Glorifying a Killer
Segment #1014
Marc Jacobs Calls Luigi Mangione a “Trendsetter” and Says He Would Style Him for Court
At first glance, this sounds like another strange collision between fashion and celebrity culture. Look a little closer, however, and the Marc Jacobs–Luigi Mangione story raises a more uncomfortable question: When did an accused murderer become a fashion influencer?
During Vanity Fair’s Lie Detector Test, fashion designer Marc Jacobs was reminded that celebrities including Winona Ryder and Lil’ Kim had worn his clothing during highly publicized court appearances. He was then shown a photograph of Luigi Mangione and asked whether he would be willing to style him for court.
Jacobs laughed and answered, “Yes.”
When asked what he might put Mangione in, Jacobs observed that Mangione already “looks pretty good the way he dresses, actually.” The conversation then turned to the attention generated by Mangione’s clothing. Asked whether Mangione qualified as a “trendsetter,” Jacobs again answered yes.
To be clear, there is no evidence that Marc Jacobs is actually styling Mangione, nor is there evidence of a contract or arrangement between Jacobs and Mangione’s defense team. Jacobs was responding to a hypothetical question.
But that distinction almost misses the more interesting story.
When Notoriety Becomes Celebrity
Luigi Mangione is not famous because he made a movie, recorded an album, designed clothing, or accomplished something extraordinary in public life. He is famous because he is accused of murdering UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
Mangione has pleaded not guilty, and the presumption of innocence remains fundamental. But it is equally important not to lose sight of why he is standing in a courtroom in the first place.
Yet something remarkable has happened around the case.
Mangione’s appearance has been analyzed. His clothing has generated headlines. Photographs of him arriving at court circulate across social media. Admirers have turned him into memes and an anti-establishment symbol. Clothing associated with his appearances has attracted consumer interest. His looks are discussed alongside the legal proceedings.
Now one of America's best-known fashion designers is publicly entertaining the idea of dressing him.
That tells us something about contemporary celebrity culture.
The Courtroom as a Runway
There is nothing new about defendants thinking carefully about what they wear to court. Defense attorneys routinely understand that clothing influences perception. A defendant appearing before a jury generally wants to look respectable, restrained, and nonthreatening.
Fashion designers dressing famous defendants isn't entirely new either.
What feels different here is the surrounding culture.
Mangione's clothing isn't simply being evaluated as courtroom strategy. It has become part of his public persona. Fashion coverage, social-media commentary and political symbolism are increasingly merging with coverage of the criminal proceedings themselves.
The danger is subtle.
The courtroom begins to resemble a stage. The defendant becomes a celebrity. The clothes become merchandise. And the alleged crime that created the celebrity gradually recedes into the background.
Marc Jacobs Didn't Create This Phenomenon
It would be unfair to blame Marc Jacobs for creating the Mangione phenomenon. He didn't.
He was answering deliberately provocative questions in an entertainment interview. His comments were brief and somewhat playful. There is a substantial difference between saying you would hypothetically style someone and actually joining that person's defense effort.
But Jacobs's response illustrates how completely Mangione has crossed from the crime pages into popular culture.
Calling him a “trendsetter” is particularly revealing.
A trendsetter is ordinarily someone whose taste or behavior other people admire and imitate. Applying that description to a defendant in an extraordinarily serious murder prosecution demonstrates how celebrity culture can detach an individual's image from the circumstances that produced the fame.
The question isn't whether Mangione dresses well.
The question is why we care.
Where Is Brian Thompson?
There is another uncomfortable element to this story.
The enormous attention devoted to Mangione inevitably competes with attention paid to Brian Thompson, the man whose killing created this entire spectacle.
That imbalance is common in sensational criminal cases. The accused frequently becomes far more famous than the victim.
Social media intensifies the problem because algorithms reward compelling personalities, striking photographs, controversy and emotional identification. A handsome young defendant surrounded by ideological arguments about health insurance generates enormous engagement.
A murdered corporate executive does not necessarily generate the same cultural fascination.
The result can be a disturbing inversion: the accused becomes the protagonist while the victim becomes background information.
Whatever one thinks about American health insurance, corporate power, executive compensation or UnitedHealthcare, those political arguments should remain separate from the fundamental question of whether killing another human being is justified.
The Commodification of Rebellion
Mangione's emergence as a fashion figure also exposes one of the stranger contradictions of modern culture.
Some admirers portray him as a symbol of resistance to corporate America. Yet that rebellious image is simultaneously being converted into clicks, merchandise, fashion stories, social-media engagement and entertainment.
Anti-corporate rebellion itself becomes a commodity.
The fashion industry doesn't necessarily have to endorse Mangione's alleged actions for this to happen. It merely has to recognize that he attracts attention.
Attention has economic value.
That may ultimately be the most revealing aspect of the Marc Jacobs exchange.
A Cultural Warning Sign
Marc Jacobs saying he would style Luigi Mangione isn't a major scandal by itself. It was a brief answer to a provocative question.
But the fact that the question could be asked—and that almost everyone immediately understands why it is culturally relevant—is worth examining.
We increasingly live in an environment where fame and infamy occupy the same marketplace.
A criminal defendant can become an influencer without having an Instagram sponsorship. A courtroom photograph can function like a fashion campaign. Clothing can sell because someone accused of an infamous crime wore it. And a celebrated designer can casually discuss styling that defendant because the defendant has already become a recognizable cultural brand.
That doesn't make Marc Jacobs responsible for the phenomenon.
It makes his comment a remarkably good illustration of it.
Perhaps the strangest part of the Luigi Mangione story isn't that Marc Jacobs says he would dress him.
It's that somewhere along the way, our culture made the question seem perfectly normal.