The Price of Beauty

Whoever says beauty is cheap hasn’t seen the aisles of Chanel eye cream or Le Creme or Lancome lotions. Or the thousand dollar purses, silver studded watches, and 8-inch stilettos. Cosmetics, makeup, miracle placebos, and jeweled paraphernalia, all expensive, invaded our society, and, of course, our medicine cabinets and shelves.

My mother dominates the medicine cabinet. She has Estee Lauder on the top shelf, mixed with a few vials of pink gooey nail polish, and white tubed eye cream lying on makeup remover. My dad is a bit more modest; all he needs is a shaving cream and razor. My inventory consists of Aquafresh with Listerine, and the necessities for my contact lenses.

We spend thousands (mainly my mom) on cosmetics a year- our excuse? We can afford it. We can afford to be pretty, good looking, or beautiful. Last time I checked, one did not need material facial embellishments to be beautiful. Whatever happened to ‘inner beauty counts’? Hm. The other adage, “beauty is in the eyes of the beholder”, reigns true in a world of physical inflections and “judge a book by its cover” attitudes. No more tenets, please.

These companies are making millions. Estee Lauder made $5 billion last year; Chanel reeled the same sum- in America alone. Somehow, someone somewhere spends $100 for a four ounce bottle of moisturizing lotion.

We have to stay beautiful of course. But here’s the price of beauty: extracted oils from plants, a growing monopoly on cheaper goods, and a financial distinction between who can afford this or that $500 bottle.

These products are necessities, but heck, the indulgence of luxuries is almost second nature to us.

Tough luck.