The mirror has been acting strangely lately. My hair has turned white. Tiny lines have been etched around my eyes, crevasses have formed between my cheeks and mouth, and unmistakable marionette lines can no longer be hidden on my 43-year-old face. Need to improve your nighttime routine?
A quick peek online reveals that I have even stranger company. It’s teenagers who care about their age. These so-called “Sephora kids” are bombarding beauty retailers and similar retailers with money in exchange for anti-aging drugs that they believe will keep them young forever, and Sephora customers and cultural critics alike We are equally concerned about this trend. .
Are these miniatures seeking snatched faces in search of the premature fountain of youth a sign of worse things to come, or simply a reflection of a shallow reality fueled by social media, filters, and product placement? Is it just there?
“We’re all selling the idea that we’re against aging, because we should be afraid of aging, and even better, we should be afraid of aging,” said sociologist and University of British Columbia professor Laura Hurd. We should fight against it,” he told me.
A huge success in beauty marketing
This trend cannot be scoffed at. I used to be an impressionable child. In the early 1990s, when she was still a teenager, she took her babysitting earnings to the local Thrifty’s, bought him a cone of ice cream, and placed a magazine on the floor next to her rack. I vividly remember parking the car. You can read teen magazines from cover to cover.
These magazines tell me that it’s my job to be “fresh” and beautiful, that it’s my job to expertly hide any traces of acne or a shiny nose, that dark circles under the eyes or freckles can give me social prestige. It taught me that my future well-being could be at risk. I had millions of dollars in it and was sure it would sentence me to eternal pariah status. But it never occurred to me to swipe some of my mom’s Oil of Olay.
(What does your skin really need?)
That’s not surprising, says historian Kathy Peace, author of Hope in a Jar: The origins of American beauty culture. Her research shows how children and teens, especially girls, were caught up in her 20th century marketing success.
Before World War II, makeup was marketed primarily to women in their 20s and older, and many relied on homemade concoctions to perfect their skin. However, starting in the 1940s, cosmetics companies began to segment their markets, designing ads aimed solely at teenagers and children. Both tiers had their “unique” star products, such as acne-fighting products and trend-following items for teenagers, and toy makeup kits for young children.
Anti-aging products, on the other hand, were the sole domain of older women desperate (or desperate) to maintain their appearance. That’s probably why other teenagers and I never thought to pick them up.
Acne medications are still targeted at teenagers. But social media also exposes them to older beauty influencers, public figures who are open about their use of anti-aging skin care, Botox, and other beauty procedures. The ubiquity of these products, touted by marketers as the “holy grail” for consumers, means that today’s teens are more likely to pick them up . The phenomenon is so widespread that major cosmetics companies have distanced themselves from it, with Unilever launching a campaign to “protect girls’ self-esteem from the pressures of anti-aging skin care.”
mirror distorted by filter
My youthful myth that a flawless face was desirable and attainable was fueled by retouched images that promoted the illusion that other people actually possessed these perfections. Ta.
It turns out that this technique is as old as photography itself. In mid-1919, people began asking photographers to airbrush their imperfections.th This is the century when photographic technology has evolved to the point where every wrinkle and pore can be seen, Pais said. “What’s different now is that it’s available to everyone,” she says.
(Identifying photos that have been manipulated is more difficult than ever.start here. )
With apps like Facetune and easy-to-use photo editing tools that come standard on every smartphone, it’s easier than ever to capture the perfect face on camera. The proliferation of filters has even spurred its own counter-movement called #nofilter, which claims people post “candid” shots of their faces without a filter. But the #nofilter trend is far less widespread than you might think. Research shows that up to 90% of people edit their selfies before posting them.
This has real-world implications. A study published in 2023 found that participants who edited their photos were more likely to perceive themselves as less attractive. They also engaged in what theorists call self-objectification, or internalizing what external observers think about their appearance rather than prioritizing their own self-image. Self-objectification is associated with mood disorders such as body shame, eating disorders, and depression.
Research shows that teens take selfies not only to seek approval from their peers, but also to cope with body dysmorphic disorder, a mental illness that causes a persistent focus on perceived “flaws” in appearance. Photos may be used. And social media can make the situation worse. In a nationally representative study conducted in 2022, parents of children ages 8 to 18 who were confident in their appearance were twice as likely to report that their child’s self-image was more affected. . More on social media than in real life.
Social media has always been great at personalizing content. But trends that once took months or years to break into the mainstream now take place in days. Rather than pursuing mass messaging, advertisers are discovering highly targeted micro-markets based on demographics and online behavior. This is a disturbing development, and one in which the equation of children and anti-aging serums suddenly makes sense.
What does this mean for children?
There are obvious questions about whether children’s often sensitive (and already wrinkle-free!) skin can withstand the powerful ingredients designed to blow wrinkles into oblivion, and allergic reactions and facial There are many reports of abnormalities. It’s also unclear what the trend toward preventive Botox injections, which aim to prevent wrinkles from forming in the first place, means for younger skin.
(Melanoma is overdiagnosed at an “alarming” rate.Here’s what you need to know. )
But the more we witness this phenomenon, the more we wonder how the lack of people facing aging online will affect children’s sense of reality and their sense of self once they themselves begin to age. I’m getting more and more worried about whether I’ll give it.
Mr. Heard fears something else. That is, the growing interest in “anti-aging” products perpetuates prejudice.
“We’re showing clearly on people’s faces the fact that we’re against aging,” she says. “We’re selling the idea that we should fear it, and even better, fight it.”
This fear has real consequences for older people, from casual ageism to institutional and social practices that exclude, dehumanize, and endanger older people, Hurd says. Hurd’s research reveals how social prejudice undermines the self-esteem of older people, especially women.
Self-image is just the beginning. Discrimination in the workplace, problems finding love, and loss of “social currency” are all linked to looking older. Ageism may even encourage elder abuse. Although research on this topic is still in its infancy, researchers are beginning to uncover the link between perpetrating and condoning elder abuse.
“The term anti-aging is problematic,” Hurd says. “But we just accept it.”
But we don’t have to do that. Perhaps the Sephora Kids craze offers us adults an opportunity to check our attitudes toward aging.
What if instead of scanning our features for evidence of snatched cheekbones, we thought about what an honor it would be to have even more wrinkles, sags, and scars? How to Recognize Filters , what if we taught kids how to spot deepfakes, or how to identify the tell-tale signs of mass photo editing?
It may sound unfair, but as Hurd points out, there are real-world ways to combat ageism. People can advocate for policies that support older people, get to know older people, and explore ways to mix generations. in their social life.
After getting off the phone with Heard, I decided to cross “Upgraded Night Serum” off my list. And I told myself to look for my girlfriend’s 43 years of experience the next time I passed in front of the mirror. Instead, it’s time to fight my own internalized ageism.
