Being Geek Chic is a blog about one woman navigating the male-dominated industries of production and tech. It's written by Elizabeth Giorgi, Founder, CEO and Director of Mighteor - one of the world's first internet video production companies. Learn more about Mighteor here.
Wendy Syfret (@WendyWends) might tell you she’s a good good girl, but we don’t quite buy it. She’s a rebel with wit and insight, and she’s not afraid to speak her mind.
She’s currently an associate editor at both Vice Magazine and i-D Magazine. And she’s also the editor of Good Good Girl, a blog that’s “a product of new wave feminism: women of our generation have overcome a lot of obstacles, and now need to resist the urge to keep fighting—against each other, ourselves, and our own expectations of what we should be.”
It’s safe to say that Syfret’s one of our most empowering Lady Geeks to date. A few of our favorite posts on Good Good Girl are: “Stop Trying to Convince Me I’m Beautiful,” “Celebrating Miss Piggy, Feminist Icon,” and “Letting Go of Heroes.”
But before you dive into the prose, opinions, and humor of Good Good Girl, check out Syfret’s interview with Being Geek Chic. Read on!
Q: How did you discover your passion for empowering fellow lady geeks through the blogosphere?
A: Well in general it was love at first sight between myself and the internet. God I really sat on that sentence trying to work out whether I should make a “love at first site” joke. As I moved through high school I became more and more interested in feminism and I suppose the two started to merge.
I can’t really remember how Good Good Girl became I thing. I think I just started writing things and having ideas and didn’t knowing where to put them. Or I’d be chatting to a pal about their projects and think, I really wish I could do something on this, or somehow show everyone on earth how amazing you are. I wish I had some amazing moment when I woke up and knew what I was doing, but it was all pretty organic. Which is how all things should be. Except dessert, which should be artificial and insane.
Q: Most gratifying moment as an editor for Good Good Girl?
A: Funny you should ask, we recently had our first Good Good Session. It was all about writing and we teamed up with this really amazing writers agency called the Good Copy here in Melbourne. We had a panel of great female writers and we fleshed out a bunch of practical stuff around making good work and getting the money and respect you deserve for it. Also afterwards we drank bloody marys and ate a huge cake with a tiny pineapple on it.
Other than that—and this sounds like a massively cornball comment—but whenever someone tells me an article resonated with them, or we feature a girl who I respect I feel pretty great. I’m just glad anyone gives a shit about it to be honest.
Q: If you could take any fictional character out for a drink, whom would you choose and what would you drink?
A: Holy crap this question is stone cold impossible. Maybe Franny from Franny and Zooey. We’d drink white wine because we’re wasps and that’s the law. Actually we’d probably just end up forming a suicide pact.
100 Years of Solitude is my favourite book and I’ve always been pretty drawn to Colonel Aureliano Buendía, maybe we’d drink rum and fall in love and he’d make me one of his golden fish and we’d die in some sad and beautiful magical realism way. Why are my literary fantasies so emo? Fuck it, I choose Mindy Kaling, I bet at least one thing in Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me was made up, so I claim that counts. We’d drink mimosas and talk about how hard it is having it all.
Q: What would you tell your 13-year-old self?
A: That bucket hat everyone gives you shit about is gonna come into style but by then you won’t be cool enough to wear it. Also being funny will get you everywhere, and out of everything.
Q: What’s the title of your memoir?
A: Endless Optimism, Constant Dread
Emma Bauer is a Being Geek Chic Contributor. Clearly, she’s got great taste. She is a PR enthusiast, dog lover, tea drinker, art appreciator, and of course, aspires to Be Geek Chic. Follow her on Twitter: @emmalynnbauer
When I was in the 6th grade, I organized a group of girls to sing Aretha Franklin’s RESPECT at a school pep rally. We wore matching shirts and danced around with feather boas while belting out R - E - S - P - E - C - T. I’m not sure anyone in my school particularly cared, but it’s a distinct memory for me as an adult. Maybe it was because a pep rally is an odd place for this kind of show. Maybe it’s because I clearly had underlying feminist motives as a pre-teen girl. Maybe it was the boas.
Sixth grade was a pivotal time for me. On top of this musical performance, I dressed as a female CEO for Halloween. I decided to embrace my bookishness and intentionally sat in the front row of the class. I stole my mom’s suits and wore them on any given Tuesday.
And it was the year I figured out I wasn’t “beautiful,” by conventional standards.
One day while waiting in line for lunch, a classmate said to me: “you have Elvis mouth and it’s weird.” At 12, I was not only being told I looked like a dude, but that I was weird. There’s nothing worse at this tender pre-teen age than being told you are not normal. Being compared to the opposite sex in the looks department is devastating enough, but when it’s said as a tool to point out a negative differentiator between you and other girls, it’s particularly heartbreaking.
I can remember exactly how it felt to hear someone say that to me. The meanness and the contempt practically spraying itself from the words onto my face. For what it’s worth, the girl was somewhat accurate in choosing that description. When I start talking really fast or get super excited, I do have the tendency to speak out of the right side of my mouth. Think of how Margaraey Tyrell AKA Natalie Dormer does her little side grin in Game of Thrones. It’s kind of like that. As a result, I’m getting more wrinkles on the right side of my face now that I’m older, but that’s irrelevant.
What is relevant is that after I heard that, I truly NEVER believed I was an attractive woman.
I was a smart woman.
I was a brave woman.
I was an eloquent woman.
I was an ambitious woman.
I was a funny woman.
But I was, without any shred of doubt in my mind, NOT a beautiful woman.
Beautiful women are symmetrical. Beautiful women have big beautiful lips and even complexions. Beautiful women don’t become less beautiful when they open their mouths. Beautiful women don’t get compared to Elvis.
Somewhere in high school, I forgot about being compared to the gyrating King. I dated and even had a few boyfriends. I did as teenage girls do, I enjoyed their company and their kisses - in the backs of cars, against trees, behind the school and on my mattress which I had thrown on the floor in the corner of my room as some kind of protest against furniture. Not one ever pointed out that my mouth got a little asymmetrical from time to time. Not one mentioned if my oral peculiarity impacted my make-out abilities. Not one seemed to care. But somehow, despite all this, I still felt fundamentally un-pretty. I thought they liked the smart, brave, eloquent, ambitious, funny me. I couldn’t even see myself as anything else.
More than a decade of dating later, I was on a date when a dude mentioned that he liked how my mouth was a little off center. It charmed him. It added to my personality. He didn’t call it beautiful though. And immediately, the words from the girl standing in front me in line in the 6th grade hit my chest. I absorbed the negative memory before allowing the compliment he was offering me to take hold.
This feeling is bullshit. And I hate that it’s an emotional tether that I’ve allowed to impact how I felt about myself for years. The even bigger tragedy is that nearly every single woman I know has a story similar to mine. There are countless beautiful, bold, brilliant babes who were the recipient of an unflattering comment that still wander around this earth carrying that criticism like a calling card.
Are you one of them?
Aretha’s iconic song is about a couple navigating the strangeness of the intersection of love and mutual respect. It’s about creating a culture of equality in all elements of cohabitation between partners. But when I sang that song as a 12 year old girl, I was asking for a different kind of respect. I wanted to respect myself enough to be able to get up on stage and demand it. Today, I’m closer to middle age than I am to my primary education, and I wonder how a fundamental lack of respect for my own beauty has changed the course of my life. I don’t want to live like that anymore. And we shouldn’t be allowing ourselves or the little girls growing up today to experience that same weight.
I’m asking you to throw that comment away. The one that you’ve been carrying around since 4th grade or 8th grade or last damn week. I’m asking you to respect yourself enough to know that you are MORE than an ugly observation about what *actually* makes you beautiful.
Beauty is not perfection, but rather the quirky qualities that mark our individuality and transcend our very human existence.
Yeah, my mouth is a little wacky. But, dammit, I’m still beautiful.
Natalie Dormer is on her way to being a nerd goddess. Between Game of Thrones, Elementary and Mockingjay - she’s absolutely everywhere. And, personally, I couldn’t be happier.
If you ever look in the mirror and grown audibly or in your head, be kind to yourself. And heed Dormer’s words:
Dormer and I share one trait: a crooked smile. It’s not that we try… our mouths are just asymmetrical. For a while, mean pre-teens called me Elvis in school. And no, it wasn’t meant to be kind. But the fact that she rocks it so proudly reminds me to quit hating it so damn much.
Life is too damn short.
I’ve always really really loved makeup. In 7th grade, I started saving up my allowance to raid the Jane cosmetics section at Target. In 8th grade, I bought my first non-drugstore makeup in a Korean mall in Los Angeles. Today, Sephora and LUSH are my favorite brick-and-mortar stores (really, one of the few reasons I ever drag myself to a shopping center any more).
So, the theme of today is “Pretty Nerds are Nerds Too.” I’m friends with tons of lady nerds. Some of them never wear makeup. Some of them look like they fell off the cover of a magazine. They’ve all been judged for it, no matter what side they’re on, which is sucky.
But, I say, embrace your beauty. Wear makeup if it makes you feel pretty. Don’t if it doesn’t (so I’ve included some skin/spa-type products for those who don’t wear makeup).
And without further ado, here is the first-annual Nerds Are Pretty Too, Best of Beauty list (just in time for the holidays):
Things We Discovered and Fell in Love with in 2013:
Benefit Stay Don’t Stray
This is probably the most amazing primer I’ve ever used (and it doubles as a concealer) – and I’ve pretty much used them all over the years. If you aren’t using a primer under your eye shadow, you’re pretty much throwing your makeup away by having to re-apply throughout the day. This is thick enough for blemishes and really helps even out your eye tone – and of course holds your eye makeup forever and ever.
Lush Karma Kream
Is this what heaven smells like? I certainly hope so. Pretty much everything at the Lush store smells amazing. This moisturizer is so thick and creamy and it smells absolutely amazing. After spending most of my life avoiding skin-irritating scented products, Lush holds an extra appeal to me, because their ingredients are all natural. Karma is one of their signature scents and this stuff is absolutely worth every penny.
Aveda Blue Oil
Living down the street from an Aveda Institute has it’s benefits, one of which being easy access to discount-priced facials. Blue Oil is the last step in their services, and the mix of peppermint and camomile is incredible: both refreshing and calming at once. I keep this in my bag at work and bust it out when I’m feeling overwhelmed.
Minis at Sephora
Nice makeup is expensive, I’ll give you that. But the worst is shelling out for a product that either 1) you aren’t crazy about or 2) comes in a size that you will never use up before it’s expiration date. Sephora has tons and tons of miniature products and kits, which I think is a great way to try new things and add colors and options without breaking the bank. Two sets I picked up this year are Too Faced’s Tan Without The Twinkle (perfect matte bronzer), and Benefit’s Gettin’ Cheeky (minis of three of their cheek stains).
Lush Tea Tree Water
Another pick with some aromatherapy attributes. This is great when I want to kind of balance my skin out (I have a lot of oil and dry spots, often caused by the prescriptions I used to manage my acne). It adds a little moisture back to my skin without slathering on a cream and it smells amazing. I usually use it at night, so the scent kind of helps me to fall asleep. It’s also great to help you cool down or to use at 10,000 feet to combat the deadened airplane air and perk your skin up.
Clarisonic Mia
This is a bit of a splurge, but it makes a really nice gift (I tell you this truthfully, having received it as a gift last Christmas). It’s like giving someone the ability to have a facial any time he or she wants. There are also interchangeable brush heads for different skin concerns (deep pore, acne-prone, aging, etc). I’ve found they are often much cheaper to purchase replacement heads on Amazon.
Urban Decay Naked2 Palette
Lots of the eye palettes I buy are limited edition, one-off products (which is how I came to own a gorgeous set of Tarte shadows that were packaged to match a “True Blood” theme). But Naked and Naked2 (and, rumor has it, soon to be Naked3) are signature products from Urban Decay. This is the kind of palette that looks gorgeous on anyone and you can build out simple day looks, elegantly professional eyes for work and a fancier, more dramatic look for going out. Naked2 also has a simple, slim case, which makes it awesome to travel with.
Clinique Chubby Stick Intense in Curviest Caramel
This is the perfect nude lip color! This line (Intense) is, as you would imagine, slightly more pigmented than the original Chubby Stucks, which went on more like a colored balm. This is a gloss/lip color cross, but goes on smoothly and actually is quite moisturizing. I’m in love with this color and would have one of these in every purse, jacket pocket and desk if I could.
Honorable mentions: Origins GinZing Refreshing Eye Cream, NARS The Multiple in Orgasm, Smashbox Master Class Palette, and Lush’s Cupcake Fresh Face Mask.
Tell us about your best beauty discoveries of 2013 AND let’s talk more where you believe beauty products and nerdiness intersect.
Recipe by Emma Carew Grovum. She is a data journalist working at the Chronicle of Philanthropy in Washington, D.C. She previously worked as the Digital Editor for The Cooking Club of America and blogs at kitchendreamer.blogspot.com Emma loves Star Wars, pandas and all things Joss Whedon. Find her on twitter at @emmacarew.
I’m not much of a girly-girl. I like black clothes. Gray on an adventurous day. Nothing weirds me out more than a floral pattern. And I’ve certainly never mastered the “smoky eye” - but I do want to look nice. Looking nice is key. And so I’ve set out on what one might call a scientific experiment to sort out the way to look nice without looking overdone. I’ve also got terminally dry skin, which is something the entire beauty industry doesn’t seem to think exists.
I had to put this in the frame of scientific pursuit in order to justify the high price tag of beauty products, but also because I feel as a dry skin person, we are oft ignored. Apparently the entire world A. doesn’t live in Minnesota or B. is sweating. After much work, this dry fleshed girl is pleased with the results.
So every face must start clean. Wash it once a day or twice a day, but no matter what, if you have dry skin like me you must use something that is chemical free. I like Derma E Face Cleanser. Chemicals = “dryness.” Be kind to your epidermis and spend the extra money.
Now, before I pat my face down with a rough towel, I put two nice droplets of Josie Maran Argan Oil into my hands and rub it over my damp face. The towel rubbing only aggravates the skin.
Once my face feels clean and moisturized, I use the Josie Maran Argan Stick to add extra hardcore moisture to my super dry regions. My T-Zone and eyebrows are a trouble spot for me, so I just rub it all over those spots. My whole face now starts to feel properly moisturized and smells super awesome. Josie Maran’s products are 100% organic, but that doesn’t mean they smell like Patchouli. I like that. Next I add a nice thin layer of Clinique Continuous Coverage. I know it doesn’t matter much right now, but the SPF will be nice in the warmer months.
Next, it’s time for some color. I then brush a nice bit of Physician’s Formula SPF Bronzer over my forehead, nose and just under my cheekbones followed by some Sonia Kashuk Blush. I hate a glittery blush as I am not a ballerina or a 15 year old. This Target brand does the trick.
To finish it up, I add a bit of Neutrogena Lip Balm that’s got a bit of color in it just for the extra splash of rouge while getting more moisture.
To recap, I’m using:
I’m not even going to pretend to give you general beauty tips, but this has been a proven method to prevent my skin flaking off all winter and as we know, prevent zombie face. Minnesotans can get a bit of a zombie look this time of year from the pale skin and it skin falling off only makes it worse. These steps seems to have given me the right mix for preventing such zombie/human confusion.
