Twitter users have been poking fun at the MP for mimicking the look first favoured by Beyoncé – but led to widespread ridicule when it was used by George Osborne, Theresa May and David Cameron for looking more like an awkward John Wayne
THE NEW Home Secretary has been mocked for becoming the latest top Tory to adopt a ridiculous “power stance” as he poses for pictures.
Twitter users have been poking fun at Sajid Javid for mimicking the look first favoured by Beyoncé – which has been proven not to even work.
There was widespread ridicule when it was used by George Osborne, Theresa May and David Cameron, who looked more like an awkward John Wayne in his films as a cowboy.
But despite that Mr Javid, who was appointed to succeed Amber Rudd at the Home Office this morning, stood with his legs apart, planted on the ground outside the department’s headquarters.
People on social media immediately compared him to the Prince Regent in Blackadder performing the “heroic stance”, or to footballer Cristiano Ronaldo lining up to take a free kick.
But most of all people kept asking over and over again was “why” the leading politicians continue to stand so bizarrely in photos.
Especially after one of the people who popularised the idea of a so-called “power stance” in 2010was the subject of a 2010 now says it has no effect whatsoever.
Professor Dana Carney of California University who wrote that her original research only looked at 42 people and far larger studies had failed to replicate the result.
She said the “evidence has been mounting” suggesting there is unlikely to be an effect “on internal or psychological outcomes”
Adding: “As such, I do not believe ‘power pose’ effects are real.”
The first Conservative politician to use it was then-Chancellor Mr Osborne after he had finished his speech at party conference in 2015.
The same week in Manchester Mrs May, then the Home Secretary, also took up the odd look as she was applauded following her address to delegates.
And then the following spring Mr Cameron also began to use it, at a photocall during the EU referendum and then during a Sky news TV debate on the subject.
It sparked speculation they were being coached by a body language expert in how to appear more assertive, but each time it saw them ribbed on Twitter for the pose.
