspapers are writing stories about how everyone in America is beginning to look insane.
I have absolutely no problem with people modifying their looks via surgery or injectables (I’ve had both and highly recommend a Botox lip flip for a sexy, pouty look :P). But usually the point of these modifications is to look “better.” Sure, that’s a loaded term filled with presumptions about what makes someone worthy of love or money or whatever. But what’s happening now is, I think, different.
There can be no claim made that these people are being modified to look better, at least in the traditional sense of the word. Because, again, objectively, they look like shit—like lumpy and leathery piles of skin poorly stretched over human skulls.
These body modifications serve a higher purpose, but not their usual higher purpose. These Republicans, and especially the Republican women, are, essentially, through aesthetic modification, signaling that they are fascists, and that fascism is the law of the land.