A new podcast from the award-winning body hair and care brand Flamingo, hosted by author, curator, and critic Kimberly Drew. Each week on Unruly, we unpack the quiet ways women’s bodies are commodified, defined, and regulated by social media, the medical profession, the beauty industry, and more. Then we name them, out loud — because information is power, and your body is your business. New episodes drop on Wednesdays.
JESSICA: “Basically, everything that we know to be true about diet culture and its negative effects on our lives is true of beauty culture as well. It's just a different body part that we're focused on: the skin and the face. And I like to describe beauty culture now as sort of diet culture's face-focused fraternal twin. And I think if we could push back on beauty culture in all the same ways, it would end up preserving, like, the power of beauty.”
Kimberly Drew: Creams, lotions, serums, masks, supplements…..The beauty industry is estimated to generate $580 billion dollars this year.
Beauty brands keep selling us products and making us promises. And I'm no innocent party: As an influencer, products and product placement play a central role in the work that I do. But, at what point are we choosing to participate in the beauty industrial complex and when are we operating out of some kind of unconscious social pressure? And…at what cost?
And each year, younger and younger women are marketed products designed for “anti-aging.” Creating more and more consumers.
How do we untangle ourselves from this messaging? ? And how can we find what’s right for us? How do we establish our own beauty behaviors without falling into beauty standards served to us by outside forces?
I’m your host Kimberly Drew. I’m an author, curator, and all-around cultural enthusiast. And From Flamingo this is Unruly, where we take the quiet ways women’s bodies are commodified, defined, regulated and we name them – out loud. We wanna educate and support each other. Because your body is your business.
This is Episode Two: The Beauty Industry: Diet Culture’s Fraternal Twin.
Today, I’m joined by Jessica DeFino, a beauty industry reporter and author of the newsletter The Unpublishable. She’s going to tell us the things that the beauty industry doesn’t – or won’t – tell us.
Kimberly: Hi!
Jessica: Hi, how are you?
Kimberly: I’m well, how are you doing?
Jessica: Good, thank you.
Kimberly: So, first and foremost, I would love for you to talk about the work that you've been doing, how you found yourself doing the work that you do.
Jessica: I started in the beauty industry through my work on the Kardashian-Jenner official apps, and I was kind of immersed in the beauty industry through that. It was the first time in my career I had been on the receiving end of like beauty PR packages and getting free expensive makeup and skincare products in the mail sent to me to try. And it was, I mean, it was quite an experience. Eventually, through what I learned there, I decided I wanted to pivot into beauty journalism and report on some of the things that I had seen in the beauty industry that didn't necessarily fit right with me. I was freelancing for places like Vogue and Fashionista.com and Allure and some of the things I saw in that space. I was like, okay, here's why the beauty industry functions the way that it does, because the beauty media is set up in a certain way. And eventually I pivoted out of that as well. And now I write independently for my beauty newsletter, the Unpublishable.
Kimberly: Which is such a good pivot point, I think, for us to start our conversation today. And I want to start with, what actually is the beauty industry in your mind?
Jessica: I would describe the beauty industry as the industry that sells us the tools of beauty standards. Or, maybe a more generous description would be the industry that sells us the tools of industrialized beauty. I mean the sort of, you know, mass-produced beauty that we are buying into and calling beauty, it has sort of co-opted this larger, almost spiritual concept of beauty that is multidimensional and has narrowed it down to a single dimension, the physical dimension. And it sells us only physical products. It often sells us those physical products attached to these multidimensional ideas of health and wellness and fulfillment and empowerment. But really what it's selling is, is physical tools only.
Kimberly: If you could talk about the origin point for Unpublishable, your newsletter. I'm very curious why you've chosen this avenue and what you feel you're able to accomplish there.
Jessica: I describe The Unpublishable as what the beauty industry won't tell you from a reporter on a mission to reform it. And, I mean, my beauty journey started when I was really young. I've always been completely obsessed by physical beauty. I was in beauty pageants when I was really young. You know, just local pageants like Miss Servile Petite, Miss New Jersey. And that was probably my first, like indoctrination into beauty culture and the importance of beauty. I did community theater as a kid where makeup and beauty was a big part of the character you were playing. It was a big part of storytelling, and I think I really internalized a lot of that to the point that as I grew up, as I was a teenager, as I was in my twenties, I almost solely focused on that. I think for, for a long time I wanted to be a performer. I went to school for music. I was a singer-songwriter. But when I look back at what I was focusing on in those times, it was largely the aesthetic of it. I was like, you have to be beautiful to be a singer-songwriter. You have to have the right vibe, the right outfit, the right skin, the right look. And so much of my, like, passion for music ended up being sublimated into this aesthetic performance of what, like a famous singer-songwriter would look like, right? But I was very unhappy. My skin was literally crumbling beneath my foundation. I had all of these problems, and the more, the deeper I delved into the beauty industry as a professional, the more I was understanding why. I was seeing how beauty was being manufactured, mass produced, and sold to us via manipulative marketing. I saw these narratives being produced on the Kardashian-Jenner apps when some of their beauty lines came out. I saw how it was being sold to a public that didn't really understand what they were buying or buying into where the standards that they were buying into and performing were stemming from, and why it was ultimately, like, so unfulfilling and ultimately destructive. And I wanted a place to sort of talk about some of that, free from the politics of the traditional beauty media – advertising, affiliate sales, there's like a lot of money from the beauty industry tied up in the beauty media. That makes it hard to really tell the truth about beauty culture.
Kimberly: One of the things that is often under-discussed in the context of publishing and media is how dependent so many publications, especially in our contemporary climate, are on branding, advertisers, and, of course, the need to push product or to build merchandise. Those platforms really also operate as e-comm that generates the clicks and keeps us all in some way in a dependent relationship with the site. You know, we talk about clickbait – that's where that term comes from, those things that draw our audiences and keep them enrapt and keep them spending time and or money.
Jessica: Yes, 100%. Like, I almost even struggle to call a lot of beauty coverage reporting now, knowing how influenced it is by outside factors: the press trips that the editors are sent on, the gifts that the editors get, free products that are gifted to writers, to influencers. And of course, advertising budgets that keep the beauty media and, you know, even influencers on social media afloat.
Kimberly: And I exist at that intersection, all the time, it’s a very complicated intersection.
Jessica: So many of us do.
Kimberly: So many of us do. And I think I just want to circle back, too, to what you were saying, the balance of internalizing these realities and then also, yeah, like respecting your inner theater kid. I wonder for you, how do you keep your wits about you in relationship to these things? Is The Unpublishable this medium or avenue for this? Because I think one thing that is, I guess, a priority in Unruly and thinking about our audience is how to hold these nuances, how to respect ourselves, and how also to just move as wisely as possible.
Jessica: Yes. I mean, you bring up great points and so many of these things are things that I'm still struggling with myself. I think a lot of the work I do in The Unpublishable, I do try to take myself out of it and look at the beauty industry in a more objective way. I see it as a place where it is possible to tell the truth about beauty, culture and the beauty industry without pushback from outside forces. And so I don't necessarily have, like, a concrete goal. I'm not saying ‘I want everyone who reads The Unpublishable to divest from industrialized beauty completely. I want us to stop buying beauty products.’ So, my hope for the work that I do on The Unpublishable is to provide more of a balance to this really, really positive marketing of the beauty industry that really touches all facets of popular culture right now, and to give people, you know, another sort of input to take in and to help them make decisions that are right for them.
Kimberly: One of my favorite pieces that I was reading on your newsletter is titled “Beauty Culture is a Public Health Issue”, and a lot of the ideas that you present there really resonated with me. And I wonder if you could talk about the construction of that piece and its intention.
Jessica: Basically, everything that we know to be true about diet culture and its negative effects on our lives is true of beauty culture as well. It's just a different body part that we're focused on: the skin and the face. And I like to, to describe beauty culture now as sort of diet culture's face-focused fraternal twin. And there are so many parallels between the two that I, I just wish, I just wish that we as a culture could really grasp because I have seen so much progress with the pushback to diet culture. And I think if we could push back on beauty culture in all the same ways, it would end up preserving, like, the power of beauty, of true beauty, where it is this form of self-expression, where it is this form of empowerment, if we can recognize all of the many, many instances where it is not.
Kimberly: What do you think this kind of beauty culture, as you describe it, which, like, love, first of all, what is it teaching us about our bodies? What is it teaching us about ourselves, I guess?
Jessica: Well, beauty, culture, I mean, it's a system of beliefs that's embedded in society. These beliefs are largely shaped by patriarchy, white supremacy, colonialism, capitalism. And what beauty culture does is it upholds beauty, physical beauty, our bodies as a form of political, economic and social capital. And so it equates this very narrow physical idea of beauty with health, wellness, worth, even moral goodness, like beauty largely functions as sort of an ethical ideal in modern Western society. And it positions just normal human features as flaws to be fixed. We alter our hair color and our hair texture. We attempt to stop aging or slow aging, which is impossible. We're conditioned to try and remove fat from our stomachs and add it to our asses and our boobs, and we remove hair from our legs and our armpits and then we add it on to our brow bone and our eyelashes. Like it's all just really nonsensical. Beauty standards are completely socially conditioned, and we can see that by looking at the beauty standards of different cultures across place and different eras across time. They change and they will always change. And that's for a reason. It's to keep us chasing them.
Kimberly: Mmm. I think that that's the perfect segue way to what I want to talk about next. The true monster under the bed, I think of this moment: anti-aging products. I mean, it is actually so, so, like, stupendous to think about what it means to be in a society where there is so much to mourn, and yet we are resisting what I can only describe as the great honor of aging. And yet these products are being pushed to us more and more. And the us that I describe as growing younger by the day.
Jessica: Yes. Oh, gosh. I mean, anti-aging is the industry's most enduring standard. It's… anti-living is what I like to call it. Like another word for aging is living. And so when you reframe it that way, you start to see just how ridiculous and impossible it is. And like also just psychologically ill-advised. It's an ill-advised pursuit. I think the way that it impacts our sense of self, our sense of identity and like our idea of like the purpose of life is really under-examined. The modern anti-aging industry is, is trying to pull one over on us. I don't know if you've noticed, but there's a ton of anti-aging content that's being rebranded as pro-aging.
Kimberly: Oh, no, I haven't seen this yet.
Jessica: Okay. No, there's a ton of beauty brands that are saying, like, we're pro aging, We're about aging gracefully. Preserv-aging is a big term.
Kimberly: Preserv-aging! This is like the athleisure of the beauty market.
Jessica: Exactly. It is wild. Or they call it non-aging. But there's all of these like, put-a-positive-spin-on-it terms that are taking the place of anti-aging. But then when you look at the the physical, like the intended effects of the product, it's the same goal as anti-aging: it's to get rid of wrinkles, it's to smooth fine lines, it's to lighten age spots, to counteract sagging skin. It's all the same. And I think that is a really dangerous turn that the industry is taking. I think another dangerous thing about it is framing eternal youth as health. It is not healthy to stay eternally young.
Kimberly: Right and from a disability standpoint – it is problematic to equate being young with being healthy. People of all ages can struggle with illness.
Jessica: 100%. And especially with anti-aging, it frames like, sort of, these normal bodily changes as being unhealthy and undesirable. A big one that I see all of the time is the claim that your collagen levels start to decline after age 25 or after age 30, or your natural hyaluronic acid levels decline after 25 or 30. And the idea behind that is like, now you have to consume collagen, now you have to apply hyaluronic acid. And these things are no less healthy than, like, going through menopause. These are changes that happen to all bodies. They're not unhealthy, they're not bad. They don't need to be counteracted in any particular way with any particular product. So all of that sort of messaging really does help conflate this idea of, of youth and health.
We're gonna get into how we can divorce ourselves from beauty standards in just a moment. Normally, this is where you’d hear an ad – and honestly, maybe you’d skip through it. But instead, we’ve got a story from a nonprofit that supports women's bodily autonomy and mental health. It’s one of the organizations that Flamingo donates to as part of its mission to “keep your body in mind.”
Kimberly: On this podcast, we are all in on conversations around body autonomy, and one of our big, kind of, refrains is how our bodies are our business. Where does the line for you blur between this industry, which provides us with the tools, but then also conversations around empowerment?
Jessica: I think it's a really interesting topic. It's one that I am constantly sort of reexamining for myself as well. I think in terms of beauty and autonomy, one of the big things I think about is the importance of physical autonomy and. The importance of emotional autonomy as well, and the way that beauty culture and beauty marketing sort of strips us of this emotional autonomy. It influences the decisions we make about our own bodies and why we make those decisions. And I think the right to exercise like physical autonomy over your body has to be balanced out by an awareness that your, your wants and your desires may be conditioned by a beauty culture that doesn't actually have your best interest at heart. So I would love for that to be more of the conversation.
Kimberly: What is the first step that you think folks should take to reduce pressure from beauty standards that they find around them? I'd love to hear from you what, what advice you might offer or what kind of mantras have developed for you as you navigate this space very intimately.
Jessica: I think the first really easy step is to reevaluate your inputs and see where you have control over them. You know, a lot of, a lot of our beauty culture conditioning is coming from sources that we can't necessarily control. But things like social media, who you follow, the brands you buy from, the marketing emails in your inbox. Those are really tiny, easy ways that you can start to curate less pressure to conform to beauty standards in your life. I think another tool that, that I use myself and I encourage other people to use is, is based on this quote from a sociologist, Tressie McMillan Cotton: “I like what I like is always a capitalist lie,” is has been huge for me and been hugely transformative for my own beauty behaviors. And so what I hear in that quote is just an invitation to examine my own wants and desires and really just, like, pull apart where they come from. How is that desire planted? How is that desire reinforced through beauty culture? Is it something that is ultimately going to serve me and my community and the people around me? Or is it ultimately like serving a destructive industry that doesn't value me?
Kimberly: We are all so intertwined in these ways and it is quite difficult to figure out on an individual level what the best steps are to take. One of the phrases that you threw out was “your beauty behaviors.” What are some of your beauty behaviors? How do you define those and how is it informed by what you've learned in your journey?
Jessica: So I would consider, like, applying makeup every day to be a beauty behavior. Other examples of beauty behaviors would be, you know, straightening your hair, dyeing your hair, getting Botox. But makeup is a beauty behavior that I have not been able to completely let go of. When I started doing this work, I was a full face of makeup every day kind of girl. Like I would be wearing full coverage foundation, a full cat eye before I would even, like, step out to go to CVS to buy toilet paper. Like it was, it was, I mean, all encompassing. It was a huge part of my day, my life, not to mention like, my resources, my time, my money, my energy and my headspace was all tied up in creating this look for myself because I didn't feel that I could go without it and still feel good about myself. So when I started doing this work, a project that I had set up for myself to tackle this beauty behavior was just one thing at a time. Take away one thing at a time. So I started, I think, with, like, full coverage foundation. It was like, okay, if I skip the foundation, but I'm still using the concealer, I'm still using the powder, I'm still doing the full eye makeup, how does it feel? And I slowly let myself get used to one, being out in the world with fewer products on my face and and, two, just like getting used to seeing myself in the mirror and recognizing myself and just letting myself do that very, very slowly. And this process of just very gradually divesting from makeup and changing my beauty behaviors there has helped me realize, like, I wasn't actually getting a lot of enjoyment out of my full-face practice. Like that wasn't bringing me joy. It wasn't an act of expression. It was an act of self rejection. And it's helped me realize when makeup is actually a tool of expression and joy for me.
Kimberly: I'm so happy for you.
Jessica: Thank you.
Kimberly: That's such an impactful and vulnerable story to share. That is also where the autonomy lies, right? But to be able to have that moment of slow down, and sit with yourself and really investigate with yourself and say, ‘These are the ways that I want to participate. These are the things that I want to do.’ It's the bee's knees.
Jessica: It is. It's, it feels so good. And I think that's also something that I don't really talk about as much in my work. And I would like to start talking about more, but just, like, how good it feels to do the hard work of examining your own beauty culture conditioning and let go of it. Like, it's not just all doom and gloom, ‘Let's destroy the industry. Let's never use a skincare product again.’ It actually feels so good to let go. And I would love for more people to feel that.
Kimberly: One of my favorite internet moments was when Kim Kardashian posted a selfie with her medicine cabinet. I don't know if you saw this. But it's a photo of her, and you see the cabinet and you see the big like, you know, like, I don't know if it was like Cetaphil or Cerave, but it's in the background and you're just like, ‘girl, like, you're just like us,’ you know what I mean? It was this funny thing where it's like, you're using the basics, too.
Jessica: Yes, you're using the basics, too. And then also like that should come back into your mind when these celebrities, you know, not just Kardashians, but when any celebrity launches their own beauty brand or their own skincare brand, like moments like that are so important to remember, because these are beauty idols who are supposedly selling us the tools of their beauty. These are tools they're not using. These are tools that they haven't been using to get to where they are today. They're tools that they've, like, come up with, with a team.
Kimberly: One thing that I think can be interesting about this moment is this kind of decade, really, of this voice-building on social media and this voice-building in more interactive digital mediums. And I wonder, as you're looking back at the self eight years ago, how you're contesting with some of the ways that you are part of the machine?
Jessica: Yes, I am very aware of all of the ways that I have been part of the machine. I think the work that I do now is part self care to try and do better knowing the damage that I've been involved in inflicting. And it's part apology for the standards that I have promoted in my work in the past. I try to be really mindful in my content of resurfacing times in which I was saying the exact opposite of what I'm saying now. I think it's really important to keep that, like, past version of myself, not centered in my work, but a part of my current work. One, because I don't want to I don't want to erase that. That's such a huge part of my motivation now. And two, because I do think it's really valuable to my readers, to people who are reading this, to know that that the work that I'm sharing now is coming from somebody who has seen, you know, has been in the belly of the beauty beast and has participated in it and can confidently assure you, like, there is not much beauty to be found in beauty culture.
Kimberly: Jessica, thank you so much for your candid answers in what is such a difficult journey and conversation that we're in. Where can we continue to get knowledge from you? Where can we support you? Where do we find you, Jessica?
Jessica: Well, thank you so much for having me and for your thoughtful questions. I really loved chatting with you. People can find me via my newsletter, it's called The Unpublishable. You can just Google it or it's jessicadefino.substack.com is the URL.
Kimberly Drew: Look. There is no shame in opting into beauty and wellness practices that feel good. But, it is equally important to zoom out and check in, to make sure that the way we see ourselves and treat ourselves are truly serving us. Even untangling ourselves from the idea that we can spend our way into being more self confident - can help us all become a bit empowered and, well, a bit more…. Unruly.
I’m Kimberly Drew… for a transcript of the episodes and more resources, please visit www.shopflamingo.com/unrulypodcast.
Unruly is a podcast created by Anna Wesche and produced by Pineapple Street Studios in collaboration with Flamingo. Our associate producer is Marialexa Kavanaugh. Our lead producer is Natalie Brennan. Our mid-episode profiles are produced by Sophie Bridges. Our managing producer is Kamilah Kashanie. Our editor is Darby Maloney. Our Head of Sound & Engineering is Raj Makhija. Our Senior Audio Engineers are Pedro Alvira and Marina Paiz. This episode was mixed by Pedro Alvira. This episode was mixed by Marina Paiz. Our Assistant Audio Engineers are Jade Brooks and Sharon Bardales who also gave scoring assistance. Our Executive Producers are Je-Anne Berry and Aggi Ashagre. Our music is from Epidemic Sound.
