It was the end to a very busy school day. My friend and I decided to go grab some In-N-Out and lay on her bed watching tv when a commercial came on, completely transforming how I view the beauty industry. Take a minute (literally one minute) to go ahead and watch the commercial for Shea Moisture and maybe you can see where I am starting to go with this.
What is "Normal?"
What defines normal in the realm of beauty? Do the women walking down the runway or those on the front page of Vogue, define what beauty is? What about the moms in line at the grocery store or the women jogging through the streets? Can they define what beauty is? I live in a large urban city where diversity thrives and the women I see around me are not alike but uniquely different with their natural beauty. None of these women share the same hair, skin or body, and that is okay. When I think about what normal is, a word that comes up is boring, and none of these women are that.
Like the commercial says, why would we allow the standard of beauty to be defined by the hands of companies working for a profit. You pick up a bottle of shampoo and it reads, ‘For Normal Hair,’ but what does that mean? Where is the standard of normal we should abide to and who says it is important to? My mom and I have naturally curly Latina hair, while my friends who are Asian and White may have pin-straight hair or wavy locks. So when we go shopping on the beauty aisles and see these products, it’s discouraging and damaging to see we don’t fit in this category. Regardless of our hair types, they should all be considered normal. In a time and place in our society where appearance is dominate in all aspects, the labels these companies produce contribute to this harmful impact on women. I believe women should start to recognize this problem with the beauty industry in order to truly learn about the companies they are supporting.
The damage of the beauty industry
This does not only apply to hair products, but in all categories of the beauty industry such as, skin, makeup, and clothes. The models we see on the commercials and advertisements inside the stores, the labels on products, and the size measurements are subliminally creating a negative effect on women and for little girls. I want my future daughter to look at herself in the mirror confident in her skin because the beauty industry incorporated women who look like her within their brand.
Now don’t get me wrong — I am highly influenced by the beauty industry. Growing up, I aspired to be a fashion journalist who would work for a big name fashion magazine. But as I grew older I discovered I did not want to be a part of something that created limitations and criteria on what is considered beautiful.
My skin is dark brown, my hair is wavy and long, I have combination-oily skin, (with the occasional blemish due to an all-nighter finishing a project). My pant size depends on the store, ranging from a 25 to 28 and my shoe size is a 6. How I just described myself is a product of what companies have said about me. Although I might not fit under what is ‘normal’ on the bottle, I know there isn’t another Sarah out there like me and I love that.
