May 292015
 
old woman sees young self in mirror

courtesy: Tom Hussey

The other day I perused the Internet for short hair styles that might be attractive on older women. Why? I’m considering a change in style, and I’m willing to concede I might be considered an “older woman.”

Imagine my surprise upon encountering a picture of the lovely Maggie Gyllenhaal among the images. Maggie G. only 37, is an older woman? Since fricking when?

Gyllenhaal told CNN a Hollywood producer deemed her too old to play the lover of a fifty-five year old man. Although the story isn’t immediately verifiable, it dovetails with anecdotal reports from the left coast. Tinsel Town’s ageism is as old as the Hollywood Hills.

So are assessments as to female desirability. Amy Schumer hilariously captures the prevailing mindset in her “Last F**kable Day” video, starring Tina Fey, Patricia Arquette and Julia Louie-Dreyfus. Hard to believe we’re still dealing with overt female-centric ageism in 2015. Where’s the progress?

It goes beyond female desirability. Women over fifty might as well all wear black dresses to the floor, like the nanna few of us ever had. In everyone’s eyes, we’re one amorphous post-child-bearing blob.

Since I’m past sixty, I’m on the lookout for portrayals of “seniors” in pop culture. Trust me when I tell you the difference between men and women remains apparent. It’s not just Liam Neeson and company strutting their stuff. It’s that women are old, done for, vulnerable and over-the-hill. Or they play far younger because otherwise, well, they wouldn’t exist. Two examples among many:

  • On a recent episode of “The Good Wife”, the client was “a little old lady” of 62, played by an actress who appeared to be in her mid-seventies and defended by the lawyer in her mid-fifties played by Christine Baranski, 63.
  • On a rerun of “Law and Order: SVU”, the rape of a woman was seen as especially revolting because she was described as an elderly woman of 60.

Yes, we have a comedy in which two actors in their seventies portray seventy-something characters facing divorce for the first time. The honesty is bracing. The fact that they are played by Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda with gleaming teeth, perfect skin, beautiful necks and all the money their characters require to suffer luxuriously is simply a way to address the issues of female aging without throwing too many wrinkles into the plot, I guess.

Television often casts 49-year old women to play the mothers of 30 year old men. Under fifty, the women can still be rocket scientists, university professors, molecular biologists and CIA agents with advanced degrees who might, if required kick some butt here and there. Given the accomplishments and relative youth among the mothers, I can only surmise there were quite a few on-campus births back in the day as well as understanding employers.

I’ve heard senior women are the latest trend. As AdWeek gushed in early April, “older women are the new ‘it’ girls.” Apparently retailers are belatedly realizing baby boomers hold—and spend—most of the wealth. Wave our wallets at them and watch them come running. We’ll see how long that lasts.

Meanwhile, the truthful portraits of mature females vie for attention with the more popular tropes that older women (except for Meryl Streep or Dame Helen Mirren, of course) have two choices: lift, dye, process, rise, repeat, until you look like something that, as Julie Louis-Dreyfus observes “has been left out too long in the sun.” Or accept your lot in life as a generic sexless thing. You can fight against it; I certainly intend to. It’s an uphill climb. Strong, secure, sexy post-child-bearing women are either terrifying or incomprehensible to a significant portion of the population.

Back to the haircuts: I’m sorry Maggie Gyllenhaal is placed in the “mature woman” category when it comes to style. It could be worse. For instance, I went back to look and came across a style in the “women over sixty” category that interested me: short, curly and low-maintenance. Looks a bit like Carol, the gray-haired warrior from “The Walking Dead”. Wait; that IS Carol; at least it’s a picture of the actress who plays her, Melissa McBride. McBride just turned fifty. What’s she doing in the over sixty category? Is it the gray hair? Or is it that one old lady walking looks just like the next.

This story was originally published in The Broad Side

Jan 302015
 

I am drained these days by outrage, including my own.

The other day, I went on Amazon to find several reviews of my new book had been removed because Amazon’s policy is to eliminate any endorsement from anyone with a connection to the author. While I understand Amazon’s caution with regard to spouses and relatives, the policy appears to be applied to anyone in your office who may have liked and wants to review the book you’ve written.

It’s an irritating policy to be sure but initially I wasn’t irritated; I was OUTRAGED.angry cusing smiley face

The Oxford Dictionary defines outrage as that which arouses extreme anger, shock or indignation. The very act of thinking along those lines convinced me the Amazon incident wasn’t worth the effort.

That’s the thing about outrage, though: it acts before thinking. As Stephen Covey, author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change, notes “Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.”

Insert “read” for “listen” and you’ve got a description of today’s media/social media landscape.

Outrage is no longer the province of Internet trolls—those people who deliberately promote incivility. These days, nous sommes tous les trolls.* A single statement, a single word, can trigger a visceral reaction that begins with the conviction on the listener/reader’s part that the writer or speaker means them harm.

lit matchThe other day I witnessed a commenter go off on a post from a kind and decent woman who wrote, “Oh, I wish we were going to have a blizzard!” The angry respondent chastised my friend for her insensitivity to those who suffer when blizzards hit. She continued to express her fury even after an apology was offered, thus souring what should have been a light-hearted exchange between friends.

That’s another thing about outrage: Once the match is lit, angry or frustrated people can find find all sorts of grievances to use as kindling—anything to keep fanning the flames.

Human beings are hard-wired to be reactive, especially in a group setting. Fans of sports or pop culture have always felt free to give full expression to their displeasure, whether in a fistfight at a bar over a controversial call or a shoving match at an opera house over a less than stellar performance. Mob mentality can easily envelop the most carefully orchestrated protest when participants get caught up in voicing their anger. Of such impulses are riots born.

The trouble is, the platform is much larger nowadays, thanks to social media. So is both our outrage and our conviction that we are entitled to be outraged. Offense is easily given and taken; one doesn’t even have to leave the comfort of one’s own home.

The problem is, outrage creates a toxic climate, a condition in which listening in order to understand is rendered impossible. Some crude self-promotion and canny marketing is always at work, since provocation attracts more attention than accord. The more public the expression of outrage, the more notice is gained.

Wholesale outrage has done the most damage in areas where a dialogue might well bring about a degree of understanding. In discussions about important issues that revolve around equality for non-white or non-Christian or non-straight communities, so many otherwise thoughtful people now stand (or sit at computers) prepared to be outraged. In certain online communities, one does not presume to address the sentiments, strategies, goals or growing pains of a group without the risk of being slammed as “patronizing” or worse. There is empathy for the persecuted, to be sure; but not for anyone offering critical commentary. Alliances are impossible; compromise unthinkable. The default position is not to foster discussion or stay open to constructive criticism but to be inflamed by it.

My problem with the ongoing epidemic of outrage is that first of all, it celebrates a negative emotional reaction at the expense of a rational discourse, precluding the latter at every turn. I can hardly find a thread or series of comments that doesn’t devolve into snippy name-calling or some truly nasty insulting. Every potential conversation is turned into a blood-sport.

Worse, if we get outraged over everything, we concede that everything is worthy of outrage. A flattened football, a shooting by cop, a perceived insult to a religious icon and the murder of people who happen to be living or working in the wrong place at the wrong time—who can believe these are all equally worthy of such heated, violent outbursts? The answer is: they aren’t.

Chronic outrage is exhausting. If we don’t save our righteous anger for things that absolutely must be changed, what changes? All we do is nurture our growing distrust and dislike of our fellow human beings—an idea I find outrageous.
very angry smiley face*we are all trolls.