Everything Is Content - Ageing & The Pursuit of Youth (Rerelease)

Episode Date: August 7, 2026

Hello EICucumbers, we have another gem from the archive. This is the accompanying episode to our double beauty special from 2024.Has much changed in two years? It feels like the pursuit of youth has only become more ubiquitous since then, but rather than replacing thinness, that old chestnut has also come back to haunt us all. Can you believe the impact of GLP-1s is just two years? It's quite something...We'd love to hear your thoughts on the themes that still ring true and the ones that have already evolved since this first came out. We're very naughty and still check DMs and Spotify comments despite being OOO, so please do keep messaging in <3 Love O,R,B xxxx—THE GUARDIAN: A quick reminder ... The Beauty MythNEW YORK TIMES: The Art Of BotoxNEW YORK TIMES: Straws That Don’t Cause Wrinkles. Wait — Straws Cause Wrinkles?THE TELEGRAPH: ‘Anti-wrinkle straws’ beloved by Gen Z slated by skin expertsTHE GUARDIAN: ‘My ultimate goal? Don’t die’: Bryan Johnson on his controversial plan to live for everEVENING STANDARD: #TheFaceof10: new campaign launches to protect young girls from damaging anti-ageing skincare contentTHE GUARDIAN: Swedish pharmacy bans sale of anti-ageing skincare to childrenTHE CUT: TikTok Is Taking Over My Teen’s Multistep Skin-Care Routine Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, EIC Crabcakes. Happy Friday from Everything is Content, e.g. your favourite independent Popquatch podcast. As mentioned last week, we are still on our annual summer holes. So instead of a brand new episode, we are rolling back the ears on some underappreciated gems. Don't worry, we'll be back the week after next with a brand new juicy bonus and main. So that's the 19th August for a fresh set of EIC content nails. But before we tell you about this week's choice, I have a burning recommendation. So Richer and I went along to see Izzy Radford's Darkly Comic Play Big Dog last week, and it was absolutely sensational. It is, and a quote, a sharp new comedy interrogating the true

crime industry and influencer culture. We will say more on our main app on Friday the 21st of August, but the show is now on at Edinburgh Fringe, running at the Gilded Ballroom until the 31st of August. We'll post a link to the tickets in the show notes. You will likely have seen Izzy on social media if you haven't seen her live.

She's brilliant. So if you're up in Edinburgh doing fringy-type things, this is an EIC rec. Do not miss this. On to this week's rerun, we are diving deep into the world of aging and anti-aging. We discuss Botox, anti-wrinkle straws, and how a culture that tries to conquer death can never really be at peace with aging. We also divulge our own tweakman history and relationship with injectables, so it's definitely not one to miss. Thank you so much for listening,

and we already can't wait to be back in your ears. You are listening to Everything is podcast. Sorry, hang on. Okay. Your Honour, I'm going to do that one again. I'm Beth. I'm Ruchera. I'm anoni. You are listening to Everything is Content, our Pop Culture podcast.

We get together every week because we can't get enough of everything to do with pop culture, and we want to chat to you about it. With a serum in your pop culture skincare routine. Last week on the podcast, we did a deep dive into the world of makeovers. We discussed some of cinema's most iconic makeovers, and the naughty's hellscape of makeover TV shows and then how makeover culture is manifesting in today's internet landscape. So go back and give that episode a listen, if you haven't already.

We got very fired up. Today is the second of our beauty specials and we're going to be diving further into a topic that as three women roughly dancing around the age of 30 is very close to our hearts. I want to say something funny where I can think. Aging. Aging.

Aging. Aging. Make sure you're subscribed so you don't miss an episode. And if you have anything you want to add to the conversation, chat to us on Instagram at Everything is Content Pod. So last week on the podcast, we touched on makeovers and tweaksments and how it can feel like we're all one beauty treatment away from having our magic makeover moment like Anne Hathaway does in the Princess Diaries. And finally achieving our ugly duckling to Swan pipeline. And we spoke about the pressure that society. puts on us to conform to Western beauty standards. But another major impossible standard that we're

held to is looking young. And as all of us are 30, soon to be 31 or coming up to 30, where are you guys out with ageing? Do you feel a pressure to look young or are you just, you know, going with the flow? I'm kind of tempted as the oldest member of the pod squad. Oh, hideous. I never say that again. To be like, my feelings are the most valid here. But actually, I think, so I'm almost. 31, I feel more relaxed about aging than I did when I was 29. So I'm almost more interested to hear from Ruchera about kind of how you feel positioned before 30, which I think people consider that like birth real aging hump. So spotlight on Ruchera. Thanks, Beth. Yeah, I think I have a really bizarre point of view on this, which is I've always looked really young for most of my life.

So I have a complete reverse approach on it where I've always wanted to age myself. up for as long as I can remember, I have all of these insecurities about not being taken seriously in the workplace, people, you know, undermining my experience because they just do a face value impression of me and assume that I'm 10 years junior or whatever. I don't, I do worry about aging, but it's the opposite thing where I'm kind of like, oh, I'd love a few crow's feet or like a little bit of wear and tear on my face. So it's not, it's not your average fear of aging. It's the opposite, I'd say. Okay, humble brag. No, don't do this to me.

I'm joking. I show ageing. My face, like, I can't even begin to guess my own face, like age-wise. I would not ask anyone as well, because it would hurt my feelings. But I definitely have, like, signs of aging, and it does happen. It feels like you've never looked in the mirror, and then at kind of 30-plus, you look, and you go, well, that wasn't there yesterday. So I've got visible signs of aging, because, of course, in 31, it'd be quite weird if I didn't. And I've also done, like I'm kind of in the skincare world.

I'm not obsessive with it. And I've also had the tweakments. I've had Botox and I've had a lip flip, which... We're also obsessed with the lip-flips. We were so influenced when you had that done. Yeah, but do you remember when we just started doing the podcast and I had the lip-flip? And it was too severe. And I basically gave myself a lisp.

So wait, lip-flip for anyone who doesn't know is Botox in the top lip to prevent the kind of lower lip from tucking under. So you just have a fuller look. And I got quite an extreme one just as we were launching this podcast. And I was like, guys, I can't speak. When I would do my teeth and would do the mouthwash, I had to manually, I had to manually. I don't pinch my mouth part like a ravioli.

So I'm quite open about what I've had done. And I don't, you know, it's Botox twice a year. And it was that never again. So like I do feel like I'm so aware of aging and I'm taking, I'm doing anti-aging stuff. So I'm in it, whether I feel like I'm bothered or not. I'm in it. I completely agree with you, Beth, what you said earlier,

about how once you get to 30, it almost lessens. Because I did Botox, my sister did Botox on me, maybe I was 29 or 28. And then I kind of let it wear off. And I was so worried because I think in your head, you're like, oh my God, when I get to 30, I'm going to look drastically different. Obviously, like, the 24 hours between being 29 and 30,

you look exactly the same. And then when you arrive, you're like, oh, okay, I actually, it's not, it's almost like you're so prepared to wake up one day and just that haggard, that actually it's quite a really, now like, oh, it's fine. And even on the like visible signs of aging thing, I actually think what it is, it's like, most of my friends don't really have like, yeah, we're like, they have a couple of wrinkles, whatever. It's not even that. It's just there's something about people's faces and you can just,

you know how old someone is. And I know you're saying which here, people would look at you and you do look younger, but then there's also this other side of things where like someone could have the most unwrinkled skin and you'd still know, you kind of could guess, you know, that. You know, that they're like 25 as opposed to 15, even though their skin looks a certain way. So there's like something about the ability to maintain, the ability to be on top of, you know, keeping a certain look. Well, I guess with aging, it's like,

it's happening whether we like it or not. It's kind of like a train that's going to end up at a destination. And what people are trying to do is like slow it down as much as possible. So there is no way to literally look like you did at 15. You can't reverse it. but all of these things, I guess in people's minds, are like trying to hit the pause button rather than like stop it completely. That idea, we're true that aging is happening whether or not we like it is such an important thing to think about because it's such a blessing to get older and to age. And the fact that we're all like kind of terrified of it and trying to hit pause is weird because I do think that things do get better as you got older.

You know yourself more. You kind of understand your sense of style. You might have a bit more money, hopefully if you've worked up in your career. there's things to be said for having had lived a life and been experienced and it's so warped that we're so desperate to kind of like gain in every other area but age is the one place where we're like no you must not know my age so we asked you on instagram what you were feeling about the pressure of ageing and we had a few comments in the first message we had was i feel like the beauty industry is working so hard to keep me poor i'm resisting i can't be asked. If I dyed my grey hairs, I'd be hundreds of pounds out of pocket each year. I can't do it, which I think is a really valuable, and I think we spoke about it last time, but it is such a valuable angle of like, forget about insecurities, get about keeping up appearances, especially

in a time when we're living through the cost of living crisis. Like, it is just actually unaffordable to do the level of things that maybe we aspire to do. Have you tapered off any beauty treatments since this sort of like financial crisis we're going through or is that one thing that sort of you tend to prioritize? I haven't got a haircut for ages and I'm definitely overdue and yeah, I keep putting it off because of that because they're just so expensive and I'm also really bitter about somebody chopping a straight line in my hair and that costing like 70 pounds. I just, yeah, so I'm just putting that off and I kind of think I might have a go myself. There's a real premium on female beauty. So like these things do cost money. I budget for them. And even when I budget for

them like it's not necessarily going to be good. So I do think there's like, I have a lot of resentment of how much money I spend and I intentionally don't look at how much money I spend and spend because I know it would make me feel furious. I don't know at who, myself, the patriarchy. It's so expensive to kind of maintain these things. So I do want to step back, but I don't know where to start because I've also got a Botox appointment in next month. So I don't know what I'm talking about. Something which I wanted never to do on this podcast is to kind of reference Naomi Wolf. But I don't know, one of my first and most, I know, one of my first most seminal texts on like beauty and aging was the beauty myth by Naomi Wolf, who is, I believe now is, you know,

real anti-vax does not need to be kind of someone we lean on. But I remember reading the beauty myth and she talks about beauty labor, you know, it's both anti-aging and it's just beauty maintenance in general as being like a third shift. So we go to work, you know, we have kind of domestic labour and then we have this third shift of maintaining beauty. It is getting your nails done. It is going to this appointment to get a needle in your face. It is genuinely, it's time and money. It equates to labour. And when I think about that, then I get very cross and then I get really kind of self-reflective because it's my time that I'm not getting back. Like fuck the money. Not really. But also like it's hours of my time that I will not reclaim.

Yeah. But then, and this is so pathetic. If I, so for instance, I once a week will put like a layer of tan on, not dark fake tan, just like a bit of glow because I'm trying to avoid the sun in my later life. So I didn't so much when I was younger. Later life. Later life. Reader, she's 30. In the end times. I just used to fry in the sun and I'd be like, you know, any chance.

But I've got it down to fine art. I literally have a shower. I scrub it off. I pop it on. I wait an hour. It's amazing. That feels like a lot of labour. But the plus of that is when I do that, I feel so much better.

everything's easier, I feel better in my clothes. Like it is, it's annoying how much these things improve my mood. Like when I have my nails done and I feel like my skin's nice and I'm clean generally, it does, it kind of saves time in other ways because then I'm not like stressing and fretting and like feeling good in yourself is great, but it is expensive. So another message we got from a listener was, I remind myself that aging is a privilege not afforded to all. And I feel like that's quite a common sentiment.

that people say in response to, you know, the fear of aging, the fear of how we look, that having a future, living is not guaranteed. It is a blessing. And aging is, you know, the proof of a life well lived. And I don't know what you both think about this. I think on the one hand, it's so true and it's so clear that that is the right way to think about it. But I can't find that message like penetrating me too deeply.

I find that I just find it so hard. to believe that in my bones because of all the conditioning that we get. I agree completely. I don't feel it until someone dies. I think it is so clear and it's so penetrating at that moment when someone dies, at the moment when you kind of go, oh, life is only so long for some people. But then it does, that falls away because the other stuff is so loud. So I don't think it's a personal failure to kind of like lose the thread of that message, even though it is completely and totally true. The other stuff is just really, really loud. But it's also I think that relativity thing where like it's like a film or something will bring you out of

yourself that will make you suddenly realize that, oh my God, this little bubble I'm living with is just so irrelevant. The world, so much bigger than me. And, you know, there's so many things to fight for. And if we could all get into that headspace, we would lose that all of the stupid things we worry about every day and the anxieties and stuff. But that is physically impossible. It's so hard because then you'll bump into a friend or like an ex-boyfriend or something will trigger you to like once again succumb to the feeling of like, I want to look the best I've ever looked. And also it feels far away.

There's that psychological concept where I think if something is too far in the future, it's actually very hard for people to grasp onto it. For instance, like climate change or whatever. So when we think about the abstract concept, maybe abstract of us dying, I don't know about it for you guys, but for me that does feel touchwood I die, you know, at an older age.

It feels almost too far away. It's kind of like how I used to view smoking when I was younger because everyone would be like, it's so bad for you. I'd be like, I'm 12. Yeah. It's not going to hurt me now. Do you know what I mean? It's like childbirth and all the things I hear about that. I still mentally feel like, that's not me. I'm a 16 year old girl.

I think though that actually it's really psychologically healthy to not carry around a fear of dying all the time, even if it is in service of like living every day to its fullest and like not caring about aging. It's not healthy to think concept about death. Point two, I think some of anti-aging, not all, a lot of it's picture. A lot of it is misogynistic. But some of anti-aging and some of like the whole wellness cult is to do with a fear of death. I think that we chase younger looks and chase a kind of eternal youth because of an inbuilt human fear of death. I think we think, okay, if I eat properly, if I eat clean, if I look after my body, if I kind of push down my visible age, then I can cheat death. I think it's a fear of death. And I think that is the most human way to understand it

rather than just kind of pure vanity. It's not just that. But then on the flip side, I wonder if it's something about just being like valued as a woman, because as we know there's this whole idea that once a woman hits a certain age, she becomes invisible within society and it can be really hard and disconcerting

if you have especially had like a lot of value based on your looks to suddenly lose that part. Because I personally struggle or find it very interesting when women who are in their like 70s or 80s, for instance, like go and have a facelift. And this is my own, this is when I'm like doing workings out with my own internalized misogyny because I'm like, well, who's, what's that for then?

Like, what's the point? Like, surely everyone's seen your face. It really confuses me. Like, I understand it when it's like someone in their 30s or 40s or 50s, but when someone's so far into life, so it must be what you're saying, but it must be that fear of death. Because at that point, I'm thinking like,

surely everyone's seen your face. Like, what's going to happen to you now? What's the pleasure? So like why does that kind of benefit you to spend that much money and undergo quite invasive surgery to change your appearance drastically to look younger when you are in later life? Yeah, it's, I'd love to talk to someone about that. It's really weird as well. So like, for instance, sometimes I look at Chris Jenner and obviously she's had loads of work done. She looks fantastic.

And then actually you'll see her kind of moving around and she has the physicality of like a 70-something year old. But her face has been expertly chopped up to look, you know, much younger. I wonder what it does to your psyche. Maybe you do feel, maybe if you see a young person in the mirror, you feel, I wonder if it keeps you alive longer. You know, they always say that, like, the way to stay alive longer is to keep your brain active and to, like, stay around young people and do things. I wonder if you see yourself as a young person if it could actually, like, elongate your life. I used to work with elderly people, like, when I was about 18 years old. And I heard all the time, it was like, you rest, you rest.

They were like, it's so nice to have a young person around. And as, like, I get a little bit older, I kind of do see that. Like that is the kind of through line. People are like, you have to act like you are the 35 year old or inside. Otherwise you'll just fade. So maybe we're concluding that Botox is good for everyone because it keeps us young. That's what I'm getting from this. Yes, yep.

The only other thing on that is about the disconcerted thing. There's loads of studies to show that like babies, say, for instance, if you had Botox and you've got a young baby, they don't know how to like respond or react to you because you're not doing your natural facial expressions. They can't actually like read your face. It can cause a lack of bonding between like mother and baby. they've done loads of studies. So maybe you're allowed to have Botox when you're childless

and when you're a grandmother. Finally, when we're allowed to do what they want. So one message we got, which I think is very apt from a listener, is this. This is perfectly timed as I found my first grey hair this morning. Do I feel pressure to avoid ageing? No, but it has taken some work, mental, of course, to get to this place. I now think ageing is beautiful. and I think some of the most beautiful people in my life are the wrinkliest,

but the love just radiates from them. Chef's kiss, I think that's gorgeous. Thank you. I want to see if we can unpack how we got to this point where anti-aging has become one of the most prominent beauty ideals of our time. Obviously, I feel like youth has been associated with beauty, so that's never really gone away or, you know, come out of the blue. That's been around for a while.

And as we mentioned last week, this is tied up with ideas of fertility. So, you know, a woman's value being that she can procreate and carry a child. So naturally, that ties into the younger a woman looks. The more fertile she is, the more valuable she's perceived in society. But I want to talk about any older women who are gorgeous and celebrated in society. Let's go. Me. Ah, the most celebrated of all time, of course.

Can I talk about my favorite women? My favorite woman, Susan Sarandon. I love her. Great example. Who I think is in her later 70s now and is obviously very beautiful. Don't know, won't speculate on whether she's had procedures done or whatever, but she kind of looks like a woman who is, if not in her 70s, in her 60s.

She looks great. She's also really curious. She's also always at like marches. She's like really politically engaged. I think to me that is like the woman. That is a really fascinating. older woman who sort of hasn't slowed down in the traditional sense of like where is she she's very visible she's doing her thing her mind feels like as curious as ever i just love her

i feel like the poster woman for sort of like natural aging that everyone always talks about is helen mirren Emma thompson Emma thompson yeah Emma thompson and Helen mirren i feel like that always everybody's like two references i wonder how annoying that is for them because they do get brought up literally constantly they're like look how gorgeous like Emma Thompson is and they do look amazing. But one of my faves is definitely Gillian Anderson in terms of like people aren't using her in that way

where I think they're talking about Helen Mirren and Emma Thompson which kind of feels slightly patronising actually because I think that they're just women going about their lives and clearly just haven't had taken an interest in it. Whereas Gillian Anderson everyone is just genuinely thirsting over her and seems to be kind of

not caring that she has got visible signs of aging and she is you know she's not her 30s and people just think she's hot and I think that's a really nice place to have got to where it's like actually women over the age of 30, 40 can be hot and it doesn't need to be qualified in any way. Yeah, yeah, I completely agree. The two I thought to bring up were Salma Hayek who I looked up and she's 57. I feel like she's literally just like categorically perceived as sexy to everyone on this earth with a pulse.

and Angela Bassett as well who's 65 and I'm just like fountains of beauty fountains of sexuality I just think they're amazing and I love them What was Angela Bassett in that film where she played like the older woman who How Stella got her groove back

where she like is an older woman who hooks up with the younger man Like the OG the idea of you have to watch it It's really good I mean she's obviously she's like 30 in that film but it is so good She is the original idea of you And famously Angela Batsett did the thing.

Oh yeah, of course. She continues to do the thing. Wait, how old is Angela Bassett? She's 65. 65. She's done the thing for decades and decades. Also, speaking of, it's just making me think of American horror story. Jessica Chastain is, no, wait, what's her name?

Jessica Lange. Yeah, oh, she's wonderful. Iconic, truly. We love an older woman, don't we? I was going to say, it's quite disconcating because I'm trying to think of that you're saying, like, Selma Hyme, it's 50-something, and I just realized that actually lots of the ones that I probably think are gorgeous, I haven't quite realised how old they are like,

how old's Jada Pinkett Smith? Maybe she's only like 40 something. I mean, Will Young's in his 50s, so, Will Young, sorry, Will Smith. Her husband, the gay, British singer Will Young. Jada's 52, Wikipedia says. Yeah, so she looks great. It's so weird because we're definitely living in a generation

where I think we're the first generation maybe to see it, but especially because of the Kardashians. acting in a way that even I'm starting to feel like I'm aging out of slightly. For instance, you know, the very provocative pictures on Instagram or like even the style of bikini I'm wearing, I'm kind of like actually I don't necessarily want to wear a full thong. I kind of do want to cover my ass cheeks up a bit. Whereas in my early 20s, I didn't.

I literally only wanted to wear Brazilian bikinis. And that's not because I'm becoming more prudish. I just feel like I have less, I don't know, that side of me is kind of diminishing a bit with age. Whereas I feel like they're acting in a way that feels really young. and that's like warping my understanding of it as well. Yeah, I know what you mean. I feel like I have a similar thing with like covering up more,

but I spoke to a friend about this the other day and it's like my idea of sexuality change has changed as I've got older. So, well, when I was younger, I feel like the primary way of being sexual in your mind is just like showing skin. Whereas now I feel like it's like in, you know, I don't know, an off the shoulder number that's like floor length. And like there's all these like different ways where I just perceive myself as like still exuding what I think is like a version of bisexuality through clothing or appearance

but it's like not necessarily by just like showing everything all the time if that makes sense our signifiers have changed for age within I guess like one or two generations there's no kind of like coded fashion for the 50 plus the 40 plus the like 70 plus oxygenarian if you look like you know share and downwards there is like like you know you're like Like for the really visible figures, they kind of all dress the same, which is just like very glam. And I do think that that does mirror back in terms of like how we dress as people. And I remember when we talked about like the idea of you a few episodes ago, it was very much the criticism was like, that's not how a 40 something dresses. And you go, but there is no such thing anymore of how a insert age dresses or act.

Like there's a complete blurring of age lines. Yeah. I want to know what you both think about how the media's contributed to our ideas of aging. So do you think that we're, you know, policing in the same way that tabloids used to, women who are getting older? Or do you think that's changed? I wonder if it's, you know, the thing we spoke about the other week, which was about how basically tabloids have got smarter in the way that they, so they will post pictures of women or they will say something about them. And you know that what their aim is is to deride and humiliate, but they're kind of the language they're using is not,

because we have changed our perspective and people don't want to see the media being visibly misogynistic or cruel or ageist. I think the pressures still exist. I just think the tabloids are more like sneaky around the way that they do it. They will, of course, at any chance they get, post an unfiltered picture of someone who maybe was trying to hide their skin or whatever. I think there's still that element of, trying to shame especially female celebrities for how they look.

But I just think it's more insidious. They will say things like, yeah, so-and-so is embracing ageing, just, you know, or embracing her old age, because she's got grey hair or whatever age, or, you know, look at her flaunt, her natural body, because she's put on weight with age. It is, yeah, exactly. It's just that kind of, like, slightly coded language.

They're like such agents of the patriarchy. then it's no surprise. The depressing thing is is when we kind of do that, when we kind of see the media go like, oh, old woman. And then we go, yeah, oh, old woman. It's that kind of like shock

of like, you know, a woman on the beach. It always happens with Pierce Bronson's wife, who is a gorgeous woman. They've been to get for ages. She's in her 60s. And they kind of go, must be true love,

things like that, because she's gotten older. And we do this for anyone who decides to either be visible as an older woman or to be visible in a way that isn't kind of looking like they're trying to be young. So like a woman who gains weight doesn't tie her hair, doesn't have. Oh, Keanu Reeves' partner is like age-appropriate and no one can get over it.

Keone Reeves, the man is 50s, going out with an older woman also in her 50s. And it's like unheard of in Hollywood. Like, I mean, this is a completely different point to where we started. But that is baffling to me that like an early 50s man going out with a 59 or a woman. is so unusual. Alongside with the tabloid shaming and the kind of cultural shaming of women who age, in the last decade, I would say,

Botox has had a massive, ironic, cultural facelift to us and has kind of become a bit of a meme. So I'm thinking of, you know, Christine Quinn in Selling Sunset when she was on the show doing a, I think it was a Burgas and Botox event for her house sale, and then also the real house. housewives constantly joke about getting work done and you know being overdue a botox

appointment it's become it's become this really light thing in society whereas i remember when i was really really young still feeling like getting work done was like this thing to be shamed and embarrassed of and it's not that at all anymore yeah i think it used to be something that we would associate only with the uber elite the uber rich and then now it is like kind of you know my friends that have very normal jobs. They go and get their three-monthy Botox appointment. It's like because I had like different groups of friends and my some of my friends are like media front facing and I'm kind of just semi-aware that I just know that they get things done just because I kind of expect it or know it, whatever. And then I'll just speak to like a friend from school or something and all the girls

or like different groups that I would never know. And they're like yeah, yeah, I get mine done here. And I'm like, oh, okay, this is actually not just, you know, certain people or like it's kind of, it's just become, it's just a very expensive form of skincare, basically. It's like, it's like every rung of the ladder, you know, you start off when you're 16, you're buying simple, then you get to 18, maybe you're buying like clinic and then, you know, maybe you're looking into retinoids and then it's like, if you can afford it, you know, it's Botox, it's just become, it's, it's completely lost that stigma of being like, oh my God, she's having work done. And I think also there used to be this whole narrative about how like natural beauty was so much worth so much more and sort of like

women really clung on to this idea that they hadn't had anything done. And now I think it's like people just don't care. It's like, yeah, I get it done or I don't. It's so true. Also, I think with Botox, the point is, and as a misconception of Botox that you get Botox and then suddenly you have this like youthful plump appearance. With Botox, you have to kind of commit to it

because what it does is freeze your kind of face in place so you don't deepen the existing lines, you give them a rest. So when you get Botox, you don't automatically get younger, you then have to kind of commit for longer and longer times. So it's the expectation of like, well, this is you now when you start getting it, which I think really got me. And it used to be like the Botox face totally frozen. Now there's all these like subtle injections all over your face that you get,

like you say, like every three months to keep aging at bay. It's like a war between like your current face and this like horrible idea of, oh my God, I've got to keep my future face at bay. The only other thing that I almost think is more dystopian, but again, maybe this is just being like, oh, when my day is that Botox is one thing. And like, I really don't, I wouldn't want to advocate for any women who aren't thinking about it to get it done. But at least if you have Botox, you can still like live a normal life. It's doing the job of not letting you express yourself. So you can still have fun.

There are young women on TikTok who are like, I don't frown, I don't laugh. I use a straw that goes, you know, sideways so that I'm not parsing my lips to create wrinkles around my mouth. And that to me is more worrying that people are literally stifling actively kind of like not moving their faces in certain play and so they don't create these wrinkles, which is what Botox does. But usually as best said, you do it when you know, you've maybe already lived a bit of a life and there's already a bit of a line and you kind of stop it and extracts from getting deeper. The idea that there are like 16, 17, 18, 19, 20 year olds literally not expressing emotions for fear of showing that they've lived alive. that kind of worries me a little bit more. I, just before we recorded, message my sister, who is 21 as of last month.

And I asked her, does aging bother you? Is it something that you think about? And she said, at the moment, it doesn't really bother her, but she feels like if she gets to 23 and she sees like a line on her face, that would stress her out

and she'd probably think about it. And yeah, I don't know. I can't remember how I felt age 23, but I'm fairly certain. Aging just honestly was not even crossing my mind. It was all about being thin, to be honest, and just like, you know, appearing to be a body shape that was accepted by society and maybe even like having lighter skin because that was a really specific hang up for a dark-skinned Indian woman like myself.

But aging wasn't on the menu. So I think that is a big change. That is a shift. You're so right about like the thinness thing. I completely agree. And also just thought back to like the original thing we were talking about, about being 30. And I've realized that I do care less a little bit. As in like, I'm actually thinking like, I don't know if I'm going to bother getting Botox can. Because now that I'm 30, not you, I was about to say you're allowed to have wrinkles. It's like expected. I think almost my, I've like let out a breath of air now that I'm 30 because it's like, well, if I do have a wrinkle, of course I will.

I've reached the age that a woman starts to expire if I'm not wrinkling and then I'm not, you know. Expire. That's what I'm not, sorry, that was not me. That was me hyperbolicly talking. as a voice of the patriarchy. Got it, got it. Mention a name and I want to talk about Brian Johnson and if there's a difference between the ways in which women fight aging to this man who has made it his sole mission to tell us everything

he does to basically, I don't know, stop himself from dying and look 24 years old. What does he do? Because there's quite a list. I think the first one was he was, he was like taking his son's blood he was having injected that was one thing what else does he do i know that there's been there's some penis rejuvenation oh lord lord where it's i think he says it's like shockwave therapy that costs like two grand to rejuve the peen um so both of those i'm sure there's more extreme things in pursuit of aging which is way more extreme than we've kind of said that we know women to be getting up to or at least to be owning up to not that it's a crime

do you know what I think so interesting about him is when you see his before pictures to me he looks like a perfectly normal like fine man I was going to say handsome but then I don't want to and he like he's got he's got paws

he's got a bit of a wrinkle and to me that is like what you know those things can be handsome on a man and then you see his now and he's pauless and he looks Botox up to the hill and retinoid and creams and it looks really jarring because he's a man. But if we saw a woman do the same transformation visually as he's done,

we would be like, oh my God, she looks better. It's so weird how gendered that is because it's like men, we usually do think men look better as they get older. I've seen it even with like friends or like famous people as they get older. I start to think, God, actually he's really handsome. And the handsomeness that I'm viewing is due to the fact that their skin looks a bit more rugged or they've got a bit more hair or like. So it's so interesting when this man has done a facial thing,

that a woman would love to do, which is basically make her skin just completely smooth, it kind of looks unattractive on a man, which I think even in of itself is quite like funny. He looks kind of alien and kind of like snake-like because it's so smooth. And I can't think of any other man in the public eye who resembles him in that way. But we are just, you know, constantly shown images of women who are like completely pauless and smooth and like that's normalized. I think men who have crow's feet and all that kind of. stuff like George Clooney vibes with silver hair that that has become labeled as attractive to us so if men do go down the anti-aging route you know like Simon Cowell had pictures looking quite can I say

botched is that rude no you can say botched so he looked he looked quite botched to be honest and he had some worked and it wasn't the best and I think there is something culturally about seeing men go down that route at the moment that is unsettling and almost labelling that embarrassing, whereas we've kind of normalised women actively pursuing anti-aging at the moment. Yeah, men are not allowed to do, men are not allowed to have worked out. There's a very narrow parameter, like fillers, maybe a hair transplant, yes, but like don't talk about it too much. It's still a stigma. They kind of are expected to just grow. We'll let them be graceful. We'll go, wow, I love love your wizened look.

But if they don't want a like a grizzly wizened look, they're going to get judged, whereas women have to. I mean, you kind of fucked whichever way you cut it, but it is kind of easier for men because they can just naturally age and everyone will continue to be like,

oh wow, he's so fuckable. Whereas a woman, it's like, no, you actually need to pretend that you're 20 years younger. But it's interesting that men, when they do it, we're like, oh, no, we don't want you looking like that. But when a woman does it, it's like, well done.

Yeah, job well done, as you should. It's like Paul Rudd. everyone's like oh my god he looks so young he's just stayed young we really obsessed with this idea of like a man's natural beauty it's totally different it's totally different how it presents but it's really interesting that if a man does age in a way that we appreciate um poor yard paul pro rott has stayed looking very similar and then i think recently has you know he's a man in his his 50s is beginning to look like a man in his 50s and people go hmm hang on i thought you weren't going to age um so it does extend to everyone but it It's worth for women, but it does extend to men. No one's safe. So all of this anti-aging propaganda has an effect on us, it has an effect on people older than us, and it has effects on people that are younger than us. We had a message from Louise on Instagram who said,

I was in a primary school recently where kids aged 8 to 10 were asking about my skincare routine. We've spoken before on the podcast about Gen Z and the huge interest they have in skincare. I think it was our Christmas episode. We talked about a 10-year-old. who had anti-aging products on her Christmas list. Dove recently released a campaign with a slogan, Let 10 Be 10, saying that they were fighting back against the pressure young people and children are feeling about preventing ageing.

And as a 31-year-old, I can say so confidently when I was 10 around that age, I did not feel any major interest in anti-aging products or even like real, doing like proper adult skincare. like what has happened, why has this filtered down to such a low age group? What's going on? Can I just confidently say, Beth, that you're not 31? Well, listen, I'm rounding up, which you'll understand when you're my age. I was like, do you have a passport or something?

I'm so confused. She's gone from being 30, almost 31, almost 31. Now she's just 31. Less said about that, Zibeta. what is happening with these 10-year-olds that are worried about anti-aging, that are doing like anti-aging skincare, it was not true for us. I mean, as a 34-year-old, it was never ever true for me.

I mean, maybe that's me. Maybe you guys had different experience. But I'm going to say, millennials, we were doing like weird beauty stuff. We were interested in the adult world, but we were not trying to anti-age at like barely double figures. I remember when I was at uni, beauty and skincare YouTube.

was like going crazy and I was like religiously watching like caroline hereons and like all the like oh geez and I remember acids started becoming a thing around then so you know the pixie glow tonic all of the like kind of pre retinal retinal kind of skincare stuff was like popping off and I remember I guess now that would count as anti-aging but for me it was all about just looking pauless that was like my main fixation and I remember just using it not realizing that if you use that every day your skin barrier is going get fucked. I fucked up my skin barrier erupted into like, I guess I don't know, like maybe scabs or like something all over my face. And I think a similar thing is happening now where it's all of this stuff available with like retinal, acids, vitamin C, serums, everything. And I think it's kind of

almost like just being a gateway to having good skin, the assumption that you have to use all of these things. I remember that piece we quoted in the cut from that episode, these like, 12-year-olds were having like 12-step skincare routines morning and evening. So I did want to be like it was so much better in our day because I do feel like the psychological warfare that these poor retinal adult teenagers are going through must be a lot. That being said though, when I was at school, people were literally putting like olive oil on their skin to tan on holiday when coming home with like third degree burns. We were smoking, getting sunbeds and the opposite of it, we were actively adding, taking away

years from our life. The anti-aging was not a thing for us. Pro-aging. So that actually when you put it like that, you're like maybe it is a bit better to be, you know, saving up to go to space and K on the weekend than it is to be literally cooking yourself under the sun. I guess teenagers are always going to find a way to, you know, try and act like being adult. It is scary, but I was just thinking like there were definitely things that we were doing that were, you know, harmful. I guess it's just harmful in another way. Did you see that story? It was in The Guardian that in Sweden, a chain of chemists have basically decided that they're going to stop underage people from accessing loads of these anti-aging products like retinels and acids without the consent of a parent. A pharmacy called

Apotech hiartat. I think I got that right. And it has 390 pharmacies in Sweden. Yeah, unless customers under 15 have a parent with them and can consent, they can't access it. That seems smart. Even just to avoid what you went through, Ruchner, and what also I've been through, which is overusing the acids and completely blitz in your face. Because these AHAs, BHAs, retinoids, aren't a joke, if they're, like, medical grade. You can do damage.

Also, they're really expensive. So I don't... Sounds like a good idea. I think it's such good idea. Now that you said that, it kind of makes you think, like, why isn't a skincare that says, like, 18 plus on it? Do you know what I mean?

I agree. Because also just for your skin, generally, anyway, like, it's like, with a baby, you only use certain really sensitive stuff. When you're a teenager, you need to be using that really gentle, thing and maybe the really simple solution to this is just that like yeah you have to be 18 plus to access these things unless you know you've been prescribed it by a doctor or whatever because it's

just another thing as well for kids in the playground to be like I've got this I mean there was already pressure when we were at school you know someone might have the new kit pulling backpack or the new paper chase pencil case and now the gullies are being like I've got the drunk elephant tanning drops it's another extortionate way for kids to feel left out I can't think of one single good reason that somebody under 15 needs any of these products. Like, I had horrific acne when I was 15. None of these products would have helped me. You know, like, it's literally, like you say, simple skincare and like even maybe medical grade where you would have a doctor prescribing you that anyway is the route to go down. I don't know, getting like 60 pound Sunday Riley retinal

drops is not, it's not going to help. It's not good for anyone unless they are at the right age to be using that stuff. As much I kind of talk about ageing, I actually really don't care that much. Like I, I stuff that thing where I'm like, it's quite far away. And I also, I sometimes think to myself, like, for instance, I want at my run. I have my factor 50 on my face. It's a bit bad. And I was like, I wonder if in like 10 years I'll have like loads of age spots and I'll look back or I'll have like wrinkles around my mouth from when I've smoked or whatever. And I'll be like, I wish I didn't do it. But right now in this moment, I don't have strong enough urges to be like that invested, this fear is huge. Is it just marketing? Is it literally just products being really clever

at marketing to kids? Because I can't really imagine being that age and this being my worry. Yeah. Well, you mentioned the straw, the straw that like loops around and apparently means that you won't get wrinkles because you're not contorting your mouth to like that sucking shape, which also has been debunked by scientists. I saw online the telegraph rate piece and anti-aging experts said that the only way you age is from sun damage, smoking and like loss of collagen, a straw's not going to fucking stop anything. Yeah, it feels like inventing a problem to sell a solution. It's like, oh my, these regular straws that we've been using comfortably for as long as we've been like sipping our cute little drinks.

Isolating. They're going to give you, yeah, well, exactly. They're going to fuck you up. So here, don't worry, it's only like $16.99. Here's your solution. And it's how embarrassing? You kind of like purse your lips around this. It's like playing the flute. Yeah, it looks like a wiggly flute. It's humiliating. Is sucking on a straw not literally like how we all got here? That is sucking on a teat.

Like, do you know what I mean? What are we going to do? Are we going to have baby? Are we going to have like these like stick on nipple things that like adapt so that your baby doesn't get wrinkly mouth? Yeah, how humiliating to just be like, I've bought this? Because then when you've got a regular straw, people know, well, she wants a drink. When you've got an anti-wrinkle straw, people know inside your heart and so they go, oh, she's worried about a few fine lines.

It's exposing its humiliating. it is just money in some asshole's pocket. But I actually don't think it is that, Beth. I think that community of young girls who like have this fear and I feel bad for them. Like it must be a terrible way to live. But it's almost like another Stanley Cup accessory. Like we've spoken about the Stanley Cup mania before. But you know you can buy all these little like extra add-ons to put onto a Stanley Cup

and that's like a status thing. I think this straw she was using in conjunction with the Stanley Cup. So I think it's just going to be like another like special way to upgrade your Stanley Cup. There's always like trends and anxieties around girls when they're really young. I feel like for us it was like this militant obsession with like thinness. And like all these various ways of people like comparing notes on what they were doing to like be on track. And it almost becomes competitive and then a bar to measure how well you're doing. I wonder if this is like seeping in in the same way.

Girls are like, well, I don't go out in the sun. I only stay in the shade. I only do this. I only do that. And it's like a metric to like shame each other. and compete. It is. Yeah, you're right. It is the new dieting. It is. And when people are dieting, they can't imagine that you don't care as much as they do and they're really affronted by it. They're like, but I hate myself. I'm drinking the cabbage soup. Why aren't you drinking the

cabbage soup? And I think all of these anti-aging procedures, all of these like extra measures are the new cabbage soup. It's so tricky because I feel like I'm so in it and so of it. Like on the one hand, I feel like I don't care as much as say an extreme. but I certainly care more than I don't know some girl who's farming somewhere and has like never even given a thought to put your makeup on or whatever so there's like obviously a sliding scale

like we're too late we're so sucked into the vortex we've been living this for too long like there are certain things that we will never undo we'll have certain like disordered behaviours that we will never be able to escape from because that is just the society in the world that we've grown up in and I think it's so hard to watch

teenage girls or whatever go through it but as you say like return generation upon generation does this But it's just sad because you think, God, that will probably stay with them forever. And with ageing, it's like, it kind of, I guess it is controllable with adjectibles, but it's like you are going to get older, hopefully. The appearance of ageing is absolutely controllable. You can look, taught tight forever.

You will still die. You will still be an old person. So it does feel like shadowboxing for a lot of money and a lot of hours of your life that you don't get back. And the idea that people are changing their behaviour. is to like bend around this cultural anxiety is so sad to me. Just the idea that somebody would say no to like planning a day out with a friend because, I don't know, they ran out of SPF or it's going to be out in the sun and sun damage and all these anxieties.

It's just, it's giving up life to look like you've not lived it. I think you said that Beth and it's just that, isn't it? I was just thinking, I wonder if like the younger people doing all this anti-aging stuff because then if they're doing that, maybe their goal is that they'll never have to get both. and have all these injectables because they've been like protecting their skin from such a young age. Maybe that is kind of the end goal. Because do you have you seen on Crop It Up on Instagram now? Like I keep getting these videos where it's like, I never did Botox.

I never did this. They show before picture and they show an after and they look perfect. And what they do is basically like massage and tap their face for like eight hours before bed. It's really depressing. I feel like it's actually quite bleak. The more you break it down. Imagine living so rigidly that you wouldn't smile too wide when somebody makes a joke. or you won't like crease your forehead when you're like jokingly frowning at a friend.

I don't know. It's just, it's sad. We like honestly, I only just started like always having my makeup taken off in my late 20s. We often would go to bed and you just kind of put mascara on the morning on top of the mascara for the night before. Oh my God, we did that. Yeah. My cellar water wasn't a thing when I was at school. We just used face wipes which just move your makeup around your face. Yeah. Like the idea of double cleansing and tone it.

Like this was something that I got on it. Maybe it's just my age. But we were like mid-20s. But also I didn't start wearing makeup until much later as well Like I didn't start wearing foundation until uni And that was like a BB cream And I wasn't putting it on well at all So like when we were wearing makeup

We weren't taking it off And when we were like doing skincare It was like a £2 peel off mask from Superdrug Love those same It does feel like a diminished A diminished number of children's spaces Not the first person to say this But the internet and digital spaces

had so many, like growing up, we had, you know, the club penguins. They weren't perfect. Like, Habo Hotel was full of purpose, but we had it. We had neopets. We had places where kids would go. And now they're kind of shuffled into adult spaces. And we're going, God, it's weird that they're absorbing and mimicking adult content. But of course they are.

They have nowhere else to go. That's what they're seeing. That's what they're going to do. That's kind of like they are sucking directly from the tea of like adult phobias of aging. It's kind of our fault, not awful, us three. but like our adult media is being beamed directly into young people's eyeballs. This is kind of the only end goal where all of these digital spaces have been flattened into like one consumer space rather than like, go on Neopets for a while, go on Club Penguin,

have a bit of fun, like purely a leisurely internet. We don't have a leisurely internet now. We have commerce. And you always see these means, but it's like this is what 13 year olds look like now and then like what I look like as a 13 year old and it'll be like a blue eye shadow and like red lipstick all around her mouth. and then like her hair and different bunches of pigtails wearing like three bras with a vest on top. Like I do feel sad that they don't have these.

I know like I don't know if it's actually just we being jealous that they all just look so gorgeous, so young. Or if I genuinely am feeling like, God, it's so sad that there wasn't a period of your life where you all just look like the most awkward freaks that anyone's ever seen. Because there's something really joyful about when you're all just no idea what you're doing. You can't do makeup. They've completely bypassed that. I've seen videos of like three and four year olds doing like, using a sponge to apply foundation on like an Instagram video

and I just had to swipe past it really fast because I'm thinking like, oh! But yeah, let the kids be kids. It's good for the soul to have an awkward stage, I feel. It's good to have, you know, material for the memoir to draw back on when, you know, you went out to school in year nine with, like, clubbing makeup on, and now you live to rue the day.

I think it's good for the soul. I want to talk to parents of children of this age because I'm so curious. Like, all of the challenges of parenthood like how do you feel about this? Like you kind of prepare for all of the things that go wrong and you don't maybe prepare for the fact that your 10 year old might one day go I feel old as hell.

Like I would have connoissements. I just would not know what to do with that. Again on Miss Me, Lily Allen's podcast, she has two daughters and she realized that she's decided that she doesn't want her youngest daughter to have a phone at the same age that her eldest daughter did. So she read this book where this man says that what you need to do is get basically 10 other parents in your child's class

to all sign of thing saying I won't give my child a phone either. They can just have like a phone that just rings, but it's got no access to the internet. And that way it's easier to enforce a rule on your child when they've got like a group of classmates who also have the same thing. And I wonder if this is like going forward how parents are going to have to play it

where it's like they have to play against the system because like with the makeup thing or with, you know, skincare and stuff, you're probably going to have to actually lobby other parents because the only way you'll get young kids or teenagers to listen to what you're saying, as if their peers are also under the same rule. But I think that's got really difficult more lately

because no one really knew the dangers of kind of having social media or having a phone until it was too late. And so, yeah, basically, if your parent message us and tell us how you're handling this, because I'm talking about Nilly Allen and I don't actually know her person. Our close personal friend. So I think we've ended at a point where we're all just saying no easy answers, no easy way to understand this.

A woman's fear of ageing as an adult can be a little bit premature. It can also be really smart. The world is very ageist. It kind of feels reductive to say, just hang up your anti-aging syrians and just like chill out. It can also feel like it totally ignores the fact that this is infiltrated every age. I feel terrified for young people. I feel terrified for their parents. I'm hoping that our listeners will have something to.

say to us that will be a little bit enlightening and give us a little bit more context. But it just feels like a very unfolding conversation. What will come next? I've absolutely loved our double-barreled deep dive into beauty. And it's definitely got me thinking. I think it's things that I subliminally think all the time, but more often than not, I reach for the comfort of going, do you know what? There's a lot going on in life. So let me just get my nails done and put my makeup on. And I'll sort of like come back to those Naomi Woolf thoughts that I have when I've got a bit more time to digest. But having this conversation, especially this one about ageing, especially about like sending example to younger women, I guess has got me thinking that maybe I do need to take a bit more

culpability for how I manoeuvre myself. What about you guys? How are you feeling after these deep dives? I don't know if anything has changed before and after, but what has changed is just almost like a renewed sense of I really want to have a good sense of self and just feel that like self-acceptance is from deep within rather than like surface level because I feel as if at the moment I've got to a place I felt like I feel quite confident but the more I unpick this stuff I feel like actually there's a lot of if ands ands and butts so oh I feel good when I'm wearing a good outfit I feel good if I get a haircut all of these things help and it would be good to get to a place where these things are nice but they're not informing how I feel about myself.

Agreed. I think I want to grapple a little bit more with my feelings about it because I feel so confident more than ever at whatever age I am I've even forgotten at this point. But I also am doing probably more than ever or like I'm spending more money on it. It's a very much concern for me and I would like, because life is very short. I would like not like one not to be an agent of the patriarchy encouraging other women to worry. about, you know, fine lines or like, oh my God, your subcutaneous fat is whatever, thinning. Your like epidermis is doing this. Like you wouldn't, you get to heaven or hell and be like, God, I wasted my time. But I also don't want to beat myself up for what I've done so far.

So I think it's just a gentle internal process. So I do feel, I'm excited to listen to this episode back and hopefully then make my mind up. My new thing that's happened in the last few years is when I see a woman with wrinkles, I think, oh, God, she looks good. Isn't that interesting? Because it's like you're actually not used to seeing it. It can be quite surprising when someone hasn't, especially in the public eye. And so I actually think I'm going the other way where I'm starting to almost find women more attractive when I can see that they've aged.

And so maybe that will happen universally and then we'll be freed from the shackles that is injecting toxins into our faces. Such a good point. That's such a good point, actually, because if we say that beauty is confidence, what is more confident at this point in time than going, you know, I didn't care enough to spend money on it. I just, these are my wrinkles. Like that is like the epitome of confidence. Oh my God, you've changed my mind. I'm going to cancel my Botos appointment.

Do it. If you haven't heard our makeover special, you can head back to listen to that now. Please message us if there's anything you want to add to this conversation. We're on Instagram and TikTok at Everything is Content Pod. We'll be back next week for more of the usual. So make sure you are subscribed immediately. so you don't miss a thing.

Bye. Bye. Everything is content is a great original podcast and we are part of the Acast Creator Network. This podcast was created, devised and presented by us

Beth McCall, Ruchera Sharma and Dononi. The producer is Faye Lawrence and the executive producer is James Norman Fife.