A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
-- John Keats, Endymion
Beauty is the main positive form of the aesthetic assimilation of reality, in which the aesthetic ideal finds its direct expression.
-- Karl Marx, Grundrisse
Which of those two quotes better describes the concept of beauty to you?
It's a rhetorical question, of course, because only one of those quotes even describes beauty at all. The second quote from Marx describes something completely different: a focus on utility, social conditions, destruction of traditional norms in favor of 'assimilation.'
I note these competing views because the concept of beauty has become a (no pun intended) hot topic on social media lately.
It began, of course, with the Sydney Sweeney ad for American Eagle jeans. From a purely physical (not to mention evolutionary biological) standpoint, there is no question that Sweeney is a model of the classical ideals of beauty, including symmetry, proportion, and harmony.
Some might question the -- ahem -- proportionality of a couple of her most prominent features, but in relation to the general shapeliness of the rest of her figure, there is nothing outlandish (nor artificial) there.
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The fact that so many have attacked her ad as 'fascist propaganda' is revealing, not only as a reflection of the relative or comparative beauty of the people slinging those accusations, but also concerning what the left wants to do to traditional norms.
And it is not limited to just Sweeney, or even to just women.
Surely seeing an opportunity to capitalize on the enormous success of the American Eagle ad, Dunkin' Donuts just released an ad of its own, also playing on the concepts of beauty and genetics. Except they featured a man, the very handsome Gavin Casalegno.
Following Sydney Sweeney’s “great jeans” American Eagle ad, Dunkin’ has released a similar campaign featuring Texas-born actor and model Gavin Casalegno.
— AF Post (@AFpost) July 30, 2025
“I didn’t ask to be the King of Summer… it just kinda’ happened. This tan? Genetics.”
Follow: @AFpost pic.twitter.com/J8uuwvOE9k
NEW: Dunkin' appears to release its own version of the American Eagle ad featuring actor Gavin Casalegno.
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) July 30, 2025
The Dallas, Texas-born model was heard talking about his "genes," similar to the American Eagle ad.
"Look, I didn't ask to be the king of summer. It just kind of… pic.twitter.com/kUzxNvB1Wp
Casalegno is far less well-known than Sweeney, but he is a young actor on the rise, with his recent role in the show The Summer I Turned Pretty.
Those same classical features of symmetry and proportion apply to him, with some added traditional components of masculine beauty, such as angular lines, a square jaw, and others.
Sure enough, the left is throwing a fit about him as well. Some have said that they will boycott Dunkin' Donuts over the ad, while others have taken to having their meltdowns publicly on social media.
So it begins… a liberal is calling Gavin Casalegno’s new Dunkin’ Donuts ad “borderline if not 100% racist.”😂 https://t.co/NRP3aD8uyt pic.twitter.com/rAHI1CXuj4
— I Meme Therefore I Am 🇺🇸 (@ImMeme0) July 30, 2025
Clearly, this person does not understand marketing, because now is the EXACT time that a CMO would want to put this ad out.
There are far more examples of overly dramatic meltdowns than just the one above, and Twitchy will be covering those soon.
Oh, and not that this has anything to do with physical beauty, but there's another reason the left is more than likely to reject Caselegno.
Rising Hollywood star Gavin Casalegno just said his confidence comes from Christ—defying Hollywood’s anti-God agenda.
— Anna Lulis (@annamlulis) July 18, 2025
Not fame. Not followers. Jesus.
We need more of this. ✝️ pic.twitter.com/PnHzIwo0ZH
That's not going to make them very happy.
Listening to God and not what anyone else says about you is a beautiful concept in and of itself, of course.
But returning to the more material plane, it's clear that people on the left are egalitarian (or at least not sexist) in their hatred. Regardless of whether it is a man or a woman, they despise anyone, ANYTHING traditionally beautiful.
Why?
Well, because they are miserable, of course. And they want everyone to be as miserable as they are.
But more instructively, it is because Marxist aesthetics and ideology are far more ingrained in Western society than many people -- even these leftists -- might realize.
I could run down the litany of examples we have over the past several years, but we all know what that evidence is. Tearing down historical statues; replacing them with statues of an ugly man (inside and out), the criminal George Floyd; throwing paint and cans of soup at classical works of art to 'save the climate'; letting crime and filth overwhelm once-great American cities; and -- most egregiously -- celebrating men as women.
(The left even tried to convince America, hilariously, that masculinity is 'toxic' and that TRUE paragons of masculine attractiveness were men like Tim Walz, Doug Emhoff, and Barack Obama. How'd that work out?)
If you asked anyone on the left who is screaming right now about Sweeney or Casalegno if they are a Marxist, they would probably say no. Or they would give some meaningless word salad answer. Though in the era of Zohran Mamdani, who knows? They might declare it with pride.
Whether they accept the label or not, they have been infused with Marxist ideology, particularly if they went to college. If something is beautiful, or traditional, or just plain normal, they hate it. Any other reasons they may cite -- racism, eugenics, fascism, blah, blah, blah, whatever -- are basically irrelevant. Those words are just window dressing.
They hate norms because they are normal. They hate tradition because it is traditional. They hate beauty because it is beautiful.
The good news, of course, is that they are losing. We may talk lightheartedly about the 'culture shift' in America, but that shift is very real. And there is no better evidence of it than how much the 'backlash' against American Eagle got mocked on social media.
The left, whether they admit they are Marxists or not, made a huge mistake. They pushed too hard, particularly with gender ideology, but in other areas as well, before they had complete control. They pushed because they thought they felt mush, and for many years, they weren't often wrong about that. But then they found out that beneath that mush was cold, hard steel.
And just like that, we wrested control away from them. And we're not likely to give it back anytime soon. Not ever, if I can help it.
This is not to declare victory, of course. There really is no permanent victory against Marxism. They will always keep trying to erode beauty and normalcy. And the left still controls many institutions, including entertainment, the mainstream media, and education.
But the influence of all of those institutions is only a fragment of what it once was. And shrinking.
If we want to continue to drive them into obscurity, the path is very simple.
Appreciate our norms. Appreciate our traditions. And appreciate all that is beautiful. As openly and loudly as possible.
Whether it is superficial beauty, like we might see in models and actors such as Sweeney and Casalegno, or the much more profound beauty in such things as God's love or the miracle of mothers (yes, mothers, not 'birthing people') creating and nurturing a new life inside them, beauty is beauty. And we should love it all.
If we do not back down from our embrace and celebration of beauty, in all of its forms, the Marxist left simply cannot win.
And that, if you ask me, is a beautiful truth.
