Talk:Cosmetics

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To-do list for Cosmetics: edit · history · watch · refresh
  • Expand dangers/toxins used as cosmetics through history
  • Section or subarticle on stage/theatrical makeup
  • Cosmetics for men
  • Include US and international total anual revenues for a few decades
  • ...?
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Contents

[edit] Introduction

I think the introduction is a bit confusing, and wrong. Cosmetics do not equal make-up, although all make-ups are cosmetics. I'm proposing the following for the introduction:

Cosmetics (pronunciation: cosmetic (help•info)) are substances used to enhance the beauty of the human body. Cosmetics include skin-care creams, lotions, powders, perfumes, lipsticks, fingernail polishes, eye and facial makeup, permanent waves, hair colors, deodorants, baby products, bath oils, bubble baths, and many other types of products. Their use is widespread, especially among women in Western countries. A subset of cosmetics is called “make-up”, which refers primarily to colored products intended to alter the user’s appearance. The manufacture of cosmetics is currently dominated by a small number of multinational corporations that originated in the early 20th century, but the distribution and sale of cosmetics is spread among a wide range of different businesses. The U.S. FDA defines cosmetics as: “intended to be applied to the human body for cleansing, beautifying, promoting attractiveness, or altering the appearance without affecting the body's structure or functions.” This broad definition includes, as well, any material intended for use as a component of a cosmetic product. The FDA specifically excludes “soap” from this category. (http://www.fda.gov/fdac/features/1998/398_cosm.html)

It may be slightly too technical, but it gets the broadness of the category ought there. Comments?Bobzchemist 20:14, 10 January 2007 (UTC) Lipstick was somthing ladys in the old day wore. If they went out without it they felt undressed! It was a nesscarity! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.47.193.28 (talk) 04:30, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] History

About the Victoria quote; Was make-up as widespread among the upper classes in England as it was in Western Europe? Had it fallen out of fashion by the time? David

Maybe we could also work on a more detailed historical comment, for example on the question of the use of cosmetics in history by both men and women (it's not as if men wearing make-up was a new thing, or any indicator of sexual orientation either, and both attitudes strike me as extremely silly). However, I lack on this field, and all I have is a few comments from an old recipe book. David

I'll try to find more info on history of makeup and add it in. I'm also going to change the intro a bit to emphasize the difference between "cosmetics"(general category)and "make-up" (specific category using colorants)i.e., all make-ups are cosmetics, but not all cosmetics are make-up. This will wind up being a long article, as I'm going to expand the ingredients section extensively.BobZBobzchemist 13:44, 17 October 2005 (UTC) hjyfgh this article seems to have an anti-makeup slant

[edit] Removed

I removed the paragraphed half of this sentence:
  • "Foundation is worn to present the (idealized) appearance of the smooth, unblemished skin of youth ( However, it has been discovered that over time, foundation often ends up enhancing "fine lines and wrinkles" on the face, so that when the user takes the foundation off, they end up looking much older than their actual age)."

It seemed to be purposely anti-makeup and the writing itself was very opionated and/or sloppy ("looking MUCH older ", "often ends up"). I also removed unneccessary adjectives throughout the article. : ) I felt like reporting the fun.

^ ^ ^ ^ ^ That is somebody else's comments. Someone removed "Therefore, purchasers of mascara should consider buying only the smaller sized containers of mascara to force the purchaser to buy new mascara more often." [ 10:41, 2 September 2006 Shannernanner (Talk | contribs) (→Potential dangers - minor edits, removed POV sentence, tags) ] Claiming it was POV. It is not. It is eye-savibg, well-known advice for people who use mascara, but not often followed. Hence adding it here does a service. I suggest someone add it back in. --SafeLibraries 14:05, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Youthfulness

  • "The role of modern cosmetics is to simulate youthfulness... mascara (used to enhance the eyelashes, larger eyes compared to face is a sign of youth)"
- I don't think this is accurate. I know several teenage girls who wear make-up in order to make themselves look older. And I've never thought that it makes older women look younger. If no one objects, I'll delete this part.Palefire 22:37, Dec 14, 2004 (UTC)
Works both ways. - Omegatron 20:57, May 9, 2005 (UTC)
I think that this is almost completely accurate - the primary goal for makeup is to make the wearer more attractive. For most women that involves simulating the appearance of health and youth. Foundation is worn to present the (idealized) appearance of the smooth, unblemished skin of youth. Eyeshadow, eyeliner, and mascara is worn to make the eyes appear larger, and thus more youthful. Blush is worn to mimic the appearance of young skin flushed after exercise. Lipstick makes lips look larger, hides imperfections, and can make lips look more like the lips of a younger person, with thinner skin.
Oddly enough, teenage girls can often wear makeup skillfully enough to make them look just like older women trying to look like teenagers. Go figure. - Bobzchemist 9:57, October 7, 2005
This definition is too simplistic: makeup involves much more than simply trying to look attractive. It serves all of the purposes of clothing or hair - to create a style marking individuality, or on the contrary, signaling belonging to a group, a social class, or any number of other "signals" towards others... Adrian —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 212.40.103.36 (talk) 15:01, 3 February 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Industry numbers

"The cosmetics industry, as of 2003, is dominated by a small number of multinationals, all with their origins in the early 20th century. If the market is extended to include cometic surgery, health & fitness and dieting it is worth $160 billion every year, specifically cosmetics - perfume is $15 billion, make-up is $18 billion, skin care is $24 billion and hair-care is $38 billion."

That second sentence is extremely difficult to parse, cites no sources, and is likely to be out of date, what with fluctuating markets, inflation, and other factors. And the relevance of this information is dubious at best. Plastic surgery, fitness, and dieting have little to do with makeup. I'm going to delete the second sentence. Pat Berry 00:09, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Removed Link

I removed this link

  • Beauty because I've tried it several times in the past few days and it does not respond. - Carax 4 Apr 2005

[edit] Sections

This article needs to be broken up into sections. - Omegatron 20:57, May 9, 2005 (UTC)

I've done this, although I don't claim I've sectionized it in the best manner. If anyone else wants to take a crack at it, that's fine with me. JYolkowski // talk 18:41, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Statistical approach

Is there any research made to find out how the use of eyeliners, or other kinds of cosmetics enhance "beauty"?

(Well, some people think they look bad without cosmetics. Everyone is normally using cosmetics to some extent. So, there hypothetically exists a statistical distribution:

Let's take set of people who use cosmetics and photograph them with their cosmetics. Then let's wash them and photograph them without cosmetics. And let's compare these photos. E.g., let's give these photos for people to review on several basis. For example, "is she or he nicer with or without cosmetics", or "is he or she attractive or not" (something like hot or not)... So we could estimate the effectiveness of normal usage of cosmetics.) zack prest was here

[edit] significance

[edit] Make-up amongst men

It may be a detail, but worth mentioning that in the latest years make-up for men is beginning to get widely accepted in western countries (and is finally losing its incorrect "homosexuals only" label) ; a few cosmetics producents are beginning to try to launch make-up products especially for men. It is not very common yet, though it is definitely rising.

ye, agreed. btw, why is this article so short?
I removed a comment on this nature, but that was more because it seemed out of context and wasn't very clear or explanatory - I've nothing against covering this, but I think it needs to be more in-depth (e.g., how have things changed over the last few decades? In what way is it more accepted?). Also, men have been wearing make-up in various subcultures in western society since at least the 80s (and amongst male performers since at least the 70s), so it's not like it's only happening now. Mdwh 00:22, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
Male cosmetic use goes back much further than that. Male performers have worn make-up since men started performing; even ancient societies used make-up for performers of both sexes. I agree with you completely that the comment you removed needed removing, by the way. It's true that male cosmetic use merits much more of a mention than it gets at present, but I think this needs to be incorporated all the way through, not created as a separate section. If you go back to many periods in history - eg pre-revolutionary France, Victorian England, tribal societies in south-east Asia, etc - cosmetic use was just as prevalent among men as among women. The 'gendering' of all cosmetics as feminine is quite Western-centric and only really true in the last 50-100 years. NB: Please consider adding details of male cosmetic history to the History of cosmetics article, rather than just to this one - I keep meaning to enlarge that article, but have been rather too busy of late. - TinaSparkle 17:02, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Stage Make-Up

Aren't theatrical cosmetics relevant to this page, if not indeed, warranting a separate article? As I have little knowledge of the subject (that was why I was looking it up in the first place) I feel ill qualified to attempt to write such a section.

I agree, this needs its own section and/or article! — Catherine\talk 07:22, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
I arrived at this page having followed a link from Stagecraft and feel that a separate page on theatrical make-up would be appropriate. In my view there is only a superficial connection between stage make-up and cosmetics as discussed in this article; each serves an almost wholly different purpose. Coconino 21:13, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article improvement drive

I have nominated this article at Wikipedia:Article Improvement Drive#Cosmetics -- if you'd like to see this article become the focus of many editors for a week, please go add your support and reasoning there. — Catherine\talk 07:35, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] AID update, and re-edit

Unfortunately, it seems this article didn't make it to the AID. Shame. This is an important subject, and a total disgrace as an article: full of unsourced statements, weasel words, POV, essay-style writing, advertorial, and irrelevant information. What this article should be is a clear, unbiased, well-structured introduction to the subject of cosmetics.

I've been through on a re-edit, although I haven't gone anything like far enough. Here are some explanations for my decisions and recommendations:

  • I've removed all references to Lip-Ink, which appeared to be advertorial. Product is not a major part of the cosmetic industry and adding sentences like "Small independents, like semi-permanent cosmetics company Lip-Ink International, have attempted to break into the cosmetics market with unique products, but are largely shut out of the major retail outlets" does not make the company more relevant and are profoundly biased.
  • The rant about mineral cosmetics seemed to be irrelevant to an overview of the subject, and was strongly POV. I have removed it. If you think it is relevant, I suggest a separate article on mineral cosmetics, and a thorough reading of Wikipedia's NPOV policy.
  • Much of the material on cosmetic ingredients was unsourced or badly sourced, one-sided, and completely out of context. I removed some of the worst offenders but there is more to be done. It can't just be a list of "Oh, and another bad thing! And another bad thing!" Please create a separate article on "Cosmetic ingredients" if you want to go into this sort of detail, and link to it from here.
  • My main recommendation is that each of these sections be looked at again and written as a coherent article. At the moment, each is a collection of miscellaneous facts and trivia strung together with no real structure or sense of what might be appropriate in an encyclopedia.
  • Separate articles should be created for the cosmetics industry, the history of cosmetics, cosmetic ingredients and so on. What appears on this page should be a general introduction to the subject, not tons of detail. For the moment, I've left things like the Abulcassis story in: this is really interesting and useful information, but it should be in a separate "history of cosmetics" article, I think.

I'll create these separate articles next week if there are no objections, and move some of this content into them. From that point, this article should be rewritten. -- TinaSparkle 13:40, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Animal Testing

An interesting Wikipedia entry but shouldn't there be a sub-section about animal testing of cosmetics or a link to such a page? 81.86.144.210 19:51, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

It's a relevant issue, so yes - remembering NPOV policy, of course. -- TinaSparkle 17:20, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Separate History of Cosmetics article, & mooted WikiProject

I've created a separate article for the History of cosmetics and moved some of the information from here into it. I plan to expand it, but please do chip in.

I've also mooted a WikiProject on Cosmetics, if anyone's interested. Signing up involves no solid commitment, just a general interest and enthusiasm for the subject, from any angle. I really think it would help focus the improvement of cosmetics articles, including this one. Please see my userpage for details or sign up at Wikiprojects (scroll down to Cosmetics). Thanks! -- TinaSparkle 17:48, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

The Ingredients section has been modified to be extremely POV. I'm not really neutral on this issue, does anyone else want to clean this up?Bobzchemist 03:06, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

I've done so. We need citations, though, as ever. -- TinaSparkle 09:59, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] ACID tag?

It appears that the {{AIDnom}} tag is not currently correct. Is this article to be re-nominated soon or should the tag be removed? --AliceJMarkham 07:30, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Okay. It's a month and it's clearly not a current nom, so I've removed the tag and replaced it with a tag for the LGBT Project, as this is an important subject for transgender people. --AliceJMarkham 02:44, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Image gallery

I don't personally feel this contributes much - most celebrities in a public gathering are going to be wearing some form of makeup, and it's overkill in my opinion to have picture after picture of a person with makeup. Crystallina 03:56, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree wholeheartedly. The only reason that I have not yet removed it is that it pads out an otherwise too short article. When someone added another photo to that gallery, I reverted it - it was probably contrary to wikipedia's conflict of interest rules anyway. If one or other of the photos in the gallery is particularly illustrative of the subject, it could be moved out of the gallery into the article proper before deleting the rest of the gallery. --AliceJMarkham 06:07, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
I agree with both of you. I would support total removal of the gallery, and I don't think we need to worry about the article being too short without it. I'd rather it was shorter and more relevant. The only one I wouldn't mind keeping is the Toulouse Lautrec pic - I think this would go nicely in the 'History' section. If you think that's unnecessary we could do with it over at History of cosmetics, so by all means move it there. -- TinaSparkle 14:45, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
It's now in History of cosmetics and the gallery is gone. See, that wasn't too painful. :) --AliceJMarkham 21:18, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cosmetics vs Prosthetic makeup

I've been looking at the photo showing a special effect contact lens and I really have to ask whether we want this article to extend to prosthetic makeup or just concentrate on traditional makeup? --AliceJMarkham 21:18, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

  • I'd much rather see a seperate aricle on prosthetics and theatrical makeupBobzchemist 23:07, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] LGBT

why has this got a WikiProject LGBT studies banner? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.106.174.238 (talk • contribs) 12:38, 1 April 2007

  • Because it's a fundamental subject for transgendered people. --AliceJMarkham 13:36, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Americanising?

It appears that VMS Mosaic (talk · contribs) has decided to convert the dialect of this article from ambiguous to US english. I give up. --AliceJMarkham 01:01, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

  • No, I am simply making it comply with WP:ENGVAR which states very clearly that the spelling of words should not differ within an article without a specific reason ("dialect being ambiguous" not being one of them). Both "color" and "colour" were in the article, so I changed the article to use the one which was used the most within the article. I have changed other articles where the outcome was to change "color" to "colour". --VMS Mosaic 05:13, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] New Article Idea!

Mante1 (talk · contribs) had a great idea over in the Cosmetic Ingredient Review‎ article, and I'd like to propose it over here, as well. Various editors have very strong points of view regarding the safety, testing and/or appropriateness of cosmetics and cosmetic ingredients. While it is my personal view that those opinions are solely the result of extreme scare tacticts used by shrewd marketers to sell more "alternative" cosmetics or to boost membership numbers, I accept that some editors sincerely believe that they are echoing the gospel truth, and they have plenty of pseudo-scientific citations to support their side. I am therefore proposing a seperate article where various proponents of this or that cosmetic 'Danger-of-the-Month' club can post their ideology and article links without interfering with this main article, which needs to be more consistent and less controversial. The new article would be called "Criticism of Cosmetics" or "Cosmetic Controversy" or some such, and we'd put some notice here about not editing the main article with info or POV that should be over there instead.Bobzchemist 14:43, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

What is the cosmetic 'Danger-of-the-Month' club? I never heard of it. Do you know of any editor who knows about this subject? Bobzchemist, maybe you can get it started. Mante1 15:52, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I was being sarcastic. Many smaller companies(and a few larger ones)have figured out that the best way to sell cosmetics without actually having to make a better product is to scare the hell out of gullible consumers, usually by either badly misinterperting poorly done scientific studies, or by out-and-out lying. This happens so often that people in the cosmetic industry joke about the "scare-of-the-month club" which is a parody of the "book-of-the month club, and I was trying to make the same kind of joke.

MAKE UP IS KOOL

PETA still rants and raves about cosmetics being tested on animals, even though every single cosmetic company worldwide stopped animal testing ten years ago. Why? Because it gets them new members and more money, and it's easier to get people upset about the poor little bunny rabbits being sacrificed for something frivolous and useless like cosmetics than it is to get folks upset about what they're really trying to stop now, which is drug testing on animals. Somehow, people are much less upset when the animal testing will probably save human lives. Anyway, there's so much of this sort of stuff floating around the net that keeping it out of this article means we can only have the bare bones of the least controversial information. Pretty much anything else gets corrupted or reverted pretty quickly...I don't know how else to handle this. Bobzchemist 04:17, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Bob, I understand you have strong feelings about this but you are letting your feeling get in the way here. There are plenty of reliable references. For instance, read this reference.[1] There are lots of references on parabens too. This could be a good article in the future. There are a lot of chemicals out there. As a consumer I want to read about all this stuff. What are the safe surfactants and what are the dangerous surfactants. If the Criticism of cosmetics article was started, we will all be a little closer in answering this question. This will be good information for people to read about. Wait a second. Maybe you could be right. I got scared into buying that SLS free product. This can all be explained in the article. Create an article explaining all points of view from every angle. The article could say how companies misinterpret studies to increase there profits. I really would like to read all this. You seem to know about what is happening inside the industry. Please let us know. You have valuable information to contribute to Wikipedia. Anyways, this is an important topic. I really want to learn more about the controversy of all these chemicals a bit better. Mante1 05:51, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Getting onto parabens, I would suggest having a look at this link hereSCCP Opinion on Parabens —Preceding unsigned comment added by Valueaddedwater (talk • contribs) 21:08, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm going to revise this concept and propose adding a section in this article on "Cosmetics, Safety, and Controversy" It will have at least two sub-sections, one headed "Cosmetic Industry View" and the other headed "Cosmetic Critics View" with possibly a third "Regulators View". When these go up, I'm going to ask editors to put their views in the appropriate sections, and to leave the opposing sections alone. Comments? Bobzchemist 15:15, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Theatrical Make-up

No mention is made in this article about use of make-up to improve the appearance of performers on stage, when being photographed for motion pictures, and when being televised. Apparently, the harsh lighting is less than flattering to performers' skin. Make-up reverses the negative effects. Discuss. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.75.115.10 (talk) 02:28, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree. Knowledge of lighting is necessary to achieve a good skin tone. Not dull, not red.--Radames1 (talk) 05:45, 26 December 2007 (UTC)