COSMETIC DENIAL

A cliche which occurs in any talk show's run is the aging actress who declares that she cannot find good roles. I have noted that those who protest the loudest are actresses who have morphed themselves into frozen-faced sex dolls with too much cosmetic surgery and injected materials. Inevitably, they refer to male 'studio heads' or producers as the culprits behind their retirement. 

Does it ever occur to these women that mature roles might require some maturity? A person in his/her 50's or 60's who cannot look at the mirror without feeling depressed by his/her natural aging is not mature. Quite the opposite. 

Our technological culture is driven by audio-visual media. We are dependent on youthful innovation by a generation of people who grew up with computer technology. That will change as that generation ages. Someday, there will be wrinkled gurus of tech who will still be making waves. Perhaps that will return society to a more balanced and mature view of lifespan.

Stores like Forever 21 cater to this cultural denial of aging and death. I see skinny-jeans great-grannies at suburban malls whenever I dare to go to them. These bourgeois monuments to plastic surgery and layers of face paint skitter along with the arrogance of youth. Occasionally, I have seen one of these women in proximity to a beautiful woman with no make-up and pulled-back gray hair. It is like seeing a plastic pink flamingo next to a Rodin bronze. 

If women wish to end being objectified by men, they must first stop objectifying each other. They must stop holding each other to conformity standards dictated by media or subculture. Women who choose to have children must stop putting down the childless with constant competitive comparisons. Women who are obsessed with luring male companionship must stop shaming single women who value sexual freedom into relationships. 

Men will never liberate women. Women must liberate themselves and their sisters from self-imposed oppression of fashion, "glamour" and perpetual youthfulness. Choosing creativity, natural/healthy beauty, independence, intelligence and dignified aging brings deep rewards. Watch a YouTube of Katherine Hepburn if you question this.