Why is everyone very demure, very mindful all of sudden?
Not being like the other girls has gone mega viral
Being “very demure” and “very mindful” has become a new mantra for millions after Jools Lebron blew up on TikTok.
Her phrases are everywhere after Lebron posted a video ten days ago titled “How to be demure at work”.
In the 21 second post she says: “See how I come to work? Very demure. I do my make up, I lay my wig, I do a little braid, I flat iron my hair, I do chi chis out, I do viral vanilla, very demure, very mindful. Let’s not forget to be demure divas.”
It’s since been watched over two million times and follow ups from Lebron titled “How to be demure and modest and respectful at the work place” and “How to be very natural approachable and demure at the workplace” have collectively been viewed more than 12 million times.
But it’s other TikTok users picking up and using Lebron’s phrases in their own videos that has super-charged the ubiquity of very demure across the internet.
One tribute video from a creator named victorfromhell, who narrates his very demure, very mindful trip to the dispensary, has been viewed more than two million times.
Another from jacks, who goes around his home and performs tasks in ways that are very demure and very mindful has had over 700,000 views.
Lebron is thrilled by the viral response to her expressions and she’s now being recognised as being “from TikTok” by fans who repeat her phrases back to her.
Very demure, very mindful has the internet in a chokehold because of the compelling and sing song way Lebron vocalises the expressions and because there are so many ways to use them in every day life. Literally anything can be very demure and very mindful, or to take other Lebron favourites, “very cutesy” and “not like those other girls”.
Lebron sometimes uses her sayings to celebrate doing the bare minimum, like when she boasted: “Outfit, no stains, very demure.” And when she went back to a bar to pick up her lost ID she praised herself for not ordering a drink branding that “very demure, very mindful”.
The phrases are also used ironically and to acknowledge being delulu. In one video where Lebron shows off her long neon pink glittery nails she said: “You see how I do my nails, very elegant, I don’t do to much, I don’t go too crazy, I don’t do too long, very demure.”
The virality of Lebron’s expressions are tricky to quantify as very demure is being used by so many different creators on multiple platforms, but Google Trends has captured the hockey stick shaped rise in searches for “demure” in the last few days.
What is clear is that Lebron’s star is on the rise too. Before very demure took off Lebron was an established beauty content creator who would produce paid partnerships, review gifted products and post make up tutorials to the hundreds of thousands who followed her. Now many more are aware of her work and she recently crested one million followers on TikTok.
Since her viral moment she’s being booked for personal appearances in nightclubs and has amped up her TikTok presence, posting multiple times a day. I’m sure (and hope) bigger brand deals will also follow.
Brands are also likely to jump on the very demure trend for their own social content. My advice would be that they need to do that ASAP to fully capture the zeitgeist. Very demure is so big it risks being killed off if used in a cringey way that gives everyone the ick. Who remembers Gen Z boss in a mini?
I hope very demure can survive its viral moment. At the very least it seems that Jools Lebron will and that’s the least she deserves for being so very mindful.
This week I’ve been…
OBSESSED WITH: Jaden Barba’s pick up dance routines, RayGun memes and the messy press tour for It Ends With Us.
READING:
Teen Girls Are Spending Big. She Tells Them What to Buy. The Wall Street Journal’s interview with very influential 17-year-old TikTok star Demetra Dias.
Has Burning Man Peaked? from Ellen Huet at Bloomberg
David Remnick’s interview with the most powerful person in America, Nancy Pelosi, in The New Yorker
EATING: The garlic and Comte flatbread at Bistro Freddie in Shoreditch that I shared with the fabulous
, and the lamb chops at The Devonshire in Soho, after finally bagging one of their hard-to-get tables.highly flammable is produced and written by Rachel Richardson
She’s a content creator, commentator and consultant at Beginning, Middle and End
Thank god for this newsletter. I had no idea why I was suddenly seeing "demure" everywhere!
I'm 35 (am I too old already or is it just not my thing?) and I do not get this. I mean she's taken random, pretty antifeminist words and is using them to talk about make up and hair - I just don't get the irony here or why so many people are jumping on this very random bandwagon!
Do you understand this all?