Should Feminist's wear nail varnish?

Make-up, nail varnish and girlieness was not really something that I really grew up with.

I think this is due to two main reasons:

The main and most important reason is that my parents wanted me to grow up equal. They believed that instilling in me feminist ethics was very important. I can remember reciting the names of the Pankhurst sisters (Emmeline, Christabel and Sylvia) with my dad, and him buying me books about Boadecia and Joan of Arc. He also bought me the independent Women CD for my birthday :-) haha
They wanted me to be strong, to believe in my opinions and to fight to have the same opportunities as others. They wanted me to be happy as the person I was and the person that I am.

I am forever grateful for this - It didn't always serve me well,  and perhaps they were too extreme (?) I haven't always been everyone's cup of tea, perhaps TOO outspoken, perhaps not the most popular girl to date... But over the years I have learnt even from those boys that I SO desperately wanted to like me, that it wasn't because I wasn't pretty, It was because I wasn't easy - If they had dated me, it was a big deal... That they are so glad that they didn't as we have a true and solid friendship as equals (So that is a pretty good outcome to that teenage anguish!)

There is another reason why I didn't grow up a girlie girl and this is a lot to do with my wonderful, but sadly very unconfident Mum. What is SO wonderful in becoming an adult and a parent myself is to have that deeper understanding about your life, and to view your parents as people - not just parents. My Mum is quite cuddly and round and her way to deal with this is not to try and change - but to try and love herself as she is (Well done her!) My Mum is an only child and her Mum was very ill during her teenage life, so she missed that girlie moment... She didn't have many friends...
Perhaps more than that, she just doesn't want to care. She likes to look nice, she likes jewelry and clothes, but make up and hair and nails (preening can we call it???) That is not something we have ever shared.

Now this brings me to now, a mother with a daughter now 8, and I must say sometimes I feel a bit lost. Through the experience of quite an austere upbringing in terms of physical appearance and my learnt experience through friends and my life now in France that taking care of yourself and your appearance can be fun and can make you feel better... what message should I be sending my daughter?

She was given a 'make up set' for her birthday by her Aunt which I took an immediate dislike to - It was Disney, with various shades of red and pink lip gloss and nail varnish. M was very excited by this and kept on carrying it around and asking me if she could put it on. This brought up so much inner rage, every time I saw it, I just wanted to throw it out of the window - which made me realize that I clearly had to deal with some underlying issue, which I (not her) needed to deal with. What am I so worried about? That if she wears nail polish this is going to spiral into self loathing and anorexia? That this will put her looks before her brain and let people abuse her? Not take her seriously...
Of course I was overreacting. I think whenever I am faced with something new as a parent, something I cannot control or don't have an answer to - I tend to feel attacked - so I feel the need to defend myself with anger... (This is something I have learnt from CBT)

So I just rode it out, with the mantra, it's just nail polish - you wear nail polish, strong independent women can take care of themselves. You can do both - as long as it is for you and you are not hiding yourself behind an image... it's ok. Telling myself over and over what will be will be, she has to be her own person, she has to explore, she has to find her own personality.

So she put on nail varnish and after a day wanted to take it off as it had chipped and wasn't perfect. She put on lip gloss (as did my son) Then she decided that the box was perfect to pretend to be a school for her Sylvanian Families and emptied all the make up into a drawer and I don't think has touched it since...

Of course this is not the end and only the beginning of 'growing up' but it was quite an interesting outcome.

Yes I will still favor purple/blue clothes over pink for her, and yes I probably will also buy her books about amazing women, and teach her about Women's Suffrage... but in the end her being girlie has nothing to do with this - her 'image' is self expression and she will be who she wants to be and the less resistance I show the less she will (hopefully) show in return.

I think what I have to remember is that strong independent women do what the f*** they want without feeling the barriers of a male dominated world. So I should just hope she'll does that...