Postscript: Yesterday
It occurred to me today that a reader of yesterday's post may have been severely let down by its lack of content.
I can hear it now: "Jesus Christ on toast points, lady - there are larger issues at stake in society and you're grousing that the big bad world won't let you age gracefully! What a load of crap!"
True that. Yet I cop freely to a certain amount of vanity, which I believe was obvious in yesterday's post.
However shallow my end of the pool may appear (and I agree that there are many large issues out there that desperately need fixing), one issue has stuck in my craw for quite some time now, and that is the completely different appearance standards set for men and women.
It's as if we aren't both human, but two opposite species who aren't subject to the same rules.
Oh sure, women can get wrinkly, paunchy and gray just like men - it's just that if they do, if they dare step out of the psuedo-defiant "I ain't gettin' old mister" sexpot persona and fail to stem the inevitable with hair color, face lifts, Botox, liposuction, collagen implants, etc., they become completely invisible, considered with no interest, no authority and no status.
The alarming success of shows like "Desperate Housewives" and the acronnym MILF (which I refuse to explain) all serve to bolster the rule; women are viable only in terms of their desirablility. This isn't an urban phenomenon, nor is it manufactured solely by Hollywood.
Nothing else counts, and women who refuse to play by these rules get smacked down. Now there are many women out there that do refuse to play by the rules, and don't care in the least that they get a smackdown because of it. On some days I am one of them, and on many others I am not, yet I'm learning to understand and accept the ambiguity in these often daily reactions.
Our society presents women with very few genuine choices; granted, gains made by courageous women over the last forty years have broadened the selection, but there still aren't that many. I operate within those choices; the fact that I know most of them are shit glosses them with a cynical coating, but it doesn't make a decision any easier.
So maybe wanting the freedom to choose NOT to color my hair and NOT be penalized for it seems like a teeny baby step,
Hell - I'll see your baby step and raise you another.
posted by Miliana at 9:52 PM
4 Comments:
Storm's rising! LOL
I have no sympathy for poor male complaints. If men desired any form of change in absurd expectations or acceptance of aging for both halves of our species, they could bring them about by simply being what and who they are through a lifetime without constantly regressing to adolescent boyhood at every other breath. I can't even use the term sons of bitches, because that is masculine devised as a put down of women (and don't give me any dog breeder BS, either). Probably man's very first resentment is that like everyone else he was born from a woman's body...the original protector. No doubt most males would truly prefer it if their origination was as a seed masticated by a bird and shat out onto rocky ground to grow into a cactus-like protuberance declared to be Omnipotent Man, Super Variety.
On the aging question and the seeming inability of both men and women to either undergo it graciously or accept it wisely and thus, nip, tuck, dye, wax, pluck, transplant, botox,tattoo,starve, and a million other unnatural things - blame human perceptions, phony expectations and the advertising industry. People don't go through these gyrations to feel better about themselves; they go throught them because they are afraid of how others will view them...and this is fed by the caveman/woman mentality on both sides.
As to a woman's glam years - give me a break! Beauty standards change from century to century and year to year, just as 'fashion' changes. This is nothing more important or preordained than that shallow arbitors, weak willed men and even weaker willed women that traditions and culture have made afraid to think and act for themselves. It's shared nonsense.
Men are generally fascinated by smart, strong willed, unique women but they are also afraid of them, because too often, the man is neither smart, strong, strong willed or unique. Most people - male and female - are simply herd animals, easily led.
Well. I'm delighted that I wrote something so strongly thought about. Ahem.
Stoic-my whole point is that women have to operate in a society that is geared to the hierarchy first composed of white males. It goes down from there, but frankly if one were to rate a woman's power simply by her "sell by date" she has the fewest of all possible moments in which to overthrow the entire society.
But maybe I'm wrong.
and Kaz: my dear, your first, and rightful instinct, is to blame the patriarchy. Which is fine by me, and I agree with you that men shouldn't whine about a situation they've created to suit themselves.
I agree that the aging issue for both men and women is a problem, created by my pals in the advertising industry and it is created merely to sell products...but I think my first post was much more whiny. hence the second post.
Carry on.
Stoic-
Damnit, you just can't leave me with the last word!
Seriously, though - Athena was definitely a one-time deal, and no surprise that she was the Greek goddess who I most wanted to be.
On one hand, I agree with you that both men and women are trapped by perhaps unreasonable expectations. But my point was that women aren't the ones who put those unreasonable expectations into iron-clad (or practically) in the first place. Therefore, it's hardly fair to tell women to simply shut up and put up. It's not like they have a say.
Anyway, more food for thought, eh?
Another last word....it's curious that both Stoic and Milliana resort to mythology to underscord their arguments. Perhaps that is the real basis of all the male/female competition, arguments, misunderstandings and bullshit. Neither side is willing to concede that it requires a mutual but equitable dependence and blending in the REAL to function and fulfill possibilities - not the continuous competition and sly games of upman(woman)ship. Better to look to nature rather than mythology to actually see how fee animals manage - animals who have no consideration for any outside forces working on them or against what they actually are.
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