What did your lipstick say about you this Valentine's Day, lady?

I’m a bitter and cynical person, so it will come as no surprise to you that I have no love for Valentine’s day. In fact, I’ve waited almost a week to blog about this, just so that it wouldn’t look like I was somehow tacitly endorsing the most horrible display of sentiment that happens on a yearly basis (lies: I was just too lazy to write).

So, I hate Valentine’s Day. I do, however, love all the sexist, gendered bullshit that comes out of the woodwork at this time of year (let’s just forget about the stuff that happens all year round, won’t we?)

One sparkler is this amazing list of what your lipstick says for you, from that bastion of critical journalism, The Huffington Post. Because, of course, women are like Victorian-era children, better seen and not heard.

Shut up and let your lipstick talk for you, woman!

Though you might not like what your lipstick says. Here’s the list from the article:

PINK LIPS say "I am sweet and you can introduce me to your mother"
FROSTED PINK LIPS say "I am a bit behind the times and you can introduce me to the 21st Century"
MATTE NUDE LIPS - " I considered wearing Birkenstocks tonight"
SHIMMERY GLOSSY NUDE LIPS - "Do you watch the Jersey Shore?"
CORAL LIPS - "I intend to be home in my PJ's by 11pm"
MATTE RED LIPSTICK - " You need to work hard pal"
GLOSSY RED LIPS - " Myself and my lip color is going to be all over you"
WINE COLORED LIPS- " Do you read Tolstoy?"
ROSE COLORED LIPS - " Are you Mr. Darcy?
NOTHING LEFT ON THE LIPS - "What's for breakfast?"

Is there any lipstick that doesn’t paint a disturbing picture? If I slap on some nude shimmery gloss during an impassioned discussion about Battlestar Galactica, are people going to suddenly think that I’ve cribbed all my info from Wikipedia?

Apart from perpetuating that old Madonna/whore dichotomy that women have to deal with on a regular basis (red means slut, pink means sweet and romantic), it makes us believe that every woman does and should wear lipstick. Notice how there’s no option for ‘no lipstick’ apart from ‘nothing left on the lips’, which implies you had some but have rubbed it all off (oooh, wonder how you did that, wink wink nudge nudge *vomit*)? If you don’t fit into this list, you’re not doing your woman-ness well enough!

(Though it must be said that ‘nothing left on the lips’ could also imply that it has all disappeared because you have been eating food, which I would totally be okay with, because as a woman-beast I enjoy to eat food OM NOM NOM NOM)

Some of the other suggestions for less-common lipstick colours are actually more interesting than they are stereotypical. Coral means that you’ll be in bed by 11pm? Well since Valentine’s Day this year was on a Monday, I’m assuming that a lot of people would have wanted to be in bed by 11pm because they have to get up early for work the next day. (oh, right, to be a good woman you should be at home cooking and cleaning for your man and not having such a thing as your own job! Nasty sign of independence, that.) If ‘in bed by 11pm’ is meant to be an insult (which I’m sure it is, implying that coral lipstick is only worn by losers with no life), then count me a loser, because I love to fucking sleep. In fact, sometimes I even spend a whole eight hours a night doing it! I know, WHAT A WASTE, right?

If wine-coloured lips really do ask ‘Do you read Tolstoy?’ I’m surprised my friend Kaylee hasn’t already run out to Boots and slapped some on. She has a penchant for well-read men, and if there were a quick way to pick out any literature loving guys without opening one’s mouth, I’m sure she’d be all for it. Sadly for Kaylee, and all us women who like our menfolk reasonably erudite, if wine coloured lipstick really asks people ‘Do you read Tolstoy?’ then anyone wearing is it likely to receive a chorus of  No’s as they walk down the street. How sad.

So next time you reach for the lipstick, ladies, think about what your lipstick is saying for you. Then fuck it and pick whatever you like, or don’t wear any at all. Let people judge you by what comes out of your mouth, not what’s on it.

Playing Starcraft makes you a mental

I’m not a psycho killer. In fact, I’m not any kind of killer. I work routine jobs, hang out with my friends, and go on the internet. But if you had access to my internet history, and analysed posts I have made on messageboards/twitter/fanfiction websites, you could probably paint a picture of me as some deranged psycho who is mentally unstable and liable to snap any minute.

At least that’s the impression I’m getting from the Wall Street Journal. In the aftermath of the shooting of congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, along with an number of other people, in Arizona this week, the WSJ published the article ‘Postings of a Troubled Mind: Accused shooter wrote on gaming site of his job woes, rejection by women.’ The article then goes on to dissect the content of messageboard posts by the ‘accused’ shooter, Jared Lee Loughner. I bet any of you who have ever written on the internet about problems getting a job, or how you have no luck with women are wondering why the FBI haven’t hunted you down before now, aren’t you. What heinous material to be posting! And on the interwebs no less!

Now, before anyone starts to get angry about how I’m making light far too soon after this horrible tragedy, I will say that it is horrible. I know that. I mean no disrespect. I’m just trying to give some semblance of sanity to a world that has the media running rampant over every small scrap of material they can find around anything that the public considers ‘news’. And let me tell you, what counts as news is a very scary thing.

The article starts by summarising notes found scribbled around his house, saying things like ‘die bitch’ and ‘die cops’ on a letter from the congresswoman’s office, which I’m sure is somewhat relevant to the whole shooting thing. But then it moves into the messageboards. At first, a couple of lines the WSJ focuses on let you think that there is something of concern here. Apparently he was fixated on grammar, and yet he posted “I bet your hungry....Because i know how to cut a body open and eat you for more then a week. ;-)”. Unless he was fixated on bad grammar, that’s decisive evidence that he’s disturbed. Other lines published include him asking if anyone is angry all the time, or whether users would hit a “Handy Cap”, or some weird ranting ‘justification’ for rape. Okay, so it’s useful in painting the picture of him as a disturbed man who was not of sound mind when he committed the crime he is accused of.

But then they start using whatever posts they can find as evidence of his ‘insanity’. But these posts don’t add to the crazy. They’re just ordinary messageboard posts. Somehow, the WSJ is trying to use these as evidence that he is an insane motherfucker and somebody should have noticed earlier. I mean, of course, why wouldn’t you start to get worried when a guy is posting things such as these on the internet?

“How many stars are in the universe?”

“What do Chocolate cookies taste like?”

“This forum made me feel better J”

Under a topic he started called ‘Weight Lifting’ (Shock! Horror!) he “asked whether anyone else lifted. He described himself as 5 feet 10 inches tall and 155 pounds, and said he could do 65 push-ups, bench press 165 pounds, and do 25 pull-ups and 100 sit-ups, (thanks to the ab machine).”

Have you mused about the number of stars in the universe? Have you wondered about the taste of chocolate cookies? (Not me, I know what they taste like, but if I didn’t I’d definitely want to know) Have you ever posted information and advice about your current fitness obsession on a messageboard? Then the WSJ clearly thinks you are mentally disturbed, and you should probably go take a pill for that, or something.

I’d like it if the moral of this tale was as simple as ‘the media are morons and will print anything, even if it makes no sense’. But, sadly, there aren’t enough people in the world to temper the massive wave of idiocy that flows out from printing presses the world over. So the moral really is, be careful what you write on the internet. And I’ve broken that already.

* All material quoted in double marks (“”) is from the WSJ. Almost all the words in single are me being a dick. I do realise I use them a lot.