Worst Shade Names?

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turntrekgodhead

Lipstick Lesbian
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We all know of the "celebutard" Kat Von D debacle (also "underage red"). What other offensive, unpleasant or downright uncomfortable names have you come across?

I was looking forward to buying theBalm's Nude 'Tude for my first nude palette... then I found out one of the shades was named "Schitzo". They changed it (to "Seductive", I think) but as someone who's been called that... really offensive and disrespectful.

 
Urban Decay and Too Faced are famous for their risque names but I can't think of any right off the top of my head. 

I do, however, have theBalm's Shady Lady Special Edition palette next to me and now that I look at the names..they are a little odd lol. "Caught in the Act Courtney" "Shameless Shana" "Just This Once Jamie" to name a few.

Names of products don't tend to bother me, except one: Nars' Deep Throat blush..I refuse to buy that blush because that name is (in my opinion) trashy and disgusting. Somehow it's more creepy that Nars is founded by a male. I don't know...that's the only product that I can think of that I just can't deal with name-wise.

 
Quote: Originally Posted by KaitlinKolors /img/forum/go_quote.gif
  Urban Decay and Too Faced are famous for their risque names but I can't think of any right off the top of my head. 

I do, however, have theBalm's Shady Lady Special Edition palette next to me and now that I look at the names..they are a little odd lol. "Caught in the Act Courtney" "Shameless Shana" "Just This Once Jamie" to name a few.

Names of products don't tend to bother me, except one: Nars' Deep Throat blush..I refuse to buy that blush because that name is (in my opinion) trashy and disgusting. Somehow it's more creepy that Nars is founded by a male. I don't know...that's the only product that I can think of that I just can't deal with name-wise.
I can't agree more. It's gross and also insensitive to survivors of rape. Like, no one can tell me that they couldn't have come up with a better name.

 
I think many nail polish names are pretty terrible. Essie has a nail polish called "size matters." Illamasqua has one called "Phallic" and Sinful Colors has one called "Pearl Harbor." When Sephora by OPI was around, they had names like, "Iris I was thinner" and "I'm bouquet with you." The regular OPI line's nail polish names are pretty much all stupid.

 
Urban Decay's names always make my eyes roll. I just got "Perversion," their taupe eyeliner. C'mon, it's eyeliner, it really can't be perverted. Unless you're doing something with your eyeliner that I would not recommend.

 
The Balm's boudoir eyes palette has a shade called "lap dance." Their natural eyes palette has one called "sexpresso." But those really pale in comparison to the ones you've all mentioned...

 
Cheeky Monkey has some pretty bad nail polish names: Booty Call, Camel Toe, No Bra, One Night Stand, Trailer Trash, Brazen Hussy, Raunchy witch, Hot Slut.... It really just goes on and on. 

At least they're consistent. 

 
I don't mind risqué names at all, the only ones that bother me are ones like "celebutard" - using slurs or insults. The sexual ones might be kind of silly, but they don't bother me.

I remember that one of the Illamasqua polish names was Load, and it was an off white...that one kind of made me snort.

 
I don't mind risqué names at all, the only ones that bother me are ones like "celebutard" - using slurs or insults. The sexual ones might be kind of silly, but they don't bother me.

I remember that one of the Illamasqua polish names was Load, and it was an off white...that one kind of made me snort.
I remember this one. I could never wear that color on my nails without being grossed out all day long.

 
Interesting that "offensive" and "risque" are terms are used to describe how some people feel about shade names. I've never really come across this when disscussing shade names with other MUA's, most of the time it's "that's a cool name". A great topic though.

But what I find are the worst shade names are, are numbers. MUFE and Cinema Secrets are two brands that come to mind. I mean who has the time to remember a 4 digit number of a lipstick shade of foundation shade in a conversation? Sometimes I am guessing "is it a lot number? Or is it the number of the shade?" Very confusing, especially when relaying shade info to assistants, or trying to determine what it is when I get continuity information myself.

At least Ben Nye has both a number and the name of the shade together.

 
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Interesting that "offensive" and "risque" are terms are used to describe shade names. I've never really come across this when disscussing shade names with other MUA's, most of the time it's "that's a cool name". A great topic though.

But what I find are the worst shade names are, are numbers. MUFE and Cinema Secrets are two brands that come to mind. I mean who has the time to remember a 4 digit number of a lipstick shade of foundation shade in a conversation? Sometimes I am guessing "is it a lot number? Or is it the number of the shade?" Very confusing, especially when relaying shade info to assistants, or trying to determine what it is when I get continuity information myself.

At least Ben Nye has both a number and the name of the shade together.
YES to the numbers, I can never remember them. I have the same issue with brushes from MAC, etc...

 
I cannot say that I have really been offended by a product shade name before. Most of the time I chuckle and find them rather inventive. I think that is significantly better than a stupid numbering system that tells you absolutely nothing about the product and makes it almost impossible to remember what it's called...Inglot does that with their products and as a result, I have very few.

 
Names don't usually bother me (all I care about it is the product does what I need it to, thinking too much about the name seems silly), if it's numbers that can be annoying, like in MUFE, Nars also drives me nuts sometimes because everything is named after places that I can't pronounce. I feel like an idiot trying to read something off when a client asks me what I'm using.

 
Risque names are fine as long as they don't trigger anyone. Anything ableist, fatshaming, LGBTphobic (once I saw a lipstick- can't remember the brand- called 'Tr*nny'), or potentially triggering to a rape survivor (as Deep Throat might be), does not fly in my book.

 
I don't remember the actual names, but when MAC came out with a collection "inspired" by the serial killings in Cuidad Juarez. Classy.

 
I don't remember the actual names, but when MAC came out with a collection "inspired" by the serial killings in Cuidad Juarez. Classy.
I remember that. It was some sort of Rodarte/MAC collab for a Mexican-inspired line. There were a few bad names in that one, I think.

 
Risque names are fine as long as they don't trigger anyone. Anything ableist, fatshaming, LGBTphobic (once I saw a lipstick- can't remember the brand- called 'Tr*nny'), or potentially triggering to a rape survivor (as Deep Throat might be), does not fly in my book.
There was an eyeshadow line that had a shade called Tr**** Wreck.  I was horrified and expressed how offensive it was on this very forum.  No one else seemed to get the problem since it's a term used in the drag community!  This is a line celebrating drag!  The problem is that the trans community and the drag community are very, *very* different things.  _RuPaul's Drag Race_ is *extremely* difficult for me to watch at times due to this (in fact, I only watched the first two seasons -- which I happened to have downloaded a few years ago -- as a marathon while recovering from oral surgery this past March and can't bring myself to watch any more).  The thread is probably still around here somewhere.  I can't bring myself to go back to it because it's very, *very* offensive to the trans community no matter what the drag community thinks. 

I don't remember the actual names, but when MAC came out with a collection "inspired" by the serial killings in Cuidad Juarez. Classy.
I remember that. It was some sort of Rodarte/MAC collab for a Mexican-inspired line. There were a few bad names in that one, I think.
To be fair, it wasn't inspired by the murders themselves (there was one eyeshadow -- Sleepwalker -- that looked like bloodshot eyes to me since I had that name connected to it and like blood-spattered dirt to other people, but overall, the colors leaned fairly wispy and dreamlike).  It was inspired by the female factory workers in that city.  The problem is that these women and girls are the ones targeted by the narco gangs (for starters) for kidnapping, rape, torture, and murder.  And then there's the fact that these women work in horrible conditions for very little money, constantly in fear for their lives, and one of the specific visual inspirations for the line was of these women walking to work, still half-asleep because they have to get up in the middle of the night for work and then have to walk miles in the dark to get there.  The names themselves were okay:  Factory would be perfect for a Warhol line, Quinceanera is just a traditional celebration for Mexican fifteen-year-old girls, and Ghost Town would be great for an Old West collection.  Taken as a whole with the theme, however, it was a really, *really* bad move. 

Oh, and they didn't actually release it.  The reaction to the announcement was so extreme that they initially said that they would donate profits to groups fighting this epidemic, and then a few weeks after that statement, they flat-out canceled the line entirely, estimated what their profits would have been, and created an organization to work on women's rights (I can't remember the details on that part).

 

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