Celebrity Dumb Quotes II: Dumb and Dumber

[lizziebeth730]

May 16, 2021 14:06:12 GMT -4 horseface said:

May 11, 2021 20:34:22 GMT -4 Auroranorth said:

Can we please, for the love of all things cuddly and edible, stop asking women about their romantic lives? Especially in interviews?

As a non celebrity (and middle aged single mother of two young children) I want to "like"this about 1000000000x!

Full stop at all times. The only times you can ask are:

1) Your friend says "im bringing my boyfriend to dinner next week. Don't everyone be an asshole"
2) Your friend or coworker shows her engagement ring - you may then ask (but you must only make benign comments about the ring if it's fugly)
3) Friend or coworker shows up and says "It divorce time BAYBEEEE" then you may ask what the prick did

All other times, you may not ask.

[laurenj]

Not sure this is so much a dumb quote or just a fully boneheaded overshare, but this piece paulina-porizkova-aging-feeling-invisible really irked me.

Speaking to Los Angeles Magazine, the 56-year-old talked about a time when she and her former spouse, the late Cars frontman Ric Ocasek, were out in Las Vegas.

“We were going out for the night, and I got really done up: tight black dress, plunging neckline, red lips, really high heels,” she explained. “I was walking through the casino, and I thought I looked really hot, like I was sauntering down a runway. But I wasn’t getting noticed. In the past, there’d always been this tiny bit of friction when I walked through a crowd — this infinitesimal moment of awareness. But that night in Vegas, for the first time, there was none of that; it was like nobody even saw me.”

Eventually, one guy came up to the Vogue cover girl.

“I thought, ‘OK, this is it,’” Porizkova recalled. “He asked me if I knew where the restrooms were.”

Of the experience, she said, “It was my first brush with invisibility.”

The article goes on to make it seem like she's "celebrating" older women or whatever and that her posing nude at 56 is some sort of coup for women over a certain age.

But frankly, I find the entire thing obnoxious. Wonderful for her that she's so genetically blessed that she's gotten attention her entire life and that she's still feeling good enough about her body to show it all or whatever, but really, she's the anomaly. And it seems like the goalposts for women are being pushed again with the daily onslaught of " 55-year-old so-and-so showing her sexy physique in a bikini" photos posted by celebrities whose entire lives have revolved around their appearances.

Porizkova applauded the Los Angeles Magazine story on her Instagram, which also featured a nude photograph of herself on the cover. She shared a photo of the cover, along with the caption, “I am very proud to be the cover and a part of this LA Magazine issue on ageism. We are doing much better in celebrating beauty that comes in many different sizes and colors, but age is still something to be conquered.”

First of all, re: the bolded, we're really not doing much better. Those people who dare to exist in a public space without being supermodel sized are met with largely the same response as they ever were. And I'm not sure how crowing about how your photo was "barely retouched" when it still looks pretty damn good is "conquering age." Put someone on there who looks like the average 56-year-old woman and see what kind of reception that gets before acting like you've broken some kind of barrier.

TL;DR: I've been a hot chick my whole life and people aren't looking at me as much anymore because I'm older and rather than attempt to develop some kind of zen or wisdom about age, I'd rather try to find a way to make people look at me and admire me again.

[famvir]

Yup, if they don’t look at me in my tight dress/high heels/red lipstick, I’ll just take all my clothes off and just so barely retouch my photos.

Score one for women!

[MrsOldManBalls]

This is totally attention seeking behaviour. She’s still just a beautiful as she always has been, she knows it, she just wants to hear it from someone. Doesn’t she have a boyfriend who will tell her? (I sense that she needs to hear it from a male)

[horseface]

While this is extremely foreign behaviour to me it must be so very difficult for women who were revered for their beauty to reach "a certain age." It seems to me aging hit my mum and sisters very hard. They are tall attractive and accustomed to a certain treatment. Though my siblings are still very attractive they are now over 60. I truly do not think they were emotionally prepared for how the world treats women who don't fall within societal standards of young and beautiful.

[prisma]

This is an issue I have been chewing on regarding a friend of mine. She's really tall, and when she was younger she was rail-thin and model-beautiful in the vein of Lynda Carter. She was used to being told how beautiful she was. Now she's in her mid-50s and has put on a lot of weight and doesn't get the same attention. And it's really hard for her. She really likes to dress up in what is, in my opinion, attention-seeking ways. She has a funky, eclectic, artistic personality, so when she dresses up it comes across really strongly as eccentric and "LOOK AT ME!!" rather than classy or sophisticated. And since she's tall and heavy-set, you can't miss her, a lot of people react to her not as a free spirit, but someone who's a little tacky and crazy. And it enrages her. I think she wants the kind of attention that she got when she was in her teens, twenties, and early 30s.

I go round and round with how I feel about it. Honestly, I feel a a good bit of second-hand embarrassment for how attention-seeking her behavior is. But she has two special needs kids and an asshole husband who all suck all the oxygen out of her life, so I feel guilty for being critical of one of the few things that brings her pleasure. And getting dolled up definitely brings her pleasure. But I don't know what it's like to feel entitled to that kind of admiring attention. I grew up struggling with my weight and my parents put me on restrictive diets starting when I was 10 which started me on a lifelong battle with disordered eating and decimated my self-confidence since those types of diets always fail. I was chunky and awkward when this friend was in her prime and I DEFINITELY always felt like the ugly duckling compared to her swan. Where my friend was used to getting unsolicited praise, I had been conditioned to feel like I needed to apologize for myself for missing the mark. So I just feel annoyed at these women who feel entitled to that level of attention.

So I don't know how to feel about it. I hate that society has no use for women once they hit their mid thirties and are no longer eye-candy. But I have a hard time mustering sympathy for women who enjoyed sucking up all the attention and reinforcing these expectations that not a lot of people can live up to. It's weird that our positions are switched now. After 30 years, I have fought my way to the other side of the disordered eating and maintain a healthy weight, and she now struggles with her weight. And now she's very pro-"fat girl" stuff, which is weird because she definitely flaunted being skinny and pretty around me when I was at the depths of my struggle with weight. It all feels so weird now.

Bottom line: it's not so weird a feeling to become invisible for those of us who didn't have the level of attention that Paulina and my friend were accustomed to.

ETA: Horseface summed up so concisely what it took me three meandering paragraphs to say.

[laurenj]

Aug 20, 2021 9:25:59 GMT -4 horseface said:

While this is extremely foreign behaviour to me it must be so very difficult for women who were revered for their beauty to reach "a certain age." It seems to me aging hit my mum and sisters very hard. They are tall attractive and accustomed to a certain treatment. Though my siblings are still very attractive they are now over 60. I truly do not think they were emotionally prepared for how the world treats women who don't fall within societal standards of young and beautiful.

Right, I'm sure it is difficult for them. But the quote that comes to my mind is "don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened." In Paulina's cause, she had 50+ years of being admired and having doors opened to her that are closed to 90% of people for attributes that she didn't do anything to earn. Luck of the draw placed her in a rarified space and if it's upsetting to her that the glory days are behind her, she should also recognize that she was so fortunate to have had those at all.

And to be clear, I'm not upset that she's expressing any of of her feelings, she is entitled to them. But her remarks smack more of "well, we need to change what people think of older women now that I'm one of them and nobody's looking at me anymore." I doubt she gave a shit about the "invisible" older women around her when she was the young hot thing sucking up all the attention.

Regarding the bolded statement, THAT is what I think should be reflected upon more. Because everyone participates in it to some extent and it's worth questioning why beauty is the only thing truly valued in women in this culture. I've been reflecting on this as an extension of the discussion of the women in Afghanistan who will have their education opportunities taken away and reduced to a much smaller life in the current situation. Here we have plenty of opportunities that women fought hard to get and yet, it doesn't seem like it matters that much. Women are still judged and graded (and judge each other) on such shallow terms and it's based on nothing but a spin of the genetic wheel.

[royalwave]

This all reminds me of Madonna, who at 63 has had enough work done to look like a Bratz doll and is dating a man who could be her son.

It's sort of disheartening to know that these women who have screw-you levels of money are still THAT obsessed with their appearance that they can't stomach the idea of growing old gracefully. It's like they are nothing if they aren't being gawked at and talked about all the time, and if it takes looking like a creepy caricature of themselves to turn heads, so be it.

[seat6]

As I'm reading this my social media accounts just popped up with the news that a guy I briefly dated in college is engaged--to a woman who was born the year I graduated from high school.

He's been married three times (the second one is not mentioned) with a college-aged daughter. She's a single mom with a three-year old who works for him! (The fiancee works for him, not the toddler.)

I am enjoying the hard-earned wisdom I have gained from my advanced years. When he tried to hook up with me via FB Messenger back in 2009, I shut him down.

Come be old with me, Paulina. You won't waste any more time on worthless men.

[horseface]

Awe Prisma I blush! I must confess I have witnessed behaviour like that of your friend within my own circle, and I have still don't know how to process it. Regarding Madonna I am more bothered by how she seems to be an extremely cruel individual who is lacking in any compassion. I certainly will stand corrected if I misinterpret her, but she seems really mean.