Jeremy Meeks: Criminality & Sexuality

Jeremy Meeks

This is Jeremy Meeks. His face is fucking gorgeous. Hot vibes are off the chain. 10/10 mate. As all of us are probably aware, as well as being really really really blue steel good looking, Meeks is also a convicted criminal, and it appears that his mugshot recently went viral for these two apparently juxtaposing reasons. The whole thing is an obvious manifestation of our human capacity to become enamoured with someone’s image.

Meeks is currently locked away in San Joaquin County Jail whilst he faces multiple offences of firearm possession, street gang involvement and violation of parole. Cries of “Free Meeks!” reverberate across the globe as millions of women and men reach breaking point, his sugared almond eyes sending us all mad with hysteria and sexual frustration.

A convicted criminal is an unlikely heartthrob, yet here he is. Jokes aside, there is no denying he has a very aesthetically pleasing image. His bone structure is symmetrical, his jawline masculine. Observe the facial scar, a feature found to increase a man’s sexual attractiveness, nicked into the flesh above his left eye, and his quite perfectly executed air of nonchalance.

The immediate reaction to his looks was, not surprisingly, to shriek of his capacity to model, a response no doubt partly influenced by the style of the photograph itself: the mugshot. Polaroids of the face have always graced the portfolios of models; they are a direct and genuine representation of the model’s image.

Below are some male models:

Alt male models

These guys could all pass as convicted criminals. Indeed, what the whole Meeks story reminds us is that – despite our bone structure – any one of us could do any thing, hurt any body, make any one mistake, be born into any social, emotional or political situation. It shouldn’t be a big deal that a criminal is also good looking, but apparently it is. We are irrationally surprised and amazed that someone so beautiful could do things so ugly; we equate beauty with goodness, as we have done for centuries. Consequently when the face of crime is beautiful, we want to look; we are intrigued.

It is natural to be attracted to attractive people. It is natural, as spectators, to be drawn to spectacle. It is not shallow, empty or superficial to take some enjoyment in the polaroid of a good looking man, who in contrast to his beauty, has committed some pretty serious and unpleasant offenses.  I do not believe for a minute that anyone condones his actions, or is so blinded by his perfect lips that they actually, literally, genuinely forget why he had this mugshot taken in the first place. The combination of criminality and beauty is the whole point; the interpretation of this story could create an artistic and socio-psychological field day. Which is why it’s fucking bewildering, depressing and maddening that incidents like this are used as ammunition by this world’s seemingly ubiquitous army of sexist dickheads.

For example, this post began circulating on Tumblr shortly after Jeremy Meeks’s photograph went viral. The screenshot seen here has been Tweeted and Facebooked and Instragrammed and whatevered, often accompanied by a delightful caption or comment that further reeks of prejudiced, insular, unjust and bitter male chauvinism:

Jeremy meeks marine

Fuck it, ladies. Why aren’t we Googling marines all fucking day? Zero fucking women are talking about Kyle Carpenter. FUCKING women. For FUCK’S sake. Way to go.

Here is the screenshot again as posted on the Twitter account, @TheLadBible:

Kyle Carpenter

Ugh, women…

With all due courtesy to Kyle Carpenter, to his sacrifice and to his choices, it is an absolutely ridiculous and completely irrelevant argument to compare him with Jeremy Meeks.

Here, the viral circulation of Meeks’s photo is depicted as a form negative behaviour, specifically the negative, indecent, immoral behaviour of women. Women are to blame for the lack of Google hits Kyle Carpenter gets.

Women are to blame that honorable, brave men like him go forgotten in the public sphere. It’s women’s fault. Like the fucking story of Adam and Eve and women’s consequent blame for the fall of man, this is some full power, self-righteous, holier-than-thou arse whinge from a total butt-hurt lad that basically exhibits some pretty entrenched and disgusting medieval misogyny.

P.S. Below are some of the replies @TheLadBible received on Twitter after they posted this screenshot, and also another image from their photo feed that shows us how men appreciate the honorable and brave daily deeds of women across the world, and not at all their exterior beauty or sense of sex appeal:

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