I don’t think I had ever read a copy of Allure magazine until recently.
To be honest, I’m not sure I had even heard of it until someone gave me
a stack of magazines she had already finished and didn’t want to just throw
away. So at my daughter’s dance class
last week, I was flipping through a bunch of magazines including the February
2012 edition of Allure magazine.
To be honest, I wasn’t too impressed. The magazine seems incredibly superficial. It is just advertisement after advertisement
for make-up and toiletries. It had hard
hitting articles with titles like “How to Take a Relaxing Bath,” and “Shocks of
Color.” There were also articles on fake
eye lashes, accessories every woman should have, and the claim that “women will
go to extraordinary lengths to tame their curls.” Earth shattering stuff.
I was sitting next to a male friend as we were watching our kids
in dance class. He was giving his baby
daughter a bottle while I was flipping through my copy of Allure. Even before I got to
the article entitled “How to Buy a Sex Toy,” I was pretty mortified that my
friend saw me reading such a stupid magazine.
He is a smart, thoughtful fellow whose values I really admire. (He recently quit his job when his wife had
their third child so that he could be the primary caregiver as she grows the
family’s business.) This gentleman and I
have had some great discussions about all kinds of interesting things: the impact of student debt on the younger
generation, work-life balance, whether our respective families will add more
children, and even the parameters of attorney-client privilege. What a disappointment it must have been for
him to have looked over and seen a woman who had seemingly had a brain and
family values reading such a moronic magazine!
I wonder if he’ll bother to strike up a conversation with me at future
dance classes or if he’ll tell his wife to steer clear of the nit-wit with the
make-up magazines.
Anyhow, as I was quickly flipping through the February edition
of Allure one article caught my
eye—it was a brief history of make-up through the centuries. Maybe “article” doesn’t quite describe the
piece. It was more of a bunch of
bulleted make-up facts. One such bullet particularly
got my attention:
“$22,800: Makeup
artist Amy Strozzi’s earnings for two weeks of work with Sarah Palin in October
2008. Strozzi was the highest-paid
staffer on John McCain’s campaign.”
Now, based on my brief exposure to the magazine, I’m thinking
the editors and readers of Allure
like this fact and perhaps celebrate it.
The magazine seems quite obsessed with make-up.
But I myself was horrified at this little fact. Think about the repercussions. Do the math.
What a sum must have been spent on make-up for Governor Palin’s vice
presidential campaign! And one can
imagine this must not be an isolated phenomenon. Other female candidates likely also need to have flawless make-up to be presentable. That would suggest that female candidates routinely have to
raise more money for their campaigns than male candidates. They have extra expenditures to pay for the
make-up artists (and presumably the hair stylists, if they want to avoid the
Hillary “un-coifed” label).
1 Peter
3:3
Your
beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and
the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes.
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