Rehash

Why isn’t “airbrushed skin for all” written in the constitution? For years, photoshop was a professional’s game, gatekept, if you will, from the masses. But then Facetune came about and forever changed the course of history, democratizing photoshop to the dysmorphic masses. The promise of a user-friendly photoshop experience, where anybody could fabricate their appearance, was more seductive than...

For those of us whose “smokey eye” and “blending” skills fell short during the beauty guru makeup regime, Glossier was our saviour. Founded by “super intern” Emily Weiss (who has a brief 3-episode run on The Hills as Lauren Conrad’s more competent counterpart at Vogue), Glossier popularized the “no makeup” makeup look of the mid to late 2010s. With its minimalist branding, it quickly became a cult...

In 2021, a flight to Atlanta was delayed for two hours to accomodate for 24 wheelchair-bound women who had just received a little procedure known as the Brazilian Butt Lift (BBL). This was not an isolated incident. In the mid-2010s, the number of luteal fat grafting (BBL) procedures increased by 103 percent, as did BBL-related deaths. It was ass-mageddon. So, in this episode, Hannah and Maia trace...

People have been trying to reverse the effects of aging since ancient times, and bored rich people have been trying to live forever since, well…forever. But historically the practice has been targeted to people who are actually “aged.” So how did we go from Jane Fonda selling us miracle creams, to retinols marketed towards actual children? As the anti-aging “cosmeceuticals” market explodes before...

From the man who introduced self love, and even “love itself,” to the beauty and fashion industries, David Kibbe, comes a scale which can determine the very essence of a person using the scientific measurements of “bones big, bones small.” The Kibbe Body Type test came about during the self-help era of the 1980s, but has found new life online, as people rush to sort themselves into arbitrary physi...

Beauty is not in the eye of the beholder, but rather in the eyes of 500 sl*ts who hold all society’s power and privileges. At least, according to incels. In this episode, Hannah and Maia revisit the loneliest, angriest corners of the internet to explore “looksmaxxing” - a hot wheels-style rebrand of the “glow up”, replete with internet jargon and pseudo-science and a brand new name to make it pala...

Liv Schmidt is a 24-year-old “health and wellness” coach who puts a populist spin on pro-ana content! She’s loud, rude, and ready to take our feeds by storm one almond at a time. Schmidt’s “skinnytok” movement wasn’t built in a day - she is in fact only a messenger for the larger trend of online diet culture that has resurfaced in the past couple years. In a time where Ozempic ads line the subways...

The faces of women in the Republican Party have changed drastically, and people have noticed. As the likes of Kristy Noem and Kimberly Guilfoyle become ever-pouchier, pouty-lipped, and blown out in the short time since Trump took office, the internet has been in a frenzy. Some, including plastic surgeons themselves, have suspected these women of getting cosmetic work done to get in Trump’s good gr...

Ever since Seo Taiji and Boys broke onto the scene in their baggy overalls back in 1992, Korea has been working to cast as wide a cultural net as possible on the world stage. And, by placing young talent through rigorous game show incubators and pumping out dozens of attractive, talented, and universally appealing musical artists, they succeeded. With the meteoric rise of groups like BTS and Black...

Who said men can’t have hobbies? The world certainly did a few years ago, when hypebeasts seemed to dominate every sidewalk of every shopping district in just about every city around the world. When brands like BAPE and Supreme popularized the limited drop sales model in the 2010s, they inadvertently spawned a breed of man whose entire life seemed to depend on “copping” the latest and most overpri...

Nate Petroski is an off-the-grid recluse who has a girlfriend he met online, millions of fans all across the country, and a bespoke beard-oil brand. Something isn’t adding up here. In this finale episode, Hannah and Maia step into the wilderness of the internet’s very own homesteading community. These influencers make a living documenting their alternative, self-sufficient lifestyles. And, in an i...

You don’t know what seapunk is. We don’t know what seapunk is. Even seapunks don’t know what seapunk is. Well at least, most of them don’t. It all started with a guy named Lil’ Internet and his dream of a barnacle-adorned leather jacket. Quickly evolving (or devolving, depending on how you look at it) into a much-talked-about, less-practiced internet subculture helmed by two rather dogmatic blue-h...

Whip out your tie-dye t-shit and skull-patterned socks, because it’s time to talk about the Grateful Dead. Or, rather, their die-hard, multigenerational, technologically proficient fanbase, the Deadheads. Born from the jug bands and acid test shows of 1960s San Francisco, the Grateful Dead took the world by storm with their experimental, long-form jam sessions that, for over five decades, drew leg...

Weebs… and the people who hate them. Japan has always had a distinctive relationship with the West. But ever since it broke out on the global stage with its “gross national cool” - distributing an array of films, shows, video games, and toys the world over, Westerners have taken on a particular fascination with the country. To the point that an entire Western subculture has formed around an intere...

Ever since Serial burst onto the scene back in 2015 , it birthed not only the world of podcasting itself, but an entire cottage industry of true crime podcasts, each one more ethically dubious than the last. But one such podcast may be, at least by title, the very worst: My Favorite Murder. This wildly popular series has been criticized over the years for its flippant water-cooler recounting of pe...

If you never made your FB profile picture that “I made you a cookie, but I eated it :(“ meme in 2008, were you even living? In this episode, Hannah and Maia recall the long lost emo subculture - which took the world by storm in the mid aughts and fell quickly into obscurity thereafter. Emo emerged as a musical non-genre from the DIY hardcore punk scenes of San Fran and Detroit, and two decades lat...

Ever heard of the Disney theme park for adults called “Pleasure Island”? No? Well now you have - sorry! Disney has always been understood as a company for children. But Pleasure Island closed in 2003, and people are having babies later and later (if ever at all), and so now the Disney theme parks have become a veritable playground for a whole new group of fans: grown ups. In this episode, Hannah a...

“Grandma, would you tell us that old adage again?” “Yes dears. A long time ago, your ancestors used to say: if all the computers in the world shut down, it’s because the furries logged off for a day.” In this season 6 premiere, Hannah and Maia chat about the most maligned subculture on the internet: furries - a group of people with an above-average interest in anthropomorphic creatures, who everyo...

"She knows what she's doing". In this special release of a 2023 bonus episode, Hannah and Maia discuss the elusive "e-Girl" and how, beyond the blushed nose, winged liner, choker, and multi-coloured hair - we have no clue what the e-Girl is all about. We do know one thing though - her online presence is a precarious one. From the ill-defined youth aesthetic, to Belle Delphine&#...

Once upon a time, there was a place you could go on the internet to buy all the strangest fruits that fashion’s best and brightest had to offer. Now, you’re more likely to hit it when you decide to become the billionth person in the world to own a pair of sambas. That place is SSENSE - the luxury e-commerce mega retailer based out of Montreal, which houses every fashion brand from Canada Goose to...

When “selfie” was deemed the word of the year in 2013, people freaked it. How had society become so vapid? Were we all narcissists? Did this mean young people would spend all the precious time they COULD be building a Forbes empire… taking pictures of themselves? But did selfies really make Narcissuses of us all, or have human beings always been fascinated by their own self-image? The selfie as we...

If you’ve ever vacantly nodded along while someone rants to you about NFTs, then this finale episode is for you. Welcome to Blockchain for Bimbos. From a genuine effort to put agency over the sale of their work back into the hands of artists was born a Frankenstein’s monster: the NFT. It’s the internet version of owning a star… if you could resell that star for millions of dollars to a crypto mill...

Considering every broad and her mother owns a pair of ballet flats these days, it’s safe to say ballet has successfully re-infiltrated popular culture. But that might not be a good thing. In this episode, Hannah and Maia, along with movement artist Susanna Haight, trace the evolution of dance in the Western zeitgeist - from the days of George Balanchine, to the introduction of camera phones into t...

If you're enjoying the Parker Posey-aissance, then Party Girl is the film for you. This little freak of a movie, about a Manhattan club-goer who experiences an existential crisis after reading the Myth of Sisyphus (yes, that's the plot) was, believe it or not, the first feature film to premiere both in theatres and online. And thus it occupies a very odd space in popular culture. Predictin...

Hamilton: the musical that launched a thousand lip-biting memes. Almost a decade ago, Lin Manuel Miranda’s race-bending rap-sical took broadway by storm and rose to unprecedented levels of success, amassing a dedicated, almost fanatical global fanbase. Yet with ticket prices starting at $400 a pop, the vast majority of these fans had never actually seen the show. Even stranger, in 2016 you could t...