Is Wearing Makeup “False Advertising?”

The short answer is no.

I spend a lot of time on the internet and I like to think of myself as someone who is relatively savvy when it comes to trends online. You don’t necessarily have to be someone of that sort to be aware of the comments people who wear makeup have been receiving, mainly from boys behind a keyboard. Just scroll down on the comments section of any makeup related youtube video or read tweets sent to celebrities wearing a full face of makeup, it is possible you will find a reoccurring theme.

“Makeup is false advertising!” has been a common remark lately.

The backlash from women across the internet has been massive rightfully so, because what these posts are saying is disrespectful on so many levels. I’d first like to point out the major issue I have, they are blatantly stating that women are not in fact human beings, but rather products that need to be ‘sold’ to men. By saying that wearing makeup is false advertising they are diminishing women to nothing more than an object that at all times must be pleasing to a man. As if a woman is nothing more than the way she looks, that what she has to say or who is as a person doesn’t even matter, if her face doesn’t look just as flawless without makeup as it does with.

I find it outright offensive that many people would only be interested in someone who looks like they are wearing makeup at all times. It’s hard to believe that they think women naturally have perfectly contoured cheekbones, bright red lips, and winged eyeliner. Because of this, it is not the woman’s fault that people feel ‘lied to’ when the makeup comes off. This feeling of betrayal by the public deepens the standard that teen girls, young women, and even adults have to wear makeup to be accepted and successful. It should not matter how someone chooses to represent their own physical appearance, and honestly many of these women who do put on a face of makeup everyday don’t do it to impress men.  It may be hard to understand that for many, not everything they do revolves around a man’s opinion of them. We live in 2015, a radical time where woman can do things by themselves, for themselves.

This brings me to my second point; a lot of the time people don’t wear makeup to impress anybody but themselves. It is an empowering feeling to look in the mirror and feel confident that you look as though you could take on the world. Yes, makeup can be used as a tool to hide slight insecurities, but for me personally and many others that I know, makeup is about the art and self expression, it’s about being good at something, it’s about experimenting, and mostly having fun. It is not about becoming someone different than yourself, or advertising yourself falsely, because underneath the makeup you are still the same person .