I remember reading this long ago and a few things stuck during the fast skimming while on a visit to a relative - unlike years before, one was no longer excused from conversation any more when in company - and one of the various things that did stick in memory was recently brought back to the surface of memory by some recent events - the terror attacks, the subsequent reactions, and the furious debates in media.
A member of glitterati was brought on camera to counter a minority leader of a party that normally gets all sorts of attacks without a second thought, except this leader was not offendable by the media due to his status and so the member of glitterati went obliquely to comment and counter the original comment by the leader.
The original comment by the leader was about people of the upper class aping western ways and to go on a candle lighting vigil at the historic site of recent terror attacks, and specifically he was dismissive of people who wear lipstick and have fashionable hair and show themselves at this site to be perceived as concerned about the nation while none of them have paid attention to the far worse attacks that have been going on during last decade and a half when it was not the rich and their lairs but the middle class on streets and in buses and in trains being killed by far greater numbers.
So the glitterati member went obliquely at the "people who do not like educated women", without thinking about what he was saying, let alone bothering to explain, or really stopping to consider implications of his words, about what - if anything - education had to do with lipstick.
It was not clear if he thought buying a lipstick or indeed a whole complete makeover had to be a matter of passing a tough examination on intellectual and generally knowledge plane, rather than handing over money; whether an education automatically implies a lipstick application and generally fashion consciousness, and whether the converse is true according to him.
Coming from someone from the country he belongs to, if he thought one thing implied the other in either direction, or if he thought that only those with some sort of western oriented schooling with much money forked over and aping of western fashions as the prime value taught was the only education he could perceive as education, it would certqainly imply he has had little contact with the earth he lives on, and his mind is in another world - I am not sure if that is a real one either.
Most well educated women - by which I do not mean those that have had an expensive high school level but little else other than consciousness of appearing like a Seventeen cover model - whether doctors, engineers, physicists or whatever other particular subject they chose to qualify for a higher degree, have little or no time to think of a personal grooming over and above a basic hygiene - bathing and wearing fresh clothes to start the day, and getting hair settled firmly out of the way - because they are far too busy with their responsibilities, in the world of their work and their own homes as well. They are far too busy to bother looking like a Seventeen cover.
At work their responsibilities are not reduced compared to male colleagues on par, and at home they do not have a wife to take over the need of attention and care they must pay the home and children, making them more than twice as busy as their male colleagues, and also their housewife neighbours. Not that the latter have it easy, for all that.
As a matter of fact all of that is all too true for a "working mother" in the west, and come to think of it for all mothers as well, since there are really no mothers that are non-working - and education whatever level, most women are far too busy taking care of the world to worry about a makeover every time they step out. That they manage to be well groomed and clean is one of the miracles they regularly perform without thinking.
No, the glitterati member was thinking of his own circle - those in professions where appearance is what chiefly matters, and other glitterati and "society" people who can delegate most responsibilities and in fact do, to hired "help".
It is not clear, when he equated education of women with a lipstick and a professional expensive hairdo, if he thinks no schools other than those imparting a western orientation - by virtue of their own origins or any other reason - are good enough, and if he thought that all middle class or poor are by definition stupid and ignorant, and if he thought he knew more of everything than every person taught in a non expensive school where lipsticks are not perceived as a hallmark of civilisation, or education.
Perhaps he could learn much by a journey to familiarise himself with his nation, but one does not know if he can benefit thereby.
Why is this relevant here is amusingly because amongst other things of similar sort Morris explains quite explicitly why humans have certain features, and if people read this on a wide scale - and comprehended it properly - lipstick and perhaps most cosmetics industry bubble would burst completely. That bursting of the bubble only needs a pin, and this is more like a stampede by a determined bull on intent on a duty to do farmwork.
For that matter a similar effect on many industries would be the result of people reading Subliminal Seduction and comprehending it.
