Why is it “unnerving” to see a guy with dark brown eyebrows and platinum blonde hair, while society prefers that girls and women cosmetically enhance their face to the point where one may flinch with unexpected recognition upon seeing them without their makeup?
Makeup has been a part of human culture for thousands of years – we have come a long way from burnt matches, berries, ox blood and the urine of young boys to the quintessential Maybelline line (who knows what that consists of). However, one aspect of our society that remains entirely unprogressive is the prejudice and lack of reasoning surrounding the “improvement” of attractiveness via cosmetics.
Why is it, for instance, that males wearing makeup tend to be perceived as scandalous, or that the vast majority of females feel the need to spruce up their face in at least one small way? Men and women are, obviously, equal human beings, set apart only by the mechanisms that drive reproduction.
The idea that one sex should wear makeup and the other should not is wrong in every way – neither should, and neither should not. Like everything else, such a practice should be gender-neutral; it should be an expression of style rather than a mask of false beauty.
Why is it that the blatant lie of a beautifully made-up face is generally perceived as more attractive than its natural form? Evolutionarily it makes little sense.
Logically, the human race would not have evolved to be attracted to traits that are not found within its species, but traits found in the majority of the population – “normal” traits, the combinations of which result in “plainness” in our society. Yet these days, attractiveness is all about the illusion; if it is visually stimulating, it is doable.
This sensitivity to outrageous overstatements of beauty is likely purely caused by our culture, not our inner instincts. Maybe that’s why it’s a common generalization that women look their best right after an orgasm, after all their initial hard work has evaporated off of their faces.
Despite the fact that it hinders truth and reason, the practice of using makeup should not necessarily be frowned upon, regardless of which members of which gender choose to take advantage of it.
Both men and women have the rights to look good and/or be natural, however they want to roll. Like the clothes one wears (technically clothes lie to the world as well), makeup can be an expression of individuality, style, and/or subculture.
Feminism is not a subculture. To identify with being female one must simply bear a vagina. A guy wearing makeup is not – or should not be perceived as – “girly,” but just a person with stuff on their face, equivalent to any girl or any other guy wearing makeup.
Our society has not necessarily sexualized the human figure any more than it otherwise would have been sexualized – evolutionarily, what are our bodies made for? What our society has done, as have many societies for millennia, is deluded focus of that sexual energy away from reality in favor of an illusion that is irrationally used to divide the sexes. Dudes can rock mascara, and blotchy, pimply skin is irresistibly sexy – trust me.
