On September 7th, a group of CNU students got together and formed a performative male contest on the Great Lawn, hosted by freshmen Aubree Moeller and Kiara Brown. While hosting this event, they provided a Laufey vinyl as a prize for CNU’s most performative man.
16 men attending CNU participated in this event. A performative male achieves to create an admirable persona that caters towards women. The idea of this is to curate a style, whether that is a matcha in their hand or one of Jane Austin’s works to attract those who have similar interests. In the beginning of the contest, the performative men assembled a line on the Great Lawn holding their tote bags and Labubus.
One by one, each person described their interests in literature and fashion. The idea of the performative man archetype is to pose as somebody who is appreciative of books or an underground rock group even if they have no understanding of them. Local Einstein’s workers reported countless matchas being ordered within the morning of the event.
The idea of the contest was to find an essence of authenticity throughout the contestants, the entirety of the contest lasted an hour of deliberation and deliverance. The group’s appreciation for Laufey was quite clear not only in each speech, but when they broke out into her song “Goddess” during Jaiden Powell’s turn, conducted by Powell himself. Each contestant had their own gleaming quality looking past the matcha or tote, it was the crowd’s pick as to who was the most performative. Powell, a junior, brought his keyboard along with his modded DS that rendered Laufey’s “Lover Girl.”
The crowd grew incrementally as each man stepped up, giving their speech on why they should be chosen. One of the first men to go up was Jayden Dinh, a freshman, with various Labubus clipped to his bag and a Starbucks matcha in his hand. Dinh’s tote bag stored a plentiful range of literature that elicited feminism. Similarly, another contestant had a tote bag featured from Laufey’s merch website and had a shirt on that read “REAL MEN LISTEN TO LAUFEY”. Additionally, the same contestant carried “Justice,” a book by Michael J. Sandel, about the conceptual philosophy of justice, emphasizing the ethical issues we face whilst having Laufey’s EP vinyl in his tote.
When Jordan Tucker went up for his turn, like others he had various Laufey vinyls along with keychains, but carried “The Bell Jar” by Slyvia Plath. Each male had a similar persona, so it was up to the contestants to differentiate from the rest of the performative males to gain the crowd’s favor. From admiring artists from Clairo to Radiohead, each man went face to face as to who could gain the appeal of the crowd.
In order to find the winner, the vote was counted by how loud the crowd was for each contestant. For many the crowd roared, making it more of a competition. It was up to Moeller and Brown to seek out CNU’s most performative man through each shriek. It eventually led to a group of 6 finalists. Once again, the crowd roared for each contestant that they found best fit. Two performative males who came to the contest as a pair were called “The Brothers.” One brother held a guidance book during the stages of pregnancy. The other had “Atomic Habits” in his hand that retorted good habits and how to break the bad ones. In the final moments of the contest, The Brothers were against Jaiden Powell. Ultimately Powell was literally crowned the winner of the contest with a glistening tiara.
