I’ve covered the Met Gala from a meme standpoint in years past, and I intended on doing so this year as well — except … Where are the memes?
The morning-after meme frenzy has followed the Met Gala for at least a decade now, with allegations of Jason Derulo falling down the red carpet stairs re-emerging annually since 2015. Maybe it’s actually funny, maybe it’s just our way of punching up at the elites in an era of gaping class chasms, but either way, latching onto styling gaffes and shady moments is a canonized audience response to the glitzy fundraiser for the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute.
With all that in mind, is the best thing people could come up with this year really that Sabrina Carpenter is on track to become the sexy Green M&M?
Apparently, the answer is yes.
To be fair, the way that most (but not all!) attendees interpreted the theme “Tailored For You” — namely, a conference for pinstriped shirts and zoot suits sans zoot — didn’t leave much for us screen-sick little imps to work with.
Perhaps, after years of internet teasing, those who regularly showed up to the Met Gala in plain black suits have finally turned the joke back on us, as those boring fits are actually on theme this year, or close enough.
But it’s the broader lack of inspiration, risk-taking, innovation, agency, and personal flair — particularly while celebrating the legacy of the Black men who embodied all of those facets as a means of survival, personal dignity, and self-expression for the last few centuries — that has let the air out of the tires, so to speak. When the majority of the ultra-rich defaults to surface-level interpretations of one of the more interesting and incisive Met Gala themes in years, what’s left to laugh at?
Their effort isn’t even worth the sass.
It gets even less funny when I consider that just one avenue away from the Gala, some 200 pro-Palestine protesters were gathered outside in the pouring rain to rally, chant, and drum for Gaza for the second year in a row, largely ignored by the majority of outlets and online commentators.
Having made the journey uptown to get the story first-hand, I can safely say that whatever came from the Gala wasn’t worth standing in the pouring rain and getting clocked in the head by an errant umbrella in the rabies-coded press pit.
