When Beauty Fades

A Japanese University and a cosmetics company has claimed that they have found the point in life where women begin to age. They claim it's at 35; that's when the wrinkles begin to appear and skin starts to sag and we don't recover gracefully from late nights or weeks without sunscreen. The study is accompanied by the helpful assertion that the cosmetics company SK-II which subdidized this 'research' has come up with a cream that can help alter those effects for a mere $250.

It always makes me cringe to see research disguised as ads or the other way around. There's a fine line between intellectual integrity and corporate dollars. That's pretty much like believing the results of a study founded by Coca-Cola which claims that soda makes you smarter.

It's difficult to believe that all women begin to spontaneously age like yogourt past its expiry date in the fridge. It also adds insult to injury because this study comes from Japan, the land of Asian lillies where women seemingly don't get fat or wrinkled until they turn 88. I suppose that even these Eastern femmes fatales and goddesses have their flaws and that we shouldn't be so susceptible to stereotypes, but I can honestly say that I've met some mothers who don't look a day over 25 and not just from Asia.

Everyone ages differently and not everyone ages gracefully. So much depends on outside factors beyond age, such as genetics, diet, exercise and overall health. It also depends on how you take care of yourself or whether or not you have a skin condition in the first place which might affect your looks.

It's nice to know that this cosmetics company is trying so hard to help women out. After all, they must be taking some kind of financial hit for a mere $250 cream that apparently reverses time. Beauty always has its price and as the queens in the fashion world love to say, beauty is pain.

It's funny that this study doesn't extend to men. Are we safe in assuming that men also begin to show cracks at 35? Or is that men simply don't age at all and just stay like George Clooney forever? It appears that most of them do in their minds.

The fact is, society doesn't care how men age because it doesn't care that much if men remain youthful and beautiful. Men, as a result, don't care about it much either, with the exception of Gerald Butler who models for eye rollers for men. Seeing the cosmetics companies latch onto the insecurities of women is bad enough, but it really doesn't need to spread the neurotic love onto men. In fact, it's offensive enough that it's affected women so badly.

Maybe it's time that we all stopped caring too. Ageing is hardly an unnatural thing. Using thousands of dollars for procedures, ridiculous creams and dangerous cosmetic surgery procedures, definitely are.