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So I didn’t wanna talk about this tweet because I truly have no beef with op or anyone who agreed with this, but it is actually making me uncomfortable and I do wanna talk about it. Thread below:
I'm speaking from the perspective of a white, non-binary bisexual person whose always openly spoken out against makeup and cosmetics industry as a whole and is highly critical of the media depictions of women-led narratives. I do love makeup, and the things I express with it.
But I can't deny the harmful effects and trickling down devestations the industries involving aestheticism has done to young women globally.
The reason this tweet makes me uncomfortable is that it re-enforces traditional feminime aesthetics, and also ignores how these character archetype isn't really as rare as OP thinks - as highly feminime characters are always favoured by the narrative regardless who is writing it.
Like, here are some examples below of highly feminized women who are "ass-kickers"
here are more:
OP's tweet was likely well-meaning, wanting to explore many facets of the women-experience without misogyny, but what grips me about OP's tweet is that they're basically describing the status quo of how society finds women desirable and preferred.
Like, speaking in terms of movies - every short-haired, tomboy character always undergoes an extreme transformation rendering themselves HIGHLY feminized, a trope that is routinely criticized for putting appearence above substance and kinda removing agency from these characters:
Aside from the misogynistic undertones of such tropes; none of these women had an interest in wearing makeup, or being feminine - they were happy and comfortable in their own skin. and yet, the movie forces them to change their entire wardrobe for.. what exactly?
Let's also call back to how horribly non-feminine women characters get treated - a recent example would be Abby from TLOU 2 whose MA and the character itself got criticized (to the point of sending death threats) because Abby was less feminine and more masculine.
So many comments are about people (mostly men) calling Abby "ugly" because she doesn't fit traditional feminine aesthetics, doesn't wear makeup, dresses, or heels - but she still kicks ass and is a well-rounded, strong character that everybody hated for absolutely no reason.
I can legitimately count or even struggle to name women characters who are not what OP wishes; so many of them are soft-looking, makeup wearing ass kickers to the point where we even joke about this girl spending the entire movie running in heels away from a damn dinosaur
And the reason I feel uncomfortable is because OP legitimately ignores how non-traditional women characters are frequently ignored, harassed, hated, or even outright killed within the narrative. Also ignores the horribly stearotypes that tend to follow non-makeup women.
There's also this whole performative nature of WHY women specifically have to look this way???? Why is someone whose routinely ass kicking wearing dresses and uncomfortable shoes when it's more logical to wear comfortable clothing and flat boots??? Why the gloopy makeup?
Why are y'all obsessed with making girls soft when women aren't even allowed to express anger, grief, rage, lust, and melancholy? Part of the reason I find Dead To Me so refreshing is that women are allowed to display unsoft emotions about their predicaments and heal through rage
Like it's so bizarre to me because I rmb being in fandom circles were if women characters weren't soft uwu wearing makeup and pink dresses kind of women they were routinely hated by fans for being too emotional or whiny or even showing the slightest hint of emotion such as Bela
and I feel like these arguments for these kind of women is just repackaged trad fem aesthetics that get fed to women constantly by makeup companies as if wearing eyeliner makes you strong, or apart of girl boss culture - as if it's framing it as an empowering choice.
Like legit Euphoria had a tomboy overweight girl wear makeup and become highly sexualised and soft and it was spinned as a positive character development step that her becoming a cam girl at 17 was "empowering"
As I mentioned, I have no beef with OP, or my mutuals who agreed, and I do love my makeup and soft aesthetics - but I wish y'all would think more critical about which women characters ur hyping up and wanting to see more and why that is, and why that always is highly fem soft wmn
Like honestly - I just want more strongly written women characters that aren't always reduced to uwu soft girl with sword. kick ass. no substance kind of character. A strong character is a character that has substance and has a character arc and is explored and loved tenderly
also like idk but considering we talk badly about IG and Snapchat giving teen girls low self-esteem about their appearence - y'all want MORE CHARACTERS being that??
like it's weird you're still fixated on how she looks like rather than what she brings to the table as a character. how does she engage with the narrative? what are her goals? is her character arc strong? can she evolve, devolve? who is she, and why should we care?
