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Skin bleaching scandal in South Africa | Unreported World

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A quick google image search of the term 'beauty' pulls up an interesting insight into which bodies are included in this rhetoric. If you analyse the top images, most, if not all, are of young, white, thin and makeup-clad females, focusing on their facial features. This is an interesting exercise in looking at which bodies are included and excluded from this online space

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Richardson, Niall, and Adam Locks. 2014. Body Studies. London: Routledge.

Wolf, Naomi. 1997. The Beauty Myth. Toronto: Random House of Canada.

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A quick search on Facebook or Youtube pulls up various videos similar to the one below. Listening to this man, it is interesting to note that of all these behaviours that he points out, he positions men as the primary beneficiaries of improving such behaviours - such that the desires and needs of a man should dictate the behaviours of women, particularly in regards to body maintenance.

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The above two images on the right were taken from an article in Archer Magazine (link below) and the left was a Bonds advertisement that popped up on my Facebook newsfeed a month or so ago. I believe that the dialogue surrounding female hair/ hair removal is particularly relevant to the theme of the beauty myth, as it can be seen as a poignant symbol of both resistance to the patriarchy and an upset of what it means to be traditionally 'feminine'. I particularly love the images from the magazine, as they juxtapose the feminine colours of the outfits and makeup, the feminine styles of clothes (lace lingerie and a slip dress) and 'feminine' props such as flowers with unapologetic exposure of their grown-out underarm hair - something that by mainstream standards violates traditional femininity and beauty. In essence, they are embodying a passive AND active stance. A quote from the magazine article that really summed this up for me was:
"Gender inequality permeates all aspects of our lives. It’s often difficult to define and difficult to see. Body hair is visible and a very clear double standard in the way men and women’s bodies are policed". Looking through a Foucauldian discourse lens, this is a great real life example of his theory of power and how we self-surveil our bodies to fit the norm. Women are put under immense implicit pressure to remove bodily hair, often undergoing expensive and painful procedures to achieve this. Letting your hair grow out violates gender-norms and therefore also dissolves the illusion of 'female beauty'.

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Alex Andrews is an Australian feminist from Melbourne and the Founder of Get Hairy February. Alex is a law graduate who has worked with various social enterprises, while campaigning for issues that are important to her. Alex now studies Kinesiology while continuing to develop her passion for innovative change-making. Tell us about the campaign and how it got started...
Get Hairy February is a gender equality campaign that raises money to help eliminate violence against women in collaboration with the Full Stop Foundation and Empowered Together. For the month of February women and femmes let their leg and underarm hair grow, while asking their friends and family sponsor them.

I did a bit of research and quickly learned that women didn't always remove their body hair.

A significant turning point began in 1915 when the hair removal industry decided they wanted to target women to generate more revenue. They ran a very successful advertisement in a large women's magazine deeming women's body hair 'objectionable'. Words like 'ugly', 'unclean' and 'embarrassing' were, and still are used, to describe women with body hair.

I'd been removing my body hair since the age of 11 to be considered acceptable. It was painful, took a lot of time and effort, and also cost a lot money over the years. We're very familiar with growing hair for a good cause in Australia, so why not have a campaign for those that identify as female to let it grow too?

Founding and launching Get Hairy February was an opportunity to make that happen, and unite people in a way that could shed light and support issues of gender equality and gendered violence.
How has identifying as a feminist and growing out your body hair affected your own personal journey?
Letting it grow made a big impact on how I viewed femininity and feminism. Watching myself grow against the expectations of what a woman should look like was liberating. I felt, and still feel power linked to this choice.
Why do you feel it's important to include trans and cis women in Get Hairy February?
It's important to include trans and cis women into this campaign because we're all women. Feminism that is not intersectional and trans inclusive is not feminism. We're all subject to the oppressive standards of femininity imposed by heteronormative and patriarchal power structures.

We're a small and new organisation so we are still learning how to be as inclusive as possible in everything that we do. We understand that participating in the campaign is easier for some than it is for others. When you're dealing with multiple layers of oppression sometimes joining movements or campaigns like Get Hairy February is not possible.

We hope to connect with other activists so we can continue build a campaign that is inclusive on all levels. If you're out there, get in touch!
How do supporters' donations help survivors of domestic violence?
Donations to Get Hairy February go towards Full Stop Foundation and Empowered together.

Full Stop Foundation is the organisation behind Rape & Domestic Violence Services Australia. Their services include 24/7 telephone crisis counselling for those who have experienced or are at risk of sexual assault, family or domestic violence. They also runs prevention programs in the community to help eliminate gendered violence.

44% of sexual assault occurs before the victim turns 18. Empowered Together runs peer led workshops for secondary school student to educate them on their rights and responsibilities in relation to consent to prevent sexual assault before it happens. For many schools, with limited budgets, the cost of this training can be a difficult hurdle to overcome. The more Get Hairy February raises this year the more schools will receive this prevention program for free in 2018.

As we grow we'll continue to offer support to a wide range of organisations working towards eliminating violence and gender inequality.
What's has the experience of launching and sustaining the campaign been like?
It has been incredible!

I've read comments from people who have embraced their bodies for the first time because of Get Hairy February. I've met people who have experienced violence and wanted to do this to give back to the services that supported them when they needed it. I've spoken with mothers, who've realised after joining the campaign the kind of positive impact it has had on their children due to their own relationships with their bodies becoming more positive.

Gender inequality permeates all aspects of our lives. It's often difficult to define and difficult to see. Body hair is visible and a very clear double standard in the way men and women's bodies are policed. This campaign is about creating space for individuals to unite, to challenge gender norm expectations, and stand up for gender equality whilst supporting organisations that dedicate themselves to having a positive and lasting impact for women in our communities.
SUBSCRIBE TO ARCHER MAGAZINE

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Archer Asks: Get Hairy February organiser, Alex Andrews

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Alex Andrews is an Australian feminist from Melbourne and the Founder of Get Hairy February. Alex is a law graduate who has worked with various social enterprises, while campaigning for issues that are important to her. Alex now studies Kinesiology while continuing to develop her passion for innovative change-making.

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This is a fantastic documentary available on Netflix, that examines the phenomenon of the prolific beauty pageant industry in Venezuela. As the tagline of the film says - “Explore how the media and nationalism have fuelled Venezuela’s passion for physical appearance and the multi-billion dollar beauty pageant industry”. In a nation where one fifth of the average women's wage is spent on cosmetics, this documentary shines the light on how the nation's obsession with pageants is seen as a way to strive above poverty. However, as various academics comment throughout the film, “Just as they used to say – ‘keep people ignorant and you have them under control… If you keep the feminine population in a state of constant consumption trying to attain this beauty ideal then you keep them from the possibility of cultural change". This is an interesting analysis that once again echoes Foucault's theory of power.
Another common theme running throughout the documentary is the notion of beauty and women's bodies as a commodity that Venezuela thrives on exporting. This is another example of how women's bodies are thrown into the public sphere and used as both political and capitalist tools of control and objectification.

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“To live in a culture in which women are routinely naked where men aren’t is to learn inequality in little ways all day long.” - Naomi Wolf, The Beauty Myth (1997)

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An embodiment of a heteronormative, slave-to-the-male-gaze advertising angle. This is an interesting contrast to the Asian market's push for whiter skin, highlighting varying cultural norms of what constitutes beautiful. I also want to draw attention to the first tagline in the ad - "give yourself a leg up in the boardroom". This rhetoric echoes the struggle that Wolf (1997) highlights in her book, where women who don't necessarily conform to ideals of beauty run the risk of "restrict[ing] employment opportunities in a labour market that favours work for women in the basis of employment" (Richardson and Locks 2014, 130).

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A body positive song celebrating 'thunder thighs', shining a positive light onto larger bodies.

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Thunder Thighs - Miss Eaves (Produced by KEISHH)

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A classic third-wave feminist song that highlights the consequences of such high societal demands of beauty. Taking this theme back to the readings, Richardson and Locks (2014) outline that “there is a strong cultural belief in a ‘perfectible body’ which, ironically, has made the body increasingly ‘unstable’ and ‘a site of serious suffering and disorder... illnesses anorexia, bulimia and body dysmorphic disorder are often seen as disheartening results of this attempt to live up to cultural expectations” (33).

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This Padlet will focus on what Naomi Wolf coined as the ‘beauty myth’: the notion that women must conform to, and embody cultural beauty norms that are unrealistic and virtually unattainable. As Naomi Wolf (1997) states, this beauty myth is the ‘institutionalisation of the male gaze’. Women have long been the object of this myth, and men have long been taught to instil and expect women to embody certain cultural beauty norms. Furthermore, this beauty myth uses images of women’s beauty as a political tool to enhance inequality and quash female advancement. Along with this theme come the implicit notions of objectification, commodification and sexualisation, which this padlet will seek to explore.

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A beautiful rejection of the 'institutionalisation of the male gaze'. The lyrics are something that many women can relate to on a deep level, calling out the sexualisation of women's bodies in everyday life and reclaiming them.

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The image above and below are commercials from central and south Asia and South Africa promoting skin whitening cream. An analysis of the words used show that notions of white and pale skin equate to being beautiful and 'perfect'. Such promotions of fairer skin are targeting populations with predominantly naturally darker skin tones. This could be seen as a hang over from the colonial period, wherein beauty standards were cross cut with racial identities. The following blog is a great opinion piece on this topic: https://imansyedblog.wordpress.com/2017/03/31/the-unrealistic-standards-of-beauty-in-central-asia-for-women/

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A fantastic video showing the double standards of the beauty industry. The blogger, Em Ford, emphasises #skinpositivity on her instagram account (@mypaleskinblog), highlighting the norm that clear and unblemished skin equates to beauty. There is common held belief (however misguided) that bad skin stems from a bad diet or lack of hygiene, signifying that those with acne are uncivilised and violate expectations of what it is to be a self-actualised person. What I found particularly interesting were the comments stating that it was 'false advertising' and that you should 'trust no f***ing bitch with makeup'. Such comments reflect Beverly Skeggs's assertion that "attaining normative femininity requires a considerable amount of labour but yet this labour must be concealed. If the labour is not disguised from view then the female body is identified as cheap and/or distasteful” (Skeggs 1997, as cited in Richardson and Locks 2014, 43).

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Three months ago, I began posting images of myself without makeup on social media. The following film contains real comments that were left on images of my face. ** Click Show More** Over the past few months, I've received thousands of messages from people all over the world who suffer or have suffered from acne, an insecurity or self confidence issues.

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The above photos of Dove's "Real Beauty" campaign appear, on the surface, as empowering and inclusive messages celebrating diverse body forms. However after reading the below casting call for the models that I managed to find online, it begs the question about what 'real' truly means? This paradox seems somewhat comical, calling upon 'real' women but only if they actually fit into a defined set of rules about what 'real' and beautiful women can look like (i.e. 'no scars' and 'beautiful smiles'. In an attempt to break out of the traditional set of norms, this casting call highlights the tragicness of it all - that what is considered 'real' is actually policed and regulated too.

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This documentary discusses the cultural phenomenon of Barbie, and how her design has melded and transformed throughout history to reflect current cultural patterns and shifting norms. It highlights a recent line of barbies that have made a move to be more inclusive, offering up 'curvy' and 'tall' versions of the cult classic doll. I believe looking at the history of the Barbie doll touches on the power that commercialised and commodified beauty ideals have to define what it is to be feminine.

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Tiny Shoulders: Rethinking Barbie (Official Trailer) • A Hulu Original Documentary

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During my recent trip to Sydney I came across this jade facial roller which resulted in a *very* impulse purchase. I am a 23 year old female who has little to no skin problems - therefore what compelled me to buy this anti-wrinkle tool?! Upon reflection, this is a great example of the way in which the beauty industry has capitalised on and commodified a fear of ageing. Beauty blogs and forums that I am part of are littered with older women telling their younger counter parts to act whilst they're still young to prevent the effects of ageing - as if getting old and getting wrinkles is not an inevitable part of life, refusing to admit to the vulnerabilities of the body.