make up and 6yo DD - what to do?

[resisterpersister]

Please help me deal with this situation!

DD's cousins came to visit yesterday, and gave 6yo DD a make up set. The cousins rarely visit and I didn't feel up to souring the visit by rejecting the gift in front of them. So she spent yesterday with her cousins, covering themselves with make up. She bloody loves it. First thing she did this morning? Put more make up on.

Lots of DD's classmates are allowed to play with make up, but she knows I won't buy it for her. I don't wear it myself. I talk to her in an age appropriate way about why I don't like make up and don't wear it.

If it was up to me, this would never have come in the house! But it's here now. I could just take it away, but I'm worried that'll make it into a huge thing, I'm not sure if that'll achieve anything other than make her want it more and feel she's been treated unjustly (and, oh, do I remember the times I felt my parents were being unjust to me!)

I suppose I could let her play with it for a few days till she forgets about it and then quietly "lose" it. (Is that cowardly?)

I could impose boundaries around it (what?). She's already said she wants to wear it to school every day and I've said errr... no!

We've been talking a bit about why adults wear make up, and I've told her about how if you wear make up every day, it's a bit like it casts a spell on you and you feel you can't go outside without wearing it, and we talked about how much of a pain that would be if her friend came round to ask her to play, but she missed out because she couldn't just leave the house.

What do I do, oh wise FWR women? I want to just throw the bloody thing away, but I'm worried about creating a bigger deal out of it and making it an even greater object of desire!

The age on the box say 5+ . Who makes this stuff FFS?

Society treats women better when they wear make-up.

Kelly , because to pretend I have anything other than virtual tea to offer would be wrong, but I'd send you strength and support over the internet if I could.

I also agree with everything you said. There are many reasons why people wear make-up.

No response to people’s real concerns about your golliwog analogy, OP?

You’ve gone out of your way to make it clear that you’re not “new to feminism” (by suggesting other posters are) so I am surprised you don’t seem more attuned to why that was problematic.

It does seem dismissive to ignore the point several ppl have addressed, when you’ve spent so much time replying to posts against which you presumably feel better equipped to argue.

So I’m going to power on through my female-socialisation-politeness and say more clearly here now that I think it was deeply racially insensitive, and you ought to take some time to think over how you understand race within the context of your feminism. And I know it’s not the point of your thread. But i think something like that deserves acknowledgement.

Really, radical feminism is a whole world view; a systemic way of looking at the world - as well as a deconstruction of oppressive patriarchy and the way it operates. Certainly for me. And that includes our approach to the earth and to the other creatures upon it. I think in a system in which animals are factory farmed and so grossly exploited and abused is profoundly un-feminist.

Make -up can become a prison for some; an irrelevance for others; but for others a liberation of sorts. Of course, the beauty 'industry' is exploitative - as are most industries. Attempts at beautifying the body are not, in themselves, profoundly wrong, though. I guess it depends on what the make-up means to the person using it is the crux of the issue.

I paint my younger brothers (8 and 5) nails, the eldest dyes his hair too but will still go out and be "boyish", do they need to be told they shouldn't go out and play football or play pretend guns as not to conform to the standards? Of course not. So why should our girls be any different?*

Exactly this. Girls are being told they are to actively avoid anything deemed feminine, why is that?

i think something like that deserves acknowledgement

I haven't responded because I want to think about it before responding.

But, apologies, you're absolutely right it does deserve acknowledgement, I should have said that.

I think in a system in which animals are factory farmed and so grossly exploited and abused is profoundly un-feminist

How is that a feminist issue? It is actually an issue which concerns me far more than about 90% of the stuff which is discussed on here. Women can stand up for themselves- animals can't.

Like Prawn I can remember being scolded and made to feel unwelcome by feminists in the 70s. It stays with you a long time.

For what it's worth, I wouldn't be happy about a 6 year old girl being given make up either, and I think you've had some sensible advice. But for me, your concerns - eloquently as you've expressed them - don't explain the disdain that oozes out from some of your posts. I guess you are new to feminism. Pull up a chair, where shall we start... What in hell were you thinking?

It's one thing being high handed with 'a bunch of people' (your words) on the internet, quite another if your daughter grows up to genuinely love make up - as some women do - or if she makes some 'nice but dim' (also your words) friends who love it. Or if she just enjoys winding you up. She certainly know which buttons to push.

Society treats women better when they wear make-up

Does it? I suppose you need to define “better”. I suppose women in make up may be treated better than women who don’t from a male perspective- they’re more likely to be helpful, or chivalrous perhaps.

In the science world I’d say the opposite- women in full make up at work are more likely to be thought of as “girly”- and stereotyped as interested in pink and handbags- relegated to secondary roles like admin or technician.

I don’t feel like I am treated any better wearing make up. I do feel like I am treated less equally- it seems to signal i am a “girly girl” and should be treated as such.

Exactly this. Girls are being told they are to actively avoid anything deemed feminine, why is that?

Are they? I certainly don’t. As i said up thread make up is fine, but I emphasize the feminist angle that people, imo, don't look better, their natural faces are fine.

Growing up I hated the double standard. As a 70’s child I was told I could do anything boys could, be anything I wanted. Then every social occasion I’d be pressured into a frilly dress, jewellery, sandals and bags, and as I got older high heels and make up. If i tried to leave the house without make up i’d be told to “put a bit of lipstick on, give your face some colour”. But the boys were never told that, so how could we be equal when being female was clearly about looks over everything?

But not all of us can or want to live on that edge, in that way - or have been exposed to the extremities of things in the way she was.

Does Andrea Dworkin's experience of male violence, which many, many women and girls have experienced in various hideous forms somehow make her analysis and political understanding of the beauty standards women face any less valid? I would argue that it doesn't. In fact I think it's irrelevant and a weak attempt to dismiss what she was saying.

You're kind of wandering off the point. You tried to use Dworkin as an example of a radical feminist who apparently had more important things to think about than the harms makeup and the beauty industry do to women. Except she didn't. In her very first book on feminism she wrote about it in detail, and came to the same conclusion as the OP. Radical feminists recognise female oppression in all its forms. The fact that our natural selves are deemed ugly and unattractive and we have to paint masks on our faces to make them acceptable is a feminist issue and one that matters. It's good that the OP is thinking about it and wants to help her daughter avoid the trap that so many of us fall into.

The fact that our natural selves are deemed ugly and unattractive and we have to paint masks on our faces to make them acceptable is a feminist issue and one that matters.

Where do you draw the line though? Are clothes and jewellery also anti-feminist? Many men and women enjoy expressing themselves through their appearance. Is this somehow less valid because it's something that is associated with being feminine?

It's not that Andrea Dworkin's opinion is wrong - she looked at this issue from a particular perspective. It's just that other perspectives are available.

It's good that the OP is thinking about it and wants to help her daughter avoid the trap that so many of us fall into

Yes, it's good and necessary. Nobody has disputed that. The contention for some arose in the way in which the thread was started - with openness and solicitation of views & advice on the issue - but then by the way those views were dismissed as somehow being unworthy. And in quite rude ways, too. Personally surprised to see a thread about make-up in the first place really. I'd have thought it better suited to another board - since it is all pretty old hat, standard stuff, which most of us dealt with and ruminated upon years ago.

As it happens, I think most of us who have had children, especially girls, have been through the same process. I certainly have - but like many others have come to a far less strident position and view. I'm far more relaxed now I have a granddaughter. My daughter has not turned out to be a simpering idiot - so I think I've done o.k there. Sometimes first children bear the brunt of parental anxiety and inexperience.

I decide what my point is, and how I choose to express it. I prefer a more conversational style. I think when people share something of themselves and their life, in the spirit of openness, it is just good practice to show a little modicum of respect, and maybe even try to address directly some of the points. I'm not trying to make out I'm better than anyone in the decisions I make, or have made in my life, and i certainly don't need to be told how to do 'feminism'

Anyhow, it seems like a good idea to quote Dworkin on this. I don't see her saying anywhere that a woman who wears makeup is a "bad feminist" or can't be a feminist. Her argument is that the beauty standards that are forced upon us mean that women aren't free:

"Standards of beauty describe in precise terms the relationship that an individual will have to her own body. They prescribe her mobility, spontaneity, posture, gait, the uses to which she can put her body. They define precisely the dimensions of her physical freedom. And, of course, the relationship between physical freedom and psychological development, intellectual possibility, and creative potential is an umbilical one.

"In our culture not one part of a woman's body is left untouched, unaltered,. No feature or extremity is spared the art, or pain of improvement. Hair is dyed, lacquered, straightened, permanented; eyebrows are plucked, penciled, dyed; eyes are lined, mascared, shadowed; lashes are curled or false - from head to toe, every feature of a woman's face, every section of her body, is subject to modification, alteration. This alteration is an ongoing repetitive process. It is vital to the economy, the major substance of male-female role differentiation, the most immediate physical and psychological reality of being a woman. From the age of 11 or 12 until she dies, a woman will spend a large part of her time and money, and energy of binding, plucking, painting and deoderizing herself.

"....Pain is an essential part of the grooming process, and that is not accidental. Plucking the eyebrows, shaving under the arms, wearing a girdle, learning to walk in high-heeled shoes, having one's nose fixed, straightening or curling one's hair - these things hurt. The pain, of course, teaches an important lesson: no price is too great, no process to repulsive no operation too painful for the woman who would be beautiful. The tolerance of pain and the romanticisation of that tolerance begins here, in preadolescence, in socialization, and serves to prepare women for lives of childbearing, self-abnegation and husband-pleasing.

"....Men of course like a woman who "takes care of herself'. The male response to the woman who is made-up and bound is a learned fetish, societal in its dimensions. One need only refer to the male idealization of the bound foot and say that the same dynamic is operating here. Romance based on role differentiation, superiority based on a culturally determined and rigidly enforced inferiority, shame and guilt and fear of women and sex itself: all necessitate the perpetuation of these oppressive grooming imperatives.

"...A first step in the process of liberation (women from their oppression, men from the unfreedom of their fetishism) is the radical redefining of the relationship between women and their bodies. The body must be freed, liberated quite literally: from paint and girdles and all varieties of crap. Women must stop mutilating their bodies and start living in them. Perhaps the notion of beauty which will then organically emerge will be truly democratic and demonstrate a respect for human life in its infinite, and most honorable, variety."

"

The fact that our natural selves are deemed ugly and unattractive and we have to paint masks on our faces to make them acceptable

We know all of this.....and not everyone wears a touch of make-up because they feel ugly and unworthy.

Where do you draw the line though?

I draw the line when women feel they don’t have a choice.

Women who don’t feel they can leave the house or open the door with no make up. Women who always say they look “better” with make up on, that they look tired or ill without it. Women who say they have to use make up so they don’t scare children/dogs/horses.

Bottom line is women look perfectly fine without make up. We are just indoctrinated into thinking glossy lips and underlined eyes is more beautiful. Hairless bodies like a barbie doll.

I also draw the line at women extending make up into artificial. Lip fillers, tattooed eyebrows, contouring, false eyelashes, beyond looking better and into cariacture. I saw one teen yesterday who looked like her fashion inspiration was robbie rotten.

Then you go so far over the line and into cosmetic surgery.

If anyone still doesn't agree with OP, pull up a chair and she'll mansplain it to you 🙄

Where do you draw the line merrymouse? Is L'Oreal OK? How about Laura Mercier, high heels or lycra body shaping underwear (corsets) and of course actual corsets. How about foot binding? Both men and women were keen on that.

The contention for some arose in the way in which the thread was started - with openness and solicitation of views & advice on the issue - but then by the way those views were dismissed as somehow being unworthy. And in quite rude ways, too. Personally surprised to see a thread about make-up in the first place really. I'd have thought it better suited to another board - since it is all pretty old hat, standard stuff, which most of us dealt with and ruminated upon years ago.

I think the OP thought that too - that make-up and beauty standards for women are sexist and misogynistic and that most feminists are on board with that. She just needed help in how to approach the subject with her young daughter in a feminist and positive way. Apparently not though. It doesn't seem to be old-hat in the slightest and some women are clearly very invested in defending make-up from any analysis. Quite why, I can't make out. I checked the thread though, to see whether the OP was rude, and she wasn't. She disagreed with what was being said to her, the minimisation of a feminist issue. On the other hand the OP was told she was a harpy and that she wasn't a feminist. I can see where the rudeness was coming from and it wasn't the OP. There was also that crack about teddy bears picnics. As Mumsnet might say "not in the spirit".

As it happens, I think most of us who have had children, especially girls, have been through the same process. I certainly have - but like many others have come to a far less strident position and view. I'm far more relaxed now I have a granddaughter. My daughter has not turned out to be a simpering idiot - so I think I've done o.k there. Sometimes first children bear the brunt of parental anxiety and inexperience.

Did you really use the word "strident" to describe a feminist position? We've been dealing with misogynistic criticisms like that for years from people who don't like their patriarchal practices analysed. I really don't expect to see it on FWR, but there you go.

I don't think women who wear make-up are simpering idiots, the question is whether they are oppressed and whether patriarchal beauty standards serve to further that oppression.

"If anyone still doesn't agree with OP, pull up a chair and she'll mansplain it to you"

Actually what she said was this:

"Do you recognise that sexism, on a macro level, kills millions of girls and women?

If not, I guess you are new to feminism. Pull up a chair, where shall we start..."

Women and girls die or are never given the chance to live because of global sexism and misogyny. It is literally life and death for all of us.

Don't her actual words and arguments get in the way of having a go at her though. Bloody disgraceful.

I am 100% with you OP. I have absolutely no problem with women who choose to wear make-up (most do), and I am not suggesting it should be banned. But I view the make-up “system” as one that is profoundly damaging to women as a class. It supports and perpetuates the idea that we as women (more than men) have some sort of obligation (however mild) to make ourselves look younger/more attractive/more conventional. Sadly make-up in general is not about “playing with colour” - it is more often about removing blemishes, making our lips and eyelashes look more conventionally “beautiful” etc etc. It is indeed on a spectrum with lots of other things I am not keen on (including Brazilian waxing, hair straightening and ear-piercing). I don’t know exactly where “the line” is -and I definitely stray over it myself sometimes- but make-up for young girls is definitely the wrong side of it in my book.

So I would not allow make-up as a toy in my house. Same as I don’t allow toy guns, barbies, or, indeed, golliwogs. Not because makeup is just like golliwogs (it isn’t) but because both are toys that don’t fit into my moral system.

I would wait till it hasn’t been played with for a couple of days then lose it.

Telling anyone to pull up a chair and learn, when they already know what happens, is patronising.

ethronium read the full thread and you'll see my point. I was asked to pull up a chair whilst she explained feminism to me...

If she'd not been so patronising and difficult , I would have agreed with a lot of what she said. But after that, I think I have a right to be put out by her!

I appreciate your point but I think you’re overreacting. Plenty of feminists wear make up on a daily basis (their choice and what they feel comfortable with). It makes you no less a feminist to wear make up if you’re raising her in a supportive way with feminist values this will have far more impact on her views and opinions than wearing a bit of make up at home aged 6

I find the Dworkin quote such a huge exaggeration.

the most immediate physical and psychological reality of being a woman

Really?

I'm also supportive of the general sense that women's appearance has demands upon it that men's doesn't, and this is a problem.

But I am less inclined to categorise individual elements of that as only good or bad. I don't think that a particular thing, say earrings, or the colour pink, is conventionally male or female, makes it a problem. I don't think that stuff is very important.
What is important is when something begins to present much more of a burden than it ought to. Human beings will always put a certain amount of effort into grooming, to some extent it is part of being healthy. It's also always going to have a social element, it's not going to be a wholly individual choice - people are influenced by the popular perception, even pressured.
It's a problem when it is practices, and expectations, that are really unhealthy, or really time-consuming, or really expensive. And that is true even if they are things men and women do. That applies to clothing, hair removal, make-up, body modification, whatever.
On the other hand, if it's not dangerous, time consuming, or very expensive, it's got to be less of a problem.
Make-up doesn't necessarily qualify as those things. So it becomes a matter of preference to me. And the kind of make-up that is fairly inexpensive and quick also isn't usually so far out that it significantly affects our beauty standards. People can go without if they want and not look way out of the norm.
In my experience coming down on something that is not extreme as if it is extreme tends to be counterproductive.