Women’s Equality Day

I’d say Happy Women’s Equality Day, but, while the 19th amendment has given women the right to vote (and we apparently exercise it more than men), we are still missing a law explicitly prohibiting gender-based discrimination. Not acceptable. We only need one more state to make the Equal Rights Amendment a reality. Organizers have started a campaign to make that happen in Virginia in 2019. If you know someone that lives there, poke them into action!

You can read more about this from the organizers themselves or just check out this article by Katherine Hafner.

Meanwhile, Tena (@nailsit) brought together a group of 19 nail artists to both celebrate and bring attention to this special day. Check out the group tag or see the collage at the bottom of this post. I decided to focus mine on little horrid and insidious messages women are taught to internalize.

• Base Polishes:
  Revlon’s Parfumerie “Powder Puff” and Zoya’s “Perrie”
• Stamping Polishes:
  Mundo de Unas’ “Fuschia” and Zoya’s “Perrie”
• Advanced Stamping Polishes:
  Nails Inc’s Magnetic Polish “Houses of Parliment” and Sinful Colors’ “Beautiful Girl”
• Stamping Plates:
  Born Pretty’s BP-L055 (“You are so pretty” and “Love is all you need”), Maniology (formerly Bundle Monster) BM-303 (lips) and Basic Instinct BM-XL301 (“Yes Obey” and “We aim to please”)`

It’s been a long time since I used Revlon’s Parfumerie “Powder Puff”. I forgot how pretty it was and how little I like how it smells. I do love so many of Revlon’s discontinued Parfumerie line but this pink is not one of them. The completest in me won’t let me de-stash it though.

In order of the nails…

“You are so pretty.” – Sounds like a compliment, but really it’s just another way to get us to spend money to chase the dream of being prettier. It distracts us from real issues like fighting for equal rights. Worst of all, it’s just a continuation of the message that what you look like is more important than what you do.

“Love is all you need.” – Love is great. Love keeps us going when we want to quit. But I live in a state where people make sad but true jokes about moms addicted to meth. They do it because they are unhappy and also because they want to be thin (see first problem statement). Yet how can they talk about how unhappy they are when they have their loving families around them? Society tells them it should be enough; therefore something is wrong with them. It’s a trap.

“Yes” / “Obey” – Why are the traditional and typical wedding vows about how women should obey but nothing is said about a man having to obey? Inequality right there. Hate it. Also hate how people keep transforming women’s “Nos” and “Maybes” into “Yeses” because that’s what they wanted to hear. No means no. Maybe means no. Only yes is yes and that’s on a sliding scale. Yes to ice cream if it’s good ice cream. No to Mountain Dairy ice cream, not worth it.

“We aim to please.” – Women/girls are taught to please all the people around them at expense to themselves. For example, when men and women talk about having “bad sex” they are talking about two different things. Men are talking about how it wasn’t particularly exciting. Women are talking about how they were physically in pain. I have certainly found this to be true in my own life. I mean, haven’t we all heard that stupid line about how the first time should be painful for a woman? Mine wasn’t. So what it is is a lie we tell women so whoever happens to be their first time doesn’t have to take responsibility for it sucking.

If that wasn’t tmi, check out this talk from Stuff Mom Never Told You for more on societal views on bad sex.

What’s scary is that I found all of these on stamping plate images. Although, to be fair, the ones from Maniology are from a kink stamping plate where such messages are not toxic at all if you’re doing it right (i.e. Not Fifty Shades of Grey. I still hate her for how she didn’t bother to read the important information he sent her about his sexuality and equally hate him for continuing on with her when he knew she hadn’t. Fifty Shades of Irresponsible is more like it. :p).

Collage!