It’s Wednesday. WEDNESDAY. And people are still talking about that awesome time Susan Sarandon wore a black bra with a blazer over top on the red carpet over the weekend and called it a day. It’s like #boobgate or something.
Let me be very clear about this. Susan Sarandon could have worn a tube top made of Ritz Cracker boxes, and I would have given it the nod of approval that it deserved. But I actually squealed when I saw her cleavage on full display for all of Hollywood at the SAG awards. Not because I’m a creepy fan (okay, maybe I am), but mostly because this felt like an epic win for women everywhere that a 69-year-old woman was living the dream with her boobs out.
You know the deal. Younger is prettier and young bodies are the only ones that should be seen naked, ever. At least that’s what the media would have us think. The fashion industry casts models hot out of the womb, the beauty industry is always concocting some new anti-aging potion, and the web is littered with articles like “How to Look 10 Years Younger.” Youth = beauty in case you’ve never, ever paid attention.
There’s always been this idea that, after a certain point, women are supposed to throw in the towel on all things fashionable and fall back on modest dressing like some Stepford Wives cardigan set or muumuus. Sags and wrinkles aren’t sexy, they tell us, so we’re supposed to just wrap ’em up like last night’s leftovers. I never bought that idea, and I still don’t buy it, obviously.
The fact that there has been endless commentary on the beautiful masterpiece that is Susan Sarandon’s chest goes to show how wired we are to imagine older women in things with high necklines. When a woman of a certain age takes the ‘risky’ move to master a look that Sarah Paulson already hit the red carpet with back in the fall, all hell breaks loose. Kate Winslet fondles you like she doesn’t have her own set. Twitter explodes and makes hilarious jokes about the “sagging” happening at the SAG awards. People like Piers Morgan call your outfit “tacky.”
Hollywood needs more trailblazers like Susan Sarandon and Jane Fonda who serve up seriously sexy boobage to bless our eyes and help change the notion that older bodies aren’t meant to be seen. I give major props to Sarandon for having the balls to give the middle finger to the ageist media with her outfit selection. And if her chest offended you or caused you to lose vision in your right eye, consider it a favor because she’s just helping you become your more open-minded, best self.
Stay sexy, Susan.
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