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Paulina Porizkova on Battling Ageism and Posing for the SI Swimsuit Issue at 54 Login/Join 
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If you want to see pics of her shoot you can go to the link below. IMO she's every bit as beautiful today as she was in her 20's and 30's, but that's not what impressed me the most about her this time around. Instead, I found the article she wrote for the swimsuit edition both impressive and encouraging. Being only a year older than she is, I too feel as though I've become invisible a great deal of time as the world we live in just doesn't seem to have any place in it for 'old' people. Unlike many famous people, I think Ms. Porizkova has her head screwed on straight and her focus clearly where it should be. She impressed me 30+ years ago when I first became aware of who she was, and she's done it again, but for a completely different reason.

Link to article

May 08, 2019

For the last decade or so, I’ve had a recurring nightmare. I’m on a photo shoot for Sports Illustrated Swimsuit at my current age. The sun is setting on a beach, I’m in a bikini, pumped and ready to shoot, but am ignored in favor of much younger models. As the sun plunges below the horizon, so does my heart as I realize my age has rendered me essentially invisible.

Then a few months ago SI called to ask if I’d like to be one of the core “girls” in the upcoming issue. I’d be the oldest core girl. Ever.

I landed my first SI cover 35 years ago, and the trajectory of my career changed overnight. But these days, you’ll most likely find me behind a desk, or more truthfully, behind the kitchen table, with crap reality TV on in the background as I write. I write fiction and nonfiction, and have been militant about ageism: I’m deeply offended on behalf of all of us women who are rendered socially invisible once we look a certain age. Certainly, today’s 50 is not yesterday’s 50. While I am, at times, proud to look my age, when someone on social media calls me a wrinkled hag, I have to do a lot of slow breathing. So I had to wrestle with the question: How do I feel about being the old lady in SI? Do they really want me—or am I here because of what I represent?

I’m 54, I haven’t “had work done” (yet), and now I’m being asked to climb back into a bikini when I’m basically the age my mother was the last time I did this, in 1992. But editor MJ Day—the power behind the Swimsuit Issue and the woman who has been responsible for broadening the idea of female beauty with gorgeous girls of all colors and sizes—decided she wanted me.

With only three weeks to prepare, I considered for a moment all the things I could do to make myself look younger. Then I settled for a facial, and the only work I did was working on accepting that I didn’t look 25. Or 35. Or 45.

My acceptance took a rude hit in the Nairobi airport. After a 16-hour flight, we all looked the way people do after long flights, except for Haley (Kalil), the other model traveling with me. At 25, she was exactly as beautiful as when we boarded. No bags under her eyes, no weird folds from sleeping on a sweater and no bed-head hair. That’s when our airport guide, a man in his 60s, took a head count and announced, “One of you is missing.” He shook a sheet of paper as if to somehow dislodge the missing person and stared right through me as he continued: “It says here there are two models. So, where is the other one?”

Aside from the obvious awkwardness everyone felt, and the sweet way they pretended that didn’t just happen, once we did the fittings and I got to the beach with the crew, muscle memory kicked in, and it felt just like 30 years ago.

Then came the sunset.

Back in the old days, the best bikinis were saved for that last 10 minutes of light. In a week’s shoot, you could tell the favorites for a cover by how many sunsets they got. This time, I wasn’t kidding myself; I knew I wasn’t in the running for a cover. Still, as we got ready for my one sunset, MJ handed me my favorite bikini and photographer Yu Tsai helped me to stand on a tree branch that overlooked the mangrove bay. We had very little time in which to capture the magic. As I balanced myself on the tree, sucking in my stomach for all I was worth, the sun snowballed into a grey cloud. It wasn't exactly a sunset, but we got a shot.

In my nightmare I was upset because I was bypassed because of my age. Now, I realized it was all about just being invited. By hiring me, MJ had cracked open the door to another possibility: the visible mature woman. Or, let’s just say: the hot old lady.


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Wow, she's gorgeous. Good article and great pictures.

Jim


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She still looks stunning to me.


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Oh, to be 55 again! Wink



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quote:
Originally posted by M-11:
Oh, to be 55 again! Wink


At 71 I hear ya. Paulina is a young chick in my eyes. Smile

Jim


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Posts: 9791 | Location: The right side of Washington State | Registered: September 14, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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She is pretty.


I am sorry she's a militant.

I don't have patience for militants anymore.


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She is my age and I have had a "thing" for Paulina since I first saw her in SI sitting on the edge of a boat in the yellow bikini with Kim Alexis. Picture is burnt in my memory. She remains quite stunning.
 
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It has to be a soul crushing experience to have your life based on your looks to eventually realize you're no longer the shiny penny. Those rules were fine when you were though.
 
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quote:
Originally posted by 1s1k:
It has to be a soul crushing experience to have your life based on your looks to eventually realize you're no longer the shiny penny. Those rules were fine when you were though.


I agree. Poor, pitiful Paulina. Boo fucking hoo. Oooo...my nightmare is all the younger girls get all the attention....blah, blah, blah. Perhaps if she didn't live her life around her looks and had more depth than a teaspoon she could cope with the inevitability of age. But instead she comes across as a whiny woman who can't stand the spotlight being off her. Cry me a river.



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quote:
Originally posted by Jimbo54:
quote:
Originally posted by M-11:
Oh, to be 55 again! Wink


At 71 I hear ya. Paulina is a young chick in my eyes. Smile

Jim


Her husband is 70. Been married since 89.


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I missed a chance to work on a location photo shoot with her when she was in her prime. For Vogue magazine. The first assistant called to book me and make 100% certain to be available. Unfortunately, for me, I was already booked with someone else - shooting tools in a studio. I really regretted that.
 
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She is hardly the poster woman for middle aged women and "ageism." She looks better at 54 than most women do ever in their whole lives. To the extent women are treated poorly as they age and their youth fades, she will experience less of that than almost anyone.

I am glad she is bringing some attention to this, and her celebrity helps, but she isn't ageism's top victim.




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You just can't beat good DNA, and she has it.

Regarding ageism and attractiveness though, really? Give me a break. Anyone who can't see that as we age, universally, we become less "sexy", needs to have their heads examined.

I ask this of the men and women...would you rather look at a mostly nude 20 year old or a mostly nude 60 year old?

It's not "ageism", it's biology. Younger people are more sexually attractive. That's just the way it is.


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I think see looks every bit her age, but that is ok. I'll take a woman who looks her age every time over the face lift, tummy tuck, fake breasts freak shows that you often see lately. Just one man's opinion.
Rod


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quote:
Originally posted by mojojojo:
quote:
Originally posted by 1s1k:
It has to be a soul crushing experience to have your life based on your looks to eventually realize you're no longer the shiny penny. Those rules were fine when you were though.


I agree. Poor, pitiful Paulina. Boo fucking hoo. Oooo...my nightmare is all the younger girls get all the attention....blah, blah, blah. Perhaps if she didn't live her life around her looks and had more depth than a teaspoon she could cope with the inevitability of age. But instead she comes across as a whiny woman who can't stand the spotlight being off her. Cry me a river.
Wow! I didn't read a single word or hint in that article of what you elaborated on. I took this piece as something very humble and honest in recognizing we all get older and become somewhat invisible to the world around us. Maybe you personally just aren't there yet. Paulina has had her hands in a number of ventures over the past 25 years, and virtually none of them has anything to do with trading on her looks. With all the SJW/PC BS in the current swimsuit edition, I thought including someone like Paulina who isn't a 100 pound 20 something, was both interesting and good to see. Maybe you could cut her just a bit of slack?


-----------------------------
Guns are awesome because they shoot solid lead freedom. Every man should have several guns. And several dogs, because a man with a cat is a woman. Kurt Schlichter
 
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quote:
Originally posted by 1s1k:
It has to be a soul crushing experience to have your life based on your looks to eventually realize you're no longer the shiny penny. Those rules were fine when you were though.

Those were my thoughts exactly.

If she'd just done the shoot and been happy, but, no. Gotta be militant about it.

Not. Interested.



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Just more media SJW virtue signaling, surprised it gets a pass here. Sports Illustrated runs a blatant T & A special edition full of hot young things in barely there swimwear, great. Now we need it sprinkled with chubbies and grandma to virtue signal inclusion....barf.


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the visible mature woman.... Or, let’s just say: the hot old lady.

Big Grin
She still looks stunning to me, too.



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Link to article

She's lovely, but she looks every bit of her 54 years old. Feminine self-deception is annoying.

Nothing wrong with looking attractive, at any age - but Sophia Lauren is a better example of how beauty should embrace aging.
 
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I follow the "Never date someone who is less than half your age." So she's good to go there.

I'd be proud to be her entry in the "Undertaker's Challenge."

For those who don't know the Undertaker's Challenge, it is where someone dies during sex and the undertaker has to use all of their skill to get the expression of bliss of the decedent's face.





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