From my (male) perspective, makeup really doesn’t matter to me. In fact, makeup tends to be intimidating. It says a woman is looking for a certain type of guy (who doesn’t happen to be me). She’s expecting a guy to wine and dine her, and he needs to be tall and handsome and have a fat wallet.
Nope. I don’t like makeup that much. Certainly not full war paint. If you have to wear it, then make it look natural, or I’ll be too intimidated to talk to you. Or at least, I used to be.
Now I’ve learned a lot about women from fluther that I never knew. For example, it seems that a large number of women my age feel invisible. So to me, that means they probably will be grateful if I talk to them. It’ll make them feel seen.
But honestly, all your efforts at makeup affect me subliminally, if they affect me at all. I don’t like it when you look too good because then I think you won’t be interested in talking to me. I’ll bet that women get more interest from men unmadeup than madeup.
In fact, I think that the real reason women get all made up is not at all for me. We really don’t count. We’re dogs. If she’s female, we’re interested. No. You use make-up to impress other women.
So when you stop wearing it to the corner store, the truth is you no longer care to compete with other women for status. Not status as far as men are concerned, but status between you women. Or at least, you’re not competing on the basis of how you put yourself together.
What happens, I suspect, is that young women write you off and think you don’t count any more. Older women may or may not write you off, depending on whether they are still doing make-up. But other women, the ones feminists might call “hags” understand that you have changed your source of power. You are now running on wisdom instead of looks. Some women get this and others don’t. Some men get this, but I’m not sure how many.
Yet another change.