Blog | Can I Have A 'Non-Sexual' Mascara, Please?

Ever tried a blush called ‘Orgasm'? Or a mascara that struts its stuff with the moniker, ‘Better than Sex'? Or, simply, ‘Climax'? 

No, this is not a beauty column. Nor am I trying to, er, get you in the mood by flashing raunchy words at you. Truth is, I have only just stumbled on to the jaw-dropping fact that these days many cosmetic products bear hyper-sexualised names—the more explicit the better. It's all very cool. Or hot, if you will.

The cosmetic brand NARS has a mascara called ‘Climax' and a range of blushes with names such as ‘Deep Throat', ‘Multiple Orgasm', ‘Super Orgasm', ‘Threesome', ‘Torrid', ‘Aroused', ‘Peep Show'—you get the drift. The entire blush collection is called, what else, ‘Orgasm'. “Have more than one,” advises its tagline.

It's Tiring, Honestly

Charlotte Tilbury, an ultra-luxe brand, is not far behind. Its liquid highlighter, ‘Glowgasm Beauty Light Wand', comes in shades like ‘Pinkgasm', ‘Goldgasm' and ‘Peachgasm', just so you don't miss the multiple 'gasms' it brings to the table. Its lip colour range is a decidedly modest ‘Pillow Talk', but it does have shades with names such as ‘Lost Cherry' (Google, if you don't know your slang!) 

And then there is the brand Too Faced—all in-your-face and unabashed. It boldly, and baldly, calls its mascara, ‘Better Than Sex'. Not risqué enough? Well, you could also go for the' Too Faced Lip Injection Liquid Lipstick' in shades like ‘It's So Big', or, ‘Large and in Charge'. Its Melted Matte Liquid Lipstick takes the naughty name game a shade higher: ‘Suck It', it instructs helpfully.   

Now you may tell me that I've been living under a rock and cosmetics with sexually suggestive names have been around for some time. And you would be right. Full disclosure: My knowledge of cosmetics and their brands had thus far been limited to one or two trusted names. Never adventurous with makeup, I have misspent my youth, sticking to the boring trio of compact-lipstick-kajal, vaguely aware that there was an explosion of products out there which could give me a glam look, but never having the patience to trawl through the staggering array of primers, concealers, blushes, bronzers, mascaras, and what have you. The sheer number of choices and the time it would take to make an informed one, scared me off.

But all that changed recently. Thanks to a spate of weddings in the family, I wondered suddenly if I could give myself a spiffy makeover with some well-chosen beauty aids. And so it was that I boldly went where I had never gone before. That is to say, I ventured into an online cosmetics shopping site. It was like going down a rabbit hole, and I spent several agonising hours trying to decide if I should buy this or that, and more crucially, buy which from what international brand. 

Frankly Sexual

But, hey, I emerged wiser from the experience. Apart from expanding the horizon of my knowledge, and learning about the huge number of cosmetic brands available to the Indian consumer today, I also came upon the eye-popping trend of beauty products being marketed with frankly sexual names. 

To be sure, the entire beauty industry, chiefly targeted at women, perpetuates and feeds on the social pressure on them to look young and beautiful and, therefore, attractive to the opposite sex. It is part of the larger societal process of the incessant sexualisation of women, be it in language, culture or the mass media. However, when a beauty brand pitches a cosmetic with a name like ‘Orgasm' or ‘Glowgasm' or ‘Deep Throat', when it so explicitly identifies the product with sex or a sexual act, it is, in effect, shedding all pretence and telling the woman that she is essentially a sex object and her success as one depends on her enthusiastically embracing the said product.

Sex Sells

Cosmetic companies claim that they go for these racy names to catch the attention of their increasingly young clientele, including girls in their tweens. In an age of short attention spans and the jangle of a million distractions, a lipstick with a gentle, flora-themed name like ‘Peony' or ‘Evening Primrose' seems decidedly tepid compared to, say, a raunchy ‘Peep Show'. It's all about getting the eyeballs, they say. It's all about imbuing their product with a sexy vibe. And who doesn't know that sex sells?

Some brands are clearly in it for the shock value, such as Tom Ford's ‘F***ing Fabulous' and ‘Vanilla Sex' eau de parfums for men and women, Soap and Glory's ‘Sexy Mother Pucker Lip Gloss' (its foundation is called ‘Glow Job', by the way) or the Illamasqua Nail Varnish in a shade called ‘MILF'. These ribald names are supposed to attract customers like moths to a star.

Do beauty products with overtly sexual names sell better than those with more matter-of-fact monikers? In a random survey of lists of best-selling mascaras, I did not come across any where the ‘Too Faced Better Than Sex Mascara' was at No 1, although it did feature in the Top 10 everywhere.

How Far Is Too Far?

Perhaps beauty brands with risqué names and innuendo-laden puns do seem exciting and enticing to consumers. It must be working at some level, or why else would so many companies persist with the gambit? Be that as it may, I am worried about the brave souls who have the job of coming up with these so-called sexy names. How will they keep ratcheting up this relentless pornification of beauty brands? What's next? Will the beauty industry adopt a Fifty Shades of Grey kind of manual to brand its products in the future?

(Shuma Raha is a journalist and author)

Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author