Where's My Swagger, Beauty Industry?

Give me some shark's teeth and boot mud in my firming gel.

This man is washing his hair with basalt and the ground up boot laces from Jiffy Lube employees. Why? Because he’s a DUDE!

My husband expressed a desire to up his skincare game and it was about the sexiest thing he’s ever said to me.

“I CAN HELP!” I yelled, dashing off to Marshall’s to buy him a full regime.

(And also a hot dog scented candle for my son because the buyers at Marshall’s, man. They never disappoint.)

But the Beauty Industry on the other hand…

VERY DISAPPOINTED!

I have one question for you:

WHERE IS MY GODDAMN SWAGGER???

Ladies, are you aware that while we are sudsing our bodies with champagne toast and sunrise whispers, our male counterparts get to bathe in crushed peanut shells soaked in Labatt Blue collected from the floors of NFL playoff games? Why can’t I bathe in beer-soaked peanut shells, Beauty Industry??? You think I don’t want in on that?

I did some further research at Marshall’s and then at Target and then right in my own bathroom and discovered women have been getting the rose-scented shaft (that’s what she said) ever since Cleopatra first bathed in sour milk and ostrich eggs. Women’s beauty products are designed to firm and smooth and regenerate our hopelessly lost youth. Men’s products are created to buff, beef, and fight volcanoes with the force of a thousand angry bobcats. How is this fair?! Do I want to smell like ELECTRICITY and BASEBALL CLEATS? I don’t think so. But I want a choice!

Look what I found in my own shower!

And yes of course I bought these! For research!

Men who exfoliate are vikings! Women who exfoliate get to check one step off in their 33-step skincare routine.

Is this not Viking enough for you?

Listen to me, Beauty Industry:

I’ve had the top layer of my skin blasted off with tiny sand particles!

I’ve allowed someone to jab little baby needles into the surface of my face like a poke cake trying to trick my body into making more collagen.

I’ve had hot wax poured on and ripped off parts of my body I’m not even sure my husband knows I have.

I’ve let 20-somethings fresh out of esthetician school zap my hair follicles with lasers. And I used a Groupon to do it!

I have shaved, plucked, threaded, steamed, extracted, peeled, and detoxed this old body and have never been called anything more adulating than, hon.

I AM SOOOOOOOOOO VIKING!

“Women’s” beauty brands are called names like Caress, Suave, and Dove. Dudes go home with Fist Fight, Bar Swill, and Big-Balled Komodo Dragon. Why do soap makers think women need to gently nourish and transform their tired old husks with MicroMoisture dew droplets plucked from the very cabbage leaves Anne Geddes stuffed newborn babies inside of to take their pictures, but when dudes lather up, they get TOUGHER and BUFFER and more likely to wear flannel and chuck axes unironically?

Maybe I’m tired of my skin feeling like morning’s first breath or grade A mulberry silk. Ever think of that, Beauty Industry? Maybe I want to leave my shower journey feeling like an armadillo, looking like a cyborg, and smelling like the inside of Hulk Hogan’s tiny yellow shorts after his epic match up against Andre the Giant. I mean, I absolutely DO NOT, but again— I’d still like the choice.

Hmm, I wonder which product is made for who?

These are literally side-by-side on the company’s website. I didn’t even need Canva to make this image!

MEN: We are crafted from leather. Tough, durable, smells like the earth men!

WOMEN: We have moods! Some are like a sunrise, some are like a total eclipse, some are big, gaping blackholes. We smell like an empty bag of Costco trail mix and Tums! We are so soft! Meow!

Also, guys can apparently use one product to wash their hair, face, and butts and women need minimum sixteen? Umm, okay.

Wow, Squatch. Nice Glow up.

We here in the PNW like 2 things:

• Men who smell like eagle spit

• Sasquatch

Look at our boy, Squatch getting in on the men’s grooming operation.

Looking fresh, Squatch! Be your own best customer!

Bro, he’s a doctor now. Doctor of making your man smell like the inside of a whiskey barrel! Oh, what’s that? You’re more of a purveyor of Pine Tar? Doc Squatch’s got you covered.

Did you know pine tar is actually used to treat skin conditions like eczema and psoriasis? That’s cool and all but I literally can’t imagine a “for women’s” product advertising that as a main ingredient!

Oh no, there’s more!

Okay, I bought my husband this one. Squatch grew on me.

Coconut I can get behind, but Castaway? No offense to our deserted brothers and sisters, but I’m sure even they would agree this is not the fragrance profile we should be chasing here.

But at least Dr. Squatch is using REAL SOAP and not those stupid revitalizing ribbons us ladies are stuck with.

Okay, Boomer.

It’s not just my husband (by way of me) and Gen Z teens who are buying into the butch beauty standards for dudes. MY DAD bought into it. Literally! I saw this in his shower!

Dad, no!

But Shelly, why were you lurking around your dad’s shower?

Not the point!

We have to protect our elders!

My dad went to CVS, found his way to the soap aisle, and when faced with many choices, he renounced the fragrance free, for all skin types, trusted-by-dermatologists Lubriderm, and went straight for the Swagger. If SWAGGER or “scent of sandalwood” isn’t enough, what about the dragon creature in the background? Is that Swagger? Swagger the Dragon? Swaggy Draggy? Swaggon? Puff the Cedarwood Scented Swaggon? I can do this all night, Beauty Industry!

Sugar’s too Nice for Buyers of Old Spice.

Oh they ain’t just shilling Swagger in the men’s section. Old Spice is turning men into feral, albeit shower fresh-scented savages:

The hell? Anyone else read Mambaking as MAN-BAKING. Like oooo, now that you guys smell like apex predators, you think you can conquer zucchini bread? Please! I’d like to see you try! Get the hell out of my kitchen!

But keep going, Old Spice! You’re on a roll!

Bigger is better? What are you doing to these men, Old Spice???

This product line appears to be made for the more sensitive man. Vegan, perhaps? A little shy? Definitely uses beard oil. Knows everything happening on Below Deck, but only because his wife watches it.

Also timber? What in the goddamn seven wonders does timber spell like? Fresh cut wood? (That is DEFINITELY what she said!)

GIVE ME MY SWAGGER!

You have no idea what this middle-aged lady can handle. (Or how badly I could use the coarse, scratchy bark of a palm tree in my body wash. That actually sounds kind of nice.) Give me some respect! And then give me lotion infused with Medusa’s hot flash induced sweat. Let me wash my face and unclog my pores with the venom of her hair-snakes, AND THEN use the petrified bodies of her victims to buff and smooth my dry, cracked heels!

That’s what I’m talking about!

This is the resistance!

Let us not be contained by some industry’s ill-conceived idea of what a middle-aged lady should smell like!

Join me, ladies! Be free of juiced plums and moon flowers.

We ride at midnight. Ooh, that’s a little too late. How about 9PM?

And when we are done riding, we will immediately go home for a nice, refreshing shower because who wants to smell like horse manure and wood chips¹?

XO,

Shelly

1. DUDES! That’s who! At least according to Old Spice.