Why is it that in today's world as women we can't embrace aging as we do other factors that influence our lives? Aging in women has become such a big issue today more than any other time. Today you see young women in their late twenties turning to Botox and collagen to improve the look of their skin and many womder why the need for this? The main answer is how things are portrayed in the media. Aging is never seen as something beautiful and something that one can embrace there is a constant pressure to appear younger. This isn't something that has recently turned into a problem suddenly but over many generations has escalated to what it is today. Women have always faced hardships from, race, gender, social status and in old age these factors have increased in a negative way. We see that as one gets older that society acts differentlytowards that individual. Inthe resinf the inroduction of Feminism and Gerontology: A Feminist Life-Span Perspective on Aging by Brown she shows what her grandmothers went through and then she goes on to should how the study of gerontology older women ae mostly excluded. She talks about her grandmother life experiences both who came from very opposite upbrings and went on to lead very different lives but in their old ade they began to experience very similar difficlties. According to Browne due to all the discrimination that women face in their lives and even with the advancements that women have made in their old age there is still "gender inequalities that exacerbate women's problems as they age. Even in the sdtudy of gerontology which is the study of the againg processes and individuals as they grow from middle age thorugh later life we see that the focus has always been on older ehite males. The focus decreases and is almost not present when it comes to a colored female. You begin to wonder why is there such a discrimination? Why are older females not as seen as such as an importance as a man? This goes back to the story of the grandmother the one that lived a wealthier life who died in her sixties due to the fact that doctors of that time knew little about womens health and less of the health of an elder woman and if they did maybe she would have been able to live a longer life. Womens aging needs to be seen a a positive life and we need to as a society try to support this factor and not always show the negative aspects to aging. Women need not to be pressured into trying to constantly maintain a young exterior but try to live longer in a healthier manor.
-Janaine
