Over The Top Peacockery In Social Spheres

by Stanely Stuyvesant · March 20, 2009

[Socialite Marisa Noel Brown Demonstrating a "Semi-Russian Front-Split" Photo by PMc]

Every species has it's own way of making themselves look desirable. And, while peacocks' extravagant display of self assertiveness is beautiful, the NYC socialite/microcelebrities may be our favorite of specimens to analyze. Has anyone ever stood in a mirror and mimicked some of the poses that socialites like Tinsley Mortimer and microcelebrities like Julia Allison bestow upon the shutterbugs? Try it, and then quickly write down all of the feelings that come to you. A few of them might be, I feel really weird and awkward," "wouldn't a casual pose be better?," "who started this trend?," but most importantly "what message exactly am I trying to convey with this pose?"

Our "Taxonomization" of Poses below....

It would be hard to point to the origins of histrionic posing (maybe it comes from Broadway), and even harder to understand the motivations of the poser. It seems like even Hollywood isn't bizarre enough to have created or adopted it mainstream, (except for Beyonce...but she's not really Hollywood). So while we might not have answers, we thought we would at least start with attempting to taxonomize some prevalent ones.

Tinsley Mortimer