beauty

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Morning Update: 09/17/24
September 17, 2024

COVID Edition, Day 3

On Point [2013 original with AI background]

Everyone is home today. G hasn’t tested positive, yet, but he’s not feeling great. We’re keeping him home out of an abundance of caution to prevent any further spread. Tipper is feeling better and may be able to go back to school tomorrow. Kat seemed better yesterday, but I was already asleep by the time she got home last night so I don’t know how a full day of work affected her. I still feel like absolute shit. How bad is it? Hamilton, the dog who hates to snuggle, snuggled as close as he possibly could last night. I’m worried I may be dying.

Fortunately, there’s not really much in the news worth your time. There’s a lot of blabber about this, that, and some other thing, but none of it is going to directly affect your life in any way today. Breathe deep. Let it go.

I do find it interesting that the KC Chiefs dumped Tight End Peyton Hendershot yesterday. The IU grad wasn’t even suited up and playing last week when he shoved a Baltimore Ravens player on the sidelines. That earned the Chiefs a $100,000 fine. We’re assuming this is behavior he learned during his previous stint with the Cowboys. Such nonsense isn’t tolerated by Andy Reid & Co.

Ohio is having to assign state troopers to protect schools in Springfield due to the overwhelming number of threats. This is beyond ridiculous. Anyone who thinks there’s a shred of truth to the myth of Haitian immigrants eating pets is a moron. Anyone who would threaten to harm people because of that myth needs to be locked away in an asylum.

Houston got an unexpected jolt yesterday when a car ran through a fence and hit a valve on a gas pipeline, resulting in a massive explosion. The fire didn’t even think about dying down until early this morning. Hundreds of people had to be evacuated, and if you’ve never been trapped by a gas leak (I have), I gotta tell you it’s a harrowing moment of wondering whether it’s safe to move. Of course, the dude in the car was incinerated.

Oh, here’s a fun conversation to have with someone. A New York woman is challenging Miss America and Miss World rules banning mothers from beauty pageants. Now, this should raise at least a couple of arguments. The first one that comes to mind is why the fuck are we still having fucking beauty contests? The fact that any part of our society is not over the whole concept of comparative beauty is disgusting. The second conversation is the entire topic of single mothers who have never been married. This is a social thing, not a moral one. Quite honestly, I don’t have a problem with it. If you’re going to insist that everyone carry their baby to term, then you have to support them once the kid is here, not block their access to scholarships.

If you’re feeling really brave, jump in on the conversation about how pregnancy affects a woman’s brain. Mind you, this is real science, not hyperbole. We’re better understanding the adjustments the brain has to make to support the growth of a fetus and the stress it places on a woman’s body.

Speaking of births, today is my eldest son’s 33rd birthday!! I doubt anyone who knows him reads this, though. I’ll have to say something on Facebook to get him some attention.

I think this is about all I can handle this morning. The twins have been trying to help me type since I sat down at the desk. The dogs are ready to go out.

Don’t forget to drink your coffee, by the way. A new study suggests that drinking coffee offsets the negative effect of sitting on your ass all day. Mind you, it’s still theory at this point, but why take any chances?

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Photography
Sunday Gallery: All The Pretty People
February 26, 2017
charles i. letbetter - all the pretty people

Still too busy to edit anything new

charles i. letbetter - all the pretty people

As I’m writing this, I’m waiting for yet another fashion show to start in Milan. To say this past week has been hectic would be a tremendous understatement. In the past four years, we’ve never gone this long without adding anything to the website. I feel bad about that.

I wish we had new pictures as well, but it would be unfair to ask anyone to come in for new pictures when I don’t have time to edit them immediately. We’ve made that mistake before. The pictures are still sitting there. Not making any promises on that front.

What I do have is a curated set of pretty people. Understand, when I use the term “pretty,” we are in no way talking about physical appearance. Pretty is who one is, the person they display, who you allow other people to see. Unfortunately, we’ve photographed a lot of people over the years who are attractive enough on the outside, but less so when it came to who they really were. The people in these pictures were wonderful, every last one of them. We would happily work with any of them again.

Sigh. For some reason all the pretty people keep disappearing, moving away, getting on with their lives. I do wish they’d come back occasionally.

As always, click on any thumbnail to open the full slideshow.

 

[tg_masonry_gallery gallery_id=”10946″ layout=”contain” columns=”3″]

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Fashion  /  Photography
Sunday Gallery: Moments Of Beauty
January 29, 2017
charles i. letbetter - moments of beauty

We need to find the beauty in an ugly world

 

charles i. letbetter - moments of beauty

[dropcap]I found it difficult to curate a gallery for this week. My heart just wasn’t in it. Our eyes have been glued to news reports and wire feeds as thousands of people have been stranded, detained, and/or deported at our nation’s airports. They are victims, innocent victims of the president’s illegal immigration order the excludes people from seven countries from entering the US. Never mind that these people have legal work visas and green cards. Never mind that they have family members here who are relying upon them, waiting for them. Never mind they have employers who need them. The president’s order was a giant “fuck you” to all of them without regard, and a “fuck you” to the entire country.[/dropcap]

With all that going on, trying to find pictures along any kind of theme for this morning was impossible. I gave serious consideration to skipping this week’s gallery altogether. But no, when in moments of crisis, we need things that are beautiful. We need to see the beauty in our fellow human beings.

I’m sorry I don’t have pictures of anyone from the countries directly banned by the president. People in that situation rarely make it in front of anyone’s camera. They prefer to live quiet, unassuming lives with their families. They don’t take any chances.

So, for this week, we chose what I call “second glance” images, those pictures I probably didn’t choose on my first pass through a set, but have come to like for some reason or another. I hope they will bring a moment of beauty into your day, perhaps your life. Enjoy.

 

[tg_masonry_gallery gallery_id=”9846″ layout=”contain” columns=”3″]

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Advertising  /  Fashion  /  pop culture  /  PotD
The Beauty Industry Is Looking Ugly
August 26, 2016
charles i. letbetter - beauty is getting really ugly

Yeah, I know I’m ugly… I said to a bartender, ‘Make me a zombie.’ He said ‘God beat me to it.’ —Rodney Dangerfield

 

charles i. letbetter - the beauty industry is getting ugly

The beauty industry is under fire for tactics that are best described as downright ugly

Beauty is big business. Looking at revenue amounts for the billion-dollar industry don’t begin to fully embody the scope and reach of the behemoth that is Beauty. We’re surrounded by the messages, both pro, and con, on a daily basis. Regardless of one’s personal opinion, regimen, or gender, the onslaught of beauty-related messaging is downright ugly.

Consider, for example, that I can be sure that I will see a short video teasing some manner of beauty article every morning in my newsfeed. Today, it was Amanda Steele’s #GirlBoss Tricks to a Gorgeous Bold Brow on the Go published by Teen Vogue. The subject of the article, Amanda Steele, is a beauty blogger on YouTube. Beauty is one of the largest content areas on the video streaming site, rivaling gaming and music. There are teen beauty bloggers, black beauty bloggers, Latino beauty bloggers, Asian beauty bloggers, and even beauty bloggers for those who don’t like makeup. One might get the impression that people are a bit obsessed about beauty.

Then, people come along like Lena Dunham and Jemima Kirke who aim to upset the status quo by emphasizing a more natural, non-shaming approach to the subject. When this photo hit social media yesterday, the whole planet seemed to go rather berserk.


Great for them, right? It’s wonderful to have role models not afraid to be themselves, but the attention they received shows just how ugly the beauty business can get.

This Gets Personal

Not wearing makeup has become a “thing,” a movement, a trend, even a form of self-righteousness. Leading the battle, at least from a public standpoint, is singer/songwriter/grammy-winner Alicia Keys. She made her #NoMakeup campaign public last spring, but her continued refusal to wear makeup even as a judge on the television show The Voice has raised attention for the topic yet again. Yay for personal freedom! Yay for not covering up! Congratulations on being naturally beautiful enough to not be publicly condemned!

So, this really gets at all those beauty companies who make billions of dollars selling makeup, right? Think again. They simply shift tactics. Sephora even started offering “No makeup makeup” classes in some of its stores. Not wearing makeup doesn’t mean one stops taking care of their face. In fact, if one’s personal genetics leave one prone to oily skin, patchiness, or other issues, getting a no-makeup look that is as attractive as Ms. Keys might actually be more work than not wearing anything at all!

Then, there’s the whole matter of shaming in both directions. Recent studies from the University of Chicago and the University of California, Irvine, show that makeup and personal grooming are the primary factors in determining a young woman’s salary. Her skills might make her employable, but how she looks, which includes how well she wears makeup, determines at which end of the salary range she starts. What is ultimately being said that if you don’t wear makeup, you’re ugly. If you wear the wrong makeup, you’re ugly. But by all means, be yourself. How the fuck is someone supposed to make sense of that mess?

Dangerous Beauty

Whether or not one wears makeup, one still consumes beauty products and that’s where matters really get ugly. We pay a lot of attention to things that are supposedly helping our skin. Exfoliants and moisturizers, creams and lotions, and myriad other products are used by both men and women in abundance. What we too often don’t realize is that those products, not the makeup, are what cause one’s face to  break out or appear blotchy or have patches of dryness. Even more frightening is that regulation for these products is practically non-existent. Beauty companies can put just about anything they want in a cleanser or a skin cream, and they often do.

One of the biggest issues of late has been the presence of microbeads in a number of products, especially soaps, shampoos, cleansers, and toothpaste. While they are technically illegal in the US, if one is buying their beauty products online, which a lot of people do, the actual source of the product might not be disclosed. The results are about as ugly as anything you’re going to find. Not only are the microbeads bad for your skin, they’re even worse for the environment. Microbeads don’t break down and can be ingested by even the smallest of marine life.

The problem of microplastics is so ugly that Britain’s Parliament recently called for a worldwide ban on microbeads. While microbeads are a small portion of a much larger problem, they pose a most direct and immediate threat to the larger number of people because they can be ingested without the consumer even having a clue that they’re present. The long-term effects have not been studied in humans, but microplastics are even being found on the bottom of the ocean floor. There’s an environmental disaster larger than your face looming here.

The Spirit of Caveat Emptor

Beauty has always been an industry that enjoys extremely little oversight in the United States. While the EU, for example, has banned or restricted over 1,400 substances from beauty products sold there, the US only has a complete ban on eleven. Eleven. No wonder beauty companies like doing business in the US so much. Anything goes! Even worse, we are so gullible that once a company starts touting the beauty benefits of a product, consumers start flocking to it without doing any investigation. We just grab new products and start slapping them on our skin without so much as reading the ingredients list. When our skin breaks out, or dries out, or cracks open and bleeds, we might complain to our friends, but we don’t do anything to stop that product from harming others.

Back in the spring of 2015, Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) introduced bill S.1014 – Personal Care Products Safety Act. The bill, in my opinion, is mild. It says, in part:

If the FDA determines that a cosmetic has a reasonable probability of causing serious adverse health consequences, it may prohibit the cosmetic’s distribution by suspending the cosmetic ingredient statement. If other cosmetics from the same facility may be affected, the FDA may prohibit distribution from the facility by suspending the facility’s registration. 

One might have thought that the FDA already had the ability to stop dangerous cosmetic products, but it does not. Even within the definitions set down within this bill, were it to ever be passed, the FDA would only have to investigate four products a year!

Freedom To Be Stupid

Since being introduced in 2015, Bill S.1014 has gotten exactly one reading in the Senate and assigned to the committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. Heaven forbid the US Senate to have a committee structure that makes a damn bit of sense. Since arriving in that committee, absolutely nothing has happened. There have been no hearings. No one has undertaken any kind of investigation. The United States Senate has done absolutely nothing. Beyond Congress’ current attitude of complete and utter obstructionism, the prevailing “wisdom” among our elected officials is that regulation takes away a corporation’s “freedom.” Since we now consider corporations as people, they are, supposedly, free to do whatever stupid thing they wish without government interference.

So, the beauty industry is free to be as ugly as they want. They can foist any ridiculous product on the market, including no-makeup makeup, and there’s practically nothing can be done to stop them. Sure, they claim to have the consumer’s best interest at heart. A number of them even signed on in support of Bill S.1014. Senator Feinstein’s website lists the following:

  • Johnson & Johnson (brands include Neutrogena, Aveeno, Clean & Clear, Lubriderm, Johnson’s baby products)
  • Procter & Gamble (brands include Pantene, Head & Shoulders, Clairol, Herbal Essences, Secret, Dolce & Gabbana, Gucci, Ivory, Cover Girl, Olay, Sebastian Professional, Vidal Sassoon)
  • Revlon (brands include Revlon, Almay, Mitchum)
  • Estee Lauder (brands include Estée Lauder, Clinique, Origins, Tommy Hilfiger, MAC, La Mer, Bobbi Brown, Donna Karan, Aveda, Michael Kors)
  • Unilever (brands include Dove, Tresemme, Lever, St. Ives, Noxzema, Nexxus, Pond’s, Suave, Sunsilk, Vaseline, Degree)
  • L’Oreal (brands include L’Oréal Paris, Lancome, Giorgio Armani, Yves Saint Laurent, Kiehl’s, Essie, Garnier, Maybelline-New York, Vichy, La Roche-Posay, The Body Shop, Redken)

Yet, for all the talk, no one is actually doing anything to actively protect consumers. The entire beauty industry is bent on convincing us that we’re ugly, even while telling us that we’re beautiful from the inside out.

The Battle Is Yours

Fuck waiting on Congress to do anything. This battle is your own. Whether you wear makeup or don’t wear makeup is irrelevant. Everyone consumes some form of beauty product, whether it be soap or toothpaste or moisturizer. That means everyone is potentially at risk. The industry is not looking out for you. The government isn’t looking out for you. You have to look out for yourself.

Best line of defense: talk to a professional. I know Kat has a list of products she recommends as does Danelle French. Either of them will discuss the particular needs of your skin and help direct you toward products that are not likely to leave you in worse shape than when you started. Take control of the situation for yourself.

The world of beauty really is an ugly business that too often runs akin to the snake oil salesmen of the 19th century. Dangers lurk everywhere. Take care of yourself.

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Advertising  /  Fashion  /  pop culture  /  PotD
Information Overload
June 30, 2016

Where is the Life we have lost in living? Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information? —T. S. Eliot

 

charles i. letbetter - information overload

The glut of information comes at such a heavy pace so as to make keeping up impossible

I don’t know about anyone else, but the volume of information I receive on a daily basis is impossible to consume. While the majority of articles, press releases, and various studies shoved my direction do have some value, there is simply not enough time to digest and comprehend the bulk. I end up setting some pieces aside to read later and then get to the end of the month, like today, and realize I have a backlog that needs to be addressed.

Even then, I know there’s some information I have to let go. That article that says one out of three internet users are content creators? It’s been sitting there for two weeks. The information seems interesting, but there is not enough time to get into the details. A detailed essay on the dumbing down of America has been sitting there since the 7th. Incredible amounts of information that is highly applicable to this election season. Too detailed for my schedule, though. I have to let it pass.

Still, there are some stories that, for various reasons, I can’t let pass without at least a tiny bit of comment. This is information I am quite sure you need, that will impact every aspect of your life. Okay, not really, but some of it is damned entertaining. The headlines are links. Click them for more information.

Alexander Wang Is Now Chairman/CEO Of His Own Brand

For those outside the fashion industry, this may sound like a rather obvious move. It’s not. Fashion designers are notoriously bad at the business side of things. That’s why conglomerates such as Kering and LVMH own so many top-name labels. People who are wonderfully creative, such as clothing designers, too often attempt to apply that same creativity to the business side of the house and it rarely works.

Alex takes over the head of the boardroom from his sister-in-law and his mom, both of whom have been running things rather well. Certainly, Wang would not have been able to spend the time at Balenciaga had they not been in place. They’ve done an excellent job of steering his young brand through its first ten years. Influencers such as Marc Jacobs haven’t hurt, either.

The fashion market has changed dramatically in the past five years, though, and strategies that made sense when the label was founded no longer work. The move signals a new direction, though it remains to be seen what that new direction might be. Alexander Wang is one of the top US fashion brands at the moment. Let’s hope he doesn’t blow it. We’ll file this information under things to watch.

Kering Ordered To Pay Hedi Slimane $13 Million

Speaking of Kering, they were sued earlier this month by former Yves Saint Laurent designer Hedi Slimane. Honestly, when I first saw a related headline, I rolled my eyes. I think Slimane was expecting another label to pick him up quickly upon his departure from YSL. His expectations were a bit too eager. Few talked with him at all and none of the conversations reached a serious stage of negotiation.

That means the rather extravagant designer was starting to feel the financial impact of not having a regular income. So, what does he do? Find a loophole in his former contract and sue his former employer for failing to include a non-compete clause in his separation agreement. Understand, a non-compete means that a designer cannot just hop directly from one label to the next for a given period of time. A non-compete is what is allegedly keeping Raf Simons from taking the head job at Calvin Klein. How does this make sense?

Non-competes, in the fashion world, are generally compensated. Labels essentially pay a designer to not work (in an official capacity) for usually two or three years. The $13 million Slimane was awarded should keep him going long enough to create a new strategy.

Dove Release New #MyBeautyMyWay Campaign

Dove has been using messages of affirmation for women in its ads for some time now. While there has yet to be any firm information showing that the tactic is adding anything to the brand’s bottom line, the campaigns are at least socially popular. This particular campaign comes along at a time when body image and self-image, especially among women, is a significant issue.  Women are tired of the cat calls and the impolite statements regarding their appearance. Dove’s campaign encourages women to define their beauty their own way. Take a look at the 60-second ad:

My expectation is that an overwhelming number of women can identify with at least one if not multiple statements made. Additional ads address the details of each of the six women shown in this introductory piece. The timing ties into the presidential campaign as well. With a woman as the presumptive Democratic nominee and the misogynistic tone of the presumptive Republican nominee, women are feeling more empowered to be vocal and reclaiming their personhood.

Still, how long can Dove continue these campaigns without them adding significant revenue? Altruism doesn’t pay the bills.

Starbucks Is The Favorite Food Brand Among Millennials

Is anyone really surprised by this one? Of course not. Anytime we stop by one of the coffee stores we have to wait in line behind two or three 30-somethings getting their mocha-soy-caramel-latte-frappucino on. All I want is a venti blonde roast. Black. Yet, I still have to wait while each of the millennials in front of me orders a drink with far too many syllables to be healthy, then mulls over the ever-growing list of food items that look and sound healthy.  Can I just get my coffee, please?

Click the link above, though, and what you’ll see is a list of the top 17 most popular food brands among this top group of shoppers who are the driving demographic for almost every company on the planet. Look through the list and you’ll notice a trend that has been part of Starbuck’s strategy from the beginning: Fresh, healthy and innovative. The growing food menu items address the fresh and healthy issue. The drinks have always been innovative. Starbucks has made the strategy work for them and other brands are finally beginning to see the value as well.

Even we old codgers benefit. With everyone adjusting to lure millennials, we’re all eating better whether we like it or not.

Crystal Pepsi Is Making A Return

Depending on how one feels about the product, we might file this interesting piece of information under “too good to be true,” or “what the hell are they thinking?” Crystal Pepsi, which is supposed to taste exactly like the original product, hasn’t been on store shelves since 1994. There is a very good reason for that: no one wanted a cola that looked like 7Up. The caramel color is part of the identity of a cola. The drink was treated more as a novelty and then slipped slowly away.

Today, though, artificial dyes are under attack from the healthy/pure food woo groups. You know, those same people who are convinced that Monsanto is out to destroy the entire food supply (they’re not). While the actual peer-reviewed science regarding food dyes only shows a danger in a handful of very specific colors consumed in high quantities, the concept of going without dyes has a lot of marketing clout. The move worked for Hershey, after all. They saw a significant sales bump after announcing they had eliminated artificial coloring from their chocolate.

The difference between Hershey’s and Pepsi, though, is that the chocolate still looks pretty much the same. The color may not be identical, but at least it’s still brown. Take the artificial coloring out of Pepsi and you have something that does not look anything like a cola. The move didn’t work well the first time. We’ll see if this effort is different.

French Cable Now Has Porn Ads

Americans like copying a lot of trends that are popular across Great Britain and France. With the UK having pretty much sabotaged itself with the whole Brexit thing, France is getting more of the attention at the moment. Maybe a bit too much attention. The French cable provider Cable+ has come up with a set of ads that, while hilarious to view, would be almost impossible to duplicate for the American market. Let’s see if I can describe this delicately …

It’s porn.

Apparently, French Cable providers can get away with a lot racier content than we can here. In the American cable market, the most shocking thing one is likely to see is the blood bath known as Game of Thrones. We can be explicit in our killing, but not our sex. That might explain some problems with our culture.

What these French ads do, though, is hilariously parody old-school porn by removing one person from the scene. So, you have real porn stars looking as though they’re getting it on, but their partner is missing. Why is the partner missing? Because all the good porn has moved to Canal.

It’s a bit much and definitely NSFW. I’m not posting the ads here. Click the link, though. They’re hilarious.

Take A Break

After that last bit of information there, I think we need to take a break. I need another cup of coffee. I hope at least one piece of information here improves your life somehow.

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Advertising  /  Fashion  /  Original Style  /  PotD
Beauty Becomes A Battlefield
June 6, 2016

Beauty of whatever kind, in its supreme development, invariably excites the sensitive soul to tears. —Edgar Allan Poe

 

charles i. letbetter - beauty becomes a battlefield.

The beauty industry has played for years to women wanting to look beautiful, but today women don’t want their help.

Beauty is big business. In the United States alone, cosmetics companies rake in over $60 billion a year. Proctor & Gamble and L’Oréal alone have a combined global revenue in excess of $115 billion. That’s not even starting to figure in on what is spent at salons and spas. People want to look better because, more than anything, it helps them to feel better about themselves. Perhaps it is a little vain, but as long as the individual is doing it for themselves, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to spruce up one’s image a bit.

Unfortunately, there are plenty of people running around who think we all should look better than we do.

No, scratch that, they think women should look better than they do. Just try to find an employee handbook that tells men they need to come to work with makeup. I’d offer to wait but I already know you’re not going to find anything. Beauty is sexist because society is sexist and the biases and attitudes that were encoded in the 1950s have never really gone away, no matter how advanced we like to think we have become. Women are still expected to wear makeup, to make themselves “look better” than they naturally do, and an entire industry depends on women buying into that concept that they just don’t look good enough.

Men have never been taught that they need to do anything to their appearance beyond,  depending upon social trends, maybe shave occasionally. You don’t see ads for men’s wrinkle cream. You don’t see ads telling men they need longer lashes. You don’t see men telling them they need to look “flawless.” Yet, women are bombarded with those very instructions every day and if they don’t succumb to those expectations, they can sometimes lose their jobs.

The battle between women and society over makeup is not a new one, but it may be reaching a fervor. Last year, actress Demi Lavato started a trend using the hashtag #NoMakeupMonday. About the same time, the hashtag #Iwokeuplikethis began appearing. By the end of the year, the two hashtags had appeared on Instagram over 10 million times. The craze caught on and big name models and stars such as Taylor Swift, Cindy Crawford, and Gwenyth Paltrow have all posted bare-faced photos of themselves. Of course, they then went immediately and put on makeup.

The latest volley from the #nomakup side came last week when singer Alicia Keys announced that she’s not wearing makeup. Ever. In her article for the magazine Lenny, the singer says:

In one song I wrote, called “When a Girl Can’t Be Herself,” it says,

In the morning from the minute that I wake up  / What if I don’t want to put on all that makeup  / Who says I must conceal what I’m made of  / Maybe all this Maybelline is covering my self-esteem

No disrespect to Maybelline, the word just worked after the maybe. But the truth is … I was really starting to feel like that — that, as I am, I was not good enough for the world to see.

This started manifesting on many levels, and it was not healthy.

Every time I left the house, I would be worried if I didn’t put on makeup: What if someone wanted a picture?? What if they POSTED it??? These were the insecure, superficial, but honest thoughts I was thinking. And all of it, one way or another, was based too much on what other people thought of me.

The cover art for her new album is a picture of Ms. Keys, straight from the gym, no makeup, no styling, nothing. Of course, she’s beautiful.

But is that all it takes to undo decades of chauvinistic attitudes toward beauty? And, isn’t this expectation that everyone needs to be running around sans makeup just as bad as one that says everyone needs makeup? If someone else is setting the standard, isn’t one just as bad as the other?

Back in December of last year, Flare magazine published an open letter to Demi Levato that addresses that very situation. In that article, they raise the issue that there cannot be just one standard of beauty that magically fits all the women around the world. About halfway through the article, they make this statement:

It’s not the tyranny of makeup that women need to fight back against, but the tyranny of appearance. And when we post #nomakeup selfies, we’re replacing one beauty standard with another. Scratch that—we’re actually upholding an almost identical beauty standard. We’re just making it a lot harder to achieve by telling the women of the world that not only are they supposed to look like Goop or Rih-Rih or the ethereal goddess running across a field in your J.Crew catalogue—now they’re supposed to do it without the assistance of makeup.

And here women find themselves feeling as though they can’t please anyone. If they wear makeup, that’s feeding a negative stereotype. If they don’t wear makeup, they’re still feeding a negative bias that says they have to look a certain way. When does a woman get to choose how she looks because that’s how she wants to look?

Last April comedienne Amy Schumer took on the issue by parodying One Direction’s “What Makes You Beautiful” and in doing so makes the point that pushing a #nomakeup standard is just as superficial as insisting that a woman must wear makeup every day for every occasion. Both are wrong. Both need to stop. The video is hilarious, so of course, I had to share:

Whether one likes makeup or not, what ultimately matters is that you look the way you want to look. Society has no business defining what is best, or preferable, or even professional. We haven’t even touched on the topic of modifications such as piercings and dermals. The only person who can define your beauty is you and if that includes makeup, that’s fine. No one has any room to criticize what makes you feel like the best and most beautiful you.

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PotD  /  Social Commentary
A Mother’s Beauty
May 8, 2016
charles i. letbetter - a mother's beauty

Mother’s love is peace. It need not be acquired, it need not be deserved. —Erich Fromm

chalres i. letbetter - a mother's beauty

Mother’s Day brings plenty of memories, but we forget the beauty sacrifices mothers make for us.

I typically avoid the topic of mothers on Mother’s Day, partly because that’s what everyone is talking about and I’m not sure I can, or should, compete for your attention. Mother’s Day is also a little sad now that my own mother is gone. Some days it is better to let others do all the talking.

We romanticize our mothers in a sense, not that such a perspective is inappropriate, but our love for our mothers sometimes keeps us from seeing the depth of a mother’s sacrifice for her children.  She wouldn’t bring it up, of course, mothers rarely do. But what we remember of our mothers is seen through the perspective of a child. We don’t see what all went on in a mother’s life before she had children and everything she willingly gave up for us.

There aren’t many pictures still around of my mother when she was young. Her family was dirt poor and didn’t have a camera so the only pictures are those someone else took and gave her. What I see in those few pictures, though, is someone with a quick smile, sparkling eyes, and curly jet-black hair. I can understand why Poppa found her attractive. She was petite, like her other mother, with her father’s slim build; enough curve to be feminine, but not so much as to appear inappropriately sexual, which was apparently a thing back in the 1950s. She wore bobby socks with loafers and heels and gloves as was common at the time. Poppa said she was very prim and proper, very strict in her etiquette, but more than anything, he said she was beautiful.

Sure, everyone thinks their mother is beautiful, but we don’t see the same beauty that our fathers did. We see someone who is loving and caring and made sacrifices for us so that we could have everything we needed. Remember, though, that our fathers knew our mothers before we did and they saw her beauty in a different light.  They saw a side of a mother’s beauty that we’re not all that comfortable discussing. Despite everything that might have happened later, all the arguments and divorces, the illnesses and emotional issues, before we were born our fathers thought our mothers were sexy. They wouldn’t likely use that word in front of us, but that’s what they were thinking.

I occasionally come across someone who has nude photographs of their mother taken before they were born. We don’t often think of artistic nude photography having existed much before Helmut Newton, but it most certainly did, and was secretly very popular.   The difference was that they kept those photos to themselves. There was no Internet or social media on which to share them, so rarely did anyone else ever know they had been taken and it certainly wasn’t something they would just show to the kids. Typically, the photos are found by the adult child while helping their mother go through things later in her life. They elicit all knew stories about a side of our mothers we never considered: they were sexy.

Then, we came along and spoiled it all. The effect might not have happened immediately. Some women’s bodies handle childbirth better than others. Others, though, never lose the weight they put on carrying you. Hips that widened to facilitate your delivery didn’t snap back in place. If you kicked the wrong thing while you were swimming around in all that amniotic fluid, you likely created a physical problem your mother had to endure the rest of her life. She was thrilled to nurse you and cuddle you close, but because of that her breasts sag and she never looked the same in a swimsuit again.

You gave her stretch marks and those dark circles under her eyes from 18-plus years of never getting enough sleep and worrying about the trouble she knew you were getting into, even if she didn’t know exactly what it was. You killed her arches as she ran after you in shoes that were not meant for running. Her joints eventually became stiff and arthritic from all the times she put herself in unnatural positions to find that toy you had just dropped, or teaching you how to play leap frog, or picking you up and carrying you from the playground after you fell from the swing, again.

Before you were born, that lady you now call your mom paid more attention to how she looked when she went out. Her ensemble was carefully put together, even if it was more bohemian and less Chanel. She might have even worn makeup and had her nails done. After you came along, though, she was happy if what she was wearing didn’t have any fresh stains and if everything matched it was more by coincidence than design. Your mother’s stylist thought you were cute, but secretly hated you because your mother went from trying out different cuts and colors to short and easy-to-manage.

After  you came along, your mother didn’t go out with friends as often, didn’t travel as much, gave up on trying to fit into Gloria Vanderbilt jeans and damn sure wanted to make sure there was sufficient coverage between her and her Calvin’s. Almost everything that had gone into making her so physically desirable to your father either you ruined or she had to give up to care for you, except for one thing: Love.

And that’s what we remember on Mother’s Day: her love. After all, that’s what is important, right? Nothing else matters, at least, not now. A mother’s beauty isn’t defined by how “hot” she looks, how many heads she once turned, or how many hearts she once broke. A mother’s beauty is defined by how she could kiss a boo-boo and make the pain go away, or how she knew exactly when you needed her to make those special pancakes, or how she could mend a broken heart then help you plot revenge. She likes that definition.

Mothers don’t care about what they’ve given up for you. The love you and, in the vast majority of situations, would do everything all over again (with the benefit of a little wisdom from the experience). She loves you, you love her, and that makes everything beautiful enough for her. But don’t you ever forget that she did make those sacrifices. I’ll tell you what she might not: you owe her. Big.

A poet, whose name escapes me at the moment, once said that a mother’s beauty is defined is defined by the grace and compassion of her children. Your mother gave up a lot for you. Make her beautiful, damnit.

 

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Advertising  /  Current Issues
Social Change Through Selling Stuff
April 9, 2016
charles i. letbetter - social change through advertising

The ultimate end of all revolutionary social change is to establish the sanctity of human life, the dignity of man, the right of every human being to liberty and well-being. —Emma Goldman

 

charles i. letbetter - social change by selling stuff

Advertising seems a mechanism of greed, but it can also chance the world

Advertising has one primary goal: sell a product. In the crowded world of today’s marketplace, getting a message out there to the right people at the right time requires precision execution of a well-researched strategy. Make a mistake and an entire company can fail. With that kind of pressure, who has time to think about social change? Is social change even something that should worry advertisers in the first place?

Traditionally, advertisers look at an environment to see how their client’s product(s) can/might fit the existing structure. Sometimes, when the product is game-changing, advertisers may look to creating a new environment wherein their client’s product is desirable. What’s most difficult, though, is actually trying to create social change, to alter an environment, in ways that are not necessarily related to a product at all, or where the links are not obvious.

Examples of the latter are difficult to find, but we’re seeing that approach used with increasing frequency and when it’s done well the success for the brand is as astonishing as the social change it creates. The Dove beauty ads that promote being one’s self and alternative views of beauty are probably the best known and most obvious example, but there are others that have popped up this past week that are looking to do more, to make social change that is more concrete; change that actually alters society.

The first highlights a problem that, being a white male, I had never considered: how certain beauty products are shelved. I never have been one to go in for high-end beauty products. Shampoo, deodorant, and soap are all I need and my purchase is more often than not based on price. For people of color, though, such a simple thing as buying a bottle of shampoo can be challenging because the kind of shampoo they need is not shelved with the shampoo, it’s shelved in a special “ethnic” section. WTF? I knew such things had happened in the first half of the 20th century, but I had just assumed that the practice had ended long ago. Not so.

Droga5, the agency for Shea Moisture, decided that the best way to disrupt the severely crowded beauty market was through social change. We don’t need a separate “ethnic” beauty section. Put all the beauty products together and let people decide for themselves which ones they need. The message is timely, appropriate, and very well executed. Take a look.

The second example also comes from a beauty product, but the social change they’re advocating is much more entrenched, taking on a piece of Chinese culture that is literally thousands of years old. For centuries, matchmaking has been a part of Chinese culture. Even the Disney animated rendition of the story of Mulan weaves that tradition into the storyline. The status quo holds that girls need to be married by the time they are 25 or else they bring shame upon their families. Those who are not married by that time are referred to as “leftover girls.”

As odd as this custom seems to those of us in Western society, variations of this approach to marriage is present in nearly every Asian culture. So, for Chinese skin care brand SK-II to take on the subject and suggest that this centuries-old habit no longer fits in modern society means rocking the boat in a very big way. As China has opened itself to global economics and goods made outside its borders, Western ideologies have infiltrated Chinese culture and frequently meets with some resistance. For SK-II to take such a strong stand against such ingrained habits is extremely risky. Yet, the ad they’ve been using takes such a gentle and beautiful approach to social change that it is actually working in their favor. You’ll want to make sure subtitles are on to understand the ad. Take a look:

Then, there’s the matter of Ogilvy & Mather’s Berlin office’s brave attempt to fight a level of social change by creating its own products, a series of books, to fight a rising anti-immigrant wave that is far too reminiscent of a period in history most Germans wish they could erase entirely. Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf was published this year for the first time since 1945. While much of the symbolism surrounding the Nazi regime is still illegal in Germany, the expiration of the original copyright allowed for the book to be published again just as anti-immigration attitudes are growing in strength both socially and politically.

Ogilvy’s leadership decided to confront this problem head-on by publishing a set of books with the exact same title but very different content. The eleven book series, Mein Kampf Gegen Rechts (My Struggle Against Racism) looks at the effects of xenophobia and injustice through the eyes of 11 very diverse people, including a concentration camp survivor, an Afghan refugee, and a white-haired grandmother who takes on pro-Nazi graffiti with soap and a brush. The books struck a nerve and the initial publication run of 11,000 sold out quickly. Here’s the ad:

Whereas the ads from the two beauty products are careful and gentle in their approach to social change, Ogilvy’s is more like taking a ball bat to the problem. There are few phrases more socially and politically volatile than Mein Kampf. Just using the phrase causes many Germans to cringe. Yet, this is how advertising takes on the problems they see in the world and all three have seen a measure of success in their social goals.

Such an approach raises some questions that still need discussion. What are the ethics in blending social change with selling a product? Do we risk cheapening the change that we’re advocating by attaching it to a specific product or brand? Could brands create problems that don’t actually exist in order to profit from the association? These are not questions with simple answers and moving forward they need to be carefully considered.

At the same time, though, advertisers are in a unique position to use their sizeable budget to bring attention to situations and causes that might otherwise go ignored. The Shae Moisturizer ad is a perfect example; I had no idea that “ethnic” sections still existed and fully support their elimination.

With all that is wrong in our world, change has to come from somewhere and it should be obvious that it’s not going to come from a politician or a government. If brands and advertisers can lead us to think differently about the soda we drink, why can they not use that same power to change how we perceive and treat each other?

Social change can happen through a simple ad. Let ’em roll.

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PotD  /  Social Commentary
Strong, Beautiful Women
March 7, 2016

Being a woman is a terribly difficult task, since it consists principally in dealing with men. —Joseph Conrad

 

charles i. letbetter - strong, beautiful women

Our lives and our society would be nothing without the presence of strong, beautiful women

We are surrounded by strong, beautiful women. We see them every day. They are essential to our lives. In fact, contemporary society could not function without them. Even though they still lack full equality in a number of areas, that in no way diminishes the important roles they play in all our lives. Yesterday, however, brought three very strong, very beautiful women to mind and now that I have a few minutes I think it is appropriate to talk about them.

Former First Lady, Nancy Reagan passed away yesterday at age 94. Politically, Mrs. Reagan and I could not be any further apart, but that’s not what made her notable. She married and supported one of the most challenging men of the twentieth century through some of the most difficult circumstances imaginable. Her husband was shot, almost fatally, and she never left his side. When his mind began to deteriorate, she was there, a buffer between him and those who dearly wanted to paint him in a negative light. She stood strong on issues she supported. She fought breast cancer and won. She survived vicious attacks on her character. Through it all, she never stopped being elegant. She never stopped for a pity party. She never stopped being beautiful.

Yesterday would have been my late mother’s 83rd birthday. Mother was a staunch conservative whose Christian belief system dominated everything she said and did. She might have been short in physical stature, but her character was ten feet tall and there was no one on the planet who dared challenge her. I remember when former Oklahoma governor David Boren was running for re-election. The Governor was tall, large, and had the ability to present an imposing figure. Mother marched right up to him on a campaign stop, gave him a look that forced him to bend down to her eye level, and proceeded to grill him for ten minutes on the need for better education funding in the state. She backed down from no one and didn’t mind telling someone what they needed to hear. Being a pastor’s wife wasn’t easy, and neither was raising my brother and me. She managed on a budget that was impossibly small. Yet, never did she lose her sense of dignity and genteel gracefulness. She was always beautiful.

March 6 also marks three years that Kat and I have been together. I had a lot of respect for single moms before having met Kat, but she drove home the concept of women who could manage work, children, and every other challenge of life on her own. Strength? She is a United States Marine. Even though she hasn’t been active duty for a few years now, that strength and determination still show. She faces every challenge with the same grit and no-fail attitude as she would an obstacle course. She’s handling school and work and children, and most incredibly, me and still manages to find a smile, to be there for friends, and impress those who watch her in action. She keeps me going, remembers the lyrics to my favorite songs, picks me up off the floor when I fall, encourages me on the days I can hardly walk, and finds ways to make me smile when I am in full-fledged grumpy old man mode. She’s beautiful from every possible perspective but threaten her family and she won’t hesitate to leave one gasping for air.

There is no sense in which we give enough credit to the women in our lives. These are but three immediate examples of how brilliant, strong, inventive, creative, determined, and beautiful women are. I could add to the list infinitely and if you can’t as well you’re just not paying attention.

Mondays are rough for everyone, we all have challenges when it comes to adjusting from the weekend and getting into the routine of the week. Consider just how much more challenging it is for the women in your life. Not only are they having their own issues with Monday, their dealing with children’s issues, spousal/partner issues, and probably the issues of people at school and work, because it is women who most often end up resolving everyone’s issues, not just their own. Don’t you think it’s about time you said thank you?

And if it’s appropriate and possible, a kiss wouldn’t be a bad idea, either.

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Art  /  PotD
Compare And Contrast
October 26, 2015
charles i. letbetter - compare and contrast

charles i. letbetter - compare and contrast

Autumn Illusion – Compare & Contrast

As a means of contrast with the sublime, the grotesque is, in our view, the richest source that nature can offer.—Victor Hugo

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Walking through the neighborhood late yesterday afternoon, the contrast of beauty versus the grotesque was on high display. Trees with gnarled trunks and twisted branches standing next to tall, straight oaks and maples resplendent in their color were inescapable to the point that even the young male child, whose attention is more often on things such as dirt and bicycles, couldn’t help but notice and comment.

He called the bent trees ugly, which received immediate correction. Contrast is not ugly. Contrast is our source of appreciation both for what is beautiful and for what is different. We admire more the statuesque oak when we realize that growing so straight and so tall is not inherent, but a gift from nature. We are amazed also at the tree that has fought off challenges of wind and disease, scarred and misshapened.

Contrast also the trees that found enough moisture to color their leaves to those who merely dropped theirs like on might casually toss aside a used tissue. The ground is littered with both. The crunch beneath small feet another contrast to the rainbow they picked up and tossed into the air.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Life is dramatically full of contrast. Being awake is sharp against the desire to fall back asleep. Strong coffee from my own french press this morning is a contrast to memories of over-boiled sludge. 73 is the temperature registering on the thermostat in the hallway. 43 chilly degrees is what the Weather Channel app on my phone warns is waiting outside. Checking an app versus reading a thermometer.

A torn window screen, dirty, cast aside, attempts to cling to its frame to avoid being trampled into the dirt. Practical as the screen once was, beauty was never part of its physical description. Yet, I needed it in front of my camera. I held it up to the sky not for the beauty, but for the contrast. I did not need beauty, for that had already been captured. The screen was different.

I failed geometry. Finding the area of a circle escapes my talents even today. Contrasting shapes and planes of reality messes with my sense of balance. Neither leaves nor lives are well centered. Screens become grids that reach off into nothingness without obscuring or defining. Contrast full versus empty. Welcome, another illusion.[/one_half_last]

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Music  /  PotD
What Kind Of Woman Is This?
October 14, 2015
charles i. letbetter - what kind of woman is this?

charles i. letbetter - what kind of woman is this

Blue All Over (2015)

Being jealous of a beautiful woman is not going to make you more beautiful.—Zsa Zsa Gabor

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]I’m going to go off script this morning, because, with a title like What Kind Of Woman Is This? I feel the need to do some explaining. We tend to look at the Blues as a way of working out something challenging to us. No, not always. There are times when all it takes is the presence of a beautiful woman. Here are the lyrics:

The gates of Heaven must be open
I think I saw an angel just walk by
Hey, the gates of heaven must be open
I think I saw an angel just walk by

I heard a blind man screamin’, say
Now there goes a sight for my sore eyes
There goes a sight for my sore eyes
Now there goes a sight for my sore eyes
What kind of woman is this?

You should be locked up, pretty girl
In my bedroom with me
Hey, you should be locked up, pretty girl
In my bedroom with me

So we can do the same thing that Adam
Did under that old apple tree
What he did under that apple tree
What he did under that apple tree

Well, well, well, well, well, well
Choke out
Here I come again

There’s always some good lookin’ girls
Hangin’ ’round this famous place
Well, hey, there’s always some good lookin’ girls
Hangin’ round this famous place, talkin’ bout legends now

Aww, but this particular one
Looked like somethin’ from outer space
She looked like somethin’ from outer space

What kind of woman is this?
Hmm, what kind of woman is this?
What kind of woman is this?
Ooh, what kind of woman is this?

Look at that, she shakes all over when she walk
She made a blind man see
Made a dumb man talk
What kind of woman is this?
Hmm, shucks

[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]What  Kind of Woman is This? is the only original song on Buddy Guy’s 2005 album, Bring ’em In. That would mean he was 68- or 69-years-old when he wrote the song. Considering the fact that it really is not much more than one long pick-up line, one might think that the Blues comes from knowing he’s not going to be the one to get her. I would have to challenge that, though. Blues musicians seem to get better with age, like so many other things, and I’ve not seen one yet that didn’t have groupies waiting at the stage door.

One might also question whether the song’s title is sexist, patronizing, objectifying, or possibly even misogynistic. I think the song is actually more appreciative than anything. We’ve all been in that crowded room when a particular woman walks in and turns every head in the place. Maybe she’s wildly attractive, or maybe she’s a strong, confident woman who doesn’t put up with the bullshit she gets from men; perhaps she’s both.

So, where do the Blues come in? What’s the cause for the emotion? Can there be such a thing as a happy Blues song? Yes, there are happy Blues songs, and in some aspects this may be one of them. But what I think Guy is talking about is a distraction. Perhaps the woman’s presence was unexpected. Maybe she sat a little too close to the stage. One thing for sure is that everyone in the room, including the blind man, if more interested in the woman than in the person on the stage. Any musician will tell you, a distraction that compete’s with your performance is plenty of reason to sing the Blues.

Here’s to the women who can distract whatever is going on in any room, and here’s to the musicians who have to endure the distraction. May you both manage to keep your composure. Enjoy the song.

[/one_half_last]

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pop culture  /  PotD
Better Beauty
September 7, 2015
charles i. letbetter -

charles i. letbetter - beatter beauty

Better Beauty

When virtue and modesty enlighten her charms, the lustre of a beautiful woman is brighter than the stars of heaven, and the influence of her power it is in vain to resist.—Akhenaton

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Once upon a time, it was an accepted fact that only a few, the fortunate, the lucky, the pampered, had any hope of being beautiful. Life was hard. Women were married and bearing children by the time they were fourteen, working in fields, toiling over hot wood stoves, and putting up with everything from dysentery to abusive husbands. People aged quickly. Life was short. Beauty was nice if you had it, but most didn’t and they were okay with that. One looked for something deeper in other people. Who was kind? Who was benevolent? Who was skilled? Those issues mattered much more than who was beautiful because with beauty too often came laziness.

Then, in the late 1950s and through the hippy faze of the 60s self-esteem gurus such as Nathaniel Branden started telling us that everyone is beautiful and we bought it. Well, more specifically, your parents and grandparents bought it; we were the product. 1970’s popular song Everything Is Beautiful by Ray Stevens (no relation to Cat Stevens), further sealed the concept in our minds that there is no such thing as ugly or unattractive. The concept was cemented with the movement that insisted everyone get a trophy, that children’s games shouldn’t keep score  so there are no losers, and that everyone who participates is equal.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Bullshit. You know it. I know it. The world knows it. Not everyone is beautiful, just as not everyone can play the piano or pitch a no-hitter for the Yankees. And for Pete’s sake let’s make it good and clear that not everyone is a goddamn model. There are immutable standards for beauty that have stood since the dawn of time and they can be defined mathematically in something called the golden ratio. If you don’t speak math, I’m not going to take the time here to explain it to you. Just know that the ratio has always occurred in nature and once we figured it out some 2400 years ago we started adapting it to everything from architecture to art.

The golden ratio applies to people as well, from our face to our body proportions. Those whose features come most closely to matching those ratios, such as Cindy Crawford, Audry Hepburn, and Marilyn Monroe, are those we inherently consider beautiful. This isn’t some 20th-century thing and no, it’s not limited to any one culture. The phenomenon is universal. Society can attempt to re-define beauty by being more inclusive, but that does not deter what nature has decreed. Sure, you can say everyone is beautiful, but not everyone wears it well.[/one_half_last]

Editor’s note: The opinions expressed in this week’s photographs are strictly those of the author: charles i. letbetter, and do not necessarily reflect the attitudes or opinions of the models involved in the pictures. If you don’t like what you see, don’t blame the model. Thank you.
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PotD  /  Uncategorized
The Independence of Equality
June 30, 2015

charles i. letbetter

Think Pink (2010)

“With the spread of conformity and image-driven superficiality, the allure of an individuated woman in full possession of herself and her powers will prove irresistible. We were born for plenitude and inner fulfillment.” ― Elizabeth Prioleau, Seductress – Women Who Ravished the World and Their Lost Art of Love

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]When 70s model Kelly LeBrock purred the words, “Don’t hate me because I’m beautiful,” women everywhere suddenly rushed out and purchased Pantene™ shampoo. While the line was fully intended as a reverse-psychology ploy to sell beauty products, the problem LeBrock and every other attractive model faced then, and faces now, is that people do hate them because of their beauty. There is this mistaken idea that being beautiful somehow discounts one’s intellect. Sadder still is the fact that too often that anti-beauty bias comes from other women.

I can’t speak for every model, of course, but have the advantage, having photographed the young woman in today’s photo on numerous occasions, to know that she is a strong, intelligent, extremely creative,  entrepreneur who, yes, is very attractive and, yes, has enough self-confidence to stride naked into a room full or horny men and leave with their balls in her Gucci® handbag. There is no putting her in a box. She appreciates a sincere compliment, but will verbally eviscerate anyone who tries to patronize her, especially in a sexual context. The fact that she is attractive is a bonus that compliments who she is, not retail wrapping that attempts to define her.

Where we run into problems is that taking pictures of one’s personality is rather difficult. Capturing intelligence on film is playing to a false stereotype at best. I could, in theory, take pictures of her working, but that would require considerable explanation and in the end does no better job telling one who she is than does the picture above. I grow rather tiresome of the crowd that seems to think that physical beauty and being a respectable person of intelligence and depth are two separate things. To disparage beauty for intelligence is just as wrongly biased as those who would mistakenly disparage women in favor of men. Both are equally wrong and equally damaging.

Part of being independent is being able to step up and say, without quiver nor anxiety, this is who I am. Period. No justification, no apologies, and no conditional qualifying should ever be necessary. A woman who dresses in Prada is no better than one who duct tapes the inside seam of her pants together each morning. One of the most brilliant mathematicians I’ve known, a person whose command of numbers makes my head spin, was bare-ass naked when I first met her and didn’t give a rat’s ass what I thought about the matter. We forget that bias too easily runs in both directions and shaming a person for being attractive by assuming she is lacking in intellect is one of the most dangerous mistakes one can make.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]The proposed Equal Rights Amendment has been introduced to every Congress since 1924 and fell only three states shy of ratification in 1982. For reasons I fail to even begin to understand because they are so inherently foolish and ill-considered, these words are not yet law:

Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.

The fact that it has taken nearly a century and we still are not any closer to seeing those words in the Constitution than we were when they were first introduced is beyond shameful, an example of just how firmly entrenched social biases become. While we’ve made progress in the area of women’s rights, until those words become immutable law everything we think exists, every step forward we think we’ve made, is temporal and can be erased. The concept is so very simple, and the benefits so astonishingly plentiful, so as to make this amendment’s lack of ratification yet another very embarrassing stain on the United States’ record of civil rights.

At the same time, those who would champion women’s Independence hurt their own cause when they allow something such as position or physical beauty to become the basis of judgment. This isn’t a new battle, either. Consider these words from the 16th century:

“If I follow the inclination of my nature, it is this: beggar-woman and single, far rather than queen and married.”
― Elizabeth I Tudor

If even Queen Elizabeth I felt that the judgments of place and standing impeded upon her Independence, we cannot expect attitudes and practices to change simply upon the force of a social campaign. Attitudes must change, children must be taught, and we must stop looking at beauty and nudity as the antithesis of intelligence and worth.

Being Independent must give one the right to be exactly who and what they are, even when that means being fabulous.[/one_half_last]

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pop culture  /  PotD
Officially Summer
June 21, 2015
charles i. letbetter

charles i. letbetter

Cover Up (2012). Model: Danelle French

“And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies, I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer.” ― F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Summer is officially here. Sure, it’s felt like summer across most of the Northern Hemisphere for several weeks, but with last night’s solstice we are officially into the season of relaxing and vacation and getting away from it all. At least, that’s the theory. In my mind, summer conjures up images of mowing the lawn, weeding the garden, painting the outside of various buildings, road work interrupting traffic flow, and other sweat-inducing things that also seem to only happen during the summer. Still, there’s baseball, hanging out at the ol’ swimming hole, and going for long walks in the cool of the evening (assuming the evening actually cools). Oh, and girls. Girls in summer are a joy unto themselves and that is exactly where our focus shall be this week.

Girls and summer have had this partnership for centuries. Summer provides the necessary heat and girls respond by shedding a few of the 37 layers under which they were living throughout the winter and most of the spring, reminding us that there really is a beautiful person under all those piles of cotton and wool. And boys? Boys respond by getting into trouble. Everytime. We fall in love with those beautiful girls of summer, and then proceed to do some of the most stupid things imaginable in order to make sure the object of our affection knows just how much we care.

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s book wouldn’t have been nearly as interesting had it been set any other time of year. He needed that pool as the catalyst for both romance and trouble. He needed the heat and the long days. He needed the impulsiveness, anger, and jealousy that young men feel more strongly in summer. Not that the story would have ended any differently had it been set in, say, autumn. People still fall in love and make stupid mistakes in autumn; they’re just not as interesting then as when we do it in summer.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Most of my favorite childhood memories took place in summer. There were endlessly long days on my bicycle, riding for miles along dusty roads, arriving back home in the evening tired, sweaty, and usually covered in dirt. There were the summer vacations, the two weeks Poppa would hire someone to fill in for him and we would take off on something that probably wasn’t going to be too adventurous but at least got us out of Oklahoma for a few days. Visiting relatives was a big part of the summer, too, as we had a lot of cousins which meant there would be a lot of food and, since it was summer, watermelon. I loved watermelon. I could eat my weight in watermelon. Good thing I was small.

Today’s picture matches the feeling of summer well. Taken three years ago, Indiana was experiencing an unusual heat wave with several successive days reaching temperatures well above 100. Having grown up in Oklahoma, 100+ degree days weren’t uncommon, especially in July and August, but in Indiana folks begin to melt at 85 degrees. 90+ is a danger zone. At 100 degrees, things began to stop. Outdoor work schedules were altered. Special precautions were necessary for the very young and very old. None of that shows in the picture. Granted, we were up at the crack of dawn and even then temps were already into the 80s. But Danelle does a wonderful job of shrugging off the heat and giving us the beauty and emotion of an effortless summer.

Summer is officially here, kicked off by a celebration of fathers who are happy to have one day where, hopefully, no one is asking them to do hot, sweaty chores. The days of beauty, frivolity, and romance are inescapable. Let’s just try to avoid Jay Gatsby’s fate, shall we?Girls in summer are wonderful … and sometimes dangerous.[/one_half_last]

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