From: adolphso@mizar.usc.edu (adolphson)
Newsgroups: soc.motss
Subject: Re: Changing standards of female beauty
Date: 4 Jan 1993 17:42:33 -0800
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
NNTP-Posting-Host: mizar.usc.edu

In article <1993Jan4.025343.5786@macc.wisc.edu> 
anderson@macc.wisc.edu (Jess Anderson) writes:

> In article <1i7tsdINN65@mizar.usc.edu>
> adolphso@mizar.usc.edu (Arne Adolphson) writes:

> >Fashion dictates only what you -- each and every one of you
> >-- allow it to dictate.  If you don't want to wear makeup,
> >dress fashionably -- and anyone who's ever seen me knows
> >that I'm rarely out of jeans, t-shirts and scuffed up
> >Reeboks -- slim down, pump up, whatever, then don't.
>
> There's some peril, ideologically speaking, in abstracting
> too slavishly from one's own examples.  [ ... ]

I have to admit that this is one of my major failings.  
It's what makes it so difficult for me to understand what's
so hard about coming out.  It wasn't difficult *for me*,
so what's the big deal?  I suppose I need an empathy 
booster shot.

> >In any case, each and every one of us "hides" behind masks,
> >whether makeup-based or not, every public moment of our
> >lives, and I don't see what's so wrong with that.
>
> I think that's pretty facile, as generalizations go.

Is it?  I'm not talking just about the ways people dress.
Are people their "real" selves all day at work?  And, while 
at work, do they show the same "face" to their subordinates 
that they show to those people higher up the totem pole?  
Do they show the same "face" while waiting in line at the 
bank that they do when they're at a large social event?  
I'm with Pirandello on this issue.  And I put the word 'hide' 
between quotation marks on purpose.  I don't think there's 
a "real" self underneath all the "false" social selves.

[ ... ]

> >Absolutely.  My roommate's most recent boytoy moved in a
> >couple of weeks ago, and the bathroom is now filled with
> >styling mousse, hairspray, skin bronzer (although since he's
> >Mexican, and hence naturally dark-skinned, I wonder why),
> >clay masques, two different shampoos and a collection of
> >conditioners and moisturizers for his hair, all sorts of
> >skin moisturizers and who knows what else.
>
> You give the impression (perhaps only to my ear, which would
> then say something more about me) that you don't entirely
> approve of this invasion of emollients into your bath.

Three people now share a *tiny* bathroom with about one square
foot of counter space.  So you're right.  I'm not very happy
that my toothpaste and shaving cream have been pushed aside
to make room for the boytoy's three different brands (I checked
this morning) of styling mousse.  His two different tubes of
clay masques.  His, well, you get the idea.

> Maybe this violates your sense of the simple, but it's my
> impression most gay men have very well furnished baths, with
> most of that stuff.  Besides, quite a lot of these products
> are rather fun.

Granted, but can't he have fun IN HIS OWN BATHROOM?

[ ... ]

> >But I think I should point out that 12+ years of living in
> >West Hollywood, the world capital of perfectly coiffed,
> >tanned, pumped-up muscleboys has not prompted me even once
> >to pick up a barbell, or to join a gym, or to get my hair
> >cut at a fab place, or to buy really nice clothes, or
> >anything like that.
>
> For every one of you (blashpemy!), 

Blashpemy?  Well, anyway, I suppose I do stick out in a 
West Hollywood crowd.

> there are dozens of
> people who buy into all that without the least hesitation.
> After all, West Hollywood *is* the capital of it, and they
> came from somewhere to make it so.

And they keep on coming.

[ ... ]

> >OK, how's this: it is facile to claim that the idea of
> >makeup is perpetuated solely by a handful of investors in
> >Revlon in order to make money.  Cosmetics have been used by
> >women (and men) in Western culture going all the way back to
> >the ancient Egyptians.  Makeup has *always* been
> >inextricably a part of our notions of personal grooming and
> >beauty.
>
> Personal decoration goes back much further than that, I'm
> sure, and in all cultures. 

I wonder what Todd thinks of tattoos and the ritualistic
mutilation of earlobes.

> However, I don't think this
> entirely sweeps away the thrust of Todd's remark, either.
> Makeup, as we know it here, is considerably more than just
> personal body decoration; it is part of a large-scale
> business enterprise, one in which patriarchal ideas play an
> integral part.

Well, yes, and Robert Coren does suggest in another article
that I haven't taken this into consideration.  It is true
that women are expected to wear makeup in many, perhaps even
most, business situations, still.  That is something that
*must* change.

> >>>>Thus, men are able to maintain a power structure that
> >>>>obviously favors men and puts-down women; and makes lots of
> >>>>money in the doing!
>
> >>>Snore.
>
> >>Not so much boring, to my mind, as unfocussed. 
>
> >No, it's boring because it's been repeated over and over and
> >over for the past 20 years, and I would have thought we were
> >beyond it.
>
> This is a curious comment, I think.  Irrespective of how
> many repetitions over how many years, we seem (to me) hardly
> a step closer to a society structured otherwise than Todd
> says.  I can't imagine being bored with that; frustrated,
> exhausted, perplexed, outraged, all manner of things, but
> hardly bored.  What is it, then, that we are "beyond?"

We're beyond -- *I'm* beyond -- thinking of makeup as the
evil.  Makeup is morally neutral.  What is wrong is the
belief that all women must wear makeup all the time.  Focus
on *that* and stop dumping on lipstick.

Arne


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