When did you start caring about wrinkles?
On children and serums, the Olympics (again) and a wolf in love
Kia ora and welcome to The Weekend with Madeleine Chapman
A few years ago I asked my great aunt – who was in her mid-80s at the time – how she still had such beautiful skin. I was sitting right next to her, peering at her forehead and the corners of her eyes, where only the faintest of lines were visible. I knew in my bones that she, an elderly Samoan woman, was not conducting a 12-step skincare routine, so wanted to know what other life hack she'd discovered.
She looked at me very seriously and answered: "smoking".
To this day I don't know whether or not she was making a joke but why shouldn't I believe her? I have yet to see any rhyme or reason to who gets silky smooth skin at 80 years old and who gets wrinkles at 18. Which is all to say that I have gone a perhaps wilfully ignorant route with my own skin by assuming that what will be will be, and therefore doing exactly nothing to my face for 30 years.
Last year, I looked in the mirror after a particularly long week and wondered if I should be doing something about the lines that were emerging on my face. In the end I decided I probably should, and proceeded to use a face wash for exactly one week before reverting back to my "water and hands" method. I may not have taken any steps to stall my ageing face but it was a Big Moment as I came face to face (literally) with my changing body.
I'm glad that I don't spend time thinking about my skin. Not in a holier-than-thou sense but because I know how all-consuming our bodies (whether it's skin, weight or just our natural features) can be in the worst way. I may not spend hours peering at the pores on my cheeks or fretting over the fact that my funny frown line from childhood is now a deep trench in my brow, but I fill in that time with various other bodily concerns.
Which makes it all the more terrifying to read about children as young as six becoming deeply invested in skincare and anti-ageing products. As Alex Casey reported in her excellent cover story this week, the beauty industry has expanded its consumer base to children, with young social media influencers focusing on skincare routines and bright, fun packaging on serums and toners.
Kids younger than 10 years old now are thinking about anti-wrinkle creams, even if they're not quite thinking about the process of ageing in the way adults might. It's a terrifying and inevitable development in a capitalist world and makes me feel lovely and old (at 30) to have not grown up with TikTok.
I'd highly recommend settling in to read Alex's full feature – the final quote will reward you for it (in a bleak existential way).
Ps. Even if you do nothing to your skin, like me, always wear sunscreen. You want to live long enough to get truly wrinkly.
Behind the Story
Senior writer Alex Casey has this week written an incredible longform feature about the rising trend of young children coveting skincare. Note: this is not about makeup or wearing your mum’s lipstick. It’s about 10 year olds using serums and anti-wrinkle creams.
Alex has been thinking, writing about and living the beauty industry for years, and this is likely just the first in a series of big features about a billion-dollar industry with controversial aims. She joined me this week to talk about the unique challenges of interviewing kids and her own spotty history with skincare and beauty.
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— Ian, Sydney.
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Riding with Lael Wilcox, the woman who just doesn’t stop
“I feel like I’m about to interview a red carpet celebrity: a little nervous, a little wondering if I wore the right clothes, a little sweaty – although that might be the hill I just cycled up. “You can ride with her and talk to her if you like, I’ll let you have a turn,” someone says, ushering me to the front of the peloton. I take a deep breath, and start talking to Lael Wilcox, hoping she notices the bike shorts I’m wearing to dress for the occasion, and not the guiro-like sound my bike chain has been making since I adjusted the derailleur cable last week.”
It wasn’t particularly easy for Shanti Mathias to interview Lael Wilcox while biking along a busy road, but if you want to talk to the person trying to break the world record for cycling around the world, Shanti discovered you have to simply hope to keep up.
Read Shanti’s full story here.
Nothing beats an old-fashioned Olympics cry
Every single time Alex Casey has tuned in to the Olympics, she has found herself turning on waterworks so powerful that they could dilute the stinky old Seine in an instant. On screen, quarters of seconds, wonky landings, torn groins, and just not being fast enough are gathering tears in the eyes of athletes. And there’s been victory induced crying too – All this crying, and watching crying while crying, is good for us, argues Alex. We are all just sappy old sacks full of hopes, dreams and feelings, who often need just one little moment to remind us of that. For some, that moment might come after losing a race you have trained for your entire life. For others, that moment might come while you are sobbing into your cereal in front of a silent TV at dawn because a local trampolinist is sitting by himself and maybe seems lonely.
Joel MacManus has also reflected on the joys of watching sports, particularly at 4am, as is often necessary for us antipodeans. It is fitting for our brand of quiet patriotism that instead of triumphant hooting and hollering, we brace the early morning winter cold.
Help me Hera, live on stage
The Spinoff’s advice column, Help Me Hera, has become one of our most popular reads. A year on from its launch, join me and Hera Lindsay Bird live on stage in Auckland to find out if anyone has taken her advice, and if so, how it went.
This event has sold out in Wellington, so make sure you grab your tickets for the Auckland event on August 29 at Q Theatre before they sell out!
The Spinoff Essay: Following the Swiss wolf, who walked 2,000 kilometres for love
"When we insert ourselves into the lives of animals, we become complicit in their fates." Make yourself a pot of tea and pore over Kathryn van Beek's vivid and touching essay about the Swiss wolf, who travelled 2,000 km for love – traversing dodgy zoos, the war in Ukraine, her "personal, cat-sized" fears, and the question of what we owe animals along the way.
The stories Spinoff readers spent the most time with this week
Duncan Greive digs into the ratings for Stuff’s ThreeNews and finds troubling news
Hera Lindsay Bird catalogues the biggest scandals of the 2024 Paris Olympics so far
This week’s Cover Story from Alex Casey on the insidious and dangerous push by the beauty industry to hook very young children on skincare
Forty years after Rogernomics, Jo Waitoa imagines an economy grounded in Māori values
Alex Casey tackles the very last power ranking for this season of The Traitors
Recommended reads (and listens) for your weekend
Award winning musician Vera Ellen has a companion which attends every interview, intercepts every congratulation and barks at any bubbling feeling of pride – imposter syndrome.
Snooping, horse people, grudges on the ‘gram are only some of the biggest scandals of the 2024 Paris Olympics so far. Hera Lindsay Bird runs us through.
It came to our attention that we’d ranked beans twice, and not given any attention to nuts. Shanti Mathias rectifies this, in an unquestionable ranking of pretty much every common nut in Aotearoa.
Lyric Waiwiri-Smith explored parliament’s complex relationship with our indigenous language through a brief history of te reo Māori in parliament.
Every week, we ask an NZ musician to curate a Weekend playlist. This week Hip-hop artist Diggy Dupé has put together tracks to get you through all your chores.
The NZ International Film Fest has begun, and so has our coverage. First up, We Were Dangerous, a soaring celebration of misfits and girlhood reviewed by Alex Casey.
Law now requires Māori wards established without a public vote to be scrapped or held to referendum. Liam Rātana looks at the first fallout, and what could happen next.
Cuddles, puffers and comfort food – Gabi Lardies has tips on making the most of what we’ve got left of winter.
Reader feedback of the week
“I think an important point here is the same one made about how measures to get cars off the road are actually pro-motorist. Every car we get off the roads because people are using other forms of transport makes driving better for those motorists who remain. The same thing applies to emergency vehicles.”
— SamStephens
“I reckon it was a great idea to have events in the Seine, even if the odd competitor did become sick. (I realise they would have a profoundly different perspective.) It's probably the best campaign to make people aware of the pollution we have generally been brainwashed to accept, in decades. I hope that it sets a trend - cleaning up a river is probably still cheaper than building a swimming stadium from scratch - and a lot better for the environment and for the city, long term.”
— Annie
Thanks for reading.
— Madeleine Chapman
The "biggest scandals of the 2024 Paris Olympics so far" link is to your preview site, not the actual website.