Stop Asking Women To Hide Their Wrinkles With Botox

Beauty and ageing are two words which seldom go hand in hand, especially in a culture which strongly correlates the former with youth. Let’s face it; we live in a world where people are terrified of wrinkles as much as a vampire would be of sunlight. So heaven forbid an actor decides to embrace her age and play the role of a mother of three children, in her own skin. How dare she! Mini Mathur gave it back to an entitled gent who took it upon himself to “remind” her that it was “Botox time,” because clearly, she didn’t live up to his idea of how a 40 something mother of three kids is supposed to look, at least on screen.

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• A man recently suggested actor Mini Mathur to get Botox.
• Why is women's beauty constrained by their age?
• Is there nothing more to women's existence than looking young?
• As Mathur says, women age their talent doesn't.

Age shaming is especially worse for celebs who spent a considerable amount of time in the public eye and are thus susceptible to scrutiny on the basis of skin-deep beauty standards.

Mathur, who stars in Amazon Prime’s latest series Mind The Malhotra, schooled him replying, “I will not use Botox. It’s time the world got comfortable with the fact that women age, their talent does NOT.  Be happy that feisty lead roles are being written for women in their 40’s. Would you rather have a 20 year old played a 40 year old Shefali?”

Thank you Kunal. And no.. I will not use Botox. It’s time the world got comfortable with the fact that women age, their talent does NOT. Be happy that feisty lead roles are being written for women in their 40’s. Would you have rather a 20 year old played a 40 year old Shefali? https://t.co/q8EgBkpkVk

— Mini Mathur (@minimathur) June 9, 2019

I don’t know what world does this said man live in, but dude, have you looked around you and seen how 40 something women look? Or perhaps observe the Twitterverse closely to realise how women are rocking their lives, unmindful of their age. 30, 40, 50, 60, 70…women today are embracing each decade of their life with much gusto, and the addition of wrinkles and white hair doesn’t induce dread anymore. But alas, some people cannot look beyond physical appearance and their outdated standards of beauty. For them, a beautiful woman is the one who looks young. Isn’t this why “you don’t look like a mother of two,” or “you don’t look forty at all,” is considered to be a compliment? Ageing is a dread imposed by society on women, in yet another way to objectify their existence.

We correlate youth with beauty, forgetting the very crucial fact of life that it isn’t permanent. Aging is natural, so are wrinkles. Isn’t it laughable that people “suggest” women run after artificial perfection and reject the natural course of their life? How is aging not beautiful? Doesn’t it bring maturity, wisdom and grace with it? Doesn’t it come with a certain disregard towards societal norms? It is with the passing of the youth that women realise that there is more to them than the superficial standards of beauty the world judges them on.

Isn’t it laughable that people “suggest” women run after artificial perfection and reject the natural course of their life? How is aging not beautiful? Doesn’t it bring maturity, wisdom and grace with it?

I would like to slightly rephrase what Mathur said in her tweet, that women age and their talent doesn’t, it only grows and matures to be more refined. That’s because age brings with it the experience of the world. We have experienced many things the young us could never have fathomed, and while all these experiences may not be pleasant ones, they do add meaning to our lives and change our outlook, and in case of an artist, it shows in their craft. Could a twenty-year-old play the role of a mother of three with more conviction, even though the show in question is a comedy? No. Also why should Mathur look younger, when she is clearly portraying the role of a 40-something woman?

These are glorious times to be an aging woman. The twenties may be fun, but life doesn’t look as dull and boring as others make it out to be, on the other side. As I am smack in the middle of these two defining decades of women’s life, and here is what I have learned: life is fun as and when you make it to be. In running behind youth, one may miss out on the perks of not having to care for what others think. We might as well enjoy it looking our age.

Picture Credit: DNA India

Yamini Pustake Bhalerao is a writer with the SheThePeople team, in the Opinions section. The views expressed are author’s own.