Why are some South Korean women smashing their make-up?

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Why are some South Korean women smashing their make-up?

2018-11-02 13:58 Last Updated At：13:58

It comes as part of a feminist movement dubbed “escape the corset.”

K-Beauty – Korean Beauty – is one of the world’s biggest skin and make-up trends, as everyone wants to emulate the enviably bright and dewy look of South Korean women.

However, there is a growing backlash against extreme pressures to look perfect in South Korea. This has started manifesting itself on social media, with women smashing their make-up and cosmetic products.

K-Beauty is notorious for being labour-intensive and expensive. To achieve perfect “glass skin” and the desired pore-less complexion, you need to invest money in the right products and time into a multi-step regime. And now women are saying they’ve had enough.

This destruction of make-up comes as part of a wider feminist movement which has been nicknamed “escape the corset.” Women face pressures to look a certain way all over the world, but its intensity does seem to be heightened in South Korea – a place where there is such a focus on the aesthetic that you’re often asked to include a picture of yourself in job applications.

The demands on women to conform to the South Korean ideal of beauty are intense, which perhaps explains why some estimates place it as the plastic surgery capital of the world.

It’s common to see adverts for plastic surgery clinics all over Seoul – some even sporting ominous captions like: “Everyone but you has done it.” In fact, there is a growing trend of gifting plastic surgery procedures to South Korean students upon their graduation from school.

The cosmetics industry is similarly huge, predicted to be eighth largest market in the world by export.gov and growing at an annual rate of 7.4 between 2012 and 2016.

Cha Ji-won is one of the women who has trashed her make-up in protest against these weighty expectations, telling the Guardian she would spend up to £70 a month on cosmetics, and adding: “There’s only so much mental energy a person has each day, and I used to spend so much of it worrying about being ‘pretty’.”

Destroying cosmetics isn’t the only way women are taking a stand in South Korea, which is experiencing something of it’s own #MeToo moment. Since public prosecutor Seo Ji-hyeon told the world she was groped by a former politician in January, many more women have been coming forward with their own stories.

Not only this, but Seoul saw a feminist rally of around 22,000 people in June, protesting the phenomenon of “molka” – spycams hidden in places like public bathrooms to take explicit footage of women without their knowledge.

However, it’s apparent there’s an uphill battle facing the women of South Korea. Earlier this year, a female news anchor wore her glasses on air and this caused a significant stir online – even though male anchors wear specs regularly, it’s not necessarily seen as the “done” thing for women.

In an interview afterwards, the Korean Herald reports Lim Hyeon-ju as saying: “I hope that people wouldn’t think that it is uncomfortable to watch a news presenter wearing glasses, just because that presenter is a woman.”

Chances are, the cosmetic industry won’t suffer much from the “escape the corset” movement. However, it’s opening up the conversations around the expectations placed on women, and how toxic this need to conform can be. This is only a start, but it’s an important one for the women of South Korea.

AP PHOTOS: For the world's largest democratic exercise, one village's polling officers are all women

2024-04-19 18:52 Last Updated At：19:01

CHEDEMA, India (AP) — The line was orderly at Government Middle School as people waited patiently to vote Friday, even after one of the voting machines malfunctioned.

The officers at the polling station in Chedema village in India's tiny mountain state of Nagaland had arrived the day before, all of them women on electoral duty for the first time. The four women surveyed the polling station, secured the perimeter and started on the tedious paperwork involved with India's multiphase national election.

They stopped only for an early dinner, paying heed to the voice of Eholi Jimo, 35, who cooked their meal over an open fire. “Please eat while the food is still hot,” she urged.

The Northern Angami constituency is Nagaland's first to be solely managed by women polling officers. It was the idea of Kumar Ramnikant, the administrative head of Kohima district, in hopes of breaking job stereotypes.

“If our country needs proper development, then there should be equal contribution from both halves," Ramnikant said. "Empowerment should not only be at the top level, it should be at the bottom level also. It should be at all layers for real empowerment.”

“Women are more systematic. They take every sentence seriously, whereas men have an easy attitude,” said Zhoto Khamo, an officer who has supervised many elections.

India's elections that started Friday will finish June 1, with the counting starting on June 4. Each phase is held on a single day, with voting in several constituencies across multiple states. The staggered polling allows the government to deploy tens of thousands of troops to prevent violence and transport election officials and voting machines.

Security issues were not a concern at the Chedema polling station as the constituency has not recorded election-related violence in the recent past.

The Election Commission of India must ensure a voting booth is available within 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) of every voter. Some 15 million election officials and security staff will traverse deserts and mountains — by boat, foot and even on horseback — to try to reach every voter.

“I just hope it will go smoothly and things happen on time,” said Neichütuonuo Yhome, 27, the presiding officer of the Chedema polling station's team.

After they collected the electronic voting machines and other election-related material on Thursday, Yhome led her team to their station.

Their duty resumed at sunrise Friday.

The night before, they had spread their sleeping bags on the cold concrete floor of a classroom. A village leader was quick to arrange rugs for the night, saying: “They are guests of the village.”