Find Your Inclusion (Pleasing Part 5)

It’s exhausting trying to give a company I adore the benefit of the doubt.

It’s exhausting wanting and asking for inclusion and demanding an excuse for exclusion and being met with continuous ableism.

Pleasing has been around for over 2 years and they continue to exclude wheelchair users.

In their product advertisements there is no wheelchair users. On their social media there is no wheelchair users.

Over the past (a little over) 2 years, they’ve released many collections and products.

I tend to separate these products into 6 different categories: nail polish, apparel, skin care, makeup, accessories, and miscellaneous (aka I haven’t thought about it long enough to figure out these products’ category or categories).

Every person is different, so I’ll be talking about my personal experiences and thoughts and opinions.

Nail Polish: I love painting my nails. I love having different colors and/or sparkles on my nails. I like how painted nails look while I roll in my chair. I can pose my hand anywhere on my wheelchair and it’s aesthetically pleasing.

Apparel: Wheelchair users wear clothes.

We wear shirts, crewnecks, hoodie, socks, scarves, shorts, pants, sweaters, robes, hats.

This seems like one of the most obvious things I can say in my opinion, so I’m not sure what else to say. There is no actual reason to exclude wheelchair users.

Skin care: Pleasing’s skin care is anything from products for someone’s fingernails to products for someone’s entire face.

Caring about skin is not solely an able-bodied or nondisabled person thing. Wheelchair users also need to take care of our skin.

We are human beings and should be shown taking care of ourselves just like nondisabled people.

One product of their skin care is the Acid Drops (check out my article on these that I’ve already published).

Along with the exclusion of wheelchair user representation, I have another problem with the Drops. The red sqeezable dropper thing on the lid is made of latex - which I’m allergic to.

A latex allergy is common among people with Spina Bifida. This is another way Pleasing ignores and excludes disabled people. Because of my disability I cannot touch latex or use any products that contain latex - so I can’t use the Acid Drops. And there’s not any indication on the product and/or Pleasing’s website that this product contains latex. If it weren’t for my mom informing me the red dropper thing was latex I could’ve used it and that would’ve been bad.

Makeup: Pleasing doesn’t have a lot of makeup but there are products I can’t consider anything else.

Two different listings on Pleasing’s website are cream pigments and powder pigments.

Unlike the Acid Drops, the powder pigments state on the website, box, and palette itself to not put a certain part of it around your eye.

The third (what I’m considering) makeup product they currently sell is simply a gloss. Apparently it can be applied atop pigments (like eyeshadow maybe?) to make said pigments for vibrant.

Wheelchair users can wear makeup just as much and as well as able-bodied and nondisabled can. I personally love wearing bold makeup. That should be proudly shown.

Accessories: Pleasing has one accessory in multiple different colors.

That accessory is bags (like purses).

Wheelchair users can wear and use bags. We need to carry things.

It could look a little different than an able-bodied or nondisabled person carrying a bag - I personally find it easier and more convenient to hang a bag on the back of my wheelchair instead of carrying it on my lap and/or my shoulder. This doesn’t mean it’s any less worthy of being shown and seen.

Misc: Pleasing has many products that I’m not sure have any specific collection(s) they can go into.

(None of these products include human beings in photos and/or videos on their website.)

Firstly, a product I feel is often overlooked and forgotten (especially because I forgot they have it) is a journal. Coming from a writer who is also a wheelchair user, we [wheelchair users] can write. We can journal. We can have many unused journals. Why not include that, Pleasing?

Then, a little while ago, Pleasing released many different towels. Whether it’s coming out of the shower or being on the beach, towels are helpful - FOR EVERYONE.

A new addition is fragrances - and candles with the same scents.

Wheelchair users like to smell good. Whether it’s rolling around doing errands or going on a date (because that is something that happens), we can use fragrances. Being a wheelchair user does not does not automatically mean someone doesn’t use any of these products.

Lastly, Pleasing released a bandana around the time Harry [Styles] headlined Coachella.

In my research for this article, as far as I can tell there are only 3 photos on their Instagram (and nothing on their Tiktok) advertising the bandana. And they’re all photos of dogs wearing it.

So Pleasing has added canine representation before wheelchair user representation. They added dogs before they added human beings.

As I briefly mentioned above, along with the products on their website, Pleasing has a lot of photos and videos on their social medias.

There’s obviously advertisements for their products.

When they first launched, someone with Vitiligo and someone with no right pinky were in photos and videos advertising their first nail polishes.

The thing is, though, those disabilities - those people - have not visibly been in any Pleasing photos and/or videos since.

But there’s also photos and videos I have yet to publicly talk about before this article.

They include photos and videos of their brick and mortar stores - both inside and outside. Right now I’m talking about the photos and videos that include human beings.

With the photos and videos of the outside of their store(s), it’s a line outside of the building. And there isn’t a single wheelchair user visible. Statistically speaking, that doesn’t seem likely. In my opinion, someone - or multiple people - has to work incredibly hard to exclude us in a long line of people.

With the photos and videos of the inside of their store(s), it’s basically the same as the outside of the stores. Really the only difference is outside the building is a line of people and on the inside is people separated throughout the store looking and shopping.

Wheelchair users shop, though, so…stop excluding us.

Pleasing also sometimes shares photos and videos other people post.

Let me rephrase that. Pleasing also sometimes shares photos and videos of able-bodied and/or nondisabled fans.

This boggles my mind because there are wheelchair users who are fans of Pleasing and Harry.

I’m one of them. I’ve posted about Pleasing, I’ve posted photos of myself copying their photos to prove a wheelchair user could do it.

At the same time, though, I’m not surprised because one of the things Pleasing is known for is yet to be actual inclusion.

I have tried, and continue to try, to bring Pleasing’s (and Harry’s himself) attention to this exclusion.

I’ve commented on so many of Pleasing’s posts - usually anything about new products they have released or are releasing. My comments are a variation of either the statement “wheelchair users are human beings and we deserve to be seen” or the question “why are you excluding wheelchair users”.

More recently I’ve been posted about Pleasing. Whether it’s a stitch of one of their videos on Tiktok or a blog post I post about on social media, I tag Pleasing, Harry, and HSHQ.

I continuously make it known I will not stop talking about their exclusion. About their ableism. Even when I feel I’m screaming into the void.

Somehow neither Pleasing nor Harry have responded to or acknowledged me (or their ableism).

The thing that really angers, confuses, and disappoints me and breaks my heart is having the founder of Pleasing (Harry Styles) treat others equally and with respect. To include others in his things. Unless those other people use mobility aids. Unless those other people are wheelchair users.

Harry and Pleasing: please do better.