Lorraine Dallmeyer talks about how the beauty industry treats normal human changes as flaws. More than half of postmenopausal women experience hair loss, yet it's marketed as a problem to fix. She argues the industry profits by framing aging, body hair, and skin variation as abnormalities that need correction.
Questions this video answers
More than half ("Half").
90% (one study suggested 90% of hyperpigmentation cases are found in women).
Chapters
Last week here on the podcast, I interviewed Helena Gibson of Unveil Hair Care and Strut Hair, who talked very openly about the challenges that women face with hair loss. And in my research for that episode, I discovered that more than half of postmenopausal women struggle with hair loss and hair thinning. Half. But in my hunt to find out more about this issue, it became very apparent that hardly anyone is talking about it. So it's not very surprising that the women who do struggle with hair loss think that they're alone in this challenge. And that's also very much what Helena said. That women feel this enormous shame around losing their hair because they feel like they're an anomaly. Isn't that heartbreaking? And the beauty industry, of course, does nothing to dispel this myth, which is why when we see a woman who's lost her hair, the automatic assumption is that she's unwell. And this made me ask myself, what other issues do women face that the beauty industry makes us feel are abnormalities? There are, as you might expect, many examples, so we're going to take a look at a few in this podcast episode. Hi, it's Lorraine Dallmeyer, chartered environmentalist, biologist and CEO of award winning online organic cosmetic formulation school Formula Botanica. I host the Green Beauty Conversations podcast and these are my green beauty opinions which I share. My takeaways from the podcast interview we released last week and set you a challenge to make the green beauty sector a better place. If you want to be the first to hear all of my latest episodes, make sure you subscribe to this podcast. Let's start with hair loss, as I think it's such a big topic. I found it really fascinating listening to Helena tell me last week how she was inundated with women coming to her, telling her how alone they felt in their struggles when she first started her business. We rarely see women publicly who suffer from hair loss or hair thinning. There have been some more high profile celebrities in recent years, such as Jada Pinkett Smith, who has been very public and open about her alopecia. And I have no doubt that she's helped millions of women by being so vulnerable and open, which is a very brave thing to do. So hair loss is one big topic that we really see the beauty industry make people feel like it's a huge anomaly when they experience it. Another issue is hyperpigmentation, which I also feel that the beauty industry doesn't address properly, other than telling you that it needs to be corrected. So, just a quick recap. Hyperpigmentation occurs when the pigment producing cells in the skin, which are called melanocytes, begin to produce more pigment. And this then leads to the development of lighter or darker patches on the skin surface. And it can appear anywhere on the skin. It's also perfectly normal. And typically it's nothing to worry about. And it probably won't surprise you to learn that it generally affects more women than men. One study, in fact, that I read, suggested that 90% of hyperpigmentation cases are found in women. And I bet that the majority of those women feel like it needs to be fixed or corrected because of the language used by the beauty industry. Now, to be fair, we are starting to very slowly see more models with hyperpigmentation make it into beauty adverts. But that doesn't really stack up against the products that those beauty companies sell to correct what the industry still views and terms to be an abnormality. Another example is cellulite, which again, is a perfectly normal thing on the skin. It can be found across all body types. It's not an abnormality, it's not a disease. In fact, the very concept of cellulite was invented and amplified by the beauty industry itself. And it was framed as this unsightly condition that we need to master with this multitude of lotions that don't work. So again, we're being told that our bodies are wrong for being natural and for being normal. Now, that's just three examples. Hair loss, hyperpigmentation, cellulite. We haven't even talked about blemishes or body hair or sweat or any of the other perfectly normal things that you'll find are very common to most humans. I'm sure that you have some examples. You can probably think of some too. And please do DM me on Instagram because I would love to hear your thoughts and examples. And of course, the beauty industry isn't explicitly saying hyperpigmentation is an abnormality, or they're not saying it's weird if you lose your hair when you're a woman, but instead their messaging is more insidious than that. The adverts that we see always give us a picture that we must attain. That picture shows us an ideal woman or an ideal man. And that person doesn't always look like you or me, which then makes us feel like there's something wrong with us. Things have been improving over the last years and for instance, we've seen more representation from people of colour. But as we know, that representation does often stop at the adverts. I recently interviewed a guest on my podcast, Noelie Michaud from 456Skin and she perfectly highlighted that issue in the interview. Please do go back and listen to it. But the main problem that we come back to time and time again is that the personal care industry, the cosmetics industry, the beauty industry, however you want to call it, it exists to make products that can clean, beautify and enhance our appearance. The topic of skin or hair health has to be addressed in almost euphemistic terms because according to the law, cosmetics mustn't have medicinal or pharmaceutical properties. So most cosmetic companies are then going to focus on what you look like, not the overall health and well being of your body. And they are going to want you to constantly feel like you're inadequate because that's how you buy their products. It's a very sad business model. Now, representation is everything. It's a topic we're hearing more and more about across multiple industries. And some people dismiss this concept of representation as woke, which I think is grossly unfair. Because what it all boils down to is this. Humanity is a huge diverse pot of people. We all look different, we all have different skin, we struggle with different issues, we come from different walks of life, we have different beliefs, we want different things. And when you are a company or a business and you're trying to sell to everyone, then you need to show up for that huge diversity and you need to celebrate it. So my challenge to you for this week is to celebrate our humanity. Don't take part in the conversation of making perfectly normal things feel like abnormalities if you can avoid it. This won't be easy because these ideas have become so very normalized in our society. We all trip up many times on this, but keep coming back to that celebration of our diversity and that representation of our humanity. The more times we say it, the more we can make it a reality. Thank you for listening to my Green Beauty opinions. Remember to visit the Formula botanica website@formulabotanica.com to try our free online formula course. And if you haven't subscribed yet to the Green Beauty Conversations podcast, please make sure you do so now in your favorite podcast app. Leave me a five star review if you enjoy the conversations. I host and I'll be back soon with my next episode.
