They
are four young women who are not addicted to plastic surgery, pills or
creams to fight aging and wrinkles. These are girls who look natural and
barely wear any makeup. Yet, Eva, her sister Andrea, Nathalie and Naomi
all openly declare their fear of getting older. For them, aging is a sign
of physical decline that begins at age 35. And while these women are
certainly not representative of all women in this age category,
their candid comments will certainly hit a few raw nerves of the female
psyche. They'll make the over-40 crowd shudder.
Their brazen comment can be really annoying and truly touching at the
same time. They're annoying because they are unaware of the realities of
the aging process. They seem to ignore that in every period of our lives,
the positive and the negative cancel each other out; and that at every
age, we lose but also gain something. They live in a nearly virtual world,
where time is their enemy, where everything youthful is positive while
anything old is negative. They are the product of a society that fears and
rejects all that is not smooth, firm and beautiful.
These Y2K girls who surf with feminism's granted rights, such as
birth-control pills, women's rights and freedoms, are paradoxically
surrounded by the oldest feminine stereotypes. They are completely
narcissistic, placing themselves in the role of a sex object. They
recognize themselves only in terms of seduction. These are not women who
will age gracefully.
Nathalie is the only one looking for reality: "I want to know more
about maturity and old age," she says. "I feel like I need role models to
age more easily." This is an individual initiative that should be
encouraged, especially in a society like ours, where old people are almost
invisible. Remember that Canada boasts one of the longest life
expectancies in the world. It's an incredible privilege that we shouldn't
spoil with unrealistic fears and anxieties.
.gif){kind=small}
