#Jesusismybestestfriend: Lana Del Rey’s Catholic Coquette 

Last week, my TikTok feed was filled with videos by ecstatic fans of Lana Del Rey celebrating her newly released single, “Did You Know There’s a Tunnel under Ocean Blvd,” which is the title track to her upcoming album in March 2023. Lana Del Rey fans were excited to hear about a follow up album to her previous work, “Blue Banisters,” because her deeply personal lyrics allow them to follow and relate to her supposed evolution from a powerless girl to an empowered woman. However, despite her statements that she wants to champion feminism for “delicate” women, Del Rey’s lyrics continue to glamorize toxic relationships in which she submits to a masculine authority. Lana Del Rey’s use of religious imagery in her lyrics further romanticizes submissiveness in young women. Teenage girls who consume her music chase an idealized identity that, due to shifting trends, can never be achieved, ultimately leaving them without a true sense of self.

Del Rey’s glamorization of passivity in the face of abuse has been translated by young content creators into TikTok “aesthetic” videos, in which a series of images flashes by to convey the “Lana Del Rey Girl”–a young, sexy, submissive coquette. The compression of aesthetics into a slideshow of pictures helps to translate concepts through symbols and pictures. Most recently, Del Rey’s religious imagery in her lyrics has appeared in the #catholicaesthetic, which features virgin mary statues, wooden crosses, and young girls dressed in white nightgowns, locked in simple bedrooms and looking longingly out of windows. The TikToks under this hashtag use religious imagery to convey youth, beauty, and the message that submissiveness to a higher power is sexy. Most often, these TikToks are set to angsty, slow and reverbed Lana Del Rey song clips in which we hear her sing "God" or "Jesus."  The music encapsulates the mood of this aesthetic and cements its undertone of docility. In short, the #catholicaesthetic is about three things: softness, sexiness, and submission.  

Lana Del Rey’s music and the images of her wearing veils are common in these TikToks; combined with her narratives of powerlessness in abusive relationships, the result is a message of  submitting to men (her boyfriend or God) in a way that romanticizes mistreatment and embeds it in religion. A prime example of this is in her song “Ultraviolence.” Del Rey sings, “He hit me and it felt like a kiss,” and “He hurt me, but it felt like true love,” -- lyrics that explicitly describe relationship violence -- then places her boyfriend in the role of God, describing him as “raising her up.” Even in her new song, Del Rey uses religious imagery to paint herself in this passive way. In the first verse, she sings, “Mosaic ceilings, painted tiles on the wall/I can't but feel somewhat like my body marred my soul/Handmade beauty, sealed up by two man-made walls,” -- conjuring up images of churches (mosaics and painted tiles) and religious concepts such as the soul. The last line of this verse points back to the theme of #catholicaesthetic, of being locked away, held captive and passive. By referencing religion in her work, Lana Del Rey draws upon the known power dynamics of the Catholic Church, in which women are expected to obey masculine authority. She uses these religious references to encourage listeners to relate to her relationship with her boyfriend: she is devoted to him and he expects obedience despite the fact that he mistreats her. 

With almost 1.8 million searches on TikTok, the increasingly popular #catholicaesthetic is harmful to viewers consuming this media. Girls watch these videos and internalize the basic message: sexual appeal lies in passivity.  Combined with the nature of ever-changing TikTok trends, teen girls who watch these videos will never be able to achieve the embodiment of the Del Rey Catholic girl, but instead will continue to chase the idea that if they’re just a little more "delicate," a little more passive, a man will value them. Ultimately this chase leaves them with a dangerous ideology that skews their future relationships, forever distorting their perception of girlhood, sexuality, and even religion. Furthermore, because the trend cycles on TikTok are so short and the pull to conform is so strong, viewers are left constantly re-building their identities to achieve idealized versions of womanhood. Then, at the end of their teenage years, TikTok consumers are left without a real sense of self because they spent their formative years basing their personalities and interests on fake internet personas.