ITS COMMONPLACE IN HOLLYWOOD TODAY. Many of the top names have given their heart to a much younger man. There is Demmi Moore. Cher and Elizabeth Taylor both did it. Several others whose name escapes me for the moment have all done it or are doing it: women who married or are partnering with men much younger than themselves.
Not as commonplace, probably, but still a fact of history nonetheless and well-known for having done the same 1400 and more years ago and at her will was the Prophet Mohamad's first wife Khadijah. She was 15 years his senior. He was 25 and she 40 when they married. She gave him his much loved daughters and he stayed, by all accounts, happily monogamous while she was alive. She it was who fell in love with him then under her employ. She it was who took the initiative and asked to marry him. Now, that is liberated! She was a widow of independent means and he was this attractive and very reliable young man who led her caravan.
However, for the most part there seems to be a general lack of acceptance by society for a young man wanting to marry a much older woman. The man's parents, for one, are more often than not opposed to what they perceive to be a foolhardy decision. A young man should marry a young woman, so goes the going wisdom. An old woman, if she cannot find an old man to marry or to partner up with, should not have a man at all. If she has children, what more grandchildren, then she is duty bound to do the right thing and not embarrass the family. The upbeat granny with a lust for life, who will not allow age to overtake her has not yet generally arrived in the average psyche.
The point is the greater the age gap the louder the no-no. A slightly older wife has never caused a real stir. But when a woman is a whole 12-year cycle of the Chinese horoscope, say, older than her husband then it is the man that suffers, not the woman. Such a man is often viewed as inadequate, unable to reel in a woman of his peer group or younger. Or, he is seen as a wimp looking for a mother figure. In short, a much older wife disfigures a man's machismo. Which, in turn means, that the man who will look the world in the eye and take a much older woman to his heart is one of great strength, not at all the wimp.
Unfortunately, as with almost all instances of such an uneven match age-wise, the older spouse is the more successful. This is generally true for both women and men. But is it a bad thing? An older person would have had a huge head start in life anyway, which gives them a natural advantage in terms of wealth and status. When a young woman opts for an old man it is not viewed as offensive except maybe to those who perceive of them as gold diggers convinced that a young lady cannot possibly fall in love with an old person. For a man though, the condemnation is near unanimous. For the most part it is seen as almost an obscenity by some quarters. Why? He is probably wanting to get more in her purse than her pants -- which is about right when marriage takes place between the old and the young irrespective of gender. She, yes she, will grow old, ugly and repugnant only too quickly.
The problem is that society views the aging woman as unattractive. A woman just grows old. A man, on the other hand, becomes more distinguished with age his grey hair giving a sense of wisdom. Grey hair on women is seen as plain aging. Lines on a man's face give him character. Lines on a woman turn her into a prune. Most unfortunate of all is that men in general think they can all lay claim to this advantage. Even more unfortunate is that when mature women do look distinguished and packed with character, they remain unattractive because they are, more often than not, perceived as no longer sexy.
Women when they get past a certain age is no longer viewed as essentially woman. No longer Aphrodite, because her womb has shriveled and her fallopian tubes have dried up, she loses a fundamental social purpose. She is given to believe that she is now sexless and surrenders her will to this fate, for fighting it would be scandalous. It cannot be denied, however, that healthy humans, of both the female and male varieties, go on having sexual urges. This then is a clear demonstration that sex and fertility are not synonymous. So why is it that women stop looking sexy when they go on feeling sexy?
The question then is whether being sexy is a state of the mind or is it physiological? For the most part it is because women have allowed their physique to collapse for want of a reason to go on looking sexy. Not that they cannot find reason but rather it is the consequence of the reason that they fear. The tut-tutting, the finger-pointing and the ridicule, that is what robs women of reasons for always wanting to look good and feel sexy at any age. Hollywood with its huge influence on popular culture might yet be the saviour. For, would not the world benefit when there is nothing to stop us from living our lives fully?
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