An economic system designed “for men”, but which “depends on the beauty of girls”: in a book which has just been published in France, the American sociologist Ashley Mears deciphers the exacerbated nature of gender inequalities within the jet- international set.
Gold-plated bottles, champagne showers and inevitably beautiful, model-sized women: in Very important people. Money, fame and beauty: investigation into the heart of the jet set (Éditions La Découverte), the author describes how night establishments encourage wealthy men to spend considerable sums by putting them in the presence of women selected for their physique.
Professor of sociology at Boston University, specialist in gender and women, the ethnographer was able to penetrate this closed environment because she herself was invited to these evenings, having the appearance of the model that she was. as a teenager and while studying in New York.
Behind the apparent natural “spontaneity” of these evenings lies a “huge amount of work” by nightclubs and “evening promoters”, intermediaries paid by the establishments to bring in “super rich men and very beautiful women” , explains Ashley Mears, passing through Paris.
“It’s an economy managed by men for men, but which depends on “girls”, on their beauty. It is on this invisible work that everything depends,” she analyzes.
1.80 m minimum
“Girls do not benefit financially from this economic model. They don’t want to be paid so as not to be confused with prostitutes. They are content with free meals and the pleasure of being included in exclusive parties.”
From New York to Miami, from Saint-Tropez to Saint-Barth, or in villas rented for 45,000 euros per weekend, models help to attract “working rich”, wolves of finance, tech or real estate, almost all white, who will spend fortunes on alcohol.
An economic model summarized in the formula “models and bottles”.
Methuselah at 4,000 euros, a “train” of illuminated bottles carried through the crowd: these exuberant expenses establish the social eminence of the person paying the bill. And are reminiscent, according to the sociologist, of the “potlatches” practiced in particular among Amerindian tribes: feasts or ritual ceremonies where chiefs compete to show who can show off, or even waste, the most.
The “girls” meet strict criteria: young, “generally white”, “of this very specific beauty valued by fashion”, “very thin, very tall”: they must be at least 1.80 m tall, and it is their suggested wearing 10 centimeter stiletto heels, to “dominate” the crowd. Nightclubs wisely place them near the tables of the wealthiest customers.
“Capital Girls”
As for women who do not meet these criteria, they are refused entry by bouncers solely on the basis of their physique, even if they are “employed in finance”. Photos posted on Instagram should only feature “hot” girls.
“A man can enter these places for many reasons: he is rich, he has connections. One woman for one: the physique of a model,” summarizes the academic.
The “promoters”, for their part, can pocket 80 dollars per model brought in, and 1,000 dollars per evening. Some earn $200,000 a year. They spend their days maintaining their ties with young women, “driving them in SUVs to castings and parties”, to develop what the sociologist calls their “girl capital”.
As for the “working rich”, they prefer, to share their lives, “women with the same profile as them, who are very educated”.
And have a certain disdain for models seen as “not serious” or “party girls”. In any case, points out the sociologist, the personality of these women “does not count, since the sound system crushes all conversation”.