Saturday November 21st, 2009
 |  |
 |
Makeup Shakeup
Posted by Belinda Miller on February 17, 2009 - 5:29pm.
I like to think I’m a pretty easy-going mom. And my daughter Georgia is a reasonable child. Quite often though, she has ideas that don't particularly thrill me. But she is very thoughtful and argues her points very persuasively. So I end up employing my favorite parenting mantra, "What does it hurt?" I weigh her argument, and very often she gets what she wants.
“What does it hurt” is a good test for me; if it hurts someone else,
it’s not OK. If it hurts the environment, we need to make another
choice. If it hurts something we need or love, think again. And if it
hurts me by making my life a lot harder, there have to be some
compromises. If she doesn’t want to wear a coat, “What does it hurt”
makes me realize, as long as she’s not in danger of frostbite or
illness, it’s OK for me not to fight that fight. And it’s OK for her to
do messy experiments with play dough, glitter and toothpicks, so long
as she's not using one of my favorite tiki mugs and is prepared to
clean it up. And the resulting experiment can’t be slathered on the cat.
So when she wanted to play with makeup, I figured “What does it hurt?”
She loved painting her face at the Children’s Museum, so I got some
non-toxic pastels for home use so she didn’t have to wait for a museum
trip to become a housecat, tiger or Harry Potter. And when she asked to
use some lipstick, I didn’t have a compelling reason to tell her no. I
don’t wear a lot of makeup, only when Hova and I are DJing or on the
rare occasion we have a date night. And she wanted to play big girl,
just like wearing pretend high heels and dress up clothes. So I let her
play with lipstick. I even let her wear it out sometimes, though there
are more times when I tell her it's not appropriate for a child to wear
lipstick. And she grouses and says, “It’s not fair!”
But it’s one of those things I haven’t quite worked out for myself. She
wants to feel pretty, sophisticated, older. Isn't that what we all want
to achieve (well, not the older part)? She says, “Don’t I look pretty?”
and I cringe, thinking there’s nothing prettier than her bare face. I
have to own that I gave her this belief -- that makeup is pretty. Or
did that come from society, even in her sheltered, limited-commercial
upbringing? In my gut I feel that this is just another form of play.
She’s just working this thing out, like everything else she’s
pretending, from breastfeeding her stuffed animals to shooting
bad werewolves. I am uncomfortable with her thinking makeup will make
her more attractive, and she has definitely attracted attention when
she’s dressed up and has lipstick smeared into a clown smile. People
react and say, “You look so beautiful!” and it’s true, though not in
the way she imagines. It definitely reinforces the fancy
clothes+makeup=beautiful thing, but it also demystifies makeup as just
another tool in life, like scissors, which she is an expert at using,
or knives, with which she handles carefully in the kitchen, or
Sharpies, which are respected and used with vigilance.
I think the fight I should be fighting is that the sparkly purple eye
shadow and lip gloss set she got for her birthday is surely packed with
all sorts of artificial, dubious ingredients.
I don’t like her putting impure, unregulated, potentially toxic
products on her skin, to be absorbed into her system or eaten off her
lips. It’s not like she plays with makeup every day (or even every
week), so that concern is probably a little overblown, but that stuff
has some nasty ingredients. When makeup is a real issue, we’ll talk
about the purity of it (and I’ll switch to cleaner makeup, just like The Green Makeup Artist
advocates), but for now when asking myself, “What does it hurt?” I am
hoping that by not making makeup an issue, it will be less of one for
her.
Photo credit: nessadoll77
This comment came in to my personal email but I asked if I could share it. I LOVE what she says about teen/kindergarten - I'm holding on to that!
I totally get your point. I think make-up holds a huge fascination for kids, both boys and girls, though, most parents wouldn't ever let their boys play with make-up. My son was really into nail polish as a four and five year old, and guess what, as a teenager he still likes to paint his nails, and does occasionally wear eye make-up and nail polish to school. So far no one has bothered him for it. I know make-up on a young girl raises tons of other issues. Yet, I firmly believe that you are right not to make a big deal out it, and the fascination will wain, if not the interest, entirely on its own. Nothing makes a kid, of any age, want something more than when a parent says "No!" to it. Also, I wonder if explaining the toxicity and animal testing issues, can be pulled out as your secret weapon against most make-up purchases. Buying the expensive, safe, natural products could be part of a reward program, like ten stars equals one tube of lipstick, kids of all ages go for that reward system. And, of course, the Neutrogena non-comedeogenic make-up remover, is a must, as is the "we don't wear make-up to bed" rule. I think after you get through kindergarten, you'll know everything you need to deal with a teenager, they are very similar ages!
I think you're on the right track. A personal anecdote: my mom didn't care if I "played" with makeup as a youngster. I wore blue eyeshadow to grade school for a while (it was the 80s...). And then I lost interest - so when all my preteen and teen friends were slathering it on in junior high school (whether because their parents told them "not until you're 13" or often, in the school bathroom, because it was still forbidden), I couldn't care less. I basically skipped the whole makeup thing, then, until I was in my twenties, and was old enough to comprehend the more complex issues about beauty and the social construction of femininity.
If I have a daughter, I'll probably try to stress skin CARE - good use of (safe) sunscreen, and a (safe) moisturizer as soon as is appropriate...and talk about how we should take care of our skin so it always looks beautiful and healthy without, or with minimal, makeup.