Nice

Nice (pronounced nahys)

(1) Pleasing; agreeable; delightful.

(2) Amiably pleasant; kind.

(3) Characterized by, showing, or requiring great accuracy, precision, skill, tact, care, or delicacy.

(4) Showing or indicating very small differences; minutely accurate, as instruments.

(5) Minute, fine, or subtle.

(6) Having or showing delicate, accurate perception.

(7) Refined in manners, language etc.

(8) Virtuous; respectable; decorous.

(9) Suitable or proper; carefully neat in dress, habits, etc; dainty or delicate (especially of food).

(10) Having fastidious, finicky, or fussy tastes (sometime used as over-nice in a disparaging sense).

(11) Coy, shy, or reluctant (obsolete).

(12) Unimportant; trivial (obsolete).

(13) Uncertain; delicately balanced (obsolete).

(14) Wanton (obsolete).

(15) A Mediterranean port and the capital of the department of Alpes-Maritimes, in south-east France; a resort on the French Riviera; founded by Phocaeans from Marseille circa third century BC; it was ceded to France in 1860 by Sardinia.  Ancient Nicaea is from the Ancient Greek nikaios (victorious) from nikē (victory); Nizzard (a resident of Nice) is derived from Nizza, the Italian form of the city name.

(16) In the UK, an acronym for the National Institute for Clinical Excellence, a body established in 1999 to provide authoritative guidance on current best practice in medicine and to promote high-quality cost-effective medical treatment in the National Health Service (NHS).

(17) In computing (the Unix operating system), a program used to trigger a script or program with a specified priority.

(18) In the slang of drug users, being well affected. 

1250–1300: From the Middle English nice, nyce & nys (foolish, stupid), from the Old French nice, niche & nisce (silly, simple, foolish, ignorant) from the Latin nescius (to be ignorant, incapable), the construct being ne- (the Latin negative prefix) + sci- (stem of scīre (to know)) + -us (the Latin adjectival suffix); the more familiar Latin form being nescire (to know not, be ignorant of), the construct being ne- + scire, the ultimate source of which was the primitive Indo-European ne (not).  Use of the noun "nice" is restricted to the Unix operating system, where it describes a program used to trigger a script or program with a specified priority, the implication being that running at a lower priority is "nice" (in the sense of "kind") because it leaves more resources for others (thus the specialized verbs nicing & niced).  Nice is a noun, adjective & adverb, nicity is a noun, nicer & nicest are adjectives & adverbs, niceish (nicish the archaic spelling) is an adjective, nicely is an adverb and niceness & nicety are nouns; the most common noun plural seems to be niceties.

Not always nice

Lindsay Lohan in a nice dress, LLohan Nightclub pop up event, Playboy Club, New York, October 2019: David Koma crystal-embellished cady midi dress with asymmetric hem, Valentino Rockstud 110mm pumps (part-number WS0393VOD) and Chanel mini tweed bag.

The sense development of nice is regarded as unusual by most etymologists, most of whom find the meaning shifts extraordinary, even for an adjective.  Meaning originally “silly or foolish”, by circa 1300, it meant "timid, faint-hearted", came to mean "fussy or fastidious" by the late fourteenth century, shifting (slightly) within decades to "dainty, delicate" yet meaning "precise, careful" by the 1500s, the sense preserved in Modern English in such terms as “a nice distinction” and “nice and early”.  By 1769 it’s being used to convey something "agreeable or delightful and by 1830, "kind & thoughtful" yet the variety of meanings clearly overlapped, perhaps due to generational inertia: the Duke of Wellington (1769-1852), writing in 1815 of the recent battle of Waterloo which at many points could have gone either way said “It has been a damned nice thing — the nearest run thing you ever saw in your life”, using nice in yet another older sense of "uncertain, delicately balanced".

Lindsay Lohan and her lawyer in court, Los Angeles, December 2011.  As early as the 1990s, some guides were predicting the use of "nice" to convey the sardonically ironic was becoming so clichéd it might become unfashionable but it continues to flourish, possibly because it has never become associated with "lower class" speech.

The meaning shifts have created problems for historians and archivists, the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) noting that when analysing documents from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it can be difficult to say in what particular sense a writer intended "nice" to be taken.  The imprecision upset many and by 1926, the authoritative Henry Fowler (1858–1933) wrote in his Dictionary of Modern English Usage that nice had become "too great a favourite with the ladies, who have charmed out of it all its individuality and converted it into a mere diffuser of vague and mild agreeableness."  Pace Henry Fowler but it is handy for a language to include a word which so encapsulates “vague and mild agreeableness” and in any of its meanings, nice is not without synonyms.  So the semantic history is varied and, as the etymology and the obsolete senses attest, any attempt to insist on only one of its present senses as correct will not be in keeping with actual use.  The criticism usually extended is nice is used too often and has become a cliché lacking the qualities of precision and intensity that are embodied in many of its synonyms.  In modern use, it’s now often used ironically, something not desirable, or worse, can now be described as “nice”, the meaning well-understood.

Naughty

Naughty (pronounced naw-tee)

(1) Disobedient; mischievous; wilful; wayward; misbehaving (used especially in speaking to or about children or pets).

(2) Improper, tasteless, indecorous, or indecent.

(3) Wicked; evil (obsolete).

(4) Sexually provocative; usually in a weakened playful sense, risqué or cheeky.

(5) Bad, worthless, sub-standard (obsolete).

1375-1400: From the Middle English naughty, nauȝty, nauȝti, naȝti, nowghty & noughti (needy, having nothing, also (also evil, immoral, corrupt, unclean)), from nought & naught (evil, an evil act; nothingness; a trifle; insignificant person; the number zero), from the Old English nawiht (nothing).  In the seventeenth century, as words like “bad” and “evil” came to be the preferred descriptors of the more extreme, naughty became something milder, used to describe the mischievous or those with a tendency to misbehave or act badly and this soon became most associated with children, a linguistic acknowledgment that bad behaviour unacceptable by an adult was excusable by in youth, This mitigated sense of "disobedient, bad in conduct or speech, improper, mischievous" to describe the delinquencies of children is attested from the 1630s.  The sense of "sexually promiscuous" is from 1869 but between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries, a woman of bad character (which might include but was not limited to lose virtue) might be called “a naughty pack” and there is evidence this was occasionally extended also to men and later an especially recalcitrant child.  Naughty, naughtier & naughtiest are adjectives; naughtily is an adverb and naughtiness a noun.  The alternative spelling noughty is archaic and obsolete.

The construct was naught + -y.  Naught in the mid-fourteen century meant "evil, an evil act" and also " a trifle"; by circa 1400 it had come to mean "nothingness", hence the adoption by mathematicians in the early fifteenth century as “the number zero" (from noht & naht (nothing) both of which had existed since the twelfth century, from the Old English nawiht (nothing, literally "no whit" from the primitive Indo-European root ne- (not) + wiht (thing, creature, being).  It was cognate with the Old Saxon neowiht (nothing), the Old High German niwiht, the Gothic ni waihts, the Dutch niet, and the German nicht. In the Old English, it became and adjectival form meaning "good for nothing" which endured to evolve by the mid-sixteenth century to the more focused "morally bad, wicked", softened over the years to the way the modern adjective naughty is now variously applied.  Naughty is an adjective & verb, naughtiness is a noun and naughtily an adverb; naughty has been used as a (non-standard) noun, usually as a euphemism for something related to sex so the noun plural there would be naughties (on the model of nasties).

It certainly had a long gestation to get to the point where “naughty” now is used  to describe mischievous kittens, vegan restaurants, sex shops and patisseries.  The primitive Indo European roots ne (not) & wekti (thing) both date back almost seven thousand years and, at the time of Antiquity, proceeded through the Proto-Germanic to become the Old English word nawiht (not a thing; nothing).  With the same meaning the word existed in the Middle English as naht, nought & naught, the last spelling, though now quite rare, enduring to this day.  Naughty was a fourteenth century fork, with the addition of the –y it was used to convey the same quality but with a new meaning (poor, literally "having nothing").  In the way class systems work by association, the rich (and perhaps even more so, the less-poor) extended the definition to include lazy, lawless, dirty, malignant etc (as required) because of a perception of correlation between poverty and crime.  Naughty however mellowed somewhat and society adapted, finding many other words with which to demonise the poor.

Naughty and Nice

Before mobile bandwidth and faster hardware drove them extinct, there were free afternoon newspapers, handed to commuters to read on the bus, tram or train journey home.  They were a welcome replacement for the afternoon papers (for which people had to pay) which, years or even decades earlier had been killed off by television.

mX Newspaper 2012 London Olympics medal table, 2 August 2012.

During the 2012 London Olympic Games, Melbourne’s mX commuter daily noted North Korea (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea; the DPRK) and South Korea (Republic of Korea; the ROK) coincidently were running respectively fourth and fifth in the medal count so causing the ROK directly to sit atop the DPRK on their medal table.  Fearing confusion among readers not well acquainted with the peninsula’s geopolitics, mX decided to help, labelling the South “Nice Korea” and the North “Naughty Korea”.

In Pyongyang, the DPRK’s official Korean Central News Agency was quick to respond, accusing capitalist lackey mX of "…sordid behavior…" and “…a bullying act little short of insulting the Olympic spirit of solidarity, friendship and progress and politicising sports.”  The news media, it added, was “…obliged to lead the public in today's highly-civilised world where [the] mental and cultural level of mankind is being displayed at the highest level.”  Warming to the topic, the agency damned mX’s editors a being “…so incompetent as to tarnish the reputation of the paper…" which will remain a “…symbol of a rogue paper which will long be cursed in Olympic history."

DPRK Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un (b 1983) inspecting the North Korean pastry production line.

In response, mX ran the agency's attack on the next day’s front page under the headline Pyongyang Goes Ballistic Over mX Tally, claiming the table was “…not intended to be offensive” and just a “…humorous but harmless way…” for readers easily to differentiate between two countries with similar names.  It’s presumed Pyongyang was more upset at being labelled “naughty” than it was at the rogue state in the south being called “nice”.  Although nice has had many meanings, the agency probably well understood mX’s implication and acted appropriately against the imperialist propaganda.  The newspaper’s explanation was apparently accepted as an apology, the Supreme Leader not ordering any retaliatory missile strikes on the editorial office.

Naughty but Nice Patisserie, 39 Ilsham Road, Wellswood, Torquay, TQ1 2JG, UK.  Cakes, pastries, pies & rolls etc; it’s thought The Supreme Leader approves of pastry shops.

Naughty or Nice sex shop, 836 Main St, Lewiston, 83501 Idaho, USA.  Lingerie, toys, devices & accessories etc; it’s not known if The Supreme Leader approves of sex shops.

In December 2022, as a holiday season promotion, the Pepsi Corporation teamed with Lindsay Lohan to promote Pilk.  A Pilk is a mix of Pepsi Cola and milk, one of a class of dirty sodas created by PepsiCo which includes the Naughty & Ice, the Chocolate Extreme, the Cherry on Top, the Snow Float and the Nutty Cracker.  All are intended to be served with cookies (biscuits) and although Ms Lohan confessed to being “…a bit sceptical when first I heard of this pairing”, she was quickly converted, noting that “…after my first sip I was amazed at how delicious it was, so I’m very excited for the rest of the world to try it.”  

PepsiCo provided the instructions for mixing a Naughty & Ice: "For a pure milk taste that's infused with notes of vanilla, measure and combine 1 cup of whole milk, 1 tbsp of heavy cream and 1 tbsp of vanilla creamer.  From there, pour the mixture slowly into 1 cup of Pepsi and serve with a chocolate chip cookie."

Naughty and nice: Lindsay Lohan promotes Pilk.

Agastopia

Agastopia (pronounced agg-uh-stow-pee-ah)

Deriving visual enjoyment from the appearance of a specific body part or parts (some suggesting the attraction must be fetishistic to cross the threshold from admiration to syndrome).

2011: A creation of etymologists Peter Novobatzky & Ammon Shea who included it in their 1999 book Depraved English (sub-titled: "The most disgusting and hilarious word book ever" which may be hyperbolic but certainly captured their intentions).  While the book may not have been exhaustive, there was an entry for maschalephidrosis (runaway armpit perspiration), the construct being the Ancient Greek μασχάλη (maskhálē) (armpit) + hidrosis, from the New Latin hidrōsis, from the Ancient Greek ἱδρώς (hidrṓs) (sweat) + -sis (the suffix in medicine used to form nouns of condition) so there were certainly highlights.  The construct of agastopia was the Ancient Greek ἀγα- (aga(s)-) (very) + -topia (a back-formation extracted from utopia (and other words) ultimately deriving from the Ancient Greek τόπος (tópos) (place).  Utopia was from the New Latin Ūtopia, the name of a fictional island possessing a seemingly perfect socio-politico-legal system in the 1516 book Utopia by Sir Thomas More (1478–1535).  The construct was the Ancient Greek οὐ (ou) (not) + τόπος (tópos) (place, region) + -ία (-ía) (the New Latin suffix, from the Latin -ia and the Ancient Greek -ία (-ía) & -εια (-eia) which formed abstract nouns of feminine gender.  More’s irony in calling a world in which everything and everyone works in perfect harmony being best translated as “not a real place” is often lost in modern use.  Agastopic is a noun & adjective, agastopia is a noun, and agastopically is an adverb; the noun plural is agastopias.

Agastopic: Studies of the soles of Lindsay Lohan's feet in three aspects.

Although there had not previously been a generic descriptor of part-focused voyeuristic fetishism, there’s no suggestion Novobatzky thought agastopia a serious contribution to the taxonomy of mental health but some have adopted it, fleshing out the definitional range.  It’s been suggested the condition manifests as (1) a love or admiration of one’s own body part, compelling either a fondness of performing a particular task with it or a preference to cover and shield it with a protective layer or (2) the more familiar admiration of another’s body part(s).  Some sources, without citation, note it’s “…believed to be a rare condition” and one for which there’s “… no cure.”  Despite these nudges, when the fifth edition of the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders was published in 2013 (DSM-5), there was no specific mention of agastopia and this was maintained when the revised version (DSM-5-TR) was released in 2022.  Still, for clinicians who find it a convenient medical shorthand, presumably, a patient found to be "fond of certain body part" without fetishizing it (or them) would be found to be "agastopish" and because fetishes seem inherently spectrum conditions, the comparative would be "more agastopic" & the superlative "most agastopic".

The notion agastopia is “believed to be a rare condition” must be based on the published statistics but they reflect (1) the profession no longer regarding it as a diagnosable condition unless certain criteria were fulfilled and (2) the general consensus most instances of agastopia are never reported.  Impressionistically, real-world experience would take note of industry having long recognized the prevalence in at least a (male) subset of the population at a level necessary to justify the investment necessary to supply the demand.  In the days when two of the most significant vectors for the distribution of pornography were glossy magazines and various digital media (tapes and optical discs), both forms provided some content devoted exclusively to one body part or another, the protocol carried over to the internet when websites became the default mode.  Among the pornography aggregation sites, it’s not unusual for the usual suspect body parts to be listed as categories for consumers with a particular agastopic focus.

So agastopia is a thing which exists at a commercially critical mass.  ‘Twas ever thus perhaps but what has in recent decades changed is the attitude of the mental health community.  Before the release of DSM-III-R (1987), fetishism was usually described as a persistent preferential sexual arousal in association with non-living objects or an over-inclusive focus on (typically non-sexualized) body parts (most famously feet) and body secretions.  With the DSM-III-R, the concept of partialism (an exclusive focus on part of the body) was separated from the historic category of fetishism and appended to the “Paraphilia Not Otherwise Specified” category.  Although one of the dustier corners of psychiatry, the field had always fascinated some and in the years since the DSM-III-R was published, a literature did emerge, most critics maintaining partialism and fetishism are related, can be co-associated, and are non-exclusive domains of sexual behavior.  There was a technical basis for this position because introduced in the DSM-IV (1994) was a (since further elaborated) codification of the secondary clinical significance criterion for designating a psychiatric disorder, one the implications of which was that it appeared to suggest a diagnostic distinction between partialism and fetishism was no longer clinically meaningful or necessary.  The recommendation was that the prime diagnostic criterion for fetishism be modified to reflect the reintegration of partialism and that a fetishistic focus on non-sexual body parts be a specifier of Fetishism.

Fetish was from the Latin facere (to make) which begat factitious (made by art), from which the Portuguese feitico was derived (fetiche in the French), from which English gained fetish.  A fetish in this context was defined as "a thing irrationally revered; an object in which power or force was concentrated".  In English, use of fetish to indicate an object of desire in the sense of “someone who is aroused due to a body part, or an object belonging to a person who is the object of desire” dates from 1897 (although the condition is mentioned in thirteenth century medical documents), an era during which the language of modern psychiatry was being assembled.  However, in the literary record, surviving from the seventh century AD are dozens of brooding, obsessive love letters from the second century AD of uncertain authorship and addressed to both male and female youths.  That there are those to whom an object or body part has the power to captivate and enthral has presumably been part of the human condition from the start.

The DSM-5 Criteria

Criterion 1: Over a six month period, the individual has experienced sexual urges focused on a non-genital body part, or inanimate object, or other stimulus, and has acted out urges, fantasies, or behaviors.

Criterion 2: The fantasies, urges, or behaviors cause distress, or impairment in functioning.

Criterion 3: The fetishistic object is not an article of clothing employed in cross dressing, or a sexual stimulation device, such as a vibrator.

Specifiers for the diagnosis include the type of stimulus which is the focus of attention (1) the non-genital or erogenous areas of the body (such as feet) and this condition is known also as Partialism (a preoccupation with a part of the body rather than the whole person), (2) Non-living object(s) (such as shoes), (3) specific activities (such as smoking during sex).

WikiFeet is a wiki which curates users’ submissions of women's feet with a predictable emphasis on celebrities. The Lindsay Lohan page contains 3639 images with the WikiFeet community rating her feet at 4.7 stars (out of 5) which means she has "beautiful feet".  The site includes sections for “feet of the day” and “feet of the week” although the criteria for making the selection cut for these honors aren’t disclosed.  An illustrative sample of the WikiFeet rating system includes:

Billie Eilish, 97 images, rated 4.1 (nice feet)

Anna Kournikova, 362 images, rated 5.0 (beautiful feet)

Selena Gomez, 1963 images, rated 4.7, (beautiful feet)

Nicki Minaj, 1135 images, rated 3.4 (OK feet)

Mila Kunis, 1131 images, rated 4.6, (beautiful feet)

Janelle Monáe, 486 images, rated 5.0 (beautiful feet)

Nancy Pelosi, 14 images, rated 2.9 (OK feet)

Rihanna, 5663 images, rated 5.0 (beautiful feet)

Emily Ratajkowski, 2571 images, rated 5.0 (beautiful feet)

Paris Hilton, 997 images, rated 3.2 (OK feet)

Emma Watson, 1047 images, rated 5.0 (beautiful feet)

Megan Fox, 1866 images, rated 4.1 (nice feet)

Emma Raducanu 80 images, rated 4.6 (beautiful feet)

Charli XCX, 960 images, rated 5.0 (beautiful feet)

Crooked Hillary Clinton (b 1947; US secretary of state 2009-2013, left) and Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 and since 2025, right).

Crooked Hillary Clinton’s feet must convey something of her crooked crookedness because the Wikifeet connoisseurs rate them only at 2.5 stars (OK feet) but politics in the US being so polarized, there may be an element of strategic voting involved and the sample size is anyway small, crooked Hillary's page having only 24 images.  Following in the footsteps of the original, there exists a companion WikiFeet page for men’s feet although, predictably, it’s a mere shadow of the feminine version and that must be emblematic of many things in sociology, sexual politics and fetishism.  On the male site there is a solitary entry on Donald Trump’s page and while it’s not the only known photograph of his bare feet, it is the one with the best angle; with only a single image on which to base an assessment, the rating of 1.3 (bad feet) may reflect political bias rather than objective judgment.  That may also have influenced voting on the 32 images on Kamala Harris’s (b 1964; US vice president 2021-2025) page though the fact she rated a solid 4.0 (nice feet) clearly wasn’t enough to help her win the 2024 presidential election, feet just not an issue.

Shine envy: Field Marshal el-Sisi and President Trump, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia May 2017.  Military men usually have shiny shoes, the more senior ranks allocated a batman to do the polishing.

There was nothing in the recent testimony of Stormy Daniels (stage name of Stephanie Gregory, b 1979) to suggest Donald Trump has a particular thing for feet but he certainly notices shoes.  When meeting Field Marshal Fattah el-Sisi (b 1954; president of Egypt since 2014) in Riyadh, Mr Trump couldn’t help but be impressed how much shinier were the field marshal’s shoes, his seemingly close to identical pumps dull by comparison.  As they left the room, Mr Trump remarked to him: “Love your shoes.  Boy, those shoes. Man …” but knew he’d lost face and doubtless the White House shoe-shine operative was told: "You're fired!"  The Democratic Party seems never to have drawn attention to Joe Biden's (b 1942; US president 2021-2025) shoes, presumably because they feared Fox News might have demanded proof he could still tie his own laces.

Noting the definitional model in the DSM-IV-TR (2000), despite the history in psychiatry’s world of paraphilias and a notable presence in popular culture, there were those who claimed the very notion of a foot fetish was false because of that critical phrase “non-living” which would seem to disqualify a foot (unless of course it was no longer alive but such an interest would be seriously weird and a different condition; although in this context there are deconstructionists who would make a distinction between a depiction of a live foot and the foot itself, clinicians probably regard them as interchangeable tools of the fetishist although the techniques of consumption would vary).  The critic noted many fetishes are extensions of the human body, such as articles of clothing or footwear but that did not extend to feet and that diagnostically, a sexual fascination with feet did correctly belong in the category of “Paraphilia Not Otherwise Specified,” and thus be regarded as partialism: Foot partialism.

OnlyFans is a niche player in the gig economy but it’s the oldest niche in the world and one of the first successfully to embrace the implications of AI (artificial intelligence).  There are also “parasitic sites” which exist as intermediaries between OnlyFans and third parties handling transactions with a guarantee of anonymity although, if curated with care, one’s own feet on an OnlyFans page should be similarly anonymous.  Content providers are known as “sole traders”.

The feet of Ana de Armas, OnlyFans "Feet of the Year, 2023".

It need not be an expensive hobby, provided one focuses on one's favorite feet.  English singer Lily Allen (b 1985) has an OnlyFans page (Lily Allen FTSE500) for her (US size 6) feet and subscriptions are offered at US$10 per month, her hook on an Instragram post titled “La dolce feeta” including a snap of her toes next to Rome’s Trevi in which Anita Ekberg's (1931-2005) feet splashed, all those years ago.  While to those not part of the fetish it can be hard to tell one foot from another, aficionados have eyes as well-trained as a sommelier's palate; in 2023 OnlyFans "Feet of the Year" title was awarded to Cuban-born Spanish actress Ana de Armas (b 1988).

It was Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) who admitted that, lawfulness aside, as animals, the only truly aberrant sexual behavior in humans could be said to be its absence (something which the modern asexual movement re-defines rather than disproves).  It seemed to be in that spirit the DSM-5 was revised to treat agastopia and many other “harmless” behaviors as “normal” and thus within the purview of the manual only to the extent of being described, clinical intervention no longer required.  Whether all psychiatrists agree with the new permissiveness isn’t known but early reports suggest there’s nothing in the DSM-5-TR (2022) to suggest agastopics will soon again be labeled as deviants.

The washing of feet

In the New Testament there are three texts describing Christ washing feet, the best known of which is John 13:1-17 (Jesus Washing the Disciples' Feet).  The ritual is explained usually as Jesus demonstrating his humility and mission to serve mankind but it's clear he wished also to set an example to his sometimes fractious disciples:

"So after he had washed their feet, and had taken his garments, and was set down again, he said unto them, Know ye what I have done to you? Ye call me Master and Lord: and ye say well; for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; ye also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you."  John 13:12-15 (King James Version; KJV, 1611)

Pope Francis kisses the foot of a female inmate of Rebibbia prison, Rome, 28 March 2024.

One of the set-piece motifs in Christianity, the foot-washing ritual takes place on the Thursday before Easter and seeks to imitate Christ’s washing of the Disciples’ feet the night before he was crucified.  It was on that evening he said to his Disciples: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me.” (John 13:21)

The sight of a pope washing feet is familiar but when Francis (b 1936; pope since 2013) performed the ritual at Rome’s Rebibbia prison on Holy Thursday 2024, it was apparently the first time in the institution’s two-thousand year odd existence a pontiff has washed the feet only of women.  Historians concede records from earlier centuries are obviously incomplete but the event was thought so remarkable most seemed to conclude a precedent had been set.  In the past Francis has washed the feet of women, Muslims, refugees and other minorities but never women exclusively.  He has certainly cast a wider net than his more conservative predecessor, Benedict XVI (1927–2022; pope 2005-2013, pope emeritus 2013-2022) who sponged the feet only of men and, in the final years of his pontificate, only those of ordained priests.  It’s said feet proffered to popes, diligently are pre-sanitized.

Mourn

Mourn (pronounced mawrn or mohrn)

(1) To grieve or lament for the dead.

(2) To show the conventional or usual signs of sorrow over a person's death.

(3) To feel or express sorrow or grief over (misfortune, loss, or anything regretted); to deplore (now restricted mostly to literary or poetic use).

(4) To utter in a sorrowful manner.

(5) To observe the customs of mourning, as by wearing black garments (sables).

(6) In jousting, a ring fitted upon the head of a lance to prevent wounding an adversary in tilting (a charging with a lance).

Pre 900: From the Middle English mournen & mornen, from the Old English murnan (to feel or express sorrow, grief, or regret; bemoan, long after and also “be anxious about, be careful” (past tense: mearn, past participle: murnen), from the Proto-Germanic murnaną & murnan (sorrowfully to remember)  It was cognate with the Old High German mornēn (to be troubled), the Old Norse morna (to pine away. also “to dawn (become morning)”), the Greek mermeros (worried), the Gothic maurnan (to grieve) and the French morne (gloomy).  The proto-Germanic was the source also of the Old Saxon mornon and was probably a suffixed form of the primitive Indo-European root mer & smer- (to remember).  The use to mean “to lament the death of” emerged late in the thirteenth century while the sense of “display the conventional appearance of grieving for a period following the death of someone” was in use by the 1520s.  The noun mourning (feeling or expression of sorrow, sadness, or grief) was in use in the late twelfth century and was from the Old English murnung (complaint, grief, act of lamenting), a verbal noun from the verb mourn.  The meaning “customary dress or garment worn by mourners” dates from the 1650s although mourning habit was in use in the late fourteenth century.  The North American mourning dove was named in 1820 and was so-called because of its soulful call.  The adjective mournful (expressing sorrow; oppressed with grief) came into use in the early 1600s.  The spelling morne was used during the fourteenth & fifteenth centuries.  Mourn & mourned are verbs, mourning is a noun & verb, mourner & mournfulness are nouns, mournful is an adjective and mournfully is an adverb; the noun plural is mourners.

Comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953, far right) as chief mourner, carrying the coffin of comrade Sergei Kirov (1886–1934; Russian Bolshevik revolutionary & Soviet politician), Moscow 6 December 1934.

Although no documentary evidence has ever been found, most historians believe the execution was approved by comrade Stalin and in a nice touch, within a month, Kirov's assassins were convicted in a show trial and executed.  As the death toll from the purges of the 1930s accelerated, comrade Stalin stopped attending funerals; he just wouldn't have ben able to find the time.  Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) seems not to have appeared as a mourner at the funerals of any of those he’d ordered killed but he certainly issued statements mourning their passing.  Less ominously, UK Prime Minister Lord Salisbury (Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, 1830–1903; UK Prime Minister for thirteen years variously 1885-1902) remarked of the long, sad decline of Lord Randolph Churchill (1849–1895) that the deceased had proved to be “chief mourner at his own protracted funeral”.

Political mourning is a special class of lament and when some politicians are buried, their erstwhile colleagues are among the mourners only because such events are a nice photo-opportunity and a useful place for a bit of networking.  The Australian politician Pat Kennelly (1900–1981; senator for Victoria (Australian Labor Party (ALP)) 1953-1971) (who had a chronic stutter) once attended the funeral of a member of parliament (MP).  It was well-attended event with many mourners and later he was heard to observe: “It w-w-w-a-as a v-v—very s-s-sa-ad occasion.  H-h-his w-w-wi-wife and f-f-f-family were there.  There was not a d-d-dry eye in the ce-ce-cemetery.  E-e-everyone w-a-was in t-t-t-tears.  As I w-w-w-watched them f-f-file out of th-th-the ce-ce-cemetery I th-th-thought h-h-how s-s—sad.  Th-th-three h-h—hundred m-m-mourners with a s-s-single th-th-thought: ‘Wh-h-ho’s g-g-oing to w-w-win the pre-pre-pre-selection f-f-for his s-s-seat?’”

Potential gig: Lindsay Lohan in mourning garments (sables), Sohu Fashion Achievement Awards Ceremony, Shanghai, China, January, 2014.  Acting is of course a good background for a professional mourner and the career part is sometimes available to even the well-known because their presence at a funeral would be an indicator of the wealth of the deceased.

Culturally, the mourners at one’s funeral can matter because their measure in both quantity & quality greatly can influence how one is remembered and to some (and certainly their surviving friends & family), greatly that matters.  While it’s true that once one is dead, that’s it, the memory others have of one is affected by whether one drank oneself to death, was struck by a meteorite or murdered by the Freemasons and the spectacle of one’s funeral also leaves a lasting impression.  A funeral with a scant few mourners presumably says much about the life of the deceased but for those facing that, there’s the ancient tradition of the professional mourners (known in some places as moirologists, sobbers, wailers, or criers.  In South Africa, those after greater drama can hire someone hysterically to cry and threaten to jump into the grave to join the departed forever wherever they’re going (it’s said this is an “extra-cost” service).

There is reference in both the Old and New Testaments to the profession: In 2 Samuel 14 it was recorded: “…and fetched thence a wise woman, and said unto her, I pray thee, feign thyself to be a mourner, and put on now mourning apparel, and anoint not thyself with oil but as a woman that had a long time mourned the dead.”  It does seem the practice of paid mourning began in China or the Middle East but it was a thing also in ancient Egypt and Rome.  In Egypt, it was actually a formalized part of the ritual (at least for the urban wealthy) in that part of the order of service required the family to pay for the provision of “two professional women mourners”, there as representatives of the psychopomps ( conductors of souls to the afterworld) Isis (inter alia the guardian deity who protected her followers in life and in the afterlife) and her sister Nephtys (protector of the deceased and guardian of the dead).

In Rome, it was more an expression of conspicuous consumption and the more rich or more illustrious a celebrity someone had been while walking the Earth, the better attended and more ostentatious would be the funeral procession, professional mourners making up usually a goodly proportion of the count.  They earned their money because the cultural expectation was they were expected to cry and wail, look distraught, tear at their hair and clothes and scratch their faces with their fingernails, the drawing of a little blood a sign of grief; the more professional mourners in a procession, the higher the implied status of the deceased.  Historically (and apparently cross-culturally), professional mourners have tended to be women because such displays of emotions from them were accepted in a way that wouldn’t have been accepted if exhibited by a man.

Illusion

Illusion (pronounced ih-loo-zhuhn)

(1) Something that deceives by producing a false or misleading impression of reality.

(2) The state or condition of being deceived; misapprehension.

(3) An instance of being deceived.

(4) In clinical psychology, a perception, as of visual stimuli (optical illusion), that represents what is perceived in a way different from reality.

(5) A very thin, delicate tulle of silk or nylon having a cobwebbed appearance, for trimmings, veils and similar designs.

(6) The act of deceiving; deception; delusion (mostly obsolete).

1340–1350: From the Middle English, from the Latin illūsiōn(em), stem of illūsiō, (irony, mocking), the construct being illūs(us), past participle of illūdere (to mock, ridicule) + lūd (play) + tus (past participle suffix) + iōn.  The suffic -ion was From the Middle English -ioun, from the Old French -ion, from the Latin -iō (genitive -iōnis).  It was appended to a perfect passive participle to form a noun of action or process, or the result of an action or process.  It was from the Latin lūd that English ultimately gained ludicrous, illudere meaning "to mock at" (literally "to play with").  The borrowing from Latin displaced the Old English dwimmer, from the Old English ġedwimor or dwimor (illusion, delusion, sleight, magic) and, as absorbed by both Medieval English & French, meaning tended towards “act of deception” rather than “mocking or irony” which was the Classical Latin form.  The English sense is reflected in the word’s use in Church Latin which is thought the source of the meaning-shift.  In modern English use, particularly since the rise of mass-market visual entertainment, to some extent the preponderant meaning has shifted back.  Illusion & illusionist are noun, illusionary, illusional and illusioned are adjectives; the noun plural is illusions.

English offers many variations on the theme; words like fantasy, hallucination and delusion all refer to false perceptions or ideas.  An illusion is either (1) a false mental image produced by misinterpretation of stuff that actually exists or (2) a deliberate creation in some form to create an impression of stuff in a way not real.  A mirage is a distortion of reality produced by reflection of light against the sky but in general use is widely deployed as a synonym for anything illusory. A hallucination is a perception of a thing or quality that is either wholly or partially unreal.  A delusion is a persistent false belief that need not have any basis.  A chimera is something which, while unreal, has many elements of the real and thus seems more plausible.  A fantasy is either (1) a fictional creation where one is aware of its untruth or (2) a fictional creation one believes.

The Illusion Panel

The illusion panel is a visual trick used by fashion designers which to some extent mimics the appearance of bare skin.  It’s done by using a flesh-colored fabric, cut to conform to the shape of wearer and the best known products are called illusion dresses although the concept can appear on other styles of garment.  Done well, the trick works, sometimes even close-up but it’s really intended for photo opportunities.  Lindsay Lohan illustrates the idea in a few examples:

At left is a gown from the Fendi Spring/Summer 2016 collection, worn at the Asian Awards, London, April 2016.  The gown was technically a different take on the illusion panel because the skin was real: Fashion faking itself.  It’s a playful take on the idea because above the modest cut at the midriff were translucent panels which created a nice effect, especially when in motion although opinion was divided on whether the geometric pattern was too busy for the concept, some suggesting a solid color or even some bold stripes might have lent better emphasis.

The centre image is of a Julien Macdonald green and blue sequin embellished mini dress with open neckline, accented with illusion panel & black hemline, from her Fall 2013 collection, worn at Gabrielle's Gala, Old Billingsgate Market, London, May 2014.  Some comment was provoked by the choice not to retain the black belt with which it was shown on its catwalk debut and it true that did work well with the hemline trim, width and shade of both matching.  However, a panel with quite that much illusion doesn’t demand accessories and probably is more effective with neither belt nor necklace to distract.

At right, dating from January 2013 is a black Dion Lee cocktail dress with illusion panels and an off-the-shoulder silhouette, the shoes Christian Louboutin peep-toe booties.  It’s a classic example of why it’s thought illusion dresses work best if tailored in solid colors with a marked contrast between material and skin tone.

Kylie Jenner (b 1997, left) in 2017 used the idea in what was (by the standards of her clan) quite subtle but trolls quickly realized the possibilities offered by digital editing (centre).  Swedish musician Tove Lo (Ebba Tove Elsa Nilsson, b 1987, right) actually enhanced the illusion with a T-shirt which included shadow effects so the look would be consistent even in settings where ambient light was unhelpful.  Pairing the T-shirt with an oversized, double-breasted blazer was a nice touch.

As a garment, an illusion dress is not technically difficult to cut or assemble but for its effect it relies on a close congruence between the colors of panel and the skin.  Assuming such fabrics are either available or can be dyed to suit, that’s fine for bespoke creations but in the vastly bigger prêt-à-porter (ready-to-wear) market, buyers are compelled to pick whatever is the closest match, the technique of choice being to alter the skin tone for the occasion, fake tanning product the usual choice which is fine if a darker hue is needed but when lightening that’s needed, the creams used temporarily to cover tattoos are said to work well, better even than the (now often controversial and in some cases dangerous) skin-lightening preparations popular in some markets.

The illusion industry also borrows motifs.  A cage bra is built with a harness-like structure which (vaguely) resembles a cage, encapsulating the breasts using one or more straps.  Few actually use the straps predominately to enhance support and the effect tends to be purely aesthetic, some cage bras with minimal (or even absent) cup coverage and a thin band or multi-strap back.  Some things about cage bras can be illusory but the skin on show is usually real whereas when used over a skin-toned panel, the straps exist to enhance the illusion although, there’s no reason why they can’t also be structural, functioning effectively as an external bra.  Ashley Graham (left) in cage bra with the focus on flesh and Ricki-Lee Coulter (right) in a dress with illusion panel under straps illustrate the difference.

The Great Illusion (1910) by Norman Angell (1972-1967) was first published in the United Kingdom in 1909 as Europe's Optical Illusion.  Angell’s theme was that the economies, financial systems, markets and supply chains of the world’s big industrial and military powers had become so inter-twined and inter-dependent that war had become impossible.  Angell proved that not only would war be unprofitable, in any big conflict, the victor would suffer at least as much as the vanquished so no nation would be so foolish as to start one.  Quickly, The Great Illusion was translated in eleven languages and in the optimistic world of early twentieth century Europe, it became a cult, its thesis a dogma.  The aristocrat commissioned to review the British Army after its disastrous performance in the Boer War (1899-1902) were understood instantly became an adherent to the idea that “new economic factors clearly prove the insanity of aggressive wars”, delivering lectures in which he pointed out that “a twentieth century war would be on such a scale… that its inevitable consequences of commercial disaster, financial ruin and individual suffering [would be] so pregnant with restraining influences” as to render the thought of war unthinkable.

Read even now, the wealth of examples he offered and the incontrovertibility of his argument seem convincing.  Unfortunately, Wilhelm II (1859–1941; Kaiser (Emperor) of the German Empire 1888-1918), although it’s known he received a copy of the book, was more influenced by one published in 1911 by the Prussian General Friedrich von Bernhardi (1849–1930) with the unambiguous title Deutschland und der Nächste Krieg (Germany and the Next War).  Bernhardi’s text is of great interest to students of military, diplomatic and political history but the casual reader can gain the necessary understanding merely by glancing at the table of contents, the uncompromising chapter headings including The Right to Make War, The Duty to Make War and World Power or Downfall.  In case anyone might have thought he had written a work of abstract theory, another chapter was titled Germany’s Historical Mission.   Describing war as a "divine business", his central two-pronged strategy was the one which would doom both the Second Reich and the Third: Wage wars of aggression and ignore treaties.

World War I (1914-1918) was something probably worse than even Angell had prophesized and in its aftermath the phrase “the war to end all wars” was popular although some of the delegates leaving Paris after the Treaty of Versailles (1919) weren’t so sanguine, reckoning all that had been gained was a truce.  Despite the cynicism however, the 1920s were the years in which the (now mostly forgotten) successes of the League of Nations included the notion that war had been made not only unthinkable (both because of Angell’s analysis and the shock of the World War) but actually unlawful.  It was a brief, shining moment and by 1933 Angell felt compelled to add to a revised edition of The Great Illusion the new theme of the need for collective defense.  Other things happened in 1933, the implications of which would mean that too would prove an illusion itself but that year, Angell was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Illusions however seem to be something to which men can’t help but be drawn and by the late twentieth century, as globalization 2.0 accelerated, another part of Angell’s conceptual framework gained a new audience.  Angell had noted the obvious: That the imperative of modern capitalism was profit, not romantic nationalism and that there was more to be gained from peaceful trade than attempts at conquest with its unpredictable outcomes.  By the 1990s, political commentator Thomas Friedman (b 1953) had reduced this to what came to be called the “Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention (the idea that countries with McDonalds restaurants didn’t go to war with each other) and while that’s since been proved untrue, the point he was making was the same as Angell: That democracies run according to the rules of market capitalism don’t go to war with each other because the it’s too threatening to the hegemonic class which owns the means of production and distribution.

By the time Mr Putin (Vladimir Putin, b 1952, president or prime-minister of Russia since 1999) began his special military operation (the invasion which started the Russia-Ukraine war in 2022), it’s doubtful there were many left in Europe with illusion about the nature of man.  Unfortunately, it may be that in the Kremlin the reading of Bernhardi may not have gone beyond those first few bellicose chapters because deeper into his book, the author moved beyond the justification of “necessity” to the nuts and bolts of “method” for once one convinces one’s self one has a duty to make war, one must ensure it is waged with success.  To be successful he explained, the state must begin a war at “the most favourable moment” of its own choosing, striking “the first blow” in a manner which guarantees victory.  Mr Putin had illusions of his own, about the people of Ukraine, about the West and about the state of his own military.

In 2014, an illusion outfit attracted much comment when the Colombian women’s cycling team uniform was first seen at an event in Italy, held in honour of former Italian champion Michela Fanini (1973–1994).  Despite the appearance, it wasn’t a two-piece, the otherwise standard strip augmented by a flesh-coloured section across the lower torso and upper hips.  The photographs caused a stir and the unusual degree of international attention must have pleased the team’s sponsor, the city government of Colombia's capital, Bogota.  Innovations like this might be one way to redress the imbalance in the media coverage afforded to women's sport.