Lipstick what is the reason that women (the old fashioned type) wear it.

@Neverpostagain

Then later still (now) by women who pretend to believe that they do it to feel happy themselves

Please clarify what you are saying, you're saying that women do not wear lipstick just for themselves? They wear it to please men and just pretend it's to make themselves happy? Is that correct?

You've read rather a lot into that single sentence.

You haven't said anything that contradicts my statement that if men want to dress flamboyantly they can (and a few do).

If a man wore an emerald green velvet suit with long hair and heeled boots (very 60s) people would stare.

That doesn't mean that they couldn't wear such clothes, and some men might like the attention.

Most people conform to the social norms of their time/place. Obviously. Most people don't want to be stared at. Obviously.

My comparison was to different times or places in which people could face real penalties such as being arrested for not conforming. This was in response to another poster suggesting that what people wear now is all due to one person who lived 200 years ago. Times change.

To suggest that my comment indicates that I don't understand "intellectual history, the power of societal attitudes and conformism" is absurd.

I never wear lipstick. I'd rather spend the money on a book* or a cake.

*Ideally one by JK Rowling

It’s sad that expectations of women are so ingrained we cannot differentiate choice from conditioning.
Nobody has a face that looks washed out or wrong without make up. Your face is just how it should be.

Absolutely. This is the historical reason. So mainly worn be prostitutes. Then later by loads of women who wanted to appease men. Then later still (now) by women who pretend to believe that they do it to feel happy themselves. And pretend not to know the historical reason.

The old fashioned type? What is that all about OP?

I can't tell you why I like it, I went years without wearing any makeup at all, and then I got into it again, it's like an exercise in art that I can take off and try again the next day. Or not. I don't feel pressured into wearing makeup. It does make me feel different when I wear it. Sometimes I forego lipstick but focus on foundation or base or just primer and powder.

Makeup must be seen as essentially female because men who drag up use it in an exaggerated way

Because you said this: if men want to dress flamboyantly they can (and a few do).

There are no advertisements, men's magazines, articles showing men in beautiful colorful clothes and praising it. If a man wore an emerald green velvet suit with long hair and heeled boots (very 60s) people would stare. Regular men receive the unstated message that this is not the norm.

The 60s did leave us with the omnipresent validation of youth culture so regular men do dye their hair, lie on tanning beds, have plastic surgery, all very discreetly, to look youthful.

You don't seem to understand Old Crone intellectual history, the power of societal attitudes and conformism.

What makes you think that?

You don't seem to understand Old Crone intellectual history, the power of societal attitudes and conformism.

Supposedly this was a European wide phenomenon arising out of the French Revolution and the Enlightenment. Men wore utilitarian clothes and were practical and useful, women were frivolous adornments and so fashionable.

This remained the ongoing socially acceptable view of the sexes and dressing until the culturally revolutionary 1960s when men shockingly grew their hair long.
This continued until the end of The New Romantics (thank you) and with the 90s and powerful marketing we have regressed. I don't find it strange at all that societally men are beard and mustache-wearing like the Victorians and trying to end women' rights.

Most men I’ve encountered (in a relationship context) don’t like me wearing lipstick, as they worry it will come off on them if I kiss them. Even when I assure them it’s a long stay type and demo it not coming off on my hand.

As a teen I always wore red lipstick - it was something of a trademark for me - and boys nicknamed me BJ Lips, as it obviously drew attention to my lips and made them think about what I could do with them. If my labia looked like that I’d be very concerned!

As I’ve got older my lips have gone a bluish pink colour making me look dead. So now I use warmer pinks to try and put some life back in my face, the same way I wear blusher to make my cheeks look less deathly, and concealer for my under eye bags, eyeliner for my sparse lashes and dye for my grey roots, just trying to approximate the youthful glow I’ve lost.

People did all sorts of things 200 years ago that we've long since abandoned. If men want to dress flamboyantly they can (and a few do). Women don't have to wear make up or dress to look pretty and feminine if they don't want to.

None of us should have to paint our faces in order to be deemed trustworthy or worthy of employment.

Blame Beau Brummell! He very determinedly invented the notion that masculine fashion was meant to be understated and austere and should not be flouncy or colourful and those things were feminine.

Before then men wore powder and patch if they were aristocratic (and neither working class men or women did)

Exactly. And the implication is that men look good enough as they are, while the female body needs a lot of hard work even for the person inside it to be trustworthy!

I agree with you. I don’t need to be coerced into a performance of acceptable public-facing feminine self-presentation when I’m recovering from surgery.

'Chivvying' is execrable what I was imagining. I'm probably being a bit touchy about it, but I do think normalising 'doing hair and make up' as being part of 'feeling yourself', particularly after surgery that is likely to make women feel they have lost something of their femininity, is problematic.

Karensalright · 07/03/2024 23:36
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@JaneJeffer i dont know that is why i am asking, on a feminist board, duh”

So feminists can’t enjoy wearing lipstick?

I just went back through the thread to find the post you were talking about (which I didn't remember at all). This is what she said:

Every morning the nurses would chivvy those ladies to get up, get dressed and do hair & makeup.

'Chivvy' is more like encourage than instruct, and if the encouragement was to just get up, washed and dressed, then I'd see that as positive.

Not sure if you were the original poster, but that sounds a bit different from the first post I read. And much more reasonable.

I'm not sure how I'd react if I was in that situation, being 'instructed' to put on make up and 'do' my hair just after having a major operation. I never wear make up and doing my hair in the morning consists of a quick brush through.

I'd say I don't wear make up. I don't. All I'd have with me woul be toothbrush/ toothpaste, hairbrush and lipbalm. Possibly moisturiser, but I often forget that when I'm away from.home.

Having clean teeth and hair usually makes me feel better, but being expected to wear make-up would just make me laugh.

I don't remember the word used in the post, and I'm sure it wasn't an order... but I can well imagine the nurses thinking they are doing a good thing by strongly encouraging these poor post-op women to do these 'normal' things to make themselves feel better, and - specifically - still feminine. Like you, I never wear make-up, and 'doing my hair' takes about 30 seconds (see username)... I'm pretty sure I'd be severely pissed off by it.

Not sure that’s quite right - we were encouraged to dress in a way that made us feel good for ourselves. It’s a thing that if you lose something like a bosom and your hair, you can lose ‘you’ and stop caring for yourself and get very depressed.
no one instructed you to wear lipstick! I don’t, but they were right, a hot shower wand clean pjs worked wonders. They also gave me a little bottle of shower gel a kind company had donated (Baylis) I don’t know if they ever realised what an amazingly powerful donation that was.

It is an interesting question, and I do find the replies interesting, because I simply don't get it. It's surprisingly hard to understand why other people do the things they do.

Something doesn't have to be spelt out in words of one syllable to be an expectation.

Maybe it does for some of us. But in your example it is being spelt out, if the nurses are actually 'instructing' these women to do those things.

I'm not sure how I'd react if I was in that situation, being 'instructed' to put on make up and 'do' my hair just after having a major operation. I never wear make up and doing my hair in the morning consists of a quick brush through.

Love lipstick but it bothers me that men v few men wear make up. If it was really about ‘feeling good’ etc they would wear it too. It’s really about conforming to cultural ‘beauty’ norms.