#Beauty Industry

[lorynna]

this is so sad I don't think i need to add anything

[obj4soul]

Women's clothing sucks. And I now firmly believe that one of the reason women are more obsessed about their weight is because of clothing. Growing up I mostly wore mens/boys clothing and I never had to think about size, waist, etc. The clothes won't hug my thighs in the sense that would make me conscious of them while moving. If the waist was too big id grab a belt. Plus the design of pants and tshirts was pretty standard.

Now during my late teens, early twenties i started going towards more women's clothing. Because i felt I had to look more feminine. And HOLY SHIT. It sucked. BAD. First the material. Its so bad and thin and cost more than guys clothes. No standard Tshirt fit, everything has a different shoulder to chest ratio. The pants are either too tight, hug your ass and thighs too much or are too baggy to be comfortable. And the waist. Holy shit. Ive been underweight till I was 23 (medical reasons). And I didnt have a lot of problem with the waist thing then (see where this is going) but the moment I kicked my illness and gained weight and got into normal weight range, dude the waist thing became a big issue. FIRST of all. For guys the waist end at waist, the hip bone area. Not for women. Most clothes go above the hip bones, some even over the belly button. If the thing feels right standing up, youll suffocate sitting down. And even if its elastic waistband, its sitting on your stomach, it does not have a bone to support it and it feels uncomfortable. (Maybe I have some sensory issue, I don't know about yall but I dont like being conscious of clothes sticking to my body). And now to the main point. I never had any issue with waist being uncomfortable when I was underweight or when I wear boys pants (really pants made for boys get more humanly consideration than women) and the moment i got into normal range, the womens pants saying they are my waist size fit pretty snug and tight around my waist, ass and thighs. But still till this day I never face this issue with my boys pants. Today while trying on some pants that my mom gifted me that said their waist was a size bigger than mine I found then uncomfortable and started thinking should I lose some weight? And that fucking blew my mind because I am already thin and in a pretty normal range of BMI. Those clothes feel comfortable as long as you are underweight. That is insane. Seriously. Ladies if this the case with you all. Or maybe some of you. Ditch the women's section. If you are short like me, go for the boys section or else mens. These fucking clothing sizes and designs are not made thinking of your comfort in mind. Now im gonna go to the store and exchange the pants for some boys khaki pants.

I think this is just one face of how the system is designed to make you feel uncomfortable and doubt yourself. You see how much waist room guys get? We are the same species after all. What the fuck. Do you make different size clothing for male and female cats or monkeys? No fucking other species have such a wide difference in body shape than what humans are told we have.

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Collagen craze drives deforestation and rights abuses

For the first time an investigation has linked collagen powder to violence against Indigenous peoples in Brazilian forests

The stench arrives before the lorries do. They are carrying skins that were stripped from cattle carcasses days ago. Flies are everywhere.

The lorries’ destination is Amparo, a small industrial town in São Paulo state, southeastern Brazil. Here, Rousselot, a company owned by the Texan business Darling Ingredients, extracts collagen – the active ingredient in health supplements at the centre of a global wellness craze.

But while collagen’s most evangelical users claim the protein can improve hair, skin, nails and joints, slowing the ageing process, it has a dubious effect on the health of the planet. Collagen can be extracted from fish, pig and cattle skin, but behind the wildly popular “bovine” variety in particular lies an opaque industry driving the destruction of tropical forests and fuelling violence and human rights abuses in the Brazilian Amazon.

An investigation by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, the Guardian, ITV and O Joio e O Trigo has found that tens of thousands of cattle raised on farms damaging tropical forests were processed at abattoirs connected to international collagen supply chains.

Some of this collagen can be traced all the way to Nestlé-owned Vital Proteins, a major producer of collagen supplements championed by the actress Jennifer Aniston. Vital Proteins is sold globally – including online on Amazon, in Walmart stores in the US, in Holland & Barrett and Boots in the UK and in Costco in both countries.

The investigation – the first to connect bovine collagen with tropical forest loss and violence against Indigenous peoples – found at least 2,600 sq km of deforestation linked to the supply chains of two Brazil-based collagen operations with connections to Darling: Rousselot and Gelnex, which is in the process of being acquired by Darling for $1.2bn. It is unclear how much of this deforestation, which was calculated by the Center for Climate Crime Analysis, is linked to Vital Proteins.

Continue reading.

[novy2sirius]

Hey babe,

What placements, aspects or degrees in your natal chart can indicate getting fame from your beauty?

The main indications of fame from your beauty

— personally from what i’ve seen it’s mostly venusian, martian, and neptunian energy which also makes sense astrologically speaking

the most common ones i’ve seen

• | aries/taurus/libra/pisces sun

• | sun in 1h/7h

• | aries/taurus/leo/libra/pisces ascendant

• | aries/taurus/libra/pisces midheaven

• | black moon lilith in 1h

• | lots of 1°/5°/9°/25° in chart (especially if it’s the sun/venus/neptune)

placements

• | sun in 1h/2h/7h/12h

• | aries/taurus/libra/pisces midheaven

• | aries/taurus/libra/pisces ascendant

• | venus/mars/neptune in the 1h/5h/10h

• | aries/leo/pisces venus

• | chart ruler in aries/taurus/libra/pisces

• | chart ruler in 1h/10h/11h

aspects

• | mars/venus/neptune to sun

• | mars/venus/neptune to midheaven

• | mars/venus/neptune to ascendant

• | venus to neptune

• | venus to mars

degrees

— in my personal opinion i think the numerology degrees are more accurate but it’s up to personal interpretation

• | aries degrees (1°/13°/25°)

• | taurus degrees (2°/14°/26°)

• | libra degrees (7°/19°)

• | pisces degrees (12°/24°)

• | 1°/10° - according to numerology

• | 5°/14°/23° - according to numerology

• | 9°/18°/27° - according to numerology

other

• | black moon lilith in 1h/7h/10h

• | venus/mars/neptune dominant

• | aries/taurus/libra/pisces dominant

• | born under the goat/tiger/dragon vietnamese zodiac

• | born on a tuesday or friday

astrology behind this

• | sun = how we can gain fame

• | venus = beauty/attractiveness

• | mars = sex appeal (which most models have)

• | neptune = higher octave of venus/ethereal beauty

• | ascendant = what we’re known for in general

• | 2h = face (some astrologers disagree)

• | 7h = attractiveness

• | 10h = fame/what we’re known by the public for

• | 12h = ethereal beauty

• | lilith = related to sex appeal

honorable mentions

• | moon/pluto in the 1h/10h

• | sun/moon/uranus dominance

• | aphrodite asteroid in 10h/12h - code: 1388

• | poseidon asteroid in 10h/12h - code: 4341

• | leo/pisces aphrodite asteroid

• | leo/pisces poseidon asteroid

- novy2sirius - plz don’t copy me word for word

[scum-man-of-pesto]

This is SO REAL like first of all, the matriarchy they initially had was still this hyper-feminine mess where all the barbies still had to look perfect and attractive and have their hair and makeup done etc wereas the Kens simply, did not. Not to mention Alan even. And then still the only pressing harm of the Barbie-run society was that Barbie didn't give Ken much of her time in the way that he wanted her to, and as a result he subjugated every woman in the world?? He made all the Barbies ramp up the performance of the male gaze, spoke down to them, stole their literal houses and hard work, and enslaved them, and then the message was still like "uwu Barbie should've given more time to Ken so he didn't react this way" like no FUCK OFF are you kidding? The Barbies should've just systematically eliminated the Kens because at best they're useless and at worst they're clamoring to cause actual material harm. I WISH the movie lived up to "deeply bizarre and anti-man". It's actually really telling where we are in society that so many see this as an actually radical perspective filled with man-hate when it was literally so coddling to men. Don't get me wrong either, I did enjoy it for what it was like I know it wasn't going to go into an actual deep leftist analysis or anything but this reaction to it as though it had is making me nuts

[edonee]

"my eyeliner is sharp enough to kill a man"

they are shaking I'm sure

[icedsodapop]

All the lightskinned gurlies jumping on Black and Brown beauty vloggers' videos when they criticize how a makeup product is not inclusive enough (typically becos said product cannot be seen on darker skintones), saying bullshit like this:

And bringing up how the product is actually good for very lightskinned pple like those with albinism and accusing Black and Brown beauty vloggers of ableism. My lightskinned sisters in delusion, then yall should be fighting for these beauty brands to hire albino models for their marketing campaigns instead of subjecting Black and Brown pple to your racism. Don't pretend to care about pple with skin conditions for your concern-trolling.

[aman1taverna]

I guess I'm a man now?

[gynoids-over-androids]

I recently saw a reel on Instagram showing a woman using a relaxer and one of the comments said smth like "hey just for your information, this relaxer has a class action lawsuit because it gave women who used it cancer" in a VERY neutral tone, she just wrote it as a fact. and I shit you not the replies to this comment were all "well it's her choice to use it even if it's carcinogenic!! Omg not everyone likes natural hair, you pickme!"

Real "omg it's her choice to bind her feet!" vibes. It's so absurd and evil.

[petrichara]

Actually I’m not going to listen to you describe a feature of my body like a problem while trying to sell me your product

[lorynna]

Nothing about this is "bold" (the original word used to describe this path before translation in the description was "brave")

If this surgery was done due to health reasons it would be something completely different but aesthetic surgeries to better fit into society's beauty standards is rather the opposite of brave.

Because I understand the pressure of a woman's performance and the expectations that rest upon her shoulders I want to clarify that I don't support insults towards them or any harassment of that sort. I merely criticize the advertising of surgeries in this way and labeling them as brave.

Brave would be to go the longer path and learn to accept your body. To take a neutral stance on it. But the unrealistic expectations many people have towards aesthetic surgeries are unrealistic and often don't solve their problems at all, they actually create new ones and once you've crossed that line you won't be so hesitant to do it again.

Your beauty surgeon does not care about you personally. They make good money with those procedures. They might tell you what else could be done, after getting that surgery you always hoped would "magically make your problems go away" don't actually resolve your issues with self acceptance and body insecurities and you might watch yourself in the mirror again, thinking that "but what if I got another surgery like this... then I would be much happier" or "if I got another surgery like that my overall body would look much more aligned with it's features".

For example: I understand getting a breast reduction due to back problems, getting a labia reduction due to your inner vulva lips being too large and hurting when walking, things like this, health reasons.

But this woman is getting a labia reduction due to seeing it in porn or being exposed to a partner criticizing them for it because they consume porn content that is not realistic and does often show surgically altered labias and vulvas. This woman is getting a lipo suction and a breast lifting with silicone enlargement due to wanting to fit the beauty standards.

Do you know those beautiful greek shaped noses? Every time I see someone getting those beautiful, unique noses reshaped my heart hurts.

Imagine someday having a daughter that comes up to, her nose looking like yours once looked like, you asking: Mommy, why I have such a differently shaped nose than you? " and you have to try explaining to her how and why you found your nose so ugly when you were 19, that the first thing you did when you had earned enough money from your part time jobs was getting your nose done into what was" trendy" at the time. Imagine her looking up to you asking if you think that her nose looks ugly and you have to explain that to her.

[bodhrancomedy]

Whenever I see people talking about needing to “release toxins from the skin”, this pops into my head:

+

=\= same.

Therefore: 

No, we’re not poison fucking dart frogs.

[worstdykeever]

why are we pretending like this is normal ? this is a video of a 'medical esthetician' wearing these skincare masks that have not been proven to work in public even though it hinders her ability to eat and makes people stare at her. everyone talks about how predatory the makeup industry is, but we forget that the skincare industry is just as bad, if not worse. imagine not being able to eat or enjoy yourself in public just so you,,, don't look old when you're old ? what's the point of having perfect skin if you refuse to ever show it ? this has to be some kind of obsessive/compulsive behavior at this point and it's so saddening to see what misogynistic beauty standards are doing to women.

[radykalny-feminizm]

I think women collectively pretend that various beauty treatments aren’t painful, uncomfortable and extremely time-consuming because they feel that they have to undergo them anyway. They act as though the negative effects aren't that bad and that there are effective ways to minimize it. But it's all a lie.

I used to wax the hair on my legs, and when it was growing back, the itching was so unbearable I felt like scratching my skin down to the bone. I thought I must be doing something wrong because it seemed impossible that so many women did this to themselves regularly and didn't complain.

I used to shave my bikini area, which led to painful irritation every time. Again, I thought I was doing something wrong and needed to try yet another magic solution to prevent it, which, of course, didn’t work.

Once I got lip fillers. Worst decision ever. Let me tell you, I’ve endured a lot of physical pain in my life, many injuries and procedures, and I have a fairly high pain tolerance, but NOTHING compares to the pain of getting lip fillers. During the procedure, I was literally crying from the pain and praying for it to be over. It was horrible. Again, I wondered how it was possible that so many women did this without saying anything.

Various beauty treatments took up hours of my day. It felt like an unpleasant chore I had to fulfill at the cost of my free time, rather than the wonderful “self-care” experience that many women portray it as.

Of course, everyone has a different pain tolerance, more or less sensitive skin etc. But in the end, I don’t think there was anything wrong with me. I don’t think I did anything incorrectly - I was following the instructions, I was using various tips meant to minimize pain and discomfort, but I still experienced it.

I think this pain of “taking care of ourselves” is so normalized that it’s almost taboo to talk about it. Women constantly promote all these ways to "beautify" themselves, pushing other women to participate in a way. They make it seem like it's mandatory so that they don't suffer alone. Also we’re so used to suffering and making sacrifices that we just accept it as part of our "feminine" fate. At all costs, women refuse to admit they’re willingly hurting themselves.

Because if they were to admit it, they’d have to start questioning why they’re doing it to themselves and why men aren’t expected to do the same. And most prefer not to reflect on this because the conclusions are too hard to accept.

[horsegurlfem]

I see so many women online talk about how when they were younger they never learned to do makeup because they were "not like the other girls" or they were trying too hard to be different or whatever. I use to have that same mindset. I was in a show one time and I had to wear makeup because that's just how theatre is, and basically I was the only person there who couldn't do eyeliner so I had to get other people to do it for me, and it was embarrassing. I thought to myself I shouldn't have tried so hard to be different, and robbed myself of a skill that Every Girl Needs.

But the thing is, when I was in middle and high school not learning to do makeup, I wasn't avoiding it because I thought I was better than other women, I just didn't want to. I was busy spending my time on interests, instead of makeup and conformity. There's a perception that women who don't or can't do their makeup are childish, and they need to just grow up and learn, but I think this is so harmful. After my show, I could have spent the time learning to do eyeliner, but I didn't because I was still busy with pursuing my interests. This is the central point of The Beauty Myth, that women are now pressured into spending their time making themselves beautiful, which limits them from achieving their full potential by taking up their time that they could have used to pursue their interests. I wasn't trying to push back intentionally back then, though, I was just busy.

I feel so bad for these women who feel an immense shame over spending formative years developing themselves and learning skills rather than learning to do their makeup, to conform. These women who feel the need to spend their time now catching up on makeup tutorials. They're not growing up, or maturing past the point of rejecting femininity, they're finally falling for the propaganda. They're finally giving in. And I wish they could continue to resist. And I was so close to becoming one of them.

[books]

Writer Spotlight: Elise Hu

We recently met with Elise Hu (@elisegoeseast) to discuss her illuminating title, Flawless—Lessons in Looks and Culture from the K-Beauty Capital. Elise is a journalist, podcaster, and media start-up founder. She’s the host of TED Talks Daily and host-at-large at NPR, where she spent nearly a decade as a reporter. As an international correspondent, she has reported stories from more than a dozen countries and opened NPR’s first-ever Seoul bureau in 2015. Previously, Elise helped found The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit digital start-up, after stops at many stations as a television news reporter. Her journalism work has won the national Edward R. Murrow and duPont Columbia awards, among others. An honors graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism, she lives in Los Angeles.

Can you begin by telling us a little bit about how Flawless came to be and what made you want to write about K-beauty?

It’s my unfinished business from my time in Seoul. Especially in the last year I spent living in Korea, I was constantly chasing the latest geopolitical headlines (namely, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s big moves that year). It meant I didn’t get to delve into my nagging frustrations of feeling second-class as an Asian woman in Korea and the under-reported experiences of South Korean women at the time. They were staging record-setting women’s rights rallies during my time abroad in response to a stark gender divide in Korea. It is one of the world’s most influential countries (and the 10th largest economy) and ranks shockingly low on gender equality metrics. That imbalance really shows up in what’s expected of how women should look and behave. Flawless explores the intersection of gender politics and beauty standards.

Flawless punctuates reportage with life writing, anchoring the research within your subjective context as someone who lived in the middle of it but also had an outside eye on it. Was this a conscious decision before you began writing? 

I planned to have fewer of my personal stories in the book, actually. Originally, I wanted to be embedded with South Korean women and girls who would illustrate the social issues I was investigating, but I wound up being the narrative thread because of the pandemic. The lockdowns and two years of long, mandatory quarantines in South Korea meant that traveling there and staying for a while to report and build on-the-ground relationships was nearly impossible. I also have three small children in LA, so the embedding plan was scuttled real fast.

One of the central questions the book asks of globalized society at large, corporations, and various communities is, “What is beauty for?” How has your response to this question changed while producing Flawless? 

I think I’ve gotten simultaneously more optimistic and cynical about it. More cynical in that the more I researched beauty, the more I understood physical beauty as a class performance—humans have long used it to get into rooms—more power in relationships, social communities, economically, or all of the above at once. And, as a class performance, those with the most resources usually have the most access to doing the work it takes (spending the money) to look the part, which is marginalizing for everyone else and keeps lower classes in a cycle of wanting and reaching. On the flip side, I’m more optimistic about what beauty is for, in that I have learned to separate beauty from appearance: I think of beauty in the way I think about love or truth, these universal—and largely spiritual—ideas that we all seek, that feed our souls. And that’s a way to frame beauty that isn’t tied in with overt consumerism or having to modify ourselves at all. 

This is your first book—has anything surprised you in the publishing or publicity process for Flawless?

I was most surprised by how much I enjoyed recording my own audiobook! I felt most in flow and joyful doing that more than anything else. Each sentence I read aloud was exactly the way I heard it in my head when I wrote it, which is such a privilege to have been able to do as an author.

Do you have a favorite reaction from a reader? 

I don’t know if it’s the favorite, but recency bias is a factor—I just got a DM this week from a woman writing about how the book helped put into words so much of what she felt and experienced, despite the fact she is not ethnically Korean, or in Korea, which is the setting of most of the book. It means a lot to me that reporting or art can connect us and illuminate shared experiences…in this case, learning to be more embodied and okay with however we look. 

As a writer, journalist, and mother—how did you practice self-care when juggling work commitments, social life, and the creative processes of writing and editing?

I juggled by relying on my loved ones. I don’t think self-care can exist without caring for one another, and that means asking people in our circles for help. A lot of boba dates, long walks, laughter-filled phone calls, and random weekend trips really got me through the arduous project of book writing (more painful than childbirth, emotionally speaking). 

What is your writing routine like, and how did the process differ from your other reporting work? Did you pick up any habits that you’ve held on to? 

My book writing routine was very meandering, whereas my broadcast reporting and writing are quite linear. I have tight deadlines for news, so it’s wham, bam, and the piece is out. With the book, I had two years to turn in a manuscript. I spent the year of lockdowns in “incubation mode,” where I consumed a lot of books, white papers, articles, and some films and podcasts, just taking in a lot of ideas to see where they might collide with each other and raise questions worth reporting on, letting them swim around in the swamp of my brain. When I was ready to write, I had a freelance editor, the indefatigable Carrie Frye, break my book outline into chunks so I could focus on smaller objectives and specific deadlines. Chunking the book so it didn’t seem like such a massive undertaking helped a lot. As for the writing, I never got to do a writer’s retreat or some idyllic cabin getaway to write. I wrote in the in-between moments—a one or two hour window when I had a break from the TED conference (which I attend every year as a TED host) or in those moments after the kids’ bedtime and before my own. One good habit I got into was getting away from my computer at midday. I’m really good about making lunch dates or going for a run to break up the monotony of staring at my screen all day long.

What’s good advice you’ve received about journalism that you would pass on to anyone just starting out?

All good reporting comes from great questions. Start with a clear question you seek to answer in your story, project, or book, and stay true to it and your quest to answer it. Once you are clear on what the thing is about, you won’t risk wandering too far from your focal point.

Thanks to Elise for answering our questions! You can follow her over at @elisegoeseast and check out her book Flawless here!