Happy Women’s Day, fellas…

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I don’t know whether to laugh or cry over this

Male cosmetics sales in Britain are growing at twice the rate of the female market, according to a survey, with the need to look good for job interviews and the fear of looking old playing key roles.

One in five men use hair dye to cover up signs of grey, the survey of 1,013 males for L’Oreal UK found.

Taking care of their appearance is now a status of manhood, the poll concluded, with almost two thirds of men (56 percent) using cosmetic products daily and 82 percent saying there are no cosmetics products that they would be embarrassed to buy.

A quarter of men regularly use face moisturiser and two in every five (39 percent) use facial cleansers every day to take care of their skin and combat the effect of work stress and ageing.

“We know from the report’s findings that ageing is not just a female concern and that a growing number of men are looking to cosmetics to help present a more professional image in times of economic uncertainty,” said Pierre-Yves Arzel, Managing Director for L’Oréal UK & Ireland.

“Men’s anti-ageing products are therefore the major driver of the overall men’s grooming market,” he added.

Well, in a way I guess it’s comforting to know that we women are no longer alone in our marketing-induced paranoia about the ravages of time. And it’s gratifying to know that guys are no longer such complete slobs about their exteriors. But somehow, I don’t feel that guyliner is quite what our feminist foremothers had in mind when they petitioned for equality of the sexes.

Happy Women’s Day, O my brothers…and now you have a little taste of the hell your sisters are living in every day. Think about that the next time you’re pricing the Grecian Formula, ‘kay?

PS to the younger sisters: Don’t feel so smug if you’re not dipping into the “anti-aging” crap yet, girls, you’re not off the sexist hook either.

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6 Responses to Happy Women’s Day, fellas…

  1. Jim Hadstate says:

    LOL. This is so funny! What’s next? Does this suit make me look fat? I would wear that tie, but the color makes me look old!
    My Gawd, we’ve created a whole population of insecure woman/man children. They want to be told that they are beautiful, or they will go off the deep end. Anorexia and bulimia here we come! The psychiatrists and psychologists must be rubbing their hands together in glee.

  2. Jim, manorexia and boylimia are already out there and on the rise. I met my first male anorexic about 20 years ago, when I was at university in Kingston. Married and divorced too young, raving drunk, a complete basket case–and he latched onto me because I was quiet and nice and a sympathetic listener, and my smile reminded him of his former wife. Thank heaven I never gave him my number, or told him my address. I had to wait for him to pass out before I snuck off. Never saw the dude again, but I do hope he got help…from someone more qualified to give it.
    First male bulimic I met was at j-school a few years later. He was gay, and he was gorgeous. Wore leather pants and tight t-shirts to class. Sweet British accent, funny as hell. All the girls, myself included, were nuts about him. (We knew we’d never get anywhere with him, and that was not the point anyway. We just loved to look at him. And talk with him.) The straight guys all turned green at the sight of him. No one, and I mean NO ONE, could believe he used to be fat. Or that he was in recovery from anything. Only when he wrote about his struggle for an opinion piece in our school newspaper did we learn exactly what was behind all that awesomeness.
    One thing I got out of it: I quit writing off all good-looking guys as conceited. And started looking at them as human beings instead, quite possibly in a world of hurt not too far from the one we females are already in. I had just come off a bad bout with depression myself, aggravated by a former boyfriend who undermined my self-esteem (needlessly, as I found out from my male classmates and other guys on campus), so of course I needed that. It made me skeptical of all the “miracles” our crapitalist economy is trying to peddle, feeding off our existing insecurities and creating new ones where none existed. Not that I don’t love lipstick and perfume–I do–but I don’t expect to find a magic eraser on the moisturizer shelf. And I hope the guys don’t, either.

  3. Polaris says:

    This reminds me of what has been happening to men’s shaving razors. I think some of them now have five or more blades and are battery vibrated. I know guys who’ve bought functional used cars for less than the price of these razors.
    I had been using disposable two-bladed razors for years but when even they became pricey I decided to go back to an old double edge safety razor I have had for many years that I had set aside, because it became difficult to find blades for it in most stores, but the required blades are easy to get online for very affordable prices.
    I tried a batch that costs eight USA dollars for one hundred blades, that were mailed to me for an additional $1.50. The blades reached me about a week after I ordered them. They arrived in the regular mail and the package is small enough to fit in any mailbox so there is no need to be home to take delivery.
    I find that the old fashioned double edge blades shave just as well as the multi-bladed monsters, but the oldies only cost about 10 cents per blade and I can get 10 close shaves from each one.
    Some of the sharper and longer lasting double edge blades have higher prices. At the low end the price is around eight or ten dollars for one hundred blades. Others are fifteen, twenty or more dollars per hundred, up to about fifty dollars for one hundred blades, which even at fifty cents per blade is cheaper than what you can find in the few stores that still sell such blades.
    Most double edge blades and the razors to hold them, for those who need a new razor, are made outside of the USA. In many parts of the world most people cannot afford the modern hight tech razors and blades so the much cheaper but very effective oldies are still being produced in those countries.
    I suppose in the long run the ancient straight razor that you sharpen yourself at home is even more cost effective, if you do not slip and end up minus a nose.
    🙂 🙂 🙂

  4. Jeez, at this rate I’m gonna have to invest in a good old-fashioned man’s razor. As it is, I wax–or rather, SUGAR–my own legs at home. I’m wondering if I couldn’t whip up the sticky syrupy stuff myself; I probably could. Would save a bundle there if I figured out the right proportions…

  5. Polaris says:

    A Google search should turn up a few sugar recipes for the legs.
    Some barbers do fire shaving, but that’s probably one of those do not try this at home approaches.
    Razors are becoming expensive enough for some stores to keep them locked in a glass case to prevent theft and you have to ask for them, sort of like a prescription drug.

  6. I noticed that! At one drugstore where I shop, they’re behind a plexiglass shield. When you lift it, a chime goes off. Nothing else happens. I’m not sure why they do that, because it’s (a) weird and (b) a total waste of money.

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