The Expectations American Culture Places On Vanity

By Author: Jan Wilson
Total Articles: 37
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Women have been faced by many changes as far as the expectations for women in recent generations. From women's desire for education and careers to their overall appearance, alot has morphed from generation to generation. Today's females are presented with pressures about weight, plastic surgery, and even growing old.

For most of our parents the most pressing decision about the signs of aging was whether or not to color their hair, or age gracefully. Lokking back, this question seems easy, even comical to have to consider. Women, once concentrated on raising their family and matters of the heart, are now confronted with a different reality. Women are {physically depicted on TV or in movies as no less than perfect. How many times is it that you watch over weight, plain looking women staring in movies, TV shows and even commercials? The answer is never. Women nowadays feel a necessity to constantly remain on a diet, alter their appearance with surgery and to remain youthful no matter what their age.

Many women will argue that they feel no pressure, in fact it is their own choice to alter their look. ...
... And that may, in fact, be true. But society places a thought process, consciously or unconsciously, on all of us. This fact is most noted by the vast number of young women who receive fake boobs. Many of these girls are not even old enough to drive a car but are being influenced to have surgery. If that pressure is not placed by society than whom is it placed by? And as {{{women}females}}} grow older, and the signs of aging become more obvious, more and more women are reaching for hopeful solutions to halt the process.

This fact is evidenced by the massive amounts of anti aging products currently on the market. Cosmeceutical companies have been profiting on this vanity by creating anti wrinkle and anti aging creams and serums for the masses. With expensive surgeries not being available for the average American, over the counter formulas are the newest rage. Promises of removing wrinkles and preventing future ones have women and men, quite frankly, rushing to purchase these formulas. The fact that some of these creams actually do prevent many signs of wrinkles only seems to be adding to the hysteria. But is the consuption of these creams and the expectations for women to remain looking youthful too much for women to endure?

As a country we have witnessed the consequences that concentrating on weight loss can have for women and men. The insecurities and lack of self confidence of many Americans because they do not conform to the norm of what a woman should look like are abundant. Do we really desire to pursue this same thought process with the appearance of aging as well? Unlike weight, wrinkles and other signs of aging are unavoidable. One may be able to prevent gaining weight but its impossible to avoid growing old. Everyone will grow old and everyone will die. What type of emotional disaster are we setting ourselves up for??

No one is proclaiming that anti aging wrinkle are wrong, or should be avoided by any means. If women and men feel better by using the products then these creams should be purchased. The opinion of this author is simply that as Americans we have a habit to use things in excess, and as a result have excessive expectations. Scientific breakthroughs in the anti aging market are great, I just pray that our country does not place undo pressure on females to remain youthful, when aging is simply unavoidable.
Jan is a skin care consumer review reporter and contributing author for the best wrinkle creams sites.