Frothy Paradise

smalltowngayblog:

gauntlet:

However, what matters in all this age chat is not so much how old one is as how one looks. So long as one’s health holds out, the only problem with getting old is looking old; otherwise one’s birth date would be of little interest. If it weren’t for our mirrors, most of us would be unable to believe how old we have mysteriously become. And what we see in our mirrors is how others see us. So if fiftysomethings are to be seen as fantastic, or as the new 40 or whatever, they must look it. If they don’t — if the so-called Quintastics look every thin-lipped, slack-eyed, grey-haired day of their sixth decade as nature intended — most of them won’t be having such a fantastic time. They will find themselves being ignored and passed over in favour of slack-eyed, grey-haired men and wide-eyed, bright-haired women.

Sexist ageism is always with us, no matter how we struggle against the thought (and indeed against the phrase). Embarrassing the BBC into having a couple of fiftysomething female newsreaders will not change the fact that we are all drawn to youth and the beautiful signs of youth, particularly in women; we are distressed by the wrinkles and pallor that suggest nature is through with us, or at least through with the ageing babe on the telly.

As every woman of a certain age comes to learn, there is a point when you become invisible. People stop paying you attention. No doubt evolutionary biologists have explanations for this. But we know, unless we choose to ignore it, that there is all too much truth in the words of the old song: keep young and beautiful if you want to be loved and — which is part of the same thing — if you want to hold on to whatever power you had in your prime.

Minette Marin

It’s refreshing to see this posted on Tumblr. The not-so-subtle ageism that pops up on my dashboard - particularly those posts by bloggers whose previous posts repudiate racism, sexism, etc. - is the only reason I’ve ever considered dropping this pastime. “Can you believe Meryl Streep is 60?! She’s so beautiful!” or “Let’s have a 30’s and under Tumblr meetup” or “we went to this bar but we left because it was full of 40-somethings” or “tattoos are so ugly when your skin starts aging”… I’m sure everyone has seen posts of this ilk. Ageism is the  process of systematic stereotyping of and discrimination against people simply because of their age, a prejudice that is, particularly in the United States, socially acceptable. Over the last generation, ageism in America has extended beyond stereotypes of people over 60 and now include even “old” people over 30. Sadly, younger people in our culture have become less and less appreciative of the value of inter-generational connections. As a result, the unique and diverse perspective that an older person’s oral history, the lessons of their past and current life experience, become lost. The old cliché, “respect your elders” and the idea that age = wisdom have merit. But, our obsession with youth, “beauty”, hipness and new media perniciously reinforces the de-valuing of older people.

Amen to both the above.