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!
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)
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.
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.
" 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!
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)
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”.