On Demand
The High Cost of Aging
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
According to the new best-seller, How Not To Look Old, looking young is "critical to every woman's personal and financial survival." New York Times columnist Natasha Singer discusses the stringent beauty expectations for working women today and why ageism has become one of the last frontiers of discrimination.
- About the Brian Lehrer Show »
- Staff Bios »
- Contact Us »
- Tapes and Transcripts »
- Latest Episode »
- Show Archive »
Features & Series
Podcast
Stay up to date.
Subscribe to the Podcast
YOU PRODUCE The Brian Lehrer Show
Be a listener-producer with facts, questions and people you'd like to hear on the air.
More
The Brian Lehrer Show Scrapbook
Visit the scrapbook for daily photos and miscellany from The Brian Lehrer Show.
More
Shop at Amazon!
The Brian Lehrer Show picks
Start your Amazon shopping on WNYC.org and a portion of your total purchase goes to WNYC.
More
Comments
Viana,
You can listen to the podcasts every day. And I love your Whole World Botanicals! (esp. royal Camu)
And Natasha Singer, how long to women stop accepting/agreeing to this oppression? Men are perfectly free to look like hell till even a well tailored suit can't hide it!
So true Chestine. Look at John McCain who looks his age. The problem there is he is not as on the ball as one would like a president to be, in my opinion. I had to get that in. But, yes women do suffer this more. Although I have recently been the "victim" as it were, of this. Fortunately, I unfortunately say, I became more ill and I had to go on SSDI so I have an income. How sick is that!!
what is wrong with looking old.
grow up!
mccain doesn't have hair
all the male politicians dye there hair
The problem with aging -- and I'm speaking from the point of view of a 43 year old woman -- is due to the way older people act. I've noticed in my dealings with people my age that there's a certain "digging in," a lot of resistance, an inflexibility, and a certain fearfulness. Perhaps this is due to the fear of being fired. But it's self-destructive, and it's annoying. It's the thing that makes people think younger people are preferable or easier to work with.
I think it's less the actual age than the behavior associated with age that puts people off. Maybe the book should be called "How not to ACT old."
I know plenty of young people who I've mistakenly took to be older than myself just because of the way they acted! I can tell you, it's very unattractive, and I don't mean in a superficial way. I mean in the "this is someone I can work with" way.
There is another face to ageism, which is the growing technological divide between "generations" (where "generation", technology-wise, is down to about FIVE YEARS -- e.g. email to text message transition). As serious as the problem you are looking at is, I think in the coming twenty or thirty years the technological ageism will be much more serious. Any thoughts?
Eventually everyone will look like Joan Rivers.
And whay does Kucinich get a pass for his young-enough-to-be-his-daughter bride?
Perhaps John McCain should dye his hair. He certainly looks out of place with a wife so much younger than he is.
All of my older colleagues let themselves slide. Miraculously, the all, male and female, take a hard look in the mirror once they get a divorce.
More to the point, like an older building and older person needs more upkeep. I'm (obiously) not endorsing age-ism.
BTW, Fred Thompson is a creepy old dude.
And it's not fair to say men don't get scrutinized.
McCain should have taken better care of his teeth and skin and probably should get into a barber's chair more frequently.
I don't think looking young is key...looking healthy and pulled together is important.
this isn't so true in Europe -
John McCain looks out of place running for President!
we are a pretty brutal culture all around
post #6 is on point ---
it's about behavior - not looks
but more importantly - younger people cost employers less in terms of salary...
I'm 31 and I am 75% grey, and I dye my hair. Not because I think it's so terrible to look old, but I would like to at least look my age for now!
Live and let live, people!
I will have a panel titled Just Over 50 and Not Dead Yet on early boomers presence online at South by Southwest Interactive on March 8.
I am 51, just became a grandfather and don't feel bad about my age.
There is a good piece on this topic on Guardian today called Happiness returns at 50
Serge
Blog:
http://www.sergethecooncierge.com
Interesting that older women are advised to downplay their age, especially in the workplace. Doesn't age often accompany wisdom and experience...and power? Wonder if this is related to ongoing discrimination against strong/powerful women? The glaas ceiling persists in more ways than we like to admit.
I think this is a class issue, since working class women cannot afford cosmetic surgery or hormone replacement in the recent past, and also this is a desire not to be on the wrong side of history, since young people will age much more slowly that middle aged people now--maybe not age at all--and will have more options and more equality.
Chestine, I will definitely be going back to France to get a lover when I'm too old for the old men here! RIght now, at 43, I'm approached either by lecherous over-60's, or Mrs. Robinson-fantasizing under 30's. While it's amusing, it's also not very interesting for me! :) At least in France a woman has the right to be whatever age she is, as long as she looks good. That's been my experience, anyway.
George Shoman: As for the technological divide, I always tell my friends that the first sign that they're aging is when they can't install their own software anymore and start asking "young people" to do it for them. Even more annoying when it's an older feminist asking a man to help her, like a belle tied to the train tracks. It's LAZINESS!!!!! People, if you don't want to get old, don't stop using your brain! Keep learning, don't balk at new things to learn. If you stop learning how to do things at 40, you've got 30 to 40 more years to be dependent and treated like an old useless fart.
I force my friends to do all their technological stuff themselves while I watch, and then say, "now was that so hard?" It never is. Use the gray stuff.
This is our cultural MYTHOLOGY and we don't have to buy into it. Look at the "older" women running Germany, Chile, Liberia, Argentina, and almost Pakistan. Europe seems to have a much better viewpoint on aging in general, and appreciates older women, including sexually, much better than the U.S.
This has been my personal experience anyway.
Women's stamina (childbirth, child-rearing) may be a better preparation for the White House. I agree that the point is health--physical, mental, and emotional--and an open awareness of and to life.
Let's also not forget that while we may not hear about it, PLENTY of men are getting nipped, tucked, dyed, and Botoxed.
Hey I'm a guy and I'm in my mid-30's and I dye my hair! I like it darker than it is (always have) and quite frankly I don't like the disturbing grey hairs I'm getting. My personal choice.
And as for comment #9...why shouldn't he?????
What's wrong with him dating someone much younger than he is? Who cares? I'm dating a wonderful woman who is 13 years older than I am...have any problem with that?
Yes, women are expected not to age and men get "dignified"when they get older...in general(I'm not sure society really looks so kindly on the man with the huge beer gut falling all over his pants) but let's not go overboard! Live and let live!
We live in an unprecedented time in history in that women work their asses off literally with Yoga Pilates, cardio workouts etc etc and look WAY hotter and sexier than ever before. More women are consumers of fitness than in the past. We don't have kids in our 20's because we know we don't have to and being over 40 isn't what it was. Thank you Kim Catrall and Teri Hatcher and all the Sex in the City and Desperate Housewives folks for making this a reality and it's not that women look worse to men as they get older, it's that THEY'RE SMARTER and less easily manipulated and that is the turn on for those men who routinely look for younger chicks. Also as a woman who has routinely dated older men it might be prudent to remember: WE WAKE UP and eventually ask ourselves what the heck we were doing?!?! Nevermind a few age lines on women, what about that over 30 male gut? There's damn little cure for that! And as far as being able to propigate beyond 45? Why would you want to? And I don't think many men do. if you haven't had a kid by 45, you're not going to. Men are on the verge of crisis, I am telling you. Young girls are not ready to be ruled so marrying older men is not an option for them and young men are being raised with a better appreciation of the sexiness of the hot over 40! Angelina Jolie would have been out of a job by now if this was 20 years ago, but she's not because 35-40 and 40 and beyond is sexy and young in this day and age. It's a different world, kids.
I just turned 45. No one ever guesses my age correctly. Sometimes people are off by 10-15 years. I'm african american so melanin is my Botox. (There's a saying: "Good black, don't crack!") In addition, I exercise 5-7 times/week and do not smoke or drink.
In addressing agism, a women called in with what seemd an ageist comment regarding men over sixty having young children, she deemed it "irresponsible" on the grounds that "the father may be dead by the time the kid is 20".
Would she also deem it irresponsible for a man of 40 with high blood pressure and/or high cholesterol to have a baby, or what about a man who works seven days a week or travels 50% of the year for 10-20 years?
According to her logic lesbians are also irresponsible as are single mothers who adopt.
Seems to me that parenting is about quality not quantity. Personally, I'd prefer a loving, supportive, inspiring father for ten years than any alternative for fifty.
This thread is closed.
Back to Episode