Beauty standards shift, from era to era, from culture to culture.
In this country, unbeknownst to most of us, beauty norms are about far more than just social or cultural preference. In fact, beauty benchmarks are a way for those in charge to profit economically and otherwise.
Before you roll your eyes, it’s not overstating it to say that a closer look reveals that beauty culture is used, in many ways, to enforce a hierarchy of gender. It is actually weaponized as a way to impede women’s progress. In essence it is a way of keeping them in a place of subordination socially, racially, politically and economically.
There’s a lot of talk lately, some of it tongue and cheek, about the patriarchy.
Patriarchy: a social system in which positions of dominance and privilege are held by men
If you take a look back at American beauty standards throughout various decades, you’ll find that ideas of what is beautiful or desirable, don’t just coincide with gender norms, but with economic and social status. These standards are in fact driven by a patriarchal desire for power. They are arbitrary and they apply almost exclusively to women.
It’s also interesting to note that the media ( also run almost exclusively by men by the way, at least until lately) then reflects back these overriding views keeping women in a perpetual cycle.
We as women, starting at a very young age, ingest these images, and the beliefs surrounding them, and they then slowly but surely become ingrained on a deep and subconscious level.
Don’t believe me? Ask yourself why? Why do women spend millions on makeup, skin care products, hair dye, hair removal, diet culture, the latest clothing trends, manicures, pedicures, plastic surgery? Sure, men do some of this too, but the numbers are weighted heavily against the ladies.
These power structures don’t just apply to beauty standards of course. Ideologies of all kinds has long been used as a tool to maintain capitalism and also for exploitation of all kinds.
Ideology: a systematic body of concepts especially about human life or culture.
In other words, make people believe something, or think they need something to succeed or fit it, and it gives you power.
To put it perhaps too simply, beauty standards keep women in a constant cycle of trying to attain certain physical standards that are, in essence, unattainable. And guess what? Keeping women busy and worried about these things, and you create a culture and a dynamic that keeps them from their real power.
I am not saying everything about beauty culture is based on some evil, Machiavellian plotting. I love a new lipstick and dye my grays away on the reg, but it does make you wonder.
So, when did all this start? I mean, beauty standards exist around the wolrd and in every culture. But when did the notion that beauty could be monetized and used as a way to keep women subservient, in a constant state of striving?
I started by looking at the era my mom and grandma came up in as well as the era I grew up in. Now, the ethos surrounding beauty expectations in the decade after World War II and in the 1980’s might not seem similar. But my little deep dive shows that the two decades, although 30 years apart, have striking parallels.
Both eras saw a right wing call for more conventional gender roles, as well as calls for a return to the old traditional family values trope. The push, during both periods, was likely a response to the loosening of those same gender roles and sexual mores during previous generation.
Post-World War II – 1950’s
Prior to World War II about twenty eight percent of American women were part of the workforce. By the end of the war, that figure rose to thirty four percent. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the 1940’s saw the largest proportional rise in female labor during the entire 20th century.
Having that many women working outside the home was considered unconventional, but necessary, as so many men had enlisted.
At first, many women were reluctant to take traditionally male jobs. To get women out of the home and into the factory, good ol’ American propaganda was put to work.
One of the most iconic, powerful and enduring images of the time was Rosie The Riveter. Strong, beautiful and self-assured, Rosie, and the slogan that accompanied her, We Can Do It, became a formidable and effective force in enticing women into jobs normally held by men.
Not too surprisingly, after six years of working outside the home, many women found they enjoyed a new sense of freedom and agency. A survey taken by the Bureau of Women Workers right after the end of the war, found that 75% of women wanted to remain in their jobs outside the home.
But then men were coming home! So, to make way for the returning soldiers, the media machine worked yet again. This time the goal was to push women out of the workplace and back into the home, or at least into lower paying, more traditionally “female” jobs.
Social scientist James Lull points out, “hegemony is more than social power itself; it is a method for gaining and maintaining power.” Put more simply, in order for people, in this case women, to agree willingly to the roles and beauty standards being sold to them, they needed to believe that doing so was in their best interest.
A look at some of the common media messages of the era via film, magazines, advertising and television, reveal a pattern of that very narrative. Historian Ruth Schwartz Cohen points out that popular writers of the period framed women who wanted to work outside the home as, “lonely or lost women with penis envy”.
Other messaging used to achieve this end was a bit more subtle. Rather than simply urging women to return to their happy homemaker roles, they were also directed to achieve a very specific (ie: white and heteronormative) standard of beauty as part of their womanly expectations.
The perfect and beautiful homemaker storyline became ubiquitous during this time. Women didn’t have to look too far to find messaging that gave them helpful advice on how to embody the flawless mother, wife and homemaker.
A 1955 issue of Housekeeping Monthly published an article called The Good Wife’s Guide. The rules and guidelines set forth in the article included everything from being sweet, cooking a good meal, keeping the house clean and of course looking good. It went on to encourage women to, “Prepare yourself. Take fifteen minutes to rest so you’ll be refreshed when he arrives. Touch up your makeup, put a ribbon in your hair and be fresh-looking.”
It was during this era that approaches to and thinking around advertising also began to change. According to Professor Sut Jhally, instead of promoting a product based solely on its use or practicality, advertisers, with the help of extensive market research, began to tap into consumer’s emotions. They worked overtime to make people want things more than they needed them.
This approach of exploiting people’s emotions in order to drive sales, seemed tailor made for the beauty business and pushing the era’s particular beauty principles. And it seems to have worked. By asserting that a company’s goods could help women in their quest for youth, slimness and overall physical perfection, advertisers drove sales of beauty products higher than ever before.
Beauty culture began to be strategically positioned in almost every facet of a women’s life. Women during this time and into present day, became what Cultural Theorist Stuart Hall would call cultural subjects. They learned how to work within this new framework, not because it was instinctual or innate, but because they internalized the messages and behavior they believed they needed to thrive.
Women of color felt the burden of this in an even more pointed way. Beauty standards of the day were unattainable to many of these woman due to racial, social and economic restraints.
Stay tuned for part 2: The Homemaker and the Hussy. Coming soon.