To think that society does not require Botox

[MeridaBrave]

I’ve just started a new job and everyone is lovely. It’s a start up and there is a great atmosphere. A younger colleague (she is 28, so only 6 years older than my DD) said she has Botox. I asked why? She said society expects it so she has to. I really struggled to understand (I’m in my 50s and they recruited me for my technical skills).

I kept on saying I didn’t understand why it was required - clearly our employer wouldn’t care. To her it seems so obvious that it was expected by society. Eventually she said social media. I suppose also could be her social circle?

Am I being unreasonable to think that this is insane? I’m also worried about what sort of world we are bringing our daughters up into. What’s the point in feminism and equal opportunity if young women feel Botox is required.

To be honest I’m toying around with the idea of Botox and I’m late 20s. I don’t look older than I am but it’s almost like I want Botox as a preventative measure ie to delay aging in a sense. I see some areas of my skin starting to look a bit crepey and I don’t like that, eg I don’t have forehead lines but I can see faint creases/texture in that area.

I know it has many fantastic medical uses so Botox can be a good thing but I dont understand why a young woman would want to get it.
Surely you are just putting pressure on yourself for unrealistic expectations?(Wrinkles happen, that's just part of life).
And what about when social media tells you the Botox isn't enough? Fillers, tweakments, etc. I mean it's a look for sure, just not a good one.

I'm not saying men never get Botox. But it has been bourne out of the pressure on women to look young and pretty, and I don't think there's any denying that. There's nothing society hates more than an ageing woman 🤷

See my comment below. It’s a myth. This doesn’t work as a strategy

People, women AND men, have been trying to improve or at least change their appearance for ever.

Botox is just a modern drug - or modern use of that drug.

It's not a new concept.

Kate Middleton looks absolutely fantastic, if there's one person to advertise how to do it "right" (if you want natural and subtle, but looking 10 years younger) that's her.

What's wrong with looking 10 years younger? you won't look like a 20 year old, but looking younger is not a bad thing.

She’s beautiful but I don’t think she looks 10 years younger.

I’m telling you what a surgeon told my daughter - that having Botox in your twenties will not help you look younger; it will mess with your facial muscles’ ability to do their thing. I said nothing about 40 something Kate having Botox.

I just googled Kate Middleton. She looks odd smiling now as she had the lines in her cheeks but no eye movement.
Also a very shiny forehead and somehow slightly more generic and less like herself.

In fact she now rather bizarrely resembles Lindsey Lohan.

She's so skinny, and so much skinnier that she used to be when younger, she would look a lot more tired without whatever she's doing.

It's impossible to know what her "natural" face would look like, we'll never know, but I think she looks fantastic.

@Ladamesansmerci, I come from a different school of female beauty that is not bound by patriarchy.

I love being a women! I celebrate being a woman! I do this, not for the adoration of the male gaze. I do it for my being!

I feel that for to long, women have been fed this lie, of our being, being dictated to by the patriarchy.

Who cares about what men think of us. I don’t!
But I do take pride in myself!

So you’ve just started the job and a woman who barely knows you volunteered she has Botox and made it a society thing? Hmmm.

This sounds like engagement farming. I’m going to file it under ‘this didn’t happen’ and go on about my day.

Or course society doesn't require it, but obviously saying that to justify it to herself. I don't think those who have had it, and I do know a fair number, look any better for it.

I'm 40's and not succumbed to it, or any type of fillers/injectables and don't think I could be bothered.

I'm 55, and the closest I've come to any cosmetic work is having two patches of chloasma removed off my face (and that was so painful I've not gone back to sort the other bit out!). I find it really sad to see young women injected lord knows what into their faces - they're ironically making themselves age more not less. Watching most of the women taking part of MAFS UK with the identikit immobile and expressionless faces gave me the creeps.

The thing is, I think, all make up is designed and sold to us to say ‘you’re not enough as you are.’ As are cosmetic surgery, treatments etc. I say that as someone who wears make up every day.

I can pretend I’m wearing it just for me. But even if I was, where do I get the idea that I’m better if my lashes are longer, my skin is even, my cheeks are blushed? From society, of course. And from a capitalist society that wants to sell me things (which I happily buy, I’m not immune to this in any way.)

But imagine a world where eye bags were the new in thing! If looking tired and stressed was the epitome of beauty. There would be products to enhance the shadows under your eyes and injections you could have to produce extra wrinkles.

Of course it’s society. There has always been a ‘standard of beauty’ that changes through the years. It’s disingenuous to pretend otherwise.

I think it must be really hard to be young these days. It would be a strange experience to age naturally when most of your age group look completely different to you due to various procedures. You’d lose all your points of reference.

Indeed. Look at the fad for rotten teeth in the Elizabethan era, when sugar was a new treat for the very wealthy. Those nt blessed with actual decay would artificially blacken their teeth.

Absolutely. And I’m in my fifties, I remember being young and ‘heroin chic’ aka ‘looking like a drug addict’ was an aspirational standard.

It might be a regional fashion.
In others countries women don't embrace cosmetic interventions of this type, such as fillers, or even hair extensions. And they all look beautiful and normal copying the local visual habits. Which would be towards a more natural look. Of course they still look after themselves in the beauty sense, having hair and skin treatments, maintaining a trim figure and all the rest of it. So it's all about what you are exposed to, what are those around you doing, trends really.
I think women all over the world are often doing things to maintain or enhance their looks according to what is fashionable where they live.
Bar actual surgery, a lot of treatments are reasonably accessible financially in the UK. It's a question of priorities. Botox is one of the cheapest treatments as far as I can tell. It's not the cost of Botox that keeps people away from it.

Botox is more expensive than fillers!

@Allseeingallknowing I didn't know that! Safe to say it's definitely not exorbitantly priced and within reach. I don't think the majority of those who don't have Botox, choose not to do it for financial reasons.

I wouldn’t say it was- starting at about £275 for one area, lasting only a few months may well put some off!

I overheard two young women talking about getting it the other day. And yes, I did judge them for it. All it tells me is that they’re insecure, which was a sad thing to witness as there was nothing at all wrong with the way they look. They looked happy and lovely.

I’ve never understood the point of trying to look younger. Why? You’re still old. You’re still going to die sooner than people who are ten years younger. You still have that many fewer years of fertility left. You will still feel older, and be at higher risk of age related diseases and wear and tear. What possible consolation is there in looking younger when all of the meaningful expressions of age are still weighing on you?

Youth isn’t beauty. Someone joyful, secure and kind will look a hundred times more beautiful than someone with an immobilised face.

Why does anyone care about who has what? This is so odd! Women attacking other women is just unpleasant. If people want to do this, let them. It affects no one else. Most people that have it are very discreet and you’d never know. Unless you are nosy and want to ask why someone looks good! As for posters thinking you see the results on certain tv shows! You don’t. You see self publicists on these shows. Not ordinary women.