Beauty and me
November 7, 2009
I love shopping for drugstore cosmetics. It’s like being in that fabulous box of 64 Crayola crayons I loved to use when I was little: an arsenal of colors that offered 64 creative choices. As I browse the many colors of lipstick, I envision a pretty me with bright lips and shiny eyes. I pucker and imagine using glitter lipsticks, fruity glosses and nourishing balms.
And so my wicker vanity is littered with brightly colored sticks, designed to paint dry, lined, pale lips, transforming them as my whim would have it. But as my fear would have it, I am often afraid to leave the house in some of the brighter hues. I put them on, look in the mirror…and fear that bold red, plum, coral and magenta call too much attention to my otherwise lackluster visage.
Still…the fantasy, a picture in my mind of beautiful me, is fun to entertain.
The last time I wandered through the box of crayons, I noticed the shift in trends from long-lasting glossy lipstick to lip-plumping lipstick, just as the trend of matte colors had shifted to glossy the winter before. I recalled in a flash a time when, as a child, I’d overheard somebody, a woman, describing another woman as having “thin, cruel lips.” That probably wasn’t a compliment, but I’d never given it much thought. Certainly, the word “thin” connotes something standard in the world of female beauty in this day and age. “Cruel,” though possibly suggesting something untouchable, also meant severe; and it made me think of a clenched smile that hid a world of anger or heartbreak. And, while I’d never considered my own lips to be either thin or cruel, I got excited by the prospect of fuller lips with – certainly not without – bright, shiny color! I plucked a “tester” ripe berry shade of lip-plumping lipstick from the drugstore shelf and subsequently discovered, to my surprise and delight, that it contained flecks of silver glitter in the mix. This was the one for me.
(Incidentally, I love glitter! I love anything sparkly!)
There was a “buy one get one half off” special, so I snatched up a pearly crimson gloss too. In the car, after carefully scanning the parking lot to see that nobody was watching my ritual, I tried the gloss. It was dusk and so the result was less than awesome. I decided to wait for better light to plump my lips. How does that work? I wondered. I hoped that the lipstick wouldn’t be chunky and thick, likely to smear on clothes. I drove home with purpose leaning to the right at stop signs and lights to admire my new gloss in the rear view mirror.
It’s three flights of stairs into our condo and another flight up to my vanity in our master bedroom suite. I took the stairs two at a time – I was on a mission. I unwrapped the lipstick tube after some difficulty, finally finding success with my teeth. There they were: the aforementioned sparklies! What glee! I puckered my lips and smoothed the pink stain across them, top and bottom. The glitter particles were a bit abrasive and I was forced to slow my painting in order to apply the shade evenly. But what a beautiful color! It reminded me of raspberry yogurt: jam-like pink with a bit of plum thrown in to intensify the color. It wasn’t a drippy or thick consistency as I had worried. Rather, this lipstick was somewhat dryer than others I’d tried. The color caught the light from the many bulbs surrounding my vanity mirror and made my eyes sparkle. The color of my eyes seemed to intensify too and…
Holy shit! There was a burning sensation everywhere! It seemed to originate with my lips, which I could feel pulsing to the beat of my heart…but the pain was spreading outward from my mouth. I felt hot and sore. So, this is how it works! Beauty really is pain. If this lipstick stings your lips enough, they’ll plump? Well, I had to check. At least I’ll be beautiful, I thought. I looked in the mirror. I didn’t see a beautiful me. Instead, the person staring back at me looked something like this:
I looked down at the shiny black tube of burning poison. It had a white sticker on the side, which I hadn’t noticed in my excitement to unwrap it. “PEEL FOR CAUTION,” it read. I did so.
This product may cause a temporary tingling sensation which is normal. Discontinue use if you experience excessive discomfort. Do not use on chapped, damaged or sensitive lips.
I see. The “temporary tingling sensation” that I was concurrently experiencing was “normal.” “Beauty is pain” is not just something people say – like “shit happens” or “that’s life” or “it’s a slippery slope, my friend;” it’s true, and furthermore, it’s meaningful. The standard of beauty for women is to be pin thin; and thus we starve ourselves, purge our stomachs, pinch our flesh and spends hundreds – even thousands – of dollars to be skinny. In some cases, we pay the ultimate price by weaning our bodies off of food until our bodies are forced to consume their own organs for sustenance. And we die. That’s extreme. Normal is “mild” anorexia or bulimia, liposuction and self-hatred. And normal for lips – painful though it is – is the burning, tingling and ultimately numbing sensation of trying to achieve what every male desires in a life partner: blow job lips. (Because, let’s face it: who ever heard of a man looking for a woman with those undesirably thin, cruel lips?)
I’m not saying that men don’t have their fair share of superficial requirements. I think the idea of “male privilege” has been somewhat romanticized to the point that some feminists believe men have it really easy all the time. In actuality, men do terrible things to their bodies to buff them up or trim them down. (I always get a kick out of the Herculean men who break from hours of weight lifting and stride confidently down to the underworld where I work out – otherwise known as the pool – only to nearly drown or struggle to do a single lap. They think they’re in healthy shape; but really they’re just bloated.) And, in many cases, men aren’t allowed to show signs of physical or emotional weakness by failing to carry something heavy up a steep flight of stairs, going to a therapist or crying in public. But what is the male equivalent to stinging, “blow job lips” lipstick? What painful thing do men do to attract the people they desire that women don’t? Both sexes shave, wax and pluck unwanted hair. Both sexes visit gyms and fitness centers. Both sexes watch what they eat – or don’t eat.
I decided to write this essay after a girlfriend asked me to define the line between feminism and feminine beauty. In other words, she asked, what beauty rituals are acceptable for a feminist such as yourself? The answer: the beauty rituals I enjoy, for me and only me, are “acceptable.” If I’m lip plumping to fulfill a male fantasy, then that’s “unacceptable,” according to the “rules of feminism.”
As I began to account for all of the beauty rituals I perform, I realized that there are a lot that are full of nuisance or irritation. Some pleasure rituals are just for me: lavender bubble baths to soften my skin and help me sleep, lotions and creams to hydrate me, application of glitter makeup and colorful lip gloss for fun, and manicures/pedicures for relaxation. If my husband benefits from these rituals, that’s just a(n un)fortunate side effect. But when I started to think about some of the other things I do – like shaving my legs, plucking my eyebrows, squeezing into control top pantyhose and wearing breast minimizers, I realized that I don’t do these things because I worry about men finding me beautiful. Ironically, I do the most painful things I do to fit in with other women. I do these things so that women will respect and admire my “beauty.” (Because, let’s face it: I have never known a man to scrutinize the space between my eyebrows or complain of a fat bulge on my body here or there.) I don’t want the women I know to notice my flaws. I am competitive with them. I can’t stand the feeling that other women have contempt for me. I fear that they are thinking, “That sweater makes her butt look fat!” Women are the people who’ll notice and comment on your recent chemical facial peel or indistinguishable panty line. Men generally don’t notice that stuff.
I wonder how many other women feel this way. How many women fear what other women think enough to subject themselves to painful beauty rituals? Of course, there will be a length or two women find themselves going to for the admiration of men – like breast augmentation and Brazilian bikini waxes; but how is that worse than going to a painful length for the admiration of women? What’s the difference?
The goal of feminism is – or should be – the equal happiness opportunity for men and women. If happiness is hindered by beauty rituals for any reason, they violate this tenet of feminism. Unfortunately, it’s not always easy to identify why we do some of the silly, even painful things we do. (For instance, I will never understand prune juice.) While it’s fun for me to browse the make-up counter at the drugstore, I should pause and think about why I’m there. Am I there to bask in the color and glitter that makes me feel pretty and whimsical when I look at it on my vanity or on my face? Or am I staring down the barrel of the unhappiness gun, trying to be unattainably, even cruelly pretty so that others will like and admire me? I need to make the health and beauty aisles of the world into “Femspotter’s Happiness Aisles.”
After all, I can make my peace with tweezers – I hate to feel stubble with my own fingers. Blow job lips…for me, they have to go!
Dear Hillary…
October 28, 2009
Dear Hillary,
On Saturday night in suburban San Francisco, California, a 15-year-old girl was reportedly gang raped by as many as 10 male teenage attackers while another 10 stood by and watched, maybe even cheered. She was left unconscious beneath a bench on Richmond High School property after more than two hours of this ordeal.
I read about this incident on CNN.com on Tuesday morning and couldn’t believe it had happened. I found it reminiscent of the gang rape of a mentally challenged teenage girl in Glen Ridge, New Jersey in 1989, which I’d read a book about. Well, thought I, after stomping my fists and wailing at the top of my lungs; at least these types of incidents are few and far between.
But later I remembered that in 2008, in the neighboring town of Montclair, N.J., three teenage boys sexually assaulted a female teenage special education student. As in the Glen Ridge incident, the young men used a broomstick to penetrate the girl. Well, thought I, after scratching my head and whimpering; at least that’s only two recent incidents in the United States. I don’t, after all, reside in Afghanistan, for instance, where 90 percent of married women are abused by their husbands. The U.S. is a safe haven for women and girls.
On Tuesday, I waited for other news outlets to pick up the story of the San Francisco teen. I periodically googled “San Francisco gang rape.” Surprisingly, I found very little about the Saturday night incident, and instead stumbled across a December, 2008 gang rape of a lesbian female by four men, two teens and two adults, also near San Francisco. The four had spotted the woman’s car, which displayed a rainbow bumper sticker, shouted hateful epithets at her, struck her with a blunt object, raped her, drove her to an abandoned building, raped her again, and left her naked just outside the building before driving off in her car. Well, thought I, after gasping and digging my fingernails into my thighs; at least gang rape is just a San Francisco and northern N.J. thing.
But then I remembered the similar hate crime of Brandon Teena (nee Teena Brandon) in 1993 in Humboldt, Nebraska. Two men raped and murdered Teena, and also murdered two bystanders, because they hated – and likely feared – Teena’s choice to live his life as a male, though born a female. Perhaps you’ve seen the film adaptation of this incident starring Hilary Swank: Boys Don’t Cry? Well, thought I, after reliving the horror of the film and emotional ruin it left me in; at least it’s only gangs and pairs that hate women enough to murder them indiscreetly.
Oh, wait: George Sodini indiscreetly shot at women in a Pennsylvania gym in August, killing three women and then himself and wounding nine others because, as his personal blog so clearly stipulated, he was tired of 19 years of rejection by women and sexually frustrated. “Thanks for nada, bitches!” he wrote in June. And previously, in 2006, lone gunman Charles C. Roberts IV shot 10 girls, killing five and himself, at an Amish schoolhouse in Pa. leaving behind a hint or two about his unfortunate longing to molest little girls. Perhaps, he shot them out of rage and bewilderment that they existed to tempt him. Well, thought I, after digging to find all the facts of these two incidents and finding myself thoroughly disgusted and alarmed; maybe there’s something in the water…in Pa., Neb., N.J. and Calif.
Why do some men hate women, in the U.S. and abroad? Why do they want to beat us into submission? Why do they want to kill us in heinous ways? Why don’t they want us to be happy with powerful, singular identities and exciting, fulfilling sex lives? Why won’t they let us take control of our reproductive rights without at fight? Why won’t they let us be mothers and lovers at the same time, sinners and saints simultaneously?
There exists a pervasive hatred and fear of women in our American culture. Whether movies, television, art and literature reflect or cause this fear escapes my understanding. But it all culminates at a rigid point: collectively, we believe women are one thing or the other, limited by our sex to be either good or bad. The “good” women are loving mothers, faithful wives, compliant sexual partners and obliging victims. The “bad” women reject their obligations to the “good” tasks, opting for personal pleasure. In other words, “good” women sacrifice themselves for this goodness, while “bad” women sacrifice nothing. As an unnamed Hollywood executive said of Ms. Swank, “Her look and demeanor are not soft, so it’s hard to see her as vulnerable or as a love object.” (Entertainment Weekly, 10-30-09)
Ergo, this Hilary like another Hillary we know, does not fall cleanly into either the “good” or “bad” categories, and is therefore a “difficulty.”
I am reminded of a magnificent argument a certain Secretary of State and former First Lady made to a N.J. Representative in April, 2009 in support of reproductive health and the reproductive health education of women globally and at home, which went largely unnoticed by the media. I am a feminist blogger and I hadn’t heard about it until another blogger called it to the attention of the feminist blogging community. Madame Secretary said:
Congressman, I deeply respect your passionate concern and views which you have championed and advocated for over the course of your public career. We, obviously, have a profound disagreement. When I think about the suffering that I have seen of women around the world; I’ve been in hospitals in Brazil where half the women were enthusiastically and joyfully greeting new babies and the other half were fighting for their lives against botched abortions. I’ve been in African countries where 12 and 13-year-old girls are bearing children. I have been in Asian countries where the denial of family planning consigns women to lives of oppression and hardship…It is my strongly held view that you are entitled to advocate and everyone who agrees with you should be free to do so anywhere in the world, and so are we (the Obama Administration). We happen to think that family planning is an important part of women’s health and reproductive health includes access to abortion, that I believe should be safe, legal and rare. I’ve spent a lot of my time trying to bring down the rate of abortions and it has been my experience that good family planning and good medical care brings down the rate of abortion. Keeping women and men in ignorance and denied the access to services actually increases the rate of abortion…I’m sad to report that after an administration of eight years that undid so much of the good work (of the Clinton Administration), the rate of teenage pregnancy is going up (in the U.S.)…We are now an administration that will protect the rights of women including their rights to reproductive health care.
This statement eloquently confirms the Obama Administration’s commitment to the inalienable human right to life that pregnant women were born with; and that right to survive includes access to legal, safe abortions. The statement also makes clear that Pro-Choice supporters are not crazed baby killers: we are, instead, female protectors fighting for the safety and wellness of women, worldwide. We don’t cheer for abortion but instead believe it to be a necessary component to female reproductive health.
I fear, however, the administration now championed by the Secretary – i.e. that of President Barack Obama – does not share her passion. I fear that President Obama may be… distracted from the goals so clearly described in Madame Secretary’s speech. In July, the President hosted a “Beer Summit” at the White House in honor of a truce struck between affluent Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and a Cambridge, Mass. police officer who had – under national scrutiny – engaged in a “disorderly” scene, which resulted in… no damage to either party. Earlier this month, Obama traveled to Denmark in a failed attempt to woo the International Olympic Committee into naming Chicago, Illinois, his home town, as the site for the 2016 Olympic Games. And later this month, Obama hosted an all men’s basketball game at the White House. While he didn’t specifically restrict women players, he didn’t make a point of including them either; just as he doesn’t make a point of following women’s basketball. Personally, I don’t care what the President does during his free time; but on work time he should be cognizant of women’s equality.
The fact that the President is publicly, and “as the President,” interested in “man” activities like drinking beer, shooting hoops, welcoming a “big rambunctious dog” rather than a “girlie dog” into the White House and spectating the Olympics; combined with the fact that his wife seems more than happy to play the part of First Lady “Fashionista,” means that the U.S. is continuing to tolerate and even support traditional gender roles.
Traditionally, a woman might be expected to make way for her husband’s comments on major issues rather than issuing her own. It is possible that the reason a Secretary of State and former First Lady bristled when asked to speak for her husband at a question and answer forum in August in Kinshasa, Congo was because of the invocation of said tradition. News anchors rolled their eyes at the scene, but the offense was legitimate. This is 2009, not 1909. Women can and do vote, own property, hold public office, etc. And when a woman does hold an important position, her opinions on subjects relating to her office’s authority are of greater importance than any adjacent man’s: husband’s, President’s and former President’s alike.
I value your opinion, Hillary. I want to know why this misunderstanding of who we women are and what we can do exists in the U.S., masquerading as hatred and violence; and I want to know what we – what I – can do about it.
With deep admiration,
For all Americans who think it doesn’t happen here…
October 27, 2009
Police: Gang rape outside school dance lasted over two hours
Get angry about this! It still does happen in the United States. Here’s a rundown of the facts:
- 15-year-old girl gang raped for two and a half hours outside a school dance in San Francisco, CA (10-24-09)
- victim raped by at least four suspects committing multiple sex acts
- victim was found unconscious and “brutally assaulted” under a bench
- victim had to be flown to an area hospital where she was listed in critical condition before stabilizing on Monday
- as many as 15 people, all males, stood around watching the assault, but did not call police or help the victim
Do you find yourself asking the question, “Why did they do it?” There is no “why” great enough to justify this level of violence and hatred. There is no excuse!
Do not scare your daughters with this news; tell them to get angry! Collective anger is the best medicine for abuse. And tell your sons to get angry too. Tell them that this unsympathetic power-mongering WILL NOT BE TOLERATED!
A bag on a train
October 16, 2009
I often wonder where human decency has gone…drifted away, it seems, on a sea of righteous indignation. I try and make a point of analyzing and correcting my own behavior, the annoying habits I do that alienate my fellow (wo)man. My unhappiness about the dwindling supply of decency is compounded by the fact that it appears only I try to improve myself. Of course, this isn’t the case…it just seems that way when my emotions are racing.
There was a bag on the train this morning: lonely, overlapping a pair of seats. My husband and I had upgraded our tickets from Coach to Business Class in the hopes that leg room would be augmented. We hadn’t considered the human tendency to occupy two seats even when traveling alone. We meandered up and down the rows of the sole upgraded car looking for two seats together, finally deciding that we would have to sit across the aisle from each other and be satisfied. Row after row, people squeezed their bodies up against the train’s grimy windows as if fearing to catch Swine Flu from us. Their various carry-on parcels adorned neighboring seats.
I was just about to ask one stranger if she wouldn’t mind lifting her luggage from the aisle seat beside her when I spotted a pair of adjoining seats burdened only by a nondescript black bag. The only noticeable features about this parcel were that it bore a blue sticker stamped “CREW,” and it was not obviously connected to a warm body.
I thought of all the reasons for the bag to be there: somebody, a crewman, was saving his or her own seat for a return trip; the conductor, in haste, had dropped his or her luggage on the way to work, etc. I’m not terribly suspicious: I didn’t think about terrorism on Amtrak from Newark to Richmond. Why would Osama Bin Laden want to kill me on a visit to my younger brother, a hardworking college graduate who had just accepted his first “real” job at a non-profit institution where he saves lives and teaches little children to swim? He’s a good person. So am I. So is my husband. We’re liberal Americans. We want everyone to have healthcare, marriage, religious freedom, et. al. EVERYONE.
And we want everybody on the train to have a seat adjoining their loving spouse. We want everyone in a pair to be able to exchange encouraging caresses and anecdotes on their trips. This person, the bag owner, probably dropped his or her luggage and ran off to the bathroom, the café car or employment. It’s okay, I told myself. I’ll just move the bag onto the luggage rack next to the seat and we can sit down. Later, if someone comes back and intends to sit in this seat, I’ll relinquish it. After all, it’s “first come first serve.”
Or is it “finders keepers, losers weepers?” Which expression fits the situation best? Who gets to decide?
Certainly, a couple on a train cannot be expected to sit apart when they’ve upgraded their tickets and found a booth otherwise intended for a plain black bag.
I sat. I set about organizing my work station: six hours of uninterrupted blogging time awaited me. I have many topics and no time to write about them. Today, it’s the fatty, fat, fat supermodel fired for contractually violating her contract with a major clothing designer for being, well, fat: 5’10” and 120 pounds. The nerve! I should be writing about that! How can anyone be contractually obligated to an unhealthy weight? According to Weight Watchers – the cult of self-modification to which I belong, she should weigh a minimum of 139 pounds at that height. Boy, did I have a lot to say on this subject!
However, the moment I began to type, I was unceremoniously interrupted by a large man in a blue uniform. “There was a bag here,” he announced.
My husband scrambled at my left elbow. “Yes,” he or I replied apologetically. “Were you sitting here?” We gestured toward the bag resting three feet away.
The man glared down at us. “See, now, you shouldn’t have done that. You can’t move people’s bags. If I moved…we can’t even do that,” he ranted.
“I’m sorry but there were no seats together. We’re on the train for six hours and we’d like to sit…” I interjected politely. (I was very careful to keep calm at first.)
He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. There are seats. I come in here every day and I set my bag down right here. This is where it goes.”
“Do you mean that you’re not going to sit here, you just want to put your bag here?”
“That’s right.”
My husband could see that this was not sitting well with me – on principle. It’s always about the principle with me. After all, I had vowed to myself that my bottom, not being superior to anybody else’s bottom, would not take the seat of another. If he were going to sit in that exact seat, I was prepared to move to another and sit apart from my husband. My principle of self-improvement and basic humanity dictates that everyone is entitled to that seat: male, female, black, white, Jewish, Hindu, etc. EVERYONE.
Apparently, for this conductor, his “everyone” was everyone but paying customers. My husband, who had stood up in preparation to move, leaned down and whispered that it wasn’t worth getting upset over. “But I paid to upgrade my ticket, and we bought our tickets at the same time to sit together, and we are on the train for six hours…” I stated, loudly, in protest.
The conductor announced that he didn’t care. “I will not be treated like this,” he added.
“You won’t be treated like this?” I asked, yelling – oh, hell, I was practically screeching at that point and the tears of injustice had begun to well up in my lower eyelids. “You are kicking us out of a seat so your bag can sit here. I’m a paying customer. You can’t treat me like this! What are you, 8 years old?”
“No, I’m 9.”
At that point he turned his back to me and muttered something about how we could file a complaint with Amtrak through him. “Who is your supervisor?” I asked.
“Me.”
Oh, I couldn’t hold back. He was telling me, essentially, that my person – who had paid roughly $200 – was less important than his bag, which had paid nothing. He was rude and abrupt. And he had turned his back on me. “You’re an asshole!” I yelled with my face scrunched up like a 10-year-old’s. (For, if he’s 9, then I must be at least 10. I was right: just and correct.)
“Yes, and I’m going to be that for the rest of the trip,” he said, whipping around. “You can move or the next stop will be your last.”
My husband pleaded with me to move. My face was red. The tears were coming, and coming fast. And I still had to save my blog’s witty first sentence and turn off my laptop. I did so, begrudgingly, and moved down the corridor. After my dramatic exodus, the conductor lifted his bag back onto the seat and walked to the front of the car to collect tickets.
A very pleasant lady offered me her seat so that my husband could sit beside me. I thanked her through my tears. “Don’t give him any more of your tears,” she whispered gently, brushing my shoulder with a soft hand. This reassured me that others agreed our conductor was a despot in the same league as a Nazi soldier with a gun; he didn’t carry a gun but I suppose his hole-punch, blue uniform and cap provided him with supreme Amtrak Business Class train authority.
On his way past us, he collected our tickets and observed my blubbering hysterics. “Are we having a bad moment?” he quipped.
That was it! “I’ll have you fired, Dickwad!” I screamed. And as I partially stood and turned to make sure my message was delivered with brutal sonic force, I saw his lonely bag on a lonely chair.
I couldn’t help but feel a pang of guilt. If I’d learned anything working as a journalist, I’d learned that everyone – however modest or placid on the surface – has a story to tell, and an interesting one at that. EVERYONE. I had potentially undermined his: he might be a lonely man in a blue uniform and his bag may represent his solitary state, permanently installed with importance on “his” regular chair. It is quite possible that I overreacted demanding that others live by the principles I hold dear. The passengers got a fiery display of righteous indignation from both sides of the bag, so to speak. Either that, or my hysteria had ruined for them what was to be a relaxing vacation like mine.
There will in fact be plenty of days for feminist rants about too thin models and actresses and the corporations that exploit them. (Knock wood.) But today is the day that, on principle, I must continue to analyze and correct my behavior. I must remember my husband and his acceptance of the things we can’t change. I must remember the woman who graciously gave up her seat to console me. I must remember the bag on a train and what it represents: it has two sides just like every other story.
