Where's your line on beauty interventions?
aka, how I convinced myself trying Botox was righteous
This is happening NEXT WEEK in NEW YORK CITY! Come out for our live show at Tribeca Festival. Tickets here.
What Would You Give Up to Be More Attractive?
In your podcast feed this week, I interview writer and director Celine Song, best known for her beautiful, Oscar-nominated film Past Lives. In her new movie, Materialists, her characters are brash and unapologetic about the currencies shaping the dating market—looks and earnings, chief among them.
This prompted a discussion on our team about attractiveness, and how we are simultaneously screaming and silent about things we collectively deem you ought to do to look hotter. This is the area of expertise of philosopher Heather Widdows. Her most recent book is Perfect Me: Beauty as an Ethical Ideal, and she’s the founder of the #everydaylookism campaign. I had a wonderful conversation that you can hear in the Slate Plus Feed right now. Listen!
It’s made our team curious to hear some of your stories of beauty interventions and how you’ve justified them. For example, the thing that prompted me to try Botox for the first time was winning an injection session at a PTA FUNDRAISER’S SILENT AUCTION. True story. As I considered my bid, I thought, “Well, this is for the children….”
How much time and money do you spend on improving your appearance with skin care, injectables, hair dye, teeth whitening, teeth straightening, or plastic surgery, and how do you talk about it?
Are you open with your routines or treatments, or are you secretive? Record a voice memo and send it to us at deathsexmoney@slate.com
Speaking of attractive, this is the cast of Materialists. HOT!!!
When filmmaker Celine Song and I talked about choosing these actors — in the course of conversation about the hierarchy of appeal and attractiveness, and Celine’s work history that includes a professional matchmaking gig — she offered this interesting point:
I think that beyond how beautiful they are, something that I am looking for when I'm casting them in this film is, uh, lovability, right? Someone that we can see and say like, oh, so adorable. Or like, oh, cute. You know, because all three of them are just so funny. And also by the way, it's very different than likability, right? . Likability of course, is about something that has brought appeal that everybody can be okay with.
Lovability is something where, when we love something, we never go like, well, I love that person because everybody else loves them, right?
You can hear our new episode with Celine Song here.
Have you joined up with Slate Plus yet?
I often mention Slate Plus, the membership program that supports my team and all our colleagues at Slate. It’s an essential revenue source to keep the business strong.
But there’s another reason I hope you sign up if you haven’t. We’re making excellent stuff for our members!
Slate Plus drops in the Death, Sex & Money feed have become a place where we have exciting conversations that wouldn’t fit in the show’s regular format. A listener emailed this very morning and agreed:
I just wanna say (as a long time Slate Plus subscriber AND long time DSM listener, way before the twain met) that your Plus segments are really something special, like, I almost feel like we're getting the BETTER stuff….
Particularly loved the chat with Heather Widdows. Also appreciated the talk with Zitron [Big Tech and the Rise of the ‘Do Nothing’ Middle Manager], tho I find him grating at times. But you know, proper fully separate thing, not just "here are some questions I asked my other guest that didn't make the main show." Thank you!! :)
—Nadia
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Other Recommended Reads, Watches & Listens
—I’ve been more closely watching the mix of coverage over at Reasons To Be Cheerful, the journalism site founded by David Byrne. They hosted a very weird and fun variety show last week in New York City — and I looooove a very weird and fun variety show — and they also dig into under-covered issues like community-led agricultural land conservation in Oregon and local “creative reuse centers” that give arts and crafts supplies a second life.
—This political story in The San Francisco Standard made me better understand how some recent civic-minded tech activism in the city morphed into AI-powered “reform” and DOGE: “They wanted to fix SF government. Then Elon Musk came calling.”
—A new book is here from the artist (and friend of Death, Sex & Money)
. She and her co-author Vera Kachouh have made a very useful guide for resetting: Breathe Through It: An Interactive Guide to Ease Your Anxiety Through Meditation, Visualization, and Breathwork. Let me recommend you keep it on your desk, your bedside table, or wherever you regularly experience overwhelm.
—Speaking of books, we’re less than a week away from the release of comedian Jeff Hiller’s Actress of a Certain Age: My Twenty-Year Trail to Overnight Success, coming out Tuesday. I read an early copy and then found myself preordering more copies to share with friends and family. If you heard him on Death, Sex & Money, you know what a funny, honest, heart-forward, and service-minded person Jeff is. Read it as you celebrate Pride, art, friendship, trying hard, and the pitch-perfect delivery of a dirty joke.
—Finally, this weekend, a local festival is returning to Cody, Wyoming, where I’m based this summer. I salute the elevator pitch: “It’s healthy and nonpolitical…People like dogs and horses and watching soap being made.”
Until next week,
Anna
This newsletter is free to you, but let me urge you to support the Death, Sex & Money team by becoming a member of Slate Plus. What do you get? Ad-free listening and special member-exclusive podcast drops. Please join us at slate.com/dsmplus or through Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
Listen to our latest Death, Sex & Money episodes
6/3 How a Matchmaking Job Inspired a Film About Dating’s Secret Economy
6/3 Bonus: How Much Would You Give Up to Be More Attractive? (Apple|Spotify|Slate)
5/27 Betraying a Friendship to Get a Viral Story
5/27 Bonus: Big Tech and the Rise of the “Do Nothing” Middle Manager (Apple|Spotify|Slate)
5/20 Why Chef José Andrés Googled ‘How to Be a Father’
5/13 Bonus: An Ode to Rom-Coms (Apple|Spotify|Slate)
5/6 Isabel Allende on Grief, Ayahuasca, and Dating After 70
4/29 The Patient and Cunning Work of Defending LGBTQ Rights with a Republican Supermajority
4/22 Are Airline Pilots Allowed To Be Depressed?
4/22 Bonus: How to Handle Bad Bosses, Office Romances, and Other Workplace Headaches (Apple|Spotify|Slate)
4/15 How the Subway Takes Guy Became His Own Nepo Baby
4/15 Bonus: What the Heck is Going On With Student Loans? (Apple|Spotify|Slate)
My mother was gorgeous. The sculptor Noguchi stopped by her table in a NYC restaurant to tell her to never change her hair style, so she never did. Every morning, she’d “do her face,” a tradition that my daughter inherited. My mother told me I was beautiful, but it never sank in. I had other things I valued more, and never took the time for more than eyeliner. Now, at 77, I should, but still can’t. I did Botox for a while to correct a frown that existed, even when happy. I darken my hair a bit so I won’t look like a white haired old lady, but I’ve stopped spending money on expensive cuts. I’d still rather make art, learn and write. I’ll leave the face lifts to my aging friends though I do hate my neck.