Why are so many women hellbent on acting against their own interest?

On the marital name-change thing, isn't this mostly about the paternity of any children (the patronymic in Icelandic and Russian serves the same function)? Its not unfeminist to acknowledge that you can always know a child's mother, but not its father.

Yeah, as I said it’s an Anglo thing. The two are not always linked. It’s only in your socialisation and your Anglo culture that they are linked and you are judging women in a multi-cultural society by an anglo lens.

Part of the reason is because what is good for an individual does not necessarily correlate with the needs of a group.

For example, shaving and wearing make-up is time consuming and isn't reciprocated by men (although men are more beauty conscious than they have been in my lifetime). I might know that it isn't a feminist activity, and I'm letting the side down. But if it gives me an individual advantage- more likely to meet an attractive man, more likely to get and keep a good husband and father, more confident in social situations, more likely to be noticed at work etc. then I do it anyway- the benefits easily outweigh the costs.

Then you have the impact of people's other values. So a woman might view an unborn child as a living being, and be more pro-life than I am. Or she might strongly believe in individual choice, and therefore believe that women can choose sex work if they like.

I think ideologies that shoehorn everyone into a group based on one characteristic or value, and expecting everyone in that group to agree with a tick box list of arguments, are failing, because they seem incapable of accounting for the other motivations people have before acting.

That sums it up for me. And the idea that women can’t know their own preferences is really shocking. What are our brains too small?

"Is this the Anglo take the husband’s surname thing? That is actually not due to being considered your husbands property. I know this because in my culture, women kept their surname but were still their husbands property."

You're jumping to a conclusion there.

A quick Google gave me this from a professor of social policy:

"This change in women’s identity, by taking a husband’s name, has emerged from patriarchal history where wives had no surname except “wife of X”. The wife was the husband’s possession and right up to the late 19th-century, women in England ceded all property and parental rights to husbands on marriage."
Why so many women still take their husband's last name (theconversation.com)

targeted marketing - makeup was generally promoted to women, while things like facial hair shaving products are promoted to men

in fact, since social media became a thing new products and procedure for men are gaining momentum (just ask any balding man)

No, I’m not saying I came up with the idea of make up myself.
I am saying that even in places where make up exists, is sold, and women wear it the cultural expectations across the whole place (country, region) isn’t always all woman are socialised to wear make up.
You are ignoring subcultures, religion, alternative lifestyles and so on.

Why do you think that so many women just happen to like makeup and just happen to feel insecure about going out into the world with just their normal face, but so few men just happen to like makeup and just happen to feel that they can't go out to the shop without painting their face up?

Righto, that’s like saying only women in the public eye are expected to wear makeup.

@Gwenhwyfar c'moooon, i don't believe this for a second, plenty of women don't wear makeup, trim their eyebrows or pluck their chin hair (especially older ones who run out of f-s to give).

"Not all women will have experienced the same girlhood/socialisation as you did."

They will have if they live in a place where women wear makeup!

I haven't been brainwashed. Influenced is maybe a better word.

Are you really claiming you came up with the idea of makeup all by yourself? It was lucky it was already sold in the shops, wasn't it?

Sorry what? Is this the Anglo take the husband’s surname thing? That is actually not due to being considered your husbands property. I know this because in my culture, women kept their surname but were still their husbands property. The taking your husbands surname is more about identity in a patrilineal society than ownership.

@Mumoftwo1312 so basically some women expect other women to put on makeup while some other women get mad that women put on makeup

so would it not be within my own interest to ignore both groups and go with my own preferences?

"Just like we can all think of women who don’t pluck their chin hairs."

I don't know any women who walk around with chin hairs.

But that's irrelevant to my point, which was that I don't agree that ageing men, who are not in the public eye, are expected to deal with their eyebrows, etc.

Ok, so you feel you are brainwashed by society to like makeup. This doesn’t mean your feelings hold true for all women though. Not all women will have experienced the same girlhood/socialisation as you did.

"Why is the “feminist choice” the choice that you think is feminist? "

Well, it's not the one that was meant to show you were part of your husband's property, that's for sure.

Of course, you can do what you want, it's not about me or anyone else telling you what do, but don't be in denial about it.

and I can think of plenty of women who don't shave or otherwise remove hair from their bodies...so?

Just like we can all think of women who don’t pluck their chin hairs. Nonconforming individuals always exist, even if a ruling coven of women dictate all women should not pluck their chin hairs, there will be nonconforming women who choose to.

I never said they did. (Neither did op.) Very odd you keep attributing opinions to me that I haven't expressed.

"So women who like makeup are just brainwashed and not enlightened? They can’t possibly truly like it of their own choice?"

No woman is an island. We are all part of society.

I wear makeup, but I'm not going to pretend I came to like it all by myself, independently of the society I live in.

@Mumoftwo1312 so maybe it's not men who set those standards?

Why is the “feminist choice” the choice that you think is feminist? Have you thought about that? That feminism was about empowering women to make their own choices, not choices dictated to them by another woman? We get enough of that from our mothers!

"It's as though they think that they have some sort of entitlement to see all of a women."

I think this is a pretty recent thing with online dating, filters and the like.

"In a similar vein, aging men are expected to remove ear hair and bushy eyebrow hair."

If they're in the public eye, yes. Ordinary men, I'm not so sure. I'm sure we can all think of men who have ear hair, bushy eyebrows or long nostril hair.

So women who like makeup are just brainwashed and not enlightened? They can’t possibly truly like it of their own choice?