Tuesday, April 8, 2014

16 years later

They finally notice. Feelings versus reality:
Women feel invisible to the opposite sex at the age of 51, it emerged yesterday. A detailed study of 2,000 women revealed a large percentage felt they no longer received the level of attention they once did after hitting 51.

Many even went as far as to admit they felt ‘ignored’.

The women claimed their confidence plummeted after hitting 50 and blamed greying hair, having to to wear glasses or even struggling to find fashionable clothes.
This is mildly amusing for two reasons. First, welcome to equality. No one notices 99 percent of the men of any age, unless they are less than three years old. Second, the idea that men pay attention to women who are 49, or 45, or even 40, is absurd. 35 is probably the maximum age at which men pay any noticeable attention to strange women in public.

There are the occasional outliers, of course, just as the most exceptional men will command female attention in public. But, for the most part, men don't pay attention to unknown women over 35. This doesn't mean that women cease to be attractive at that age, only that they're no longer on the radar of the average male stranger.

I don't understand why this should be either surprising or upsetting to women. Men don't expect to remain competitive athletes for long outside their twenties; I'm years away from 51 and I'm already the second-oldest player on my veteran's soccer team.

41 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'd guess that as long as they stay reasonably fit they continue getting attention from men who already know them personally -- husband, ex-boyfriends, co-workers, etc. -- so they don't notice that the double-takes in the street stopped a long time ago.

To put it another way, the, "Wow you're gorgeous please marry me," attention trails off by 35, but the, "Hey I'm bored want some dick tonight?" attention sputters along until 50ish.

I liked this: "struggling to find fashionable clothes." Gee, my grandmother would have saved her egg money and bought a sewing machine and done something about that. When she was 16. How helpless are women today, that they can't even perform traditionally female functions for themselves?

deti said...

Also from the article:

"A dejected four in ten said not getting attention from men like they used to was a factor, more than half had felt intimidated by the presence of younger women at a social event.

"A concerned six in ten of the 2,000 studied felt modern life is geared toward a focus on younger women while 46 per cent thought that a lot of what older women go through wasn’t seen or spoken about."

One wonders whether some retarded lawmaker somewhere will propose bills requiring that men pay attention to, date and marry these women. Oh wait -- we already have such laws. They're called affirnative action, medicare, the "Affordable Care Act", and welfare.

deti said...

In a saner time, the 51 year old woman would have been married for coming up on 30 years to a man she loved and who loved her. She'd be surrounded by her children and grandchildren; and spending all her time doting on her burgeoning extended family and friends network from home, city and church.

Ladies, the day of reckoning will come for each one of you. The day when you, too, will be rendered invisible will be here before you know it. And in case you haven't figured it out yet, the entire purpose of using youth and beauty to lock down a well-positioned man (or at least a man with potential for good positioning) is so that when you are 51 and no one pays sexual attention to you anymore; you are cared for and occupying honored positions as matriarch of a family and loving wife to a benevolent patriarch.

Crowhill said...

We should expect a lot of new movies about older women getting the attention of young, attractive men. Hey, if they can't get attention in real life, at least they can pretend.

Stg58/Animal Mother said...

Crowhill,

Have you ever heard of a pit of hell called "Sex And the City"?

Matamoros said...

I suggest one reason they don't notice it until long after their attractiveness is gone is the old concept of complimenting a woman when you meet her, even just passing by. Plus their women friends do the hen house "oh my, you look so good" routine.

These may all be societal conventions, but it keeps their esteem up until it doesn't any more. Then, reality.

SarahsDaughter said...

...you are cared for and occupying honored positions as matriarch of a family and loving wife to a benevolent patriarch.

Like the Proverbs 31 wife.

It's not like these women haven't been told:

Charm is deceitful and beauty is passing,
But a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised.
31 Give her of the fruit of her hands,
And let her own works praise her in the gates.

Marissa said...

Ladies, the day of reckoning will come for each one of you. The day when you, too, will be rendered invisible will be here before you know it. And in case you haven't figured it out yet, the entire purpose of using youth and beauty to lock down a well-positioned man (or at least a man with potential for good positioning) is so that when you are 51 and no one pays sexual attention to you anymore; you are cared for and occupying honored positions as matriarch of a family and loving wife to a benevolent patriarch.

Deti nailed it. You're supposed to grow up and not expect sexual attention from strange men after a certain age. These women are stuck in perpetual teenage/early twenties years. Because they didn't marry and have children (or they divorced and didn't cherish their children) the only source of happiness they've always expected is still stuck in the courtship phase.

Crowhill said...

@Conscientia Republicae, of course I've heard of it.

I suspect, but don't really know, that older generations of women understood that they would get less attention as they aged, while modern women are being fed all kinds of silly stories about "having it all" and so on. I suspect that trend will continue and that more and more movies and TV shows will be geared towards making older women feel better about themselves.

On a somewhat related topic, after Sean Connery was listed on a magazine as the sexiest man alive, I remember a quote from some Hollywood starlet saying that "we" will have "made a lot of progress" when a 60 year old woman is listed as the sexiest woman alive.

The self-deception is amazing.

SarahsDaughter said...

Wife Goggles:
You can not purchase them with money
You will not find them at the bottom of a skin care cream jar
You will not find them at the gym
You will not find them at a department store
They can only be earned with time
They can only be worn by the husband of your youth.

Laguna Beach Fogey said...

Yes, this is all true. Go cry me a river.

There are plenty of outliers here in OC, fortunately, thanks in large part to the healthy lifestyle. But it's also due to the presence of hot younger women. Because there are so many young attractive girls here, older women feel the need to keep up with the competition. Usually the results are good, occasionally comical (e.g., plastic surgery gone wrong).

The OC SMP is brutal.

Trust said...

Non alphas would gladly take 17 years of visibility, and will feel zero sympathy that women who pissed away their best years are now receiving the apathy they themselves dished out with ease.

Only alphas don't know what it feels like to be invisible. And they're more inclined to replace aging carousel riders with younger ones that to give two shits how a post wall woman feels about it.

Alexander said...

Heh. So the feminists go on about a culture where men objectify women, and now they bemoan the fact that

1) Older women are objectifying younger women for feeling that the younger women are objectifying them when all they really want is:
2) Men to objectify them

Color me shocked...

deti said...

The original article described a survey of 2000 women, presumably from the UK. It doesn't specify, but if this is a study with any randomness features built in, it must have included some married women, and among them some "happily" married women.

And yet there are reports of women in the study saying they're depressed and dejected because they don't get attention from men like they used to.

Men, take note of this: even wives, perhaps even happily married women, want attention from men other than their husbands. They want this attention because it makes them feel good. They want this attention because at bottom, it lets them know they still have options. They want this attention because it gives them a false belief that if it gets right down to it, they might be able to ditch their husbands and secure commitment from another, more attractive, man.

Anonymous said...

"A concerned six in ten of the 2,000 studied felt modern life is geared toward a focus on younger women,.."

Said the women funding every known cosmetic, surgical procedure and fashion industries with the express purpose of making them appear younger than their actual age for the past 51 years.

RT

Revelation Means Hope said...

Pity the children. For spoiled children they truly are, never held to true accountability for their actions, given that free pussy pass for most of their lives. Then, after decades of soft living, their pussy pass is revoked and the dog eat dog world is fully unveiled to their stunned experience.

It has been interesting to go in the opposite direction, as I get closer to 50, having young women in their 20s checking me out and flirting. I suppose to some degree that has been going on since my 20s, but being fairly clueless about women, I didn't pick up on it unless it was blatantly obvious. I suppose I'd dread becoming invisible to women in my 70s, except most of my life has been preparation to stand on my own merits rather than a penis pass.

Blinding Buddha said...

They still believe that the party will continue even after they pass 35! They realize that they are not as desirous as before and it really bothers them. Oh well party's over! Now go feed the cat he looks hungry!! LOL

hank.jim said...

Older woman can either go veiny or obese. Few women look good naturally. Look at the new Madonna photos before photoshop. Horrid.

Retrenched said...

From the D'Animal archives...

Granted, I fully agree that as women get older, it becomes progressively sillier for them to carry on as if they can still be worth looking at. So it’s “good” (in the sense of making the best of a bad situation) when older women change their priorities to age-appropriate things such as tending to their gardens and housecats. But old habits die hard. It must be difficult to transition from being young and celebrated for your pulchritude to being sexually invisible. Your whole relationship to other people must change.

For men, getting older is not quite as traumatizing because we’re always sexually invisible for the most part anyway. Those rare episodes of feeling like one is interesting to an attractive woman simply become even more rare.

Anonymous said...

Crowhill said...
"We should expect a lot of new movies about older women getting the attention of young, attractive men. Hey, if they can't get attention in real life, at least they can pretend. "

LOL old news. I made the mistake of losing 2 hrs of my life watching "Something's Gotta Give" because it has Jack Nicholson. In that abortion of a movie we're asked to believe that a dashing doctor played by keanu Reeves falls for fifty-something shrivelled up neurotic dull-as-nails Diane Keaton. I'm throwing up a little bit in my mouth just remembering it.
Just another Hollywood vehicle trying to scold men into falling in line with the post-feminist Feminine Imperative for post-Wall old bags.

Haus frau said...

I'm reminded of the grasshopper and the ant. If you've laid up stores in the spring of life, the winter is so much warmer.

Retrenched said...

So men are predators and potential rapists when they pay attention to women, but shallow, superficial lookists when they don't pay attention to women.

No matter what a man does, he is always wrong - unless he is able to read the mind of the nearest woman, and do or say precisely what she wants him to do or say at that particular time.

Bob said...

Off-Topic but get a load of this about Wikipedia: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26828726#

But "it's not accurate to call it the world's knowledge if it's just half the population's knowledge," she says.

Wikipedia isn't doing enough for women, apparently. Ya know the thing that ANYONE can join and contribute to. But oh no, men actually being interested in science and facts, and being arsed to contribute, leads to male voices dominating conversation! Need more women to make attention whorey articles about people who do art, for gender balance!

Also lol at the "22% of women reported an unpleasant experience while editing" figure. Love how the percentage of males that feel the same isn't even listed so a comparison can't be reached, and also no mention of the 78% of women that don't feel an "unpleasant experience"..

Stg58/Animal Mother said...

Crowhill,

I know you know what SATC is. Just being facetious. I also wanted an excuse to refer to SATC as "a pit of hell".

Bob Loblaw said...

In that abortion of a movie we're asked to believe that a dashing doctor played by keanu Reeves falls for fifty-something shrivelled up neurotic dull-as-nails Diane Keaton.

Fantasies aren't necessarily supposed to be believable.

SQT said...

In a saner time, the 51 year old woman would have been married for coming up on 30 years to a man she loved and who loved her. She'd be surrounded by her children and grandchildren; and spending all her time doting on her burgeoning extended family and friends network from home, city and church.

This is exactly what I was thinking. I'm 44 and the only attention that matters is from my husband.

Anonymous said...

The old Mill's Brother's song is appropriate.

People who are lonely can be old at thirty-three.
No one wants to be... old at thirty-tree.
Your disposition sours like a lemon on a tree
Don't let it happen to you, and don't let it happen to me

Be my life's companion and you'll never grow old.
I'll love you so much, that you'll never grow old
Love and youth and happiness can be yours to have and hold
Be my life's companion and you'll never grow old.

Anonymous said...

No matter what a man does, he is always wrong - unless he is able to read the mind of the nearest woman, and do or say precisely what she wants him to do or say at that particular time.

Oh, come now, surely as a reader of this blog you know better than that. A man is always wrong - unless he is a desirable Alpha.

papabear said...

laughable: http://www.businessinsider.com/american-apparels-62-year-old-model-2014-1

LAZ said...

Yet another study to tell us something that should be common sense. Our good 'ol tax dollars at work. What's next? Measuring cow farts? Oh, wait, they already did that 2 decades ago.

pdwalker said...

heh, it's funny the timing of when I read this.

Just a few hours ago, I was forced to take a triple take of an absolutely georgeous lady on the train today. Beautiful, elegantly made up, stunning and attractive. And, I'd estimate about mid 40s.

As she was leaving my field of view, I was thinking "wow, I wonder what she looked like 20 years ago".

(yes, such women are the exception and not the rule - but it is nice to enjoy exceptions when they do happen)

Harambe said...

They start it in high school (over her high school means gr8 to 12) when they go after guys in their 20's. We retaliate in our 30's by going for women in their 20's. It's the circle of life, baby!

Anonymous said...

In a saner time, the 51 year old woman would have been married for coming up on 30 years to a man she loved and who loved her. She'd be surrounded by her children and grandchildren; and spending all her time doting on her burgeoning extended family and friends network from home, city and church.

Maybe. Or maybe once her kids were grown she'd have been dumped for a trophy wife half her age.

Anonymous said...

Maybe. Or maybe once her kids were grown she'd have been dumped for a trophy wife half her age.

And a tenth her bitterness too!

Anonymous said...

Has anyone ever seen the "dumped for trophy wife after raising his kids" trope in real life? I suppose it's probably happened to someone sometime somewhere, but I get the feeling that whole generations of men are being held suspect for the actions of a tiny few here, or even for a fictional few in Lifetime movies.

I don't know Hollywood that well or I could probably think of someone there, but the first one that comes to mind is Elizabeth Taylor, who went through several trophy boys, right? Then there's Demi Moore.... Someone help me out here. We need a man who let his wife raise his kids and then dumped her for a much younger model after he didn't need her anymore.

SQT said...

Has anyone ever seen the "dumped for trophy wife after raising his kids" trope in real life?

I think it's actually fairly rare. My husband is a financial consultant and most of his clients (some of whom he's had for almost 20 years) that have been divorced have been at the instigation of the wife. My sister-in-law just left her second husband. My sister was dumped by her husband (who was having an affair) but I don't think that marriage was ever a happy one-- and the new wife is certainly no trophy (she's a three-time married nut job).

Anonymous said...

Has anyone ever seen the "dumped for trophy wife after raising his kids" trope in real life? I suppose it's probably happened to someone sometime somewhere, but I get the feeling that whole generations of men are being held suspect for the actions of a tiny few here, or even for a fictional few in Lifetime movies.

Remember the apex fallacy. Any men that have actually done the trophy wife trade-in would necessarily be high ranking Alphas or Sigmas, and thus someone the average female is highly aware of. She's oblivious to the average, invisible guy who wouldn't do such a thing. A thousand decent Betas loving their wifes until death do us part go unnoticed by her, but a solitary badboyrockbanddrummer who swaps out one used-up slut for a younger model commands her attention.

deti said...

"Has anyone ever seen the "dumped for trophy wife after raising his kids" trope in real life?"

Agree with Jack and SQT. Most of the men who dump mom of kids for trophy wife are high sociosexual alphas. They're either very good looking men, or extremely wealthy men (Donald Trump), or generally high ranking in the professions (law, medicine, politics, high finance/Gordon Gekko types). But even among them, most of those men don't bother with divorce. They just stay married to their wives and have extramarital affairs with varying levels of secrecy and discretion.

Anonymous said...

Deti, that's what I was thinking. I can think of men who cheated on their older wives with hot young things, of course. Then sometimes their wives divorce them. But I can't think of any that fit the trope we always hear about, where a woman marries a man -- usually when he's poor, so she can work to put him through medical school -- and is a devoted wife for 20+ years, cooking his meals and raising his children, then on her 50th birthday he serves her with divorce papers and she finds out he's planning to marry his secretary.

Again, I'm not saying it's never happened. But the way women bring it up and worry about it, you'd think it was happening in every neighborhood every week.

deti said...

Cail:

I confess I've known a few men like the ones you describe -- men who started out with nothing and married young to good women, who then divorced those women after the kids got older, and were able to marry, and did marry, younger, more physically attractive women. But it's only two or three after working 20 years in my profession.

And yeah, women bring this up and worry about it all the time. I'm constantly hearing about this from women. I think it's common because women know that younger women are more attractive than they are. The funny thing about this is that they have this fantasy/illusion that MOST men CAN attract younger hotter tighter. Of course, most men simply are incapable of attracting their own wives, much less attracting other women. WOrse, most women think that if a man CAN do it then he WILL do it.

It's just a myth that there is an epidemic of 50 year old power litigators and neurosurgeons divorcing their frumps and then marrying the 23 year old court reporter with DDs or the 24 year old smokin' hot scrub nurse. It's just not happening in droves like women think it is.

Here's the reality: Most of these men are probably faithful to their wives. A few of them (that we know of) cheat, and thsoe are the ones willing to cop to it. I would be willing to bet that more men that we don't know, cheat; but are quite discreet and don't get caught even after the affair(s) run their course.

From my experience, the men who I know have cheated on their wives, did so with women who were within 5 to 10 years of their own age; and with women at roughly the same or even lower SMV than their wives. Many of the so-called "other women" for these men were single moms or divorced moms with kids at home. They were content to be mistresses to well-off sugar daddies. They knew that divorce would mean no more expensive gifts, stolen weekends away, and gourmet dinners at high-end restaurants. Some of the cheating was "Ashley Madison" style: The "other women" were themselves married, and they didn't want to leave their husbands.

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