‘Very demure, very mindful’: why everyone’s jumping on the modesty bandwagon
Rest in peace, brat summer. There’s a new buzzword-slash-ethos hitting TikTok, and it’s basically the opposite of Charli xcx’s party-girl character. Now, it’s all about being demure.
At least, that’s according to Jools Lebron, the content creator behind the catchphrase, who advises her followers on how to come off as “very demure, very mindful” in various life situations.
How does one behave demurely, you ask? First, stay presentable at work. “I’m very modest, I’m very mindful,” Lebron says in one TikTok. “The way I came to the interview is the way I go to the job. A lot of you girls go to the interview looking like Marge Simpson and go to the job looking like Patty and Selma. Not demure.”
For a week, Lebron has advised her 1.2 million followers on how to stay demure in various stressful situations, such as traveling with family (show up to the airport “very early, very on time, very considerate, very demure”) or picking up an ID left at the bar (don’t stay and drink, rather take your ID and leave – “very cutesy, very demure”). One can be demure at the Las Vegas strip, Lebron says, by “showing a little chee chee, not too much”. Or at a drag show: “I don’t stand out, I let it be about them.”
Would Emily Post approve? Probably not, but that’s the point. Lebron, who did not respond to a request for comment, wields the phrase satirically, using the bit to joke about the performance of femininity. It also reads as a spoof on Gen Z’s obsession with quiet luxury, the trend where wealth is flexed via a whisper, not a scream. (Think Hailey Bieber in an understated but expensive workout set, toting a $20 Erewhon smoothie.)
In one clip, Lebron asserts that one can even stay demure during a hangover trip to CVS. “Ladies, let’s be mindful while we’re at the CVS. This is not the Met Gala,” she says. She encourages women to “not to do too much” or dress up. Rather, show up as she did: with smeared foundation on her top, or Taco Bell refried beans stuck in her hair.
Like all good TikTok moments, “demure” caught the attention of corporations such as CVS, Elf Cosmetics, and Delta, brands that have all come to Lebron’s comments section to approve of her PSAs. (“The art of ?demure? travel,” the Delta account commented on her TikTok about traveling with family.)
Other users have jumped on the bandwagon as well, explaining how to be demure while eating pizza (“the pizza comes to me,” one creator says while taking a small bite) or getting engaged (“I didn’t make a big fuss,” a woman says while holding up her new diamond ring).
The definition of demure, of course, is “reserved, modest, shy”. Jess Zafarris, an etymologist and author of Once Upon a Word: A Word-Origin Dictionary for Kids, says the Latin root for demure, maturus, means “ripe” or “mature.”
“It reminds me of the root for the word precocious, ‘coquere’, which means pre-cooked or ripened, and tends to describe children who are better behaved, more disciplined, and perform better within the constraints of a classroom,” Zafarris said. “Demure gets applied to women in the same way: a woman who is well-behaved, doesn’t stand out, and is more reserved, composed, and serious.”
Zafarris also noted that theological writings of the 15th and 16th centuries use the term “demure” to describe someone who is a hypocrite, or “hiding a darker version of themselves”.
“I love the way that demure is being used on TikTok now, because users are sort of putting on this serious mask, but they’re poking fun at it at the same time, so it retains the word’s definition as sort of a facade,” Zafarris added.
Demure may be a far cry from the all-out bacchanalia of brat summer, but fall is just around the corner. What could be more demure, mindful, or modest than a comfortable cashmere sweater?
