Opinion | As Gen Z post anti-ageing videos on TikTok and beauty products continue to mine our insecurities, celebs like Pamela Anderson offer glimmers of hope
- It seems that for Gen Z, being old is considered a negative experience – one that should be prevented by any means necessary
- Pamela Anderson’s popular no-make-up look at Paris Fashion Week and demand for models over 60 show some progress towards overcoming entrenched social behaviours
Inclusivity in fashion and beauty has come on leaps and bounds over the past five years, but there’s still a stigma attached to getting old.
Ageing is one thing guaranteed in life. We grow up surrounded by people older than us, knowing inevitably that we are all headed in that direction. Why, then, as a society, do we continue to do everything we can to fight it?
A TikTok video titled “Things I do to slow the ageing process as a 14-year-old” went viral in 2023, racking up over 4 million views. The user opened by saying, “I started to do these things when I was 12.”
It seems that for Gen Z – the oldest of whom come in at around 26, and who generally champion inclusivity and equality across the board – being old is still openly considered a negative experience, one that should be prevented by any means necessary, from multi-step skincare routines and injectables to surgery.
Anti-ageing is big business and is expected to almost double in worth to US$120 billion by 2030. It simply isn’t in the interest of beauty companies for women to embrace getting older.
