There’s a Buzzfeed article floating around called “What’s Your Best Tip For Saving Money On Hair And Makeup?” As someone who’s highly susceptible to beauty-related clickbait and who makes approximately $14 per year, I chomped. The “advice” that followed (quotation marks are essential as you will soon realize) can be broken down as follows:

50%: pretty common-sense for anyone who has hair and/or skin, and/or makes purchases at any type of store more than once every 15 years- “wait for BOGO sales”; “use coupons”; “ask for samples so you can try products before spending money on them”; “determine what products you need to splurge on and what you can get away with buying at the drugstore”.

I cannot thank you enough, kind madams. I have been in this time capsule since 1745 and was heretofore unaware of phenomena such as “BOGO” and “coupons”. They sound as though they shall certainly enable me to keep half (if not an even larger amount???) of mine coins in mine coinpurse.

Really, though, I’m not mad at these commenters. It’s silly to think that BOGO is something other people aren’t already considering when trying to save money, but I’m sure some people read comments like these and learned something helpful, and everyone is being super girls-on-the-internet-polite to each other. Good on all of you!

20%: “OH, U GUYS MUST NOT KNOW ABOUT COCONUT OIL YET. JUST USE COCONUT OIL FOR EVERYTHING!!! I USE IT AS SOAP AND AS CONDITIONER AND I MAKE BODY SCRUBS WITH IT AND I USE IT TO TAKE MY MAKEUP OFF AND BRUSH MY TEETH AND SHAVE MY BACK AND I FEED IT TO MY KIDS AND I USE IT AS LUBE AND I GOT A 17-LB TUB FROM COSTCO FOR ONLY $14.95!!!!11!!1!!!”

I wouldn’t say I’m mad… I’d just say these commenters should maybe sleep on the couch tonight. Coconut oil does not work for everything for everyone. I live in Florida, America’s Sunny Butthole: Where Sweating Is A Profession. The thought of coating my face, body, and hair in oil has caused me to break out in hives and begin vomiting uncontrollably.

20%: “my tip for saving on makeup and hair products is to stop wearing makeup and stop doing your hair and just put it in a ponytail all the time and u could save hundreds of dollars a year like me :)”

HEY, ASSBASKET. THAT’S NOT THE FUCKING POINT.

Who comes to a “share your beauty tips” party and brings a housewarming gift of “stop doing beauty stuff”? Would you go to a ~*pLeAsUrE pArTy*~ and bring the hostess a copy of When Jesus Wept? Would you show up to a Weight Watchers meeting with a cheesecake?

Not buying makeup or hair products is technically a way to save money, sure, because you are not spending money on this one particular type of thing. Guess what? Nobody who has self-selected to read an article called “What’s Your Best Tip For Saving Money On Hair And Makeup?” fucking wants to do that! (Also, like… how did you get here, gurl?)

We want to hear about half-price Urban Decay eyeliners and free deluxe samples of Smashbox primer and your favorite drugstore lipstick that looks just like that ridonk Chanel one but costs $8 instead of $56. We want to hear about that super cheap Suave-brand hairspray that makes you look like Gisele in front of a wind tunnel. We don’t want to hear “makeup isn’t worth money, sillies, if u were smart like me u could save hundreds of dollars a year by simply washing your body in the creek and adorning yourself in free trashbags that other people have filled w/trash and put in the dumpster ❤ namaste ❤ ”

Additionally: the degree to which you are comfortable leaving the house with your hair “just put up in a ponytail”, having done no other things to it, is between 75 and 90% dependent on what your hair looks like when you dry it using ❤ the Soft, Quiet Breaths Of Mother Nature <3. For me, the Soft, Quiet Breaths Of Mother Nature look more like Mother Nature’s Hangover And/Or Chipotle Poos. I have approximately 12 strands of hair on my head. Half of them are wavy; half of them have been stuck straight to my head since 1994. If I can manufacture a successful Sorority Girl Hair Illusion using a blowdryer, a round brush, and some serum shit from Ulta that costs $45, you can pry those items out of my cold dead hands. End of story.

“but u guys, every1 is beautiful and perfect even without makeup on ❤ ”

Hey, Eliana! Another good way to save a lot of money is to terminate your internet service because it makes it waaaay to easy for you to display your wet-blanket condescension in a public forum. The fun thing about makeup is that wearing it doesn’t mean you don’t think you’re pretty.

9%: “Just learn how to cut your own hair! That’s what I did, and I save a ton of money every year on haircuts!!!”

Gurl, you gon talk that kind of shit, include a picture. Is you lookin’ fine, gurl? Or is you lookin’ like this?

And, last but not least, 1% this perfect human:

Do whatever you want with your hair, your face, your whatever. Carly’s into you doing you. But don’t waltz into my special internet corner of beauty product escapism, and tell me that it’s stupid. I don’t spray my perfume in your creek.