It\u2019s not just the perverts at Chemist Warehouse who are determined to see your mum drenched in overpriced goo this Mother\u2019s Day. Farmers (which has form in this area with its 2019 shave her, weigh her, brush her teeth<\/a> Mother\u2019s Day catalogue) is promoting Dior Prestige Micro-Nutrive & Repairing Ritual Skincare Sets for a bargain at just $860, or a Lanc\u00f4me R\u00e9nergie HCF Triple Serum Mother\u2019s Day set for $393 if you are slumming it. Kmart recommends The Smoother Effect Aqua Renewal Peptide patches for your mum to whack on her forehead for $8, and even The Warehouse is hawking a facial LED mask to \u201crevitalise your skin\u201d for just $69.\u00a0<\/p>\n With so many wonderful, thoughtful, enriching, affordable gift options to choose from, I thought it would be best to ask my own 69-year-old mother what she would think if I bought her an anti-ageing whatsit for Mother\u2019s Day. \u201cIt\u2019s fiendishly, fiendishly insulting,\u201d she said, furrowing her brow in deep defiance of even the most powerful peptide patch. \u201cIt\u2019s making a statement that my appearance is not good enough for you \u2013 but this mother ain\u2019t gonna get any younger, no matter what you slam on her face.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n She posited a role reversal. \u201cIt\u2019s a bit like me buying you something to improve your appearance like acne cream,\u201d she said. \u201cYou\u2019d get the hump with me.\u201d Desperately trying to not get the hump regarding my adult acne journey being laid bare, I asked Mum if she had anything else to say about this kind of Mother\u2019s Day promotion. \u201cI bet if you look at the women in these ads, they aren\u2019t crinkling 70-year-olds but fresh-faced 50-year-olds,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s all just a big con capitalising on insecurities and the commercialisation of Mother\u2019s Day to sell product.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Indeed, Eva Longoria of the L\u2019Or\u00e9al Tri-Peptides Age Correcting Serum is just 51 years old. \u201cThere\u2019s a supposition there that all older women want to look like younger women,\u201d Mum added, \u201cand that\u2019s just absolutely ridiculous.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Ridiculous to a militant Scotswoman whose self-professed beauty idol is 1970s children\u2019s character Worzel Gummidge<\/a> perhaps, but you can see how we ended up here as society. The beauty industry is projected to be valued at close to $700 billion in 2026, with skincare estimated to hold roughly 40% of the total beauty market. Botox has become commonplace<\/a> in Aotearoa with over 400 clinics nationwide, and beauty megastores like Mecca and Sephora are attracting girls as young as 10<\/a> to preen over their pricey viral potions.\u00a0<\/p>\n And while the men\u2019s appearance industry is also on the rise<\/a> (welcome to hell, fellas), the gendered expectations are vastly different. For example, 70-year-old Kris Jenner shows up on a red carpet with a whole new head<\/a> and the world says something akin to \u201cI\u2019ll have what she\u2019s having!\u201d. Meanwhile, 64-year-old Jim Carrey shows up on a red carpet with a touch of filler<\/a> in his cheeks, and the world becomes so convinced that he has been replaced by a clone<\/a> that his own publicist has to issue a statement<\/a> that Jim Carrey is indeed still Jim Carrey.\u00a0<\/p>\n I write this all as a reminder to myself as much as anyone else that, Mother\u2019s Day aside, all of these different products and procedures are being churned out by an insidious industry that is hellbent on keeping women miserable, insecure and financially ruined in the hopes of looking as dewy and poreless as a blobfish<\/a> at the bottom of the sea. To borrow a phrase from beauty writer Jess DeFino: we are all going to die someday, no matter how young we look, and no amount of discounted R\u00e9nergie HCF Triple Serum is going to change that fact.\u00a0<\/p>\n As for what my mum really wants for Mother\u2019s Day? \u201cJust a phone call and a card.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Everyone wants your mum positively drenched in overpriced goo this Mother\u2019s Day, writes Alex Casey. After entering a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":417711,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[6779,1244,110320,156,12967,31190,111,139,69,31194,2935,108648],"class_list":["post-417710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-aging","tag-beauty","tag-chemist-warehouse","tag-entertainment","tag-farmers","tag-gender","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-sexism","tag-society","tag-the-warehouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417710","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=417710"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417710\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/417711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=417710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=417710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=417710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Very normal scenes from Chemist Warehouse.<\/p>\n
Gorgeous goos for Mother\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n