In Praise of Imperfection
In trying to reach the boomer demographic, I often wonder why the advertising industry feels the need to use non-boomers. If you look at ads for products of interest to boomers, often the models are much younger. A man I know who has been in the advertising game all his life is quick to explain: For the most part, people want to be younger than they really are. We simply give them what they want.
And the ad man doesn’t hide the fact that often the faces of models in their thirties advertising products for mature skin are air brushed to remove any possible (or perceived) signs of aging. What’s wrong with a fifty-year-old or older face, I ask you. Why are we ashamed of age? A photographer who took my picture a while back had the perfect answer as far as I am concerned. On seeing the proofs, hoping to look younger, I asked him if he could “soften” my face so wrinkles would be less apparent. He wondered why he should because he said my face showed wisdom. Who knew!
If we’re honest about it, we know the advertisers are right. We all want to look good and, hopefully, younger than our actual age, but we have to be realistic. A couple of decades ago, I had a subscription to a women’s magazine whose target audience was business women in their thirties and forties. I always thought that the cover models were much too young for that demographic. And I was right. It was eventually revealed that they routinely sought sixteen- and seventeen-year-old models. We might all like to look younger than our real age, but that was truly ridiculous.
As boomers we should be proud of the wisdom we have acquired over the years rather than waste time on hoping to look like the models advertisers throw at us. We have to look beyond our imperfections, whether it’s a few wrinkles or a couple of extra pounds, and rejoice in who we are. We also need to talk to our grandchildren so they can accept themselves as they are. It’s vitally important when we know that girls as young as sixteen want plastic surgery and ten-year-olds are starving themselves to be as slim as the models they see.
I say let’s praise imperfection instead of youth for a change.
