On Unfeasible Time Travel
A Discussion of Beauty & Ageism
Lately, an influx of advertisements have been popping up on my Instagram feed pertaining to products that help prevent and reduce visible signs of aging. One day, I decided to explore one Instagram account in particular, which was selling a facial patch that smooths out wrinkles and “expression lines.” A self-proclaimed “natural” and noninvasive alternative to Botox. In the Instagram account’s bio, the business raved about how it not only provides simple solutions for “healthy” skin but is “female-founded.”
I’m assuming social media algorithms are sending this type of content my way because I’ve also lately been reading a lot of material on beauty culture, specifically from the brilliant Substack publication The Unpublishable, led by the inspiring beauty reporter Jessica DeFino.
However, the algorithm may have been slightly off in feeding me that kind of beauty content. The wrinkle-reducing kind.
“Anti-aging” is a phrase I’ve seen in beauty campaigns since the dawn of time. I often came across that description on beauty products that I found as I jumbled through my mom’s make-up drawer as a child, as well as the ones I selected in local drugstores for myself as a teenager.
Beauty standards are made fiercely transparent through the types of faces and descriptions we use to help sell beauty products. They’re also made clear by the actors selected to portray “beautiful” people in TV shows, movies, and hordes of other cultural content. And across all of these realms of mainstream media, it’s made clear that the most beautiful types of people are young people. When a character gets their first gray hair in a sitcom, it’s made into a laughable spectacle. Our heroes and damsels in distress are youthful, while old witches embody the villains. Wrinkles are something we’re taught to want to smooth out using a myriad of silky creams and injectable solutions, starting to implement prevention strategies as early as teenagehood.
It’s no secret that prejudice is baked into society’s conception of what it means to be a woman, but this is particularly the case for our culture’s understanding of an aging woman. Through powerful systemic and cultural forces, women are taught that youth is the key ingredient for their beauty, and that beauty is their most powerful form of currency. On the other hand, men are allowed to hold their power in different spaces. While men still undoubtedly face the detriments of ageism, it’s in a much different capacity than women. There’s a reason you don’t see men’s faces plastered on anti-aging concealers and moisturizing creams stocked at your local CVS. And if you look at popular culture, many of the most powerful and professionally successful men are at least middle-aged, often with visible wrinkles and expression lines. On the other hand, the women with the most independent professional and cultural clout are often those that have somehow capitalized on beauty, either their own or that of other women.
Our society loves women who care about being “beautiful” and making other women “beautiful.”
Amid greater consumer expectations for brand inclusivity, I’ve noticed many beauty companies integrate older women into their marketing campaigns. In many cases, instead of exclusively younger women encouraging you to prevent or get rid of wrinkles, it’s now women of varying ages. As if getting rid of wrinkles is as easy as wiping a smudge off of a mirror.
Wrinkles are a natural phenomenon in living, aging humans. As collagen production slows in aging folks and estrogen levels change in cisgender menopausal women, skin becomes thinner, drier, less elastic and firm, and an increase in the number and depth of wrinkles emerges. Most reliable medical outlets will tell you that wrinkles do not need treatment. While early onset wrinkles may be symptomatic of other adverse lifestyle habits - like excessive smoking or sun exposure - wrinkles that form over time are normal and ineffective measurements of physical health.
Despite wrinkles being a perfectly ordinary human phenomenon, much of the cosmetic industry communicates that they are a physical ailment that needs to be mitigated, like a stomachache or cancerous mole.
The Instagram account I stumbled upon insists it provides “simple solutions for healthy skin.” Smoothing out the “appearance” of wrinkles does virtually nothing for one’s health, but merely affects the presentation of one’s skin. Even if the product is more “natural” than treatments like Botox, it is effectively trying to prevent or reverse an entirely natural human process.
The kicker for me, in regards to this particular brand, is that it prides itself on being female-owned. I understand that a thriving beauty company being female-owned is a rarity, as the majority of top American corporations are male-dominated.
But is a woman telling you to hide signs of aging instead of a man a marker of feminist progress?
A woman encouraging other women to feel shame about aging is not any kind of breakthrough. Instead of trying to help eradicate the toxic beauty standards set and perpetuated by our patriarchal culture, she further normalizes them.
The aim to smooth out “expression lines” in women’s faces is another fascinating point. In addition to being made to feel guilty for aging, women are also often made to feel ashamed for expressing their emotions - whether it’s loud, joyous expressions of elation, sobs of distress, or displays of anger. It’s no surprise that products intended to erase markers of emotion - evidence of feeling - would be pushed towards women.
As if they should cover up proof of living - evidence of emotional complexity - and instead appear as smooth as silicone. A synthetic fixation, but unlike Barbie, smile-less.
Aging is a complex thing to think about at 21. While I have not yet experienced the kind of oppression that aging women face, it’s an expectation that looms over me, like a thunderous rain cloud forming with each passing day. Each fleeting birthday. There’s this idea that because I’m in my twenties, I’m currently embodying my “prime” appearance, the best I’ll ever look. And that this most beautiful version of me will eventually wither and fade with passing time, like a dying flower.
How bleak, how hopeless.
Undoing the ageism embedded in the social, cultural, and economic systems of the United States is a daunting task. And unfortunately, I don't think transforming this pervasive system of thought is something I’ll see in my own lifetime, with how ingrained it is in common conversations about self and beauty.
I’m doing what I can to challenge the ageist sentiments that are thrown my way and in the ways of women in my own life. And will continue to do so with younger women I meet in life to ensure they don’t internalize these harmful messages and feel the need to put time and energy into a futile attempt to slow time. There is so much more one can do with their resources than try to stop or hide signs of an inevitable and harmless process.
And besides, aging is an opportunity that many are denied.
It is a marker of years of wisdom and experience. Time spent loving, aching, and learning. It’s a phenomenon I don’t fear, and one you shouldn’t either.
The hands to hold. Knees to skin. Tears to wipe. Laughs to share. Sunrises and sunsets to gaze at. All far more valuable than a patch that promises an impossible and unnecessary “miracle.”