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PaperclipPerfector  5d ago (text post)   19090 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 10, 2025

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I know this probably counts as low effort, but I suspect it's fair to say the recent controversial Sydney Sweeney interview provides a near-perfect example of Shiri's scissors, doesn't it?

I'm going to add to what @cjet79 said because starting a thread on this topic would have been fine, but what made this low-effort was not merely its shortness but that you made absolutely no effort to contextualize or explain what you were talking about.

You may have assumed, because it's all over Twitter, that everyone would know what you were talking about. But as several commenters below have demonstrated, there are people who do not actually spend any time on Twitter and had no idea what this is about. There are people who barely know who Sydney Sweeney is. There are people who don't know anything about her jeans ad that caused this controversy. There are people who do not know about the interview with GQ journalist Katherine Stoeffel that has become what you refer to as a "scissors" moment.

If you want to start a top-level thread:

(1) Provide context. Do not assume that everyone else is an Online as you. Do not assume that everyone else is going to know what events and people you are referring to. Not everyone has seen the latest Trump news. Not everyone knows what WotC announced about D&D (some people, believe or or not, even in this nerdy space, barely know what WotC or D&D is). And definitely not everyone knows who a C-list actress known for having "great genes/jeans" is or why she's controversial for fifteen minutes.

(2) Provide something of a conversation starter besides "Hey guys, what do you think of this?" The bare minimum of effort, besides providing some context, would be offering your own opinion on the subject. Or why you think it's gone viral. Or why you think it's a Shiri's scissors. Something.

Here is my contribution: the tldr, for those still ignorant, is that Sydney Sweeney is a hot blue-eyed blonde actress/model who did an American Eagle jeans ad very obviously capitalizing on her great titslooks and making a genes/jeans pun. This triggered a lot of predictable nattering in leftist spaces that Sweeney and American Eagle were Darkly Hinting about white supremacy. Sweeney was then interviewed by GQ features director Katherine Stoeffel, in which Stoeffel asked her about the ad and the reaction to it. Her question was read by many as a passive-aggressive demand for Sweeney to essentially apologize and assure everyone she's not a racist; Sweeney responded with essentially "no comment." What made it go viral, besides the feminine-coded passive-aggressive language of Stoeffel and Sweeney's directness in response, is the contrast in their appearances and facial expressions. Stoeffel is a mid-looking woman in the presence of a woman infinitely hotter than her, and her facial expressions radiate hesitancy and lack of confidence, while Sweeney fixes her with a direct and assertive stare in return. This has been micro-analyzed to death by many, many people. Some have called Sweeney's look a "death stare" and said she is "smirking" or indicating contempt with the slightly upturned corner of her mouth, others have defended Stoeffel and argued that she was actually trying to be kind to Sweeney and let her defuse the charge. If you watch the whole interview, it's not nearly as confrontational or unfriendly as you might think from just watching those most-captured few seconds. Sweeney's obviously a professional who knew that question was going to be thrown at her, and Stoeffel probably was not trying to "gotcha" her. I am always skeptical of the sort of micro-analysis that assumes you can mind-read and infer everything someone is really thinking from their facial expressions and tone of voice. But certainly the visual effect combined with the cultural moment had all the ingredients to make this go viral and become a CW "scissors."

I can't help but thinking that Stoeffel bears a passing resemblance to Denny from The Room. And earlier this year I said the same thing about Ziz.

Is everyone Denny from The Room? Are you Denny from The Room? Am I Denny from The Room?

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