Red lipstick kisses

My complicated relationship with red lipstick and why we think only certain people can wear it. My feelings towards the pervasiveness of our Puritan history and misconstrued expectations of feminism.

Disclaimer: My articles function within a heterosexual context as that is my personal experience.

My best friend and I have qualms over red lipstick as in we have never been able to wear it. I could think of a total of three people who pull off red lipstick: Taylor Swift, my wonderful mother, and an acquaintance of ours named Mary.

Mary has her initials as her Instagram name, and her posts demonstrate a mastery of “casual Instagram”. There is mood lighting, Italian dinner menus, reflective wine glasses, and candid laughing pictures. More than that, her fashion exudes maturity – as in she looks like she could be French or Italian. More than that, she wears red lipstick.

I once babysat for a family whose parents were going out for a date, and the mom, to this day one of my favorite people ever, was rushing out the door asking if she should put on red lipstick. I replied telling her that I think red lipstick works on people who think red lipstick works on them.

Now I wonder, is the reason I don’t wear red lipstick because I’m not embracing the idea that red lipstick can work on me? Or does it truly work on certain people and not others? Am I cheating myself by not forcing myself to wear red lipstick?

Here's the thing about fashion and red lipstick in general: it makes a statement whether you want it to or not. Dress Code by Veronique Hyland describes how every fashion choice we make says something about us whether we engage in or care about fashion; not caring about fashion is in itself a statement about fashion.

Bozama Saint John is the Chief Marketing Officer of Netflix who previously served as the CMO at Endeavor and chief brand officer at Uber. The best style advice she was ever given was “to never wear red lipstick or red nail polish because it would be too bold”. From there, she realized that she needed to do exactly opposite of that.

Red lipstick has been historically tied to women’s social status. According to Gabriela Hernandez of Bésame Cosmetics, red lipstick was “the mark of the independent emancipated woman” during the American Women’s Suffrage Movement of the early 1900s. It was an intimidator and a shocker.

When we see red lipstick, we see the scarlet letter. It is shame highlighted on women’s lips for everyone to see as they speak their truth. It is the reminder that women have power and can break past social constructs. And that’s the exact reason I cannot pull it off.

I don’t want to be the person in the crowded room wearing red lipstick for all to see. It’s vulnerable, and it’s too loud. And that’s the lie that I believe.

The implications behind the advice given to Bozama Saint John is one of shame. We are not meant to wear red lipstick because it means that we are free. We cannot be free because society, specifically men, will not love us like that. We need men to love us because that is what we are made for: relationships with men.

Do you see how Puritan our society is?

Hester Prynne is you. Hester Prynne is me. Hester Prynne is us.

My best friend and I admire red lipstick because it is who we want to be deep down. We seek the thing that scares and challenges us, but we have been conditioned that being bold to the extent of red lipstick is an unattainable aesthetic. And as women, we were conditioned for the unattainable – the perfect homemaker, the perfect “no-makeup” look, the perfect body. If our patriarchal society can continuously set up unrealistic unattainables that steal our attention, then they can keep us under their power. We become the soldiers of the patriarchy.

But I don’t even want to wear red lipstick. I swear it doesn’t look good on me. Why does red lipstick have to be so complicated? Let’s play a game of question and answer.

Q: Is this just something I have conditioned myself to think because of what I associate red lipstick with – too bold, too much of a statement?

A: Yes, I have absolutely been conditioned to think this.

Q: If we were to all start wearing red lipstick, does it then lose its meaning and social punch?

A: If all women started wearing red lipstick, it would carry a dramatic social punch and, hopefully, turn into a symbol of female strength that was celebrated rather than shunned. A mass red lipstick movement may be comparable to when women started wearing pants.

Q: Can I simply start wearing red lipstick to push me out of my comfort zone and challenge the social norm? Or am I diminishing the value of the red lipstick by smearing it on my lips just for fun?

A: Yes, fashion and makeup are meant to be experimented with. The value of the red lipstick does not get diminished if you’re intention was not directly to “be bold”. By nature of experimenting with the red lipstick, you are adding value to the red lipstick.

Q: Would it be a betrayal to me to wear red lipstick as a social symbol if I genuinely looked bad in it and, thus, felt bad about myself?

A: Women should not have to do any certain thing to achieve the status of a proper feminist. Playing into certain behaviors because it is expected of a feminist directly contradicts the goal of feminism.

Moral of the story: If you’re thinking about wearing the red lipstick, wear the red lipstick.