Guardian article on older women

[theDudesmummy]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/dec/29/gender-woman-ageing-free-female-power?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Am I alone in feeling (probably irrationally) annoyed that this article was written by a 43 year old woman, whose own lived experience does not yet include ageing? I of course recognise the benefits of entering the giving zero fucks stage, but also have a myriad other experiences as a 60 year old woman which do NOT make me feel empowered or "set free". It it our society or is it the considerable pain in my back and my arthritic thumb that is creating my jaundiced view? (Light-hearted, or maybe not, really).

Glad I am not the only one annoyed by this! To all the 42 year olds who think they have experienced ageing: that's nice.

she says she is “entering” this phase of life!!

aside from anything else

it is a deathly boring article!

I was in my first year of my second marriage at 43. Oh halcyon days...

It's inane. All that research, time, money, and she's come up with nothing of any value.

@MissLucyEyelesbarrow

Yes, and in pre-literate societies elders were essentially the repositories of knowledge.

Octopus (bear with me) are incredibly intelligent but as they are mainly solitary and only live around 2 years, they didn't have the opportunity to pass on what they had learned. Recent studies suggest that Octopus in the Mediterranean have become more social and are "teaching" younger octopus so each generation of octopus will start from a position of greater knowledge than the previous.

Humans, on the other hand, are going the other way. There is so much information out there that we can pick and choose what we want to believe. We "oldies" (I'm 55) know fuck all as the world has changed so much that what we've learned from experience is seen as irrelevant as "yoong peeple" think they can pick it up from Tik Tok and YouTube.

I think the author of the article, contrary to what she seems to think, is actually closer to the Gen Zs than she is to the Boomers and Gen X, in that she has grown up with computers and information on tap. As PP have said, wait till she is Peri/Post/Menopausal and genuinely invisible and see what she thinks then.

May I also be the first to welcome our new Cephalopod overlords.

The gratingness of a 43 year old who looks 35 pontificating about being an "ageing" woman just got my (old) goat.

Reading her biographical details, Angela is highly educated and has had a very successful career in journalism. That's great, but I'm not sure she can speak for the average woman in an average job, increasingly struggling to be taken seriously or even noticed. It will be interesting to see if she revisits her view of ageing when she has aged a bit more.

I saw a Tik-Tok earlier from a teacher, who played a lot of clips from colleagues in their early twenties to back up her points. She said that, otherwise, no one would believe her because of her age. She is 35.

Could it be that she didn't get Angela's feel freer to speak, more confident that I won’t be dismissed, more able to demand what I want memo? 🤔

I'm sure we've discussed Angela Saini on here before because she wrote a book about the myth of differences between the sexes, which sounds quite interesting, but I also have a feeling she thinks TWAW, in which case you can discount everything else she says.

Skim-read the Guardian article. I take particular issue with this sentence: "I need lipstick now, where I found I didn’t need it before."

No, Angela, you don't need lipstick now. You have never needed lipstick and you will never need lipstick. Lipstick is something half the human race do without. You can too.

yeah, it's mindless drivel. ludicrous conclusions drawn from terrible observations.

So as a woman it’s binary

1. Beautiful, heels frills, lipstick
2. older, wide in a powerful position

hmmm am I even a woman? There are none so blind as those who cannot see.

Oh yes she’s totally TWAW

https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/essays/37791/what-is-a-woman

https://www.dazeddigital.com/life-culture/article/58353/1/angela-saini-the-fight-for-trans-rights-is-anti-patriarchal-the-patriarchs-book

Yup! I wasn't entirely sure I was getting across what I meant, but what you've just said nails it. Someone's mindset/worldview based on actual experience over several/many years is seen as less valid than a TikToker who has access to content from all over the world but whose interaction with "real life" is minimal.

“I at least feel freer to speak, more confident that I won’t be dismissed, more able to demand what I want.
^^
What reality is she living in? Wait till she's older and gets some chronic illness. Let's see how well she is listened to then. Spoiler: it's so easy to be dismissed and not listened to.”

Indeed. She’s 43. The reason she thinks life is better at her age is because she is in her career peak years of 35 to 45. (YMMV.) Not young enough to be patronised as too young, not old enough to be ignored as irrelevant.

Give it a few years and - provided she’s careful to avoid ageing “differently” - she can write an article with a more informed perspective on ageing whilst female.

😅

I’m 43 and I thought that article was a load of bollocks.

I don’t wear make up or dye my hair and I’m a distinctly different shape to when I was in my twenties but I am definitely not ageing or aged ! Mind you I’m also never going to head up departments either so when I do finally get to my pensionable years my contribution to being a useful older women will obviously be minimal.

Yep! It’s like when people who weren’t born when section 28 was enacted come here and lecture women who lived through it about what it was like 🤦🏻‍♀️

strange how older womens lived experience is not valid while Tik Toker constantly wanging on about how everyone needs to accept their ‘authentic selves’

she made my slapping hand twitch. I don't wear make up often, and am usually found in a sagging hoody, jeans and docs. And i have short silvery grey hair.

I look completely and utterly female. Always have, always will.

Your contribution will be as valuable as all of us who reach that age - you know what a woman's life is and you can testify to that. Solidarity and sisterhood.
And actually, I think we run the world, on the quiet...at least the useful bits.

Not about us, without us......

Oh I am sure when she is 60 she will cringe at this BS. Sorry about that Angela.

Didn't know she was TWAW but unsurprised, I guess.

I was pretty fabulous at 43, looking back. At 60, not so much. And much more invisible.

I laugh when I read articles about "older" women, then see they are are 40 or 50. Mere striplings! 😁