I am of the firm opinion that we are constantly being bombarded with messages overt and covert, which play an important role in forming our opinions, values and judgments. The purpose of this post is to request that we become aware and not allow ourselves to be brainwashed by vested interests.
Just yesterday, a friend who is a widow and I were discussing our being single and how well meaning friends and relatives keep suggesting ways and means of handling that peculiar situation after losing a spouse. My friend said, it is easier for men as if they are gray they are considered to be distinguished and mature and if the same thing happens to a woman, she is considered to be over the hill. She further added that older men are able to find younger women but the reverse does not happen.
I ventured to suggest that all these are due to subliminal messages constantly being hammered away at us as to what is beauty, what is modern, what is style and so on, which are all superficial values, but which impress us nevertheless both at the conscious and subconscious level. Us ordinary people get plastered with these values and the only ones to benefit from this massive over load of information are the guys who sell products to get you there.
Even women not finding younger men seems to follow the logic of such brain washing. I for one do not understand why this should be so and we have any number of cases of older women having had long sustained and wonderful relationships with younger men.
We seem to be letting our entire universe be sabotaged by such frivolous values that mankind seems to be losing out to businesses who stand to benefit. Even the media seems to be under some compulsion to follow such inane policies like milking some odd event to death as in the case of Carrie Prejean and her adventures with her title, her breast implants and so on.Just look at this news item and the amount of time and space wasted on breast implants to see why I am chagrined with such frivolity.
This is but the tip of the iceberg. Even the incident of gray hair, is something that I find silly to say the least. I told my friend that my late wife Urmeela never dyed her hair and I found her gray hair quite attractive and elegant, to which my friend retorted that I am not the representative sample of decision makers! Similarly, while I am all for weight management for health reasons, the obsession to fight nature like some of my younger friends are doing after child birth, is nauseating to say the least.
This is the first time that I am venturing into writing something on this subject though I have commented on various blog posts on similar lines. I wonder what sort of responses I am likely to get for this rant!
And lest Gail, be disappointed, let me close with some humour.
I am informed by a post in Grannymar’s blog, that widows join other widows and form clubs called “Minus One”. Can you imagine what would happen if widowers formed clubs with the same name?
Comments are closed.