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Following former president Donald Trump‘s CPAC speech, in which he continued to falsely claim the election was stolen, allege voter fraud, and tease a 2024 presidential run, conservative commentator Candace Owens entered the chat. Specifically, Owens praised Trump as a “feminist” on Twitter after he touted some wildly transphobic views about trans women being included in women’s sports.

On Sunday, Trump gave a speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference, where he criticized Biden’s decision to allow trans kids to participate in sports according to their gender identity. Trump claimed, falsely, that transgender women in sports were breaking records, and referred to them as “biological males.” In response, Owens essentially called him a feminist hero (sure, Jan). “If you guys are wondering what actual feminism is, it’s Donald Trump having the courage to stand up on stage and call out the insanity of biological men dominating women’s sports,” Owens wrote. “He never kowtows to the Left. #CPAC2021 #CPAC.”

If you guys are wondering what actual feminism is, it’s Donald Trump having the courage to stand up on stage and call out the insanity of biological men dominating women’s sports.

He never kowtows to the Left. #CPAC2021 #CPAC

— Candace Owens (@RealCandaceO) February 28, 2021

Owens was immediately the subject of serious backlash on Twitter, with users calling her a TERF well into Monday, when her name started trending. “I’d say your fear of trans people is much greater than your intellect, but we all know it’s easy to find a bigger number than zero,” one user wrote. “At almost every level of government over the past few weeks we have heard about the ‘threat’ of trans kids in sports. Let’s talk about this because there is no threat and yet, we are about to see a massive expansion of privacy intrusions into and surveillance of kids’ bodies,” Chase Strangio, a lawyer for the ACLU, wrote.

Trump’s speech and Owens’ subsequent comments are responses to the recently passed Biden administration executive order titled “Preventing and Combating Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation.” On January 20, Biden’s first day in office, he signed the order declaring that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity were unconstitutional. The order notably states that “Children should be able to learn without worrying about whether they will be denied access to the restroom, the locker room, or school sports.”

The order — though praised among many for being an inclusive step forward — has become an easy excuse for conservatives to spew hate. And, this isn’t the first time Owens has been openly transphobic and tried to mask it as standing up for women’s rights. In February, she tweeted that transgender rights policies in the U.S. were “trampling over” the rights of women. In the past, she’s also stood her ground on the false claim that only women can give birth, spoken out against trans soldiers serving in the U.S. Army, and called the work of trans activists the work of Satan and “confusing” to children. Most notably, Owens rebuked Harry Styles’ Vogue cover, where he was photographed wearing a dress, saying, “bring back our manly men.”

In reality, there’s no evidence of transgender children harming the upbringing of cisgender children, including in school sports. With nearly 2% of kids identifying as trans as of 2019, the conversation surrounding gender identity and children is becoming a more common one, thanks to the help of organizations like the Human Rights Campaign and PFLAG.

But given that ignorance is rampant in the Republican party, it’s no surprise Trump would latch onto this Biden order — and even less of a surprise that a noted TERF like Candace Owens would praise him for it.

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In the era of quarantine, during which most of our activities happen on the couch — whether we're in Zoom meetings or, let's be honest, scrolling through TikTok for three hours — comfortable clothing has never been more integral to our lives. We've traded in our workwear for nap dresses and restricting denim for functional leggings. But after nearly a year of making athleisure our uniform of choice, we're in desperate need of a revamp. It's time to find a way to stay comfortable (and ready for that mid-day yoga YouTube video) without forgoing style.

Thankfully, making activewear-centric outfits look put-together is far easier than you might think. To prove it, we styled four everyday athleisure looks using Old Navy's new Powersoft pieces, creating outfits that are as comfortable as they are chic. Read on to reinvigorate your daily wardrobe.

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On Sunday, CBS released a preview of its forthcoming interview between the Duke and Duchess of Sussex and Oprah Winfrey. In the clip, the couple discussed the experience of being royals — prior to the two leaving behind their duties and moving to Los Angeles — with Prince Harry stating that his biggest concern for his growing family was “history repeating itself,” alluding to the media scrutiny of his late mother, Princess Diana. Likely knowing she’d be a significant topic of discussion, Meghan Markle paid homage to her mother-in-law, wearing a bracelet that belonged to Diana for the occasion.

Markle paired her black, floral Giorgio Armani silk dress with a Pippa Small gold-and-aquamarine necklace, Cartier Love bracelet, and the same diamond tennis bracelet that Prince Harry used to craft her engagement ring, according to People. The bracelet, by Cartier, was once a part of Princess Diana’s jewelry collection. In 2017, Prince Harry took two diamonds from it to act as the side stones for Markle’s engagement ring. “The little diamonds on the side are from my mother’s jewelry collection, to make sure that she’s with us in this crazy journey together,” Prince Harry said during the couple’s engagement interview that same year. 

According to People, sources learned that the couple decided together that Markle would wear the bracelet to the interview with Oprah so that, similarly, “Diana could be with them.”

In another preview for the “no subject that’s off-limits” interview, according to Winfrey, Prince Harry discussed his gratitude for Markle and imagined how his mother must have felt going through the public scrutiny alone: “You know, for me, I’m just really relieved and happy to be sitting here, talking to you with my wife by my side because I can’t begin to imagine what it must’ve been like for [my mother] going through this process by herself all those years ago.” 

“It’s been unbelievably tough for the two of us,” he said, “but at least we had each other.” The interview with air in full on March 7 on CBS.

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It’s safe to say the Republican party has become synonymous with lying. Their former leader, Donald Trump, lied more than 30,000 times during his four years as president, and 147 Republicans voted to overturn the 2020 presidential election based on lies and conspiracy theories about election integrity. But no one embodies the deception of the GOP quite like freshman Rep. Madison Cawthorn, who lies about everything, including the accident that left him partially paralyzed. 

According to a Washington Post report from this weekend, while giving a speech at Patrick Henry College in 2017, Cawthorn lied multiple times about the 2014 car crash that left him reliant on a wheelchair. The Post says that Cawthorn claimed his friend who was driving the vehicle at the time, Bradley Ledford, had left him for dead.

“He was my brother, my best friend. And he leaves me in a car to die in a fiery tomb,” Cawthorn said of the accident. “He runs to safety deep in the woods and just leaves me in a burning car as the flames start to lick my legs and curl up and burn my left side.” Cawthorn also claimed he was pronounced dead at the scene, but thanks to “adrenaline or divine intervention, I definitely believe it’s the latter, I had a deep inhale of breath.”

The problem, of course, is that none of it was true. According to Ledford, he saved Cawthorn’s life. “That statement he made was false,” Ledford told The Washington Post. “It hurt very badly that he would say something as false as that. That is not at all what happened. I pulled him out of the car the second that I was able to get out of the car.” And, according to a court deposition, Cawthorn claims he has no memory from the accident. And per a police accident report and Florida Highway Patrol records, Cawthorn was “incapacitated and in critical condition” but was not declared dead.

Cawthorn launched his congressional campaign and has long-relied on the fictional version of the car accident to reach his political goals. He has also claimed that the crash derailed his dreams of attending the Naval Academy — another outright lie. Cawthorn was friends with former Rep. Mark Meadows’ son, Blake, and in December 2013, he convinced Meadows to nominate Cawthorn to the Naval Academy via a “process that enables a local member of Congress to recommend candidates,” The Post reports. But Cawthorn’s acceptance also hinged on his grades and other benchmarks, and prior to the car accident, he was rejected from the Naval Academy. Cawthorn said in a court deposition that “he went on a spring break trip in Florida with his friend Ledford” after his application was denied. 

Cawthorn has championed himself as a Trump-like candidate, and in just two months as a congressman, he has certainly lived up to the hype. More than 30 former classmates of Cawthorn’s told BuzzFeed they “witnessed, experienced, or knew of sexual harassment and misconduct” by Cawthorn on his Christian college’s campus. In October, more than 160 former students of the same college signed an open letter describing Cawthorn’s predatory behavior. He visited Adolf Hitler’s vacation home and in an Instagram post marking the occasion, described Hitler as “the Fuhrer.”

He has also promised to use his position of power as a sitting congressman to convert Jews, Muslims, and other non-Christians to Christianity, saying, “If you’re not wanting to lead somebody to Christ, then you’re probably not really a Christian.” He attacked then-candidate Raphael Warnock using racist dog whistles and thinly-veiled white supremacist language. He spoke at the pro-Trump rally on January 6 that led to the deadly insurrection attempt by Trump supporters, spreading lies about the 2020 election results. He later claimed the insurrectionists were “paid by the Democratic machine.”

So, no, it’s not a surprise that Cawthorn is guilty of lying his way into his seat. If anything, Cawthorn is proof that Trump is not simply the leader of the Republican Party. The Republican Party is full of Donald Trumps.

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Julien Christian Lutz spends much of his day on Clubhouse, an invite-only audio app that has swiftly garnered widespread attention since its launch last year. Specifically, Lutz frequents a series of coronavirus chat rooms, where many users swap ideas about health care in the pandemic, discussing things like the ongoing vaccine rollout and COVID symptoms.

These discussions are not simple exchanges of information, though. Things often get heated, and Lutz is one of the platform’s many impassioned users — something that immediately became clear when he spoke with me recently via Instagram about his experience in Clubhouse’s medical chat rooms. In our first few exchanges, Lutz was careful to say that he was not an outright anti-vaxxer, nor would he ever explicitly tell someone not to get the coronavirus vaccine. But Lutz — who calls himself a “science communicator,” though perhaps is better known as a rather prolific music video director — also described himself as “pro-herbs,” and was more than happy to send me a PDF of studies he’d found showing the effectiveness of herbal remedies in treating and combating the symptoms of COVID-19. Her also told me, via Instagram: “For doctors to have this information and not act upon it is negligence!”

Lutz told me that he rarely encountered anti-vaxxers in his time on Clubhouse; mostly, he said, it was just full of people with a lot of questions. But that’s not quite the perspective that doctors have when it comes to their experience using the platform. For them, Clubhouse is a hub of conflicting information — including misleading medical advice. But, unfortunately, it seems like this is not a flaw of Clubhouse’s design, but is rather an accepted part of it.

Though still only in beta mode, Clubhouse has become a home for all manner of things. By allowing people to connect with complete strangers, the app creates opportunities for users to join live chat rooms to discuss or listen in on every subject from getting started in creative professions to burgeoning health trends. It’s informal and communal, which is part of its appeal. But that’s also why it has fallen prey to the great challenge facing all social media platforms — misinformation. Users can easily encounter a licensed medical practitioner or experienced virologist sharing scientifically backed information in the same room as someone who says that the vaccine is embedded with a tracking device or people with the best of intentions passing on unsupported information unknowingly.

Dr. Shoshana Ungerleider, a board-certified internal medicine physician, founded a club on the app called All Things Covid last month. Since then, it has grown to almost 25,000 members due in part to weekly Q&A with expert clinicians and scientists answering any and all questions about coronavirus. In these discussions, Ungerleider said that she and fellow physicians occasionally encounter audience members who are anti-vaccine.

“Since we’re very explicit that we’re a group of physicians and scientists who speak about evidence-based, data-driven issues related to the coronavirus, it is less frequent,” she explains. More often, Ungerleider says they encounter people who are skeptical or have questions. “There’s, of course, a difference between questioning the science, which we welcome, and being anti-science.”

Lutz said he spent quite a bit of time in those Clubhouse chatrooms. “I come in and present studies about medicinal plants,” he explained. “The doctors and I argue. The regular people cheer me on and start calling me Doctor X.” Despite the nickname, Lutz is not a doctor — another thing he is clear about mentioning to me in our messages on Instagram.

Even if Lutz is clear about presenting his credentials, that doesn’t mean everyone else is. And Clubhouse is far more difficult to moderate than platforms like Facebook, Reddit, or Twitter, because any record of the chat rooms disappears when they end, leaving no digital footprint. There is no documentation of the conversation once the room closes — it’s against community guidelines to record the chat rooms, and you can even get kicked off the app for doing so. And, there are currently no internal Clubhouse moderators, so fact-checking is near impossible.

Despite the lack of accountability, users are warning each other that outlandish coronavirus conspiracy theories are spreading quickly across the app, reports Vice. Everything from false rumors of 5G satellites controlling people via social distancing to the vaccine being made from fetal cells has proliferated in recent weeks. Medical professionals on Clubhouse have attempted to intercept this misinformation by calling it out and proactively sharing scientifically supported information, but many of those who have spoken out have faced harassment, abuse, and alleged death threats.

Ungerleider said she comes across anti-vaccine rooms with over 1,000 people in them at least a few times a week. “Occasionally physicians or scientists will enter the room to try to combat misinformation, but it is very challenging,” she explained. “Clubhouse does have many people who claim to be experts but are touting pseudoscience, and it’s very dangerous.”

Lutz, who said he is in “no rush” to get the vaccine and wants to wait and see how people he knew felt after a few months, does not see himself as one of the Clubhouse users “touting pseudoscience.” He advised me: “I hope you will represent what I am saying properly. You will be doing more harm than good if you discourage people from medicinal plants after I presented you with that PDF.”

When I asked Ungerleider about the herbal remedies Lutz said should be getting more attention as legitimate treatments for coronavirus, Ungerleider replied: “We haven’t seen any randomized controlled trials (the gold standard for medical research) show benefit for supplements, herbs in treating or preventing COVID, but more study is warranted.”

But while Ungerleider offered a measured response to Lutz’s assertions, the same courtesy isn’t often extended to her — or other doctors. Dr. Aya Osman, a neuroscientist, described her time on Clubhouse similarly to Ungerleider; from her experience, she’s had harsh criticism in rooms devoted to talking about the coronavirus vaccine.

“We tend to stay away from rooms that are blatantly anti-vaccine because you simply get attacked in those rooms,” Osman said, but then pointed out that “sometimes rooms are started to legitimately have questions answered,” and that those rooms often generate informative and productive discussions when they’re filled with a large number of doctors who make it their mission to spread scientifically backed data and information. It’s when doctors become outnumbered by people who don’t believe in the efficacy of the vaccine, says Osman, that the bullying can begin. 

This harassment isn’t limited to Clubhouse. One in four physicians who use social media reported being personally attacked according to a Stat News study. The most common reason? Vaccine advocacy.

“Honestly, it usually stems from misinformation that isn’t founded in data or facts,” Osman said. “And when you provide the actual facts it can go south.” However, she believes that the public’s considerable distrust of medical institutions stems from trauma. As a neuroscientist, Osman studies how the brain responds to trauma and she believes that fear of the vaccine is an understandable response to prolonged inequity that includes racially-biased medical treatment. For every staunch anti-vaxxer, Osman says she encounters far more cautious people simply looking for reliable information.

“People are honestly hungry for this information, she said. “I think during this pandemic people have seen how messy the scientific process can be. And so helping explain some of that to the public goes a very long way during a scary time like this.”

Dr. Hisham Yousif, who spent most of the past year working in a coronavirus intensive care unit, echoed this appetite for information and advocated patience with vaccine skeptics. “Do you antagonize them on their practices and beliefs, or meet them where they’re at and open their mind to another treatment option?” he responded. “A lot of these folks feel not listened to, disrespected by the medical establishment, etc. You have to understand people’s experiences. A lot of them are rooted in pain, trauma, and prior bad experiences.”

While the spectrum of Clubhouse users may run the gambit from a medical expert to a staunch anti-vaxxer, it seems like most people there are questioning things in good faith and trying to find reliable information. So how can Clubhouse, a fledgling social media platform, provide some level of certainty that the information users are coming across is accurate? There’s no post to review or flag feature right now, and that’s part of the problem. Still, Ungerleider believes there are ways to combat misinformation in this new landscape. She suggests Clubhouse adopt a verification system similar to Twitter. Refinery29 reached out to Clubhouse to see if they had any plans to implement a verification system for combating misinformation, but they did not yet respond.

“I think it would definitely help users to understand who the credible sources are on the platform and combat a lot of the misinformation,” said Ungerleider. In the meantime, she recommended that people seeking out vaccine information on Clubhouse really do their homework when it comes to the “experts” on the platform. “Take notes while on CH and spend time personally investigating by reading the science before making any major decisions. I also think asking questions of speakers and specifically asking about the evidence to support claims is important.”

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Stacey Samedi didn’t own many handbags, but she was a fan of Telfar, so last year, she decided to treat herself to a Telfar bag. After two months on the waiting list, her bag arrived, and she immediately painted dragons around the logo. The art was done to match her Nike trainers, which she had also personalized. Posing in her customized accessories, she snapped some shots and shared them on Twitter. The post blew up.

The artist. The art. pic.twitter.com/kufaqVgQMV

— thee customizer (@stayytheartisan) September 5, 2020

One day and 11,300 retweets later, Stacey auctioned her bag on eBay for $800 (its retail price was $202). “Somebody told me I could have sold it for $2,000 if I wanted to because it is artwork — it’s hand-painted. So, I’m waiting for the next time one of my designs gets a lot of traction,” she says.

According to Terrell Lomax Russell, who also started painting on Telfar bags last year, the smooth, vegan leather surfaces on Telfar totes make them the ideal blank slate: “Because of the way the leather is, it’s just like a canvas.” He had been painting on both bags and canvases for years, but Telfar’s popularity caught his attention. He bought four bags, painted them, and shared them online. “I decided to gamble on myself,” he says. “The first post did really good, the second did very [well], the third one did even better, and with the fourth one, I knew it was going to do well regardless.”

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A post shared by Terrell Lomax Russell (@handpaintedbytlomax)

“Customization is definitely a growing trend and will become more of a movement this year,” says luxury fashion stylist Miranda Holder. She’s noticed that her clients are increasingly looking to have their luxury bags painted on. “Luxury items are becoming more accessible, and they’re lacking that exclusivity factor that used to be a large part of buying something high-end,” she says. “It’s that uniqueness that makes a handbag covetable. If you can customize your handbag, it becomes timeless.”

Social media seems to have sparked a backlash against “sameness,” notes Sara Maggioni, head of womenswear at trend forecaster WGSN. “If we think about the past few years, with millennials growing up and the filtered, curated aesthetic of Instagram, there has been a bit of a backlash bubbling up, led by Gen Z, and we are seeing people wanting something different,” she explains.

Painting on luxury bags seems to have gained traction during lockdown, too. Laurén Bienvenue, an artist who used to customize leather jackets, noticed over lockdown that far more people were looking to have their designer handbags painted. For her, it was mainly vintage Louis Vuitton. “I think during COVID, people started cleaning out their closets and going through their stuff,” she says. “So many women have asked me to revive bags that they’ve had for, like, 20 years. There are those who want a new look for that classic, monogram bag, or people who have just really used and abused their bags and they need to cover up what’s happened.”

This subversive approach can be traced back to the 1970s. Pioneered by Vivienne Westwood, music’s punk scene inspired people to leave their mark on their look, via bleached denim, studded leather, and graffitied T-shirts. In the ’90s, Alexander McQueen took the runway show to new heights with the live customization of Shalom Harlow’s gown, while 2001 saw Stephen Sprouse scrawl all over Louis Vuitton bags. Far from being precious about their products, luxury houses have encouraged this DIY spirit over the last few years. Gucci has given consumers the option to decorate their own jackets and trainers, allowing people to choose their favorite printed inner linings and, in true maximalist spirit, a range of appliqué options for the outer leather. Balenciaga opened the Balenciaga Copyshop, where customers can pick from an archive of graphics and decide how to place them on T-shirts, while Off-White hosted customization pop-ups in Tokyo.

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A post shared by ONCE UPON A LAURÉN (@onceuponalauren)

Luxury brands have long offered consumers the option to personalize their products but it was an add-on — a paid-for extra reserved for a privileged few. Now, though, thanks to social media democratizing luxury fashion, the chance to influence the design of your favorite item has become readily available to anyone with a social media account and a flair for creativity.

“With self-customization online, things are a little different [from] how they were in the past because when you’re making decisions online, you’re not working with the designer — you’re adapting the designer’s work,” says Dr. Martin Schreier, who wrote a 2020 paper on customization in luxury brands. “There’s a trade-off between saving the essence of the designer and making your own mark on the product.” Schreier has also noticed a shift in the way Gen Z views designer labels: “Nowadays, younger generations aren’t looking up to designers in the same way. This generation thinks, I’m confident, I can judge taste and I know what I like, I can co-create.”

Perhaps this is why tastemakers aren’t afraid to add bold, imaginative designs to their luxury handbags. Terrell has noticed that his younger customers tend to allow him more creative freedom when painting on their bags. “Older people like more monograms or maybe a little initial or a stripe, but the younger the customer is, the wilder the design is. I could do anything from anime bags or flower bags to something with feathers and everything on it,” he says.

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A post shared by Terrell Lomax Russell (@handpaintedbytlomax)

We can assume that Telfar is happy to see these elaborate designs on their bags: The official Telfar Instagram account has liked both Stacey and Terrell’s posts featuring their customized Telfars. It’s not surprising that the Brooklyn-based, Black-owned brand has endorsed their artwork; after all, it set out to redefine the meaning of luxury with its inclusive tagline, “Not for you — for everyone.” Telfar’s goal is to democratize fashion by providing luxury handbags to anyone who wants them at an affordable price. It’s a philosophy that chimes with the shift away from gate-keeping heritage houses.

People may not hero-worship luxury brands like they used to, but Telfar is widely adored for what it represents. It’s a brand that has made space for — and given a platform to — creatives, the LGBTQI+ community, and people of color. “I was able to contribute to this online culture,” Stacey says, explaining that there was something special about putting her own artwork on a Telfar piece. “My bag went viral, so it felt like I made a print on it.” 

The time and space provided by lockdown have helped people breathe new life into old accessories. But more than that, people are putting their own twist on the designs they loved enough to buy, participating in fashion in a communal and collaborative way.

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