This was so so good, I had to double check to make sure I upgraded to “paid” because the work you’re doing is so important. Thanks for helping me feel better exactly as I am *and* for making a dent in the forces that keep telling me I’m not.
I'm so glad you linked to Ling Ling Huang's article! I manage an indie bookstore and I put a note on the cover of "Natural Beauty" that says "for fans of Jessica DeFino". It's helped me find several other subscribers irl.
"Lest you think this all ruined my day — it’s come to my attention that some readers imagine I am upset about cosmetic corporations all of the time, forgoing blush for the flush of perpetual anger — it did not."
This is just a brilliant line, Jessica. I'll be smiling about it all day.
" Emotionally and aesthetically, I fear we are becoming a homogenous blob of post-human computer-people!!" this EXACTLY!!! it feels like everything, from individual appearances to our connections with people, is becomming programmed and plastic (à la barbie) and algorithmized and AHHH
Destigmatizing cosmetic procedures for latinas? My best friend grew up in colombia and told me that girls are expected to ask for money to get boob jobs on their sixteenth birthday, that everybody's lips are done by the time they become mothers. My Venezuelan friend who is fair skinned, doesn't get tans, and hasn't augmented butt/boobs/lips to look more like the picture of latina beauty, literally gets roasted by her own family for looking too plain. Every other latina i meet has either already got a procedure or knows in their minds exactly what they would get once they can afford it (for my best friends its some hyaluronic acid injectibles under her eyes or something) their Instagram feeds are choked with this content and they follow discuss those cosmetic surgeon influencers. What the hell do they think needs DESTIGMATIZING when latinas are already scalp-deep in the stigma of beauty performance!!!! Have they ever rushed to a train station to return a girls concealer coz she left it at yours and cried on the phone because she can't leave the house without makeup? Miss me with this shit
“The story may promote being an imperfect human, but the visuals still promote a stifling standard of aesthetic perfection” — so true! Images matter more than words.
I recently reread my diaries from high school. I was actually trying not to eat to get the Barbie thigh gap. Literally thinking something was wrong with me because my thighs were bigger than my boyfriend’s. I remember feeling so shitty. Where’d I get those ideas? Lots of places for sure, but growing up with Barbie and Ken dolls and their ridiculous proportions definitely contributed.
Let’s consider Barbie just another 20th century mistake and move on.
I recommended your Substack to two friends at a party last night and watching them pull out their phones and scroll through your headlines with eyes widening going “omg. . . I am literally going to binge read this” felt like such an Ascendant Moment™️ of bonding.
If you ever take requests or do community threads... I would love to hear about what I could say to my 8-year old daughter who just made her first comments about her own looks. (Specifically, she thinks her eyebrows are too bushy.) I felt like I swung back and forth from making various points and I'm not sure it was helpful!
In case it helps, when I was a kid I was embarrassed about being too skinny (my nickname was bag of bones), having hairy arms and big eyebrows (the trend was crazy thin then). My mom always had a very firm “you’re fine juste the way you are and you can’t let peoples comments or the fear of people’s comments get to you” approach to this. I wasn’t allowed to use makeup till I was an adult. Through my teenage years I thought it was rough and she just had to say it because she was my mom but in hindsight I feel like I owe her. When I finally had access to makeup and could wax my arms and eyebrows etc. I didn’t care to partake in beauty as much as I had wanted it earlier. I realized it was expensive (I was a student ona scholarship so dropping 200€ at Sephora for makeup was not gonna happen), time consuming and a ton work I was not interested in. My point is, hold strong and be comfortable with the idea that your daughter might not get it now, but she will get it later.
Another thing that I think matters in the long term is teaching children to be proud of themselves for the things they achieve versus the things they are. Whether it’s creative, at school, doing something nice for someone else, I always tell my niece she should be proud of herself and I make her say it too, like “you should be proud, do you feel proud?” I think it makes us more grounded as humans to know that we have value regardless of how we look.
Wonderful, thank you so much for the reply! A "you're fine just the way you are approach" plus putting value on behaviors and actions makes a lot of sense. I think I also need to figure out how to reply to her on the grounds that, yes, I have plucked my eyebrows (and she specifically said she likes my eyebrows) and I wear some makeup (haven't completely divested yet!). It is hard for me to say "you don't need any of that stuff" while I'm literally putting on mascara in the moment.
But maybe I just need to be okay saying some things are for grown ups. I was tripping up, too, because I vacillated between telling her "she looks great the way she is" and at the same time wanting to acknowledge that "yes, she'll feel pressure about these things, but she shouldn't let that get to her." Maybe the "don't fear other people's comments," as you wrote, might get at that.
It is okay to say some things are for grownups. Adults and children are not equal in everything and that’s ok. Their brains are not developed enough to take on adult roles and responsibilities and we shouldn’t let them.
Plus Makeup is sexualizing. I always saw it as a part of seduction (also, I am French so culture and context matter) so it makes sense that a little girl shouldn’t partake in that. Occasionally I put on some lipstick (so nude you can’t tell it’s there) on my younger niece when she begged me but I pre-empt it by saying “lipstick is not to be prettier it’s just for fun and just for us” (I’d only allow it if we stayed home). She prances around like a beauty queen for 15 minutes then moves on.
I’m really sorry that your daughter feels his way about her eyebrows, at 8 we should be busy playing tag, running around and climbing trees. Not worrying about how we look and how to change it.
I get it though. At her age, my main struggle was with racism. I remember getting in an argument with some “friends” at recess and they each called me a “filthy Arab” for not wanting to go along with them. And it just occurred to me then why other kids would say they weren’t allowed to play with me or hold my hand or invite me to their birthday parties. It was f*cking traumatic. But it did teach me one thing: you can’t change who you are for other people because there’s always one more thing they’ll wanna rip apart until you’re left with nothing.
I learned to accept who I am and what I look like and make fun of it better than them. So if someone commented on me being an Arab I’d say “it’s ok to be racist but at least be creative cuz it gets old”, and if someone commented on my hairy arms (usually boys) I’d say I needed it to protect me from the sun and how unfair it was that I’m North African but I’m whiter than a Norwegian snowflake! If someone commented on my back brace I’d say the rest of my robot cop costume was lost in the mail. When Kevin whatevs said my metallic braces made me look like a cannibal I replied I hadn’t had lunch and dared him to come closer. I knew I looked ridiculous with my metallic braces, my back brace, my hairy arms and skinny body in the middle of it all. I thought I looked like a rat. It was rough! But if someone said it to me, it wasn’t about me being ugly as much as it was about them being mean.
Fabulous reviews and insight, as always. I got a Barbie (with pink Dream House) in 1962, thankfully. Stiff arms and legs, weird angular face, hairless hard plastic and a body even THEN I knew was ridiculous. (I was more the Skipper type anyway). Didn’t stop me from comparing my 5yr old body to hers; yay, or yea, my already pragmatic little mind ceased to consciously do these comparisons by age 8ish. The Barbie Doll had been bastardized by so many different versions at that point her identity became muddled. My last one was ‘Haircolor Barbie’ in 1967-you could dye her hair any shade of Brown or Red. Such a mess and so disappointing I shunned everything Barbie the rest of my childhood. She fell out of favor for everyone else in the female emancipation movement of the 70’s. But she’s an aggressive bitch, and she returned a couple decades ago, drunk, with a trunk full of clothes and friends. God help the BarbieCore victims going forward.
Hmmm. I have a real problem with the claim that “I just don’t think you can effectively challenge an oppressive ideology and adopt its aesthetics. That’s not how aesthetic communication works!!” this really presumes that politics is most successful at the level of the individual body, as if opting out is necessary to be political and not contradictory. It’s a lot to at once say women are under the thumb of xyz beauty regimes and then critique individuals when they don’t reject said regimes. It suggests a kind of feminism that is all about individual choice, and in this way isn’t that different from the beauty discourse about “choosing” beauty routines for oneself and not for others. It seems to me that you’re suggesting women need to choose to opt out, or they are morally bankrupt if they attempt critique while looking a certain way (like in the Barbie storyline you indicate)
No-- that’s the opposite of what I advocate for, and I’ve written about choice feminism and its failings many many many times. The part you are referencing is talking about a Hollywood movie script and wardrobe, the products the industry is creating and the media is promoting in response to Hollywood & the Mattel corporation, and what the literal *medical establishment* is advertising to women. This is a critique of the influential and oppressive systems that create beauty culture, not individual women.
I remember 2 years ago in the pandemic, I was obsessed with assigning and defining my ✨aesthetic✨; but through the years with watching and reading things about fashion, beauty and consumerism I realized that I didn’t need to have a aesthetic or let the things I consume define me. The need to feel a part of something would inherently involve having to buy or look a certain way and just looking at the barbiecore and how fast aesthetics become about consuming or doing things to fit within that aesthetic and peoples eagerness to feel within a community and follow a “mold”.
This was so so good, I had to double check to make sure I upgraded to “paid” because the work you’re doing is so important. Thanks for helping me feel better exactly as I am *and* for making a dent in the forces that keep telling me I’m not.
Am I the only who just wants to hear more about the lobster roll?
I'm so glad you linked to Ling Ling Huang's article! I manage an indie bookstore and I put a note on the cover of "Natural Beauty" that says "for fans of Jessica DeFino". It's helped me find several other subscribers irl.
Same here! I travel a lot for work and am *always* looking for new books to read. (Read as: salivating over the Natural Beauty recommendation).
Reading your writing makes me more energized than consuming caffeine. One giant YES!
"Lest you think this all ruined my day — it’s come to my attention that some readers imagine I am upset about cosmetic corporations all of the time, forgoing blush for the flush of perpetual anger — it did not."
This is just a brilliant line, Jessica. I'll be smiling about it all day.
“Forgoing blush for flush” is a sentence I want on a tshirt or something.
" Emotionally and aesthetically, I fear we are becoming a homogenous blob of post-human computer-people!!" this EXACTLY!!! it feels like everything, from individual appearances to our connections with people, is becomming programmed and plastic (à la barbie) and algorithmized and AHHH
Destigmatizing cosmetic procedures for latinas? My best friend grew up in colombia and told me that girls are expected to ask for money to get boob jobs on their sixteenth birthday, that everybody's lips are done by the time they become mothers. My Venezuelan friend who is fair skinned, doesn't get tans, and hasn't augmented butt/boobs/lips to look more like the picture of latina beauty, literally gets roasted by her own family for looking too plain. Every other latina i meet has either already got a procedure or knows in their minds exactly what they would get once they can afford it (for my best friends its some hyaluronic acid injectibles under her eyes or something) their Instagram feeds are choked with this content and they follow discuss those cosmetic surgeon influencers. What the hell do they think needs DESTIGMATIZING when latinas are already scalp-deep in the stigma of beauty performance!!!! Have they ever rushed to a train station to return a girls concealer coz she left it at yours and cried on the phone because she can't leave the house without makeup? Miss me with this shit
“The story may promote being an imperfect human, but the visuals still promote a stifling standard of aesthetic perfection” — so true! Images matter more than words.
I recently reread my diaries from high school. I was actually trying not to eat to get the Barbie thigh gap. Literally thinking something was wrong with me because my thighs were bigger than my boyfriend’s. I remember feeling so shitty. Where’d I get those ideas? Lots of places for sure, but growing up with Barbie and Ken dolls and their ridiculous proportions definitely contributed.
Let’s consider Barbie just another 20th century mistake and move on.
I recommended your Substack to two friends at a party last night and watching them pull out their phones and scroll through your headlines with eyes widening going “omg. . . I am literally going to binge read this” felt like such an Ascendant Moment™️ of bonding.
I think the remedy to beauty culture could be everyone lolling around on park benches with someone that makes them laugh eating lobster rolls.
If you ever take requests or do community threads... I would love to hear about what I could say to my 8-year old daughter who just made her first comments about her own looks. (Specifically, she thinks her eyebrows are too bushy.) I felt like I swung back and forth from making various points and I'm not sure it was helpful!
In case it helps, when I was a kid I was embarrassed about being too skinny (my nickname was bag of bones), having hairy arms and big eyebrows (the trend was crazy thin then). My mom always had a very firm “you’re fine juste the way you are and you can’t let peoples comments or the fear of people’s comments get to you” approach to this. I wasn’t allowed to use makeup till I was an adult. Through my teenage years I thought it was rough and she just had to say it because she was my mom but in hindsight I feel like I owe her. When I finally had access to makeup and could wax my arms and eyebrows etc. I didn’t care to partake in beauty as much as I had wanted it earlier. I realized it was expensive (I was a student ona scholarship so dropping 200€ at Sephora for makeup was not gonna happen), time consuming and a ton work I was not interested in. My point is, hold strong and be comfortable with the idea that your daughter might not get it now, but she will get it later.
Another thing that I think matters in the long term is teaching children to be proud of themselves for the things they achieve versus the things they are. Whether it’s creative, at school, doing something nice for someone else, I always tell my niece she should be proud of herself and I make her say it too, like “you should be proud, do you feel proud?” I think it makes us more grounded as humans to know that we have value regardless of how we look.
A little pride every day keeps self-shaming away.
Wonderful, thank you so much for the reply! A "you're fine just the way you are approach" plus putting value on behaviors and actions makes a lot of sense. I think I also need to figure out how to reply to her on the grounds that, yes, I have plucked my eyebrows (and she specifically said she likes my eyebrows) and I wear some makeup (haven't completely divested yet!). It is hard for me to say "you don't need any of that stuff" while I'm literally putting on mascara in the moment.
But maybe I just need to be okay saying some things are for grown ups. I was tripping up, too, because I vacillated between telling her "she looks great the way she is" and at the same time wanting to acknowledge that "yes, she'll feel pressure about these things, but she shouldn't let that get to her." Maybe the "don't fear other people's comments," as you wrote, might get at that.
She gets her eyebrows from me and I also remember hating my eyebrows when I was younger, so I completely related to her feelings.
It is okay to say some things are for grownups. Adults and children are not equal in everything and that’s ok. Their brains are not developed enough to take on adult roles and responsibilities and we shouldn’t let them.
Plus Makeup is sexualizing. I always saw it as a part of seduction (also, I am French so culture and context matter) so it makes sense that a little girl shouldn’t partake in that. Occasionally I put on some lipstick (so nude you can’t tell it’s there) on my younger niece when she begged me but I pre-empt it by saying “lipstick is not to be prettier it’s just for fun and just for us” (I’d only allow it if we stayed home). She prances around like a beauty queen for 15 minutes then moves on.
I’m really sorry that your daughter feels his way about her eyebrows, at 8 we should be busy playing tag, running around and climbing trees. Not worrying about how we look and how to change it.
I get it though. At her age, my main struggle was with racism. I remember getting in an argument with some “friends” at recess and they each called me a “filthy Arab” for not wanting to go along with them. And it just occurred to me then why other kids would say they weren’t allowed to play with me or hold my hand or invite me to their birthday parties. It was f*cking traumatic. But it did teach me one thing: you can’t change who you are for other people because there’s always one more thing they’ll wanna rip apart until you’re left with nothing.
I learned to accept who I am and what I look like and make fun of it better than them. So if someone commented on me being an Arab I’d say “it’s ok to be racist but at least be creative cuz it gets old”, and if someone commented on my hairy arms (usually boys) I’d say I needed it to protect me from the sun and how unfair it was that I’m North African but I’m whiter than a Norwegian snowflake! If someone commented on my back brace I’d say the rest of my robot cop costume was lost in the mail. When Kevin whatevs said my metallic braces made me look like a cannibal I replied I hadn’t had lunch and dared him to come closer. I knew I looked ridiculous with my metallic braces, my back brace, my hairy arms and skinny body in the middle of it all. I thought I looked like a rat. It was rough! But if someone said it to me, it wasn’t about me being ugly as much as it was about them being mean.
I wanna give credit to my older brother — we used to watch yo mamma on MTV and practice zingers at home so I was always ready to be in the wild 😆
Fabulous reviews and insight, as always. I got a Barbie (with pink Dream House) in 1962, thankfully. Stiff arms and legs, weird angular face, hairless hard plastic and a body even THEN I knew was ridiculous. (I was more the Skipper type anyway). Didn’t stop me from comparing my 5yr old body to hers; yay, or yea, my already pragmatic little mind ceased to consciously do these comparisons by age 8ish. The Barbie Doll had been bastardized by so many different versions at that point her identity became muddled. My last one was ‘Haircolor Barbie’ in 1967-you could dye her hair any shade of Brown or Red. Such a mess and so disappointing I shunned everything Barbie the rest of my childhood. She fell out of favor for everyone else in the female emancipation movement of the 70’s. But she’s an aggressive bitch, and she returned a couple decades ago, drunk, with a trunk full of clothes and friends. God help the BarbieCore victims going forward.
Hell yes on the Barbie movie.
“Apologizing for looking like a mess” is my biggest beauty pet peeve--especially from people who don’t look like a mess
Hmmm. I have a real problem with the claim that “I just don’t think you can effectively challenge an oppressive ideology and adopt its aesthetics. That’s not how aesthetic communication works!!” this really presumes that politics is most successful at the level of the individual body, as if opting out is necessary to be political and not contradictory. It’s a lot to at once say women are under the thumb of xyz beauty regimes and then critique individuals when they don’t reject said regimes. It suggests a kind of feminism that is all about individual choice, and in this way isn’t that different from the beauty discourse about “choosing” beauty routines for oneself and not for others. It seems to me that you’re suggesting women need to choose to opt out, or they are morally bankrupt if they attempt critique while looking a certain way (like in the Barbie storyline you indicate)
No-- that’s the opposite of what I advocate for, and I’ve written about choice feminism and its failings many many many times. The part you are referencing is talking about a Hollywood movie script and wardrobe, the products the industry is creating and the media is promoting in response to Hollywood & the Mattel corporation, and what the literal *medical establishment* is advertising to women. This is a critique of the influential and oppressive systems that create beauty culture, not individual women.
I remember 2 years ago in the pandemic, I was obsessed with assigning and defining my ✨aesthetic✨; but through the years with watching and reading things about fashion, beauty and consumerism I realized that I didn’t need to have a aesthetic or let the things I consume define me. The need to feel a part of something would inherently involve having to buy or look a certain way and just looking at the barbiecore and how fast aesthetics become about consuming or doing things to fit within that aesthetic and peoples eagerness to feel within a community and follow a “mold”.