Ooh La La for that Elusive Trifecta

Barbara Walters' interview with former supermodel and France's new First Lady, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, as portrayed on a recent 60 Minutes episode, struck a couple of chords with me.

Tackling the complexities and nuances of dating in a candid discussion with a good friend visiting from Canberra on the weekend, we revelled in anecdotes of former, current, and potential future consorts and the deal makers and breakers that determine them. 

Interestingly, we concluded that knowing what we want and don't want in life and in our relationships, is a fluid process, with what we sought in our early twenties, now making way for choices of wiser lessons learned. 

Ah, for the luxury of time and retrospect. Non? 

Indeed, Generations X and Y are extremely fortunate in the myriad of opportunities  in all facets of our lives. But then, shouldn't increased choice, availability and mortality be then accompanied with permission to take our time, make errors in judgement, and not apologise for the liberty to change our thought patterns, desires and needs? 

Upon meeting and marrying French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, Bruni-Sarkozy's admission of her prior shunning of traditional bourgeois moral beliefs, declaring herself easily 'bored by monogamy', morphed into that of the 'love at first sight' variety. During the television interview, Walters staunchly questioned Italian-born Bruni-Sarkozy on her modelling career, album release, controversial love affairs, recent marriage and subsequent new First Lady status. 

Sarkozy and Bruni

Continued provocation alluding to scepticism regarding the supermodel turned singer's whirlwind three month romance and wedding, coupled with her colourful past and 'adulterous' ways, prompted a gracious smile from Bruni-Sarkovzy, answering that she had never been married previously, thereby rendering the adultery allegation nil and void, but rather, those married beaus should own up to the their own shortcomings. When questioned as to whether she had any regrets, again, she simply smiled and declined, admitted to making mistakes, and responded that the past defines who she has become.  

 
We have here, a 40 year old former model, supermodel at that, bilingual, well-educated, possessing musical talent, who, rather than be recognised for her decision to wait for what she describes 'true love', a marriage pre-requisite, she is judged for her past indiscretions, whilst being a single woman, responsible to no one but herself. 

Interestingly, men who decide to marry numerous times whilst flaunting their extramarital affairs aren't condemned, judged or ostracised, but instead, are almost somewhat revered, with this behaviour deemed acceptable. 

Society's double standards will never cease to amaze me. Should we perhaps applaud her for achieving her own trifecta? 

This led me to think about the women I know here in Australia. According to the 2001 Census, more than half a million Australian women aged between 25 and 34 were single. 


This is apparently, an increase of 65% on the previous decade. So, what then is the reason behind this burgeoning shift? Is it primarily by choice; sexual orientation; a dramatic decrease of both heterosexual and single men (particularly in Sydney and Melbourne); or a consequence of the impending social trend of marrying at a later age while career opportunities take precedence, leaving more to be desired in the relationship sector? 

Seven years on from that survey, we can safely infer that this number is climbing. This leaves the elusive trifecta of having it all – home, career and relationship, just out of grasp for a staggering number of Australian women. 


The popular adage of having the perfect work and life balance is an ideal most people have on layby – while we cannot have or afford it right at this moment, it will be ours one day in the future. But when exactly does this ‘future’ promise to manifest? 

Success achieved from work gives us a sense of validation and a boost to our self-esteem. The same can be obtained from a healthy relationship and having a safe, comforting and private retreat we call home. However, where and at which point do we draw the line and make a distinct balance between the trio?  

With a limited number of hours in the day, it’s to be expected those of us who have dedicated ourselves to having successful careers will spend an ungodly portion of it holed up at our desks, heads buried in lap tops and a mountain of paperwork, because it’s one or the other isn’t it, really? 


Is anyone who genuinely believes she can charge their way through high-powered, demanding career, then meet their desired partner and maintain a lasting and thriving relationship, whether it be defacto or marriage, while bringing up a family in today's relentless economy,  really just kidding herself? 

On closer inspection of the aforementioned soaring divorce and infidelity rates, one can conclude that the notion of being 'time-poor' more often than not also equates a relationship-poor status. The probability of people ever marrying has declined as the rates of marriage have declined. Based on the nuptiality tables as derived from the 2007 Australian Bureau of Statistics Social Trends, 79% of boys born in 1985–1987 would get married; by 2000–2002, this proportion had fallen to 69%. For girls, the decline was from 86% to 74%. In other words, if 2000–2002 nuptiality rates were to prevail into the future, 31% of males and 26% of females would never marry in their lifetimes. 

Relationships, like trading shares, are risky forms of investments. If you play the game right, entering then exiting at the appropriate times, you may hit the jackpot, earning yourself a windfall. Logically, it’s expected the more time, energy and trust you deposit into it, the greater the eventual future return. Realistically though, mirror the highs and lows experienced in relationships; share prices can also plummet suddenly and dramatically, leaving you floundering as you’re forced to ponder where the last few years of your life disappeared to and what you have to show for your embattled emotional war wounds.

Is the notion of the trifecta merely an illusion? A myth perpetuated throughout the decades in order to deliver an intravenous drip of hope and reassurance to those loved-starved veins still siphoning the remnants of forgotten promises and fraudulent desires? Or a game, if played correctly, allowing you to pass go, collect your partner and sail off into the sunset living happily ever after?  

Can we really have the fairy tale and if so, who does? Perhaps the new French First Lady does; provided she can get past the female ear bashing. 

We should all be so lucky.  

Dying For Beauty?

One of my earliest childhood make up memories (sans applying mum's silver liquid eyeliner and range of lipsticks to recreate Paul Stanley's Starchild and Ace Frehley's Spaceman Kiss characters during the early eighties), was around the age of twelve; as mum applied a dab of the powder puff to my face "to quell the shine" before bidding me farewell to another day at school. 

Unbeknownst to me at the time, this daily morning ritual would serve to pave the way for a future inundated with a myriad of beauty products aimed to cleanse, tone, moisturise, protect, revitalise, lift, nourish, preserve, stimulate, hydrate, plump, perfume.. and the list goes on. Regardless of where we turn, we are imbued with advertising reminding us that despite our best abilities, there's always room for improvement. 

As a woman who admits to that surge of confidence and professionalism wearing make up in the work place as well as socially, I find I'm still not adverse to lashings of mascara, a dab of concealer and smidgeon of gloss at Sunday brunch. Even so, if we subtract these elements of the equation rendering it a "make up free day", once the use of soap, shampoo, conditioner, body wash, facial cleanser, moisturiser, deodorant and fragrance are applied, is it safe to truly say we're out of the woods? 

Environmentalists warn the average woman's make up bag is a weapons of mass destruction; a ticking time bomb waiting to explode with serious health consequences. And it seems, more and more people are taking stock. 

According to Stacy Malkan, author of Not Just a Pretty Face  and co-founder of the Campaign For Safe Cosmetics, the average woman is exposed to around twenty products containing over 200 chemicals before she even walks out the front door in the morning, from soap to shampoo, and toothpaste and eye liner. 

The controversial book debunks common myths pertaining to the safety of cosmetics and personal care products, as potentially major sources of chemical exposure. Due to this 35 billion dollar industry remaining still largely unregulated, hazardous chemicals used as ingredients, are "within acceptable limits" as claimed by industry sources.

It's ironic that the products specifically designed to pamper, preen and beautify, contain these copious chemicals that are in fact, linked to health threats documented by the World Health Organisation, including cancer, infertility and birth defects. While we expect the food we buy and consume to be safe, the same stringent standards are not universally applied to cosmetic manufacturers. 

The book claims that unlike drug manufacturers who must provide proof of the safety and effectiveness of their products prior to being sold on the market, no cosmetic product requires pre-market approval by the US Food and Drug Administration. Considering the leading cosmetic and skin care brands are produced to international standards, namely US and France, this is a matter which hits closer to home than we may care to realise. 

Consumers in the UK are marginally better off following the European Union's cosmetics directive in 2006, protecting them from chemicals considered mutagenic, carcinogenic or containing reproductive toxins. Furthermore, all UK cosmetics and their ingredients must now be safety-tested. 

While environmental groups have taken a firmer stance with the potential for long-term health consequences over minor skin allergies or rashes, with WHO research has evidence suggesting certain ingredients are carcinogenic, while others affect a variety of hormone related diseases and conditions. 

Concerning levels are found in parabens (used as preservatives), petrochemicals and their by-products (in skin creams, moisturisers, foundations, lip balms), mercury (in mascara), lead (in lipstick), dioxane (in shampoo and body washes) and phthalates (in nail polish, hair sprays and fragrances). Activitsts such as the Environmental Working Group and the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics argue that it's the cumulative and synergistic effects of these chemicals with one another that are obtained from all facets of our daily lives that need to be examined. 

Furthermore, the fact that nanotechnology, which is becoming increasingly popular, allows the production of minute chemical particles to penetrate deeper within the epidermis, is especially dangerous to younger people who are particularly susceptible to chemical infiltration.  

We know the chemicals found in cigarettes are harmful regardless of how minute the amounts may be. While smoking one cigarette is extremely unlikely to kill a person, the repeated use and subsequent build up of these toxins in the system will, over time, most likely do the job. Poison, even in its smallest amounts causes both short-term as well as long-term damage to organs when accumulated over time. 

The cosmetics industry perpetuates that we are all in dire need of beautifying ourselves, but it's the cosmetics industry that is in need of a new makeover.

Verbal Bullets - The New Russian Roulette

While walking to my local shops a couple of days ago wearing a dowdy sweatshirt, track pants and ugg boots, I encountered a familiar sound. As I passed the block of apartments next to my own building, sure enough, the group of around five males in their early to mid twenties who live in the ground floor apartment, sat perched outside; smoking cigarettes, swigging back on their long necks, and leering at female passers by.

After enduring months of subtle jeers and heckling directed at myself as well as other women passing this offending group while walking home from the bus stop every evening, enough was enough.

Like clockwork, with typical cowardice, only once I’d adequately passed the building, did the low wolf whistles and snide remarks follow. Fed up with feeling uncomfortable and vulnerable in my own street, I turned around to confront the men.

“You know, I hope that wolf whistle wasn’t directed at me, because that’s not the way to treat a woman. I don’t know how you were raised, but that is very disrespectful.”

A few moments of dumbfounded expressions and silence filled the air, only to be just as quickly pierced with simultaneously reciprocations pertaining to a range of colourful expletives hurled towards me: “F&** you,” “Go and get F*^$%@,” and “F%^& off.”

A positively charming, articulate and exemplary response, to be sure.

Relaying this chain of events back to a couple of friends of both genders the next day evoked surprising responses. Both were lax in their opinions. My male friend wondered why I felt the need to respond to behaviour that’s somewhat expected and accepted by a particular age group of men in this country. My female comrade shrugged it off, also pointing out that had they been attractive, well-dressed and in a different environment, rather than t-shirt and boardies-wearing larrikins, my perception of their actions may possibly be vastly different.  

After seeing ABC’s Australian Story episode recently and reading various news articles, in particularly one from The Daily Telegraph centering on the suicide of television newsreader and former colleague Charmaine Dragun, and the subsequent root of her depression, which played a significant role in her death, I beg to differ.

Revelations that this attractive, intelligent and effervescent young woman, just a year shy of her thirtieth birthday and impending marriage to childhood sweetheart and fiancé, was haunted by depression stemming from a wolf whistle and comment made by a construction worker more than a decade ago, as she innocently walked past a worksite.

The worker’s remark in regards to her appearance may have been made offhandedly and in jest, but what ensued was the dangerous planting of a seed into this young woman’s mind, questioning her value, and wreaking future years of havoc on her self-esteem, which ultimately culminated into the onset of an eating disorder and subsequent bouts of depression.

In this day and age of increasing female equality, why are women still expected and encouraged to simply turn a blind eye to this demeaning behaviour? Tolerating such offensive and unacceptable conduct not only allows this to continue to thrive and exist in our society, but also perpetuates the myth that women are in fact, the weaker sex, openly and readily subjected to ridicule, degradation and bigotry. 

Similarly, recent accounts of bullying and defamatory abuse on popular networking websites, Myspace and Facebook, have emerged, with teen perpetrators sued, charged and even imprisoned for slanderous and libellous postings.

I implore each and every one of us, to reconsider the words and actions we speak and commit, with extreme caution. Senseless and heartless words unfortunately have the ability to cut deep into the psyche, burying into our subconscious, later manifesting in destructive ways with repercussions affecting not only the person initially affected, but also a myriad of people around them. While this may not have such an extreme effect on every person, it’s a game of Russian roulette, with the verbal bullets being shot out, having the potential to induce a hit or miss effect on one’s future sanity and mindset.

My retort towards the cursing cowards may not prevent them from continuing their behaviour; it may not even register in altering their social repertoire, or lack thereof, but it allows me to maintain a sense of self-dignity in my own life and my own mind. 

And that can only be a healthy thing.  

Demise of the Iconic Millennium Woman

While society has come a long way in the past thirty years in overcoming the gender barriers and stereotypes of women, press relating to the media scrum at Sydney airport for the imminent arrival of a string of international female celebrities for the last MTV music awards, has got me thinking; the battle is not only far from over, but has perhaps become a whole new terrain. 

Celebrities are now so celebrated for their refusal to conform and to grow up, forget Pepsi being ‘the choice of a generation’; it’s evolved into that of the illicit, with ‘rehab’ emerging as the millennium’s new buzz word. 

Countless media articles criticising the lackadaisical to the downright rude behaviour exhibited by US celebrity Nicole Richie, towards fans and paparazzi alike during her short stint in Australia is neither new nor groundbreaking news. What grabbed my attention though, was a comment posted on an Internet site in response to a quote from a teenage fan of Richie. The seventeen year old girl lamented to the SMH that after not getting any sleep for two days, she was devastated at being ignored by the star who also refused to sign autographs, declaring it ‘pretty heartbreaking’. 

The response from bloggers: pathetic, sad, ridiculous, and desperate. I tend to agree. One in particular, remarked that this girl’s life must be so dull that there ‘mustn’t be much happening Down Under’. 

Or up top, for that matter. 

To add fuel to the fire, similar scenes were witnessed last year, when Richie’s on again off again best friend and arch nemesis Paris Hilton visited Sydney to judge a Bondi beer competition. Scores of fans hoping to catch a glimpse of the infamous Hilton trailed her entourage all over town for the entire duration of the trip.  

Why are these impressionable young girls in such a state over glorifying these emaciated Mattel-type figurines? Admittedly, they’re attractive, wealthy and have a certain charisma to them, but what exactly is their claim to fame other than possessing the ‘right’ family name. It’s understandable for fans to camp out to snag concert or sporting tickets, or to even pursue actors when they’re in town. 

The difference is the latter have genuine talent and jobs, albeit to varying degrees, and thus, are worthy being role model material to some extent. Certain high profile personalities in the entertainment and sporting arena are exemplary examples, validating the true distinction between the ‘tried and true’ as compared to the impending ‘train wreck tragedies’. 

When Hilton’s fans were questioned regarding their obsession with the heiress, their remarks all rang out simply that they wanted her life. They wanted to be ‘just like her’, conducting themselves physically and mentally in as similar a manner as possible. Can anybody say Mini Me? 

The ongoing debate around Paris Hilton’s worthiness (or lack thereof) in society, has become an age old topic of discussion and is an entire separate argument of its own, but after countless scandals and controversy, the timely announcement of her parole violation following an alcohol related, reckless driving conviction and subsequent 45 day jail term (later reduced to 23 days) should serve as timely reminder that if this woman is considered an iconic role model by Generation Y, the world is in a pretty bad state. 

The eighties ‘Brat Pack’ has now morphed into a female ‘Brit Pack’ - enter Stage Left Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan to the mix. To their credit, these two have grown up in the limelight and are actual entertainers in their own rights, although Lohan’s freshest brush with the law after her car crash and subsequent arrest for DUI and the possession of narcotics found in her car by police, seems to be her strange way of mocking her highly publicised and obviously futile attempt at rehab. Britney’s own numerous rehab stints, mental breakdowns and public lashouts have also provided fine fodder for media outlets.

I can’t help but think, this gradual infiltration of new breed role model is tantamount to trouble. Their uninhibited party animal antics and sexual exhibitionism, surely does not warrant a gold medal or seal of approval, and despite their substance abuse and addictions, eating disorders, emotional breakdowns and relationship break ups, the media continues its unwavering cyclical and yet contradicting pursuit: Build them up; tear them down.  

The media must then take some responsibility for the current situation. Its contradictory and unabashed devotion to inundating newspapers, magazines and broadcast mediums with a miniscule number of the same celebrities is becoming quickly frustrating and to be quite frank, downright boring.  

So why is it then, that when I open a copy of any magazine, (and I’m not merely referring to that of the gossip variety – I’m talking fashion, beauty, health etc), I am hard pressed to flick through a few pages without seeing one of the four aforementioned ‘role models’ smiling or pouting back at me. And if it’s not these women, it’s their bevy of beautiful and equally scandalous sidekicks honing in on my precious magazine space.  

We’ve become almost so anaesthetised to such conduct, that it’s become acceptable for society to not only tolerate having this saturate our newspapers, magazines and televisions, but to watch on helplessly as today’s youth epitomise and consequently imitate this. Young women look to these stars as their muses and guides, as the potential for future achievement, when they should rather be looking to themselves, peers, parents, mentors and the people around them for inspiration. 

In a study conducted by Penelope Lockwood at the University of Toronto, Lockwood asked 44 female and 38 male students to read a fictional newspaper account of an outstanding professional who had excelled in the same field that they aspired to work in. Some of the students read an account of a female professional while others read about a man. 

Afterwards female students who’d read an account of a female professional rated themselves more positively than the female students who read about a man, and more positively than control students who hadn’t read any account. By contrast, male students who read about a male role model did not rate themselves any more positively than male students who read about a female role model, or than control students who hadn’t read any account.

In Lockwood's second study, students were asked to name a real person who was a role model for them in their career ambitions. 63% per cent of female students chose a woman, 75.6% of male students chose a man. But crucially, whereas the male students said gender was not a factor in their choice, 27% of female students who named a female role model said that they were inspired by the gender-related obstacles overcome by their choice.

It’s a fact, women inspire women, and their successes need to and should be celebrated in order to boost the self-esteem of the up and coming younger generation. Women can ultimately inspire and encourage others to pursue greatness, but allow this power to fall into the wrong hands and what will consequently be perceived is a massive step back in female equality and evolution.  

Oprah Winfrey is a prime example of a self-made woman. Her life symbolises what can be achieved from what some may consider the most disadvantaged of starts; someone who has overcome trials and tribulations fraught with race and gender bias, to catapult herself from a journalist to not only one of the most recognisable faces in the world, but one of the richest and most powerful females alive today. Winfrey was added to the Forbes Billionaire list in February 2003. 

Take a look at NxE's list of the 50 Most Influential Female Bloggers. You may not have heard of many of these talented and inspiring women, or recognise their faces, yet these are entrepreneurial women who are helping reshape the world around us and our roles and responsibilities in society through their work and their passions. 

In my eyes, an icon and role model is a person who shows others how to turn trials into triumphs. 

It describes someone who displays wisdom, dignity, grace, courage and intrinsic determination in the face of adversity; who elicits independent thought and enables others to strive for greater achievement and to become better individuals; who displays non-compromising strength, free will, self respect, and humility in accomplishments; who serves as a catalyst for positive self evolution; character integrity and the thirst for knowledge and success.

This is what we should exemplify as being true iconic behaviour.