Recently, I tracked down Dines, who teaches at Wheelock College in Boston, to see if she thinks modern women are forcing change in the beauty industry. Her answer, in a word, was no.âHow does one empower a woman through a makeup brand? Iâve got no idea,â Dines says over the phone. âWhat empowers women is equal pay, stopping rape, more battered womenâs shelters, Planned Parenthood⌠thatâs what empowerment, or rather liberation, of women is.âDines says she isnât critical of makeup brandsâor women who buy from themâbut worries that focusing on individual empowerment distracts from the bigger picture. âEmpowerment is changing the conditions of oppression,â Dines says. âAnd no amount of makeup in the world is going to do that.âThereâs also the concern that popularizing the idea of ânaturalâ beauty merely holds women to another impossible standard. Maybe what weâre seeing is simply the myth of the âcool girl,â reborn for 2017.