JAPAN: Older Women Want to Keep Looking Younger Longer

By Suvendrini Kakuchi Reprint | | Print |

Suvendrini Kakuchi

TOKYO, Jul 22 2002 (IPS) - At 49, Kaoru Shimada makes sure she works out five times a week at a local gym to maintain her slim figure. She also spends tens of thousands of yen annually on various beauty treatments in a bid to keep herself looking youthful.

But the well-coiffed homemaker, who is married to a rich banker and has two grown-up children, is not satisfied. Says Shimada: “When I turn 50 in September, I am going to celebrate by signing up for a 8,000-U.S. dollar beauty course.”

Shimada’s attempts to look as young as possible, for as long as possible, may sound familiar to women elsewhere in the world, especially those in the West. But here in Japan, older women of whatever class are supposed to look their age, and the likes of Shimada are few and far between.

Or at least, they used to be. In the past, only young women in this country were supposed to be conscious of their looks. Older women, meanwhile, were expected to be more modest and to concentrate their energies in taking care of members of their families.

Any signs of ageing was taken as a matter of fact, with the consolation being that wisdom usually came with age, and added years only meant more respect.

But that was then. These days, more and more Japanese women above the age of 45 are heading for the beauty counters at shopping centres or seeking the services of plastic surgeons to try to keep their faces and bodies from showing the ravages of time.

Indeed, the Aoymama Elle Clinic, which offers plastic surgery here in Tokyo, reports that while most of its customers are still in their 20s and their 30s, the number of middle-aged women coming in for treatment is on the increase.

Yano Intelligence, a private research organisation, also says that in Japan, women in their 40s and 50s are now the heaviest buyers of cosmetics, spending a total of close to 30 billion dollars a year.

“Traditional Japanese values excused older women for being a bit overweight or not catering to the latest fashion, ” says Hideki Sekizawa, head of Hakuhodo Life and Living, a leading think-tank on Japanese society.

“But this has changed drastically these days,” he says. “Looking young has become almost a fixation in modern society, a trend that reflects the rapid Americanisation of our society.”

Sezikawa, however, also notes the major role social affluence plays in helping older women realise their desires to keep looking young and attractive. He says, “Thanks to Japan’s economic growth, most women have the time and money to spend on trying to look beautiful.”

Beauty clinic personnel Noriko Sawa, 27, meanwhile, theorises that another factor could be the increasingly stressful lives people have in Japan. In truth, beauty care is often marketed in this country as a way of gaining peace of mind.

Whatever the reason for the trend, the nation’s authorities are now just beginning to realise that they have been too slow in monitoring and regulating the many “beauty aids” women are resorting to.

Last week, authorities released a report that said one 60-year-old woman has already died due to complications arising from taking some supposed “diet pills”.

Thirteen other women have also reported to have suffered acute liver problems from taking such pills, mostly manufactured in China and advertised on the Internet as being herbal supplements. Many of these pills are being sold for 40 dollars per pack.

Experts say, however, that the pills contained substances such as anorectic and thyrotropic hormones, which are classified as medicines and not as herbs.

They also say that these lead to liver failure, and note that the situation has been complicated by the fact that many of those who take the pills tend to take more in one sitting an attempt to speed their supposed “good effects”.

But that has only led to cases of overdose and allergic reactions at the very least. According to the Japan Consumer Information Centre, more than 10 percent of the complaints about health and food supplements they received last year involved diet pills.

Experts and observers alike worry that the risks will only increase all the more as women graduate from pills and creams to outright surgery.

Megumi Hisada, author of several books on women’s issues, for one predicts that “petit plastic surgery will become as common as hair colouring at beauty salons”.

She is referring to injections of botox to “freeze” muscles and prevent wrinkles from forming, as well as outpatient surgery for minor corrections.

Among the fears is that demand for plastic surgery would get to be so much that unlicensed practitioners or inept technicians would be tempted to do the procedures to unsuspecting women — who would end up looking worse than they started.

As it is, some clinics that offer cosmetic surgery report that aside from clients – young and old alike – seeking higher-bridged noses or larger and rounder eyes, they are also getting more requests for procedures that are more invasive, such as those for larger breasts and liposuction.

But Shimada’s friend, 55-year-old Kyoko Mita, says she will be content with “just” a facelift, which she plans to have done on her soon.

The mother of three also says she will not have it in this country, but will look for a plastic surgeon in South Korea “where the cost of a facelift is half that in Japan”.

Chiho Saito, editor of the feminist newspaper ‘Agora’, says that one of the downsides of modernisation is that Japanese women seem to want to look like their Western counterparts, not only in the way they dress, but even the way that their faces and their bodies are shaped.

She says that unfortunately, even the older women who were brought up during more traditional times are now trying to copy what the younger generation is doing.