Stop all the whining! Nobody want to date a woman in her 50s, okay?!
5
Oh Boy...……..
Another installment of blue pill manhood.
Geological science called our era is Anthropocene.
In this era Human regardless of sex lives almost 100 years.
Sexuality is not a oxygen of life after 50.
But Man world and their blue pill revolution, propelled their carnal instincts way longer than before even imagined.
But to be honest , how can you call a 60 year old man sexuality , Descent.
4
Interesting article....
Another feminist bashing of some guy who prefers young Asian girls...
Too bad we can't have preferences anymore without offending someone.
Had the Subject been Jennifer Lopez, Cher or any of older Hollywood women, this article would have been amusing.
The behavior is alike but because he is a male and 50 he's bashed.
Let's start treating the female teachers seducing young boys with prison terms of 10 years instead of letting them off with a
handslap.
I find it particularly amusing that the prettier the teacher the lighter the sentence...
I've had my single rant for the day...
Signed,
"Life is Good"
9
I find young fit women to be the epitome of sexual attractiveness. We’re talking sex here not companionship. There is a visual aspect to sex and old saggy bodies (mine included) just don’t supply it. Alas, the days of attracting such women are over for me but that’s OK. To every season..... An occassional Soapy Massage in Bangkok will have to suffice. Sex without emotional attachment can be fantastic.
5
Women, stop complaining so much. You sound very bitter. It's sad and pathetic. The French man is simply saying what nearly all guys think: we want young women who are beautiful.
Men are not interested in women once they hit 40. It's over. Get over it. Your sniping on these comments is not going to change anything.
Most men have little interest in dating someone over 40, let alone 50. They only do so because they have to. If they had a choice, they would date the 22 year old who is beautiful.
Please stop complaining. You sound very desperate.
17
I was try to write a meaningful response on the joy of love later in life. Instead I'll just say, "this fellow is an idiot".
35
Classic Adonis complex
But in reality a curmudgeon from the shallow end of the gene pool
25
Please note: "Moix" does not rhyme with "Box". It is pronounced "Mwax", as in "wax".
13
Take note: The French First Lady is nearly 66, married to a man who just turned 42. Where is the outrage?
19
Maybe it's his fame, but the question is why are these 20 something young women attracted to this guy anyway? However, many men at this age truly are not interested in women of their own generation. After all, having a young woman on their arm and in their bed let's them tell themselves they are attractive sexually and have still "got it" -whatever "it" is. What is sad is this man's comment that he finds the bodies of women his age essentially revolting. Well I suspect the point is near where women of the age he wants will feel the same way about him. Women over 50 unless they are celebrities are invisible to most men unless they have money or can provide care giving services. That's just the sad reality.
18
Don't we love the French? One thing about Mr. Moix, he sure has courage to go public with what drives him. Well, it's all fair in love and war, as they say. Wouldn't it be curious to see how the twitterverse would react if a well known woman over 50 would proudly proclaim that she prefers men under twenty-five. Do you think it would be the same?
10
Wow, really? Of course women believe youthful bodies look better...on women AND MEN? Does Mr. Moix really think the 25 yo he dates finds his body more attractive than that of a 25 yo man? Of course not, his WALLET is more attractive but not his body.
53
How do I get an email address to those 50-year-old French women? Just asking for a friend.
39
Never heard of this guy before the silly Marie Claire magazine decided to give him press. I don’t need to know more about him, so I’ll skip the article. Easy-peasy.
Besides, I don’t like prissy little suit-wearing Frenchmen. My tastes run toward tall, athletic, beefy, blue- or green-eyed white guys of size. Who cares. I wouldn’t presume to tell anyone whom they should be attracted to, any more than I’d accept criticism for having a type that I’m attracted to. Ain’t nobody’s business but my own. My love life isn’t charity. Other people’s politics regarding my preferences are irrelevant. As they are for whatever-his-name-is.
Allowing oneself to be played by outrage mongers is its own kind of foolishness.
14
How funny this is. The greatest relief of my life is leaving sexual relationships with men behind. The constant attention men need in order to commit drains the living life outta me. The only interest I usually receive now is the nurse and a purse action.
Here's one thing that bugs me though. If I ever speak to a man they quickly proceed to tell me some anecdote about their wives. As if. Get over yourselves!
25
Where can I find the ad for the Musée de l'Homme ? It doesn't show up anywhere.
2
"Alas, I’m not sure any of them (50-year old women) will be waiting."
Oh yes, they will. In quantity.
2
And an opposite example of maturity and capacity to love is found in this Sunday’s Vows article.
6
M. Moix has committed the unforgiveable sin of stating explicitly a fact both widely known and widely resented - that aging men who can still obtain the sexual favors of women through some combination of appearance, personality, wealth, prestige and raw power prefer younger women because sex with young women reassures them they are as strong as they once were and will never die, and because it allows them to believe that they are the dominant partner. This is hardly original with the script of Moonstruck; the accumulation of harems and the search for virility drugs is as old as recorded history. Women of a certain age have always resented this preference and ridiculed it among themselves. Social media now allows them to broadcast their resentment and ridicule to the world and pelt Moix with the equivalent of dead cats and road apples.
19
Serious Question: Why should any of us women care that we are invisible to Monsieur Moix, or care that he feels the pathological need to garner attention by announcing it? Really I would like to know. I have a life to live now thx.
25
I am sorry but women in their 40s and 50s are not attractive.
4
Sexy=fertility I have heard from many friends over 50 that it is a relief to be freed of the fertility. Vive la vie!
6
I was so bummed to learn that I am too old to be attractive! I am a late bloomer and only discovered my sexual desire/power in my mid-forties. It's been an exquisite awakening. I've never felt sexier, more confident, and am having more creative, passionate sex than at any other time in my life. I've recently noticed that I catch men's eye -- that they make eye contact or nod or flirt. I must be delusional. How disappointing!
23
Well, we previously learned that Frenchwomen don’t have to diet.
So if Moix doesn’t believe that Frenchwomen aged 50 and older are still attractive, could it just be the Lord’s way of leveling the playing field? [yes/s]
1
Women, like men, regret their aging and mortality. We often feel younger than we look despite exercise, healthy diets, good health (if we're lucky), nice clothes, make-up or even botox plus. President Trump, no good role model for much, said he feels 35 at 70! What self-delusion! When I was younger I hated male attention, and how I couldn't walk down the street, or sit alone in a coffee shop, a park, or bar without sexual harassment. I couldn't wait to be invisible. Now I'm sixty and actually happy not to suffer harassment, but sorry that my body has changed while my mind plays with time like scales on a piano. I think women need more role models of women who are respected and beloved not because of their looks. Unless he's playing James Bond, who cares what men look like? The person you love is sexy. I think women are confused about the third act; we may be attractive and sexually active, but we're not reaching for some good ring of the male gaze. Who cares? Let's try to grow up and older with grace and joy! Forget about the pathetic old boys who can only do it with women younger than their daughters.
28
What’s interesting is that being an elder writer of novels still has enough cachet in France to attract young women in the first place. I don’t think such a person would be as successful in America. ‘Oh did you write the DaVinci Code?’ followed by cold disinterest or even disdain is more likely to happen here.
4
Well, the writer has succeeded in creating dialog!
What interesting reaction (in France) and comments to the NYT.
Guess as long as we keep interviewing celebrities about who they are, rather than engaging with them on how they do what captivates us (or the work/results of their endeavor), we'll keep on being horrified, mystified, puzzled and dizzy. Guess celebrities are people too. Just like us.
Moix's story may be complicated by the fact that his latest book appears to deal with the recurring grief to him from his preferences. So perhaps it is hard to discuss his book without discussing him.
But should we start tossing the Aristotle, Socrates, etc.? Wouldn't they and their cohort have put the scene in the Catholic church to shame?
1
I dated women in their mid-late 30s when I was in my 20s. They were past the neurotic search for husbands and a Cinderella future and they were into me for me, not for my money or status which I had neither of. That their bodies weren’t identical to 20-something women didn’t matter at all.
I still think women older than me have a lot of appeal, even though I’m now in my 50s.
I’d have to guess that some aspect of why men as a group tend to prefer younger women is just a function of evolutionary biology — they can bear children and this instinctual drive probably contributes something to their sex drive.
The loss of this instinct with the onset of menopause likely contributes to many older men not finding as many peer age partners as interested in sex as they are. Older women are having less sex because their own biology has made it less of an imperative, it’s not just that men are shunning them.
5
American women (and some men) may feel more offended than their European counterparts by preferences of an influential man that wilfully embraces double-standards. Europeans seem to have healthier/more natural interpersonal relations, in general, than we have and this ALLOWS them to be more tolerant of minor transgressions, inconsistencies and other offenses. We try (with limited success) to use rules, regulations and moral codes to protect the interests of all individuals while being blind to the signficant, collective oppression that we suffer under (in comparison to many others). Our senses of liberation provided by our social rules and other PCisms are band-aids for our country's dehumanizing conditions. For instance, why are we allowed to see sex in movies and TV ONLY between attractive young people? Watch a foreign movie or series and you'll see intimacy between normal people. In Anerica, THIS is taboo. Our film idols have to be on a pedestal so high that 95% of hard-working, spendthrifty Americans could never reach it. Our ultra-consumer society is both highly sexualized and puritanical; it's a complicated, driving force behind our ecomomy's productivity and consumption. A more natural and ordinary relationship with sex (and other nonmaterial offerings of life) would probably put our econony into a tail-spin.
5
what Druckerman fails to grasp is that this is not about the physical appearance of women - this is about Moix's ego and his need to feed it. sadly, these women play his game as if he can decide their worth based on his perception of their appearance. Where have I seen this before? everywhere. How this is construed as a phenomenon of French culture is confusing. what Druckerman doesnt know about French culture is a lot.
10
Bimaturation is the word I was searching for. Human genders have unequal rates of physical, mental, and sexual maturation. Sexual maturity plateaus at different points as well. We've managed to match most of the gender mismatch through social engineering. Not always to the benefit of the female party obviously. However, we're essentially looking at the real world result of imperfect evolution.
Our clocks and winding keys aren't exactly perfectly aligned. We got close but there's only so much nature can do.
1
Is it about age? "Asian" usually means thin. Young often means thin. When I use Tinder, about 50% of the slender women are Asian. It might be more acceptable to say "younger" or "Asian" than to say "thin."
I have a thing for gingers. Is that equally deplorable? It's a superficial physical characteristic. If I tell someone, I'm crazy about redheads, they sometimes think it's cute. If I say I like thin women, they sometimes get angry. I'm 25% ginger. Does that make it more acceptable? Is being into redheads acceptable, because, at times, gingers have been a marginalized class (people made fun of their freckles in grade school).
2
Mr. Moix is offensive, not because he prefers younger women, but because his over all attitude towards women diminishes them as human beings. By dismissing older women as not "worthy" of his attention, he has objectified women to the point of them being a commodity for his short term pleasure, rather than full fledged human beings. It is not surprising he appears to have scant success with long term relationships. He seems to be trapped in his own adolescent mind.
20
One rule about dating at any age in in Loa Angeles is - no actresses.
2
A younger body may be firmer and the lines more aesthetically appealing, but I know the older body moves and feels and knows pleasure better. I know that, at 44, I have and bring way more sexual pleasure than I did at 22.
So, leaving out the facts of love and attraction to the “person,” I’d still take an older body than a younger body. Ughhh, men in their 20’s can be delightful, but kind of tiresome.
17
I don't agree. I've had two quasi long-term relationships with women in their fifties. Wow. What an experience. I couldn't get enough of them. And I'm a visual artist, very attuned to how things look.
However, I must say, in my current age group of single women (59-68), that is not the case at all. Maybe <5% are attractive. The rest, forgettable, and that includes me.
8
You have humor and insight.
1
Whatever.
After a few years of marriage, it doesn't matter anyway. What almost everyone wants, more than anything else, is love, affection, and companionship. A person to share life with.
Sex moves from being an end-in-itself, to being the means-to-an-end. The End being to strengthen bonds of shared life.
Tolstoy had the best view of marriage ever (even if he didn't live it). The purpose of marriage is to liberate each other to grow -- emotionally, spiritually, socially, or intellectually. And by growing, our families and communities are enriched. We become trees that bear good fruit.
Poor Mr. Moix is trapped in the first stage of pleasure seeking adolescence, while his body and brain have aged to adulthood.
50
@Karen
Great synopsis. But I think you're overlooking some inherent gender differences. In terms of sexual relations (and, in general, of course), women are initially motivated more by quality than quantity - and it's the other way around for men. Ideally (imo), both genders will become enlightened by the other side to see it also the other way... sort of a convergence.
3
Moix is right only in the sense that both men and women in their 40's and 50's should not delude themselves into thinking that they have the youthful grace and beauty of a teenager, despite getting plastic surgery, etc., and his observation may be part of French culture pertaining to growing old because De Gaulle once said essentially, who are we kidding "old age is a shipwreck."
1
Yes, they should embrace an older grace that wisdom makes alluring.
6
I didn't think this column would lead to so much commentary, because, really, who cares what he thinks?
But I'm glad I came back to it and read through many of them because it does seem like there's a healthy change taking place in how both men and women see themselves and each other, at least as stated here.
One of the greatest gifts to self is self worth and self respect. Not arrogance or superiority but a value that allows for living your life with some sense of peace. Because from that place of peace you are able to treat others accordingly.
And clearly we've seen recently how much how urgently we need that right now.
20
This has always been the dichotomy. Women who have "looks" are told that they are cheap if they use it to get ahead of their sisters. Yet, when men no longer come a calling, the complaint is that age and looks should not matter. Why not admit we are humans and we desire youth and beauty.
9
Physical beauty attracts.
Intellectual beauty sustains.
27
Best column of the week by far. Especially that last paragraph. Bravo Ms. Druckerman!
5
Three songs come to mind:
"Jealousy" (Natalie Merchant)
"Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend" (perf. by Marilyn Monroe)
"39 and Holding" (Jerry Lee Lewis)
Enjoy. ;-)
1
Let’s face it. The only reasons young women sleep with older men are that they have money, fame and/or some daddy issues. They want something from them.
Men have the same saggy bodies, strange bumps, odd hair growths and wrinkles that women get. They just like to delude themselves that they are still young and sexy, and are actually attractive to young people just for themselves. Sad.
49
You have a sad view. There are men I their 50s and 60s who are healthy and fit. I’m on my 60s, 5’10 160 - a middleweight athlete and my girlfriend is 47. She’s as attractive and for as she was when we met 7 years ago and kids about her aging. She’s independent and money plays no role in our relationship.
7
@Stephen
So you think... unless you know you have none.
5
The Trump Era has given us a new “Me Too” movement where males young (recent smirking MAGA boys tormenting a Native American vet) and old (say, Moix) feel empowered to publicly and triumphantly announce to The World: “when it comes to being a douchebag—ME TOO!”)
They may, due to internet trolling, “evolve”.
But, like herpes, the internet is forever.
29
Not racist but prefers Asian women in their 20s. No, nothing racist about that. It’s hard to keep reading when the makes these two statements back to back. Sorry, but Orientalist sexual preferences exist because of and due to racism and sexism.
29
This comes across as a ploy from a man trying to draw attention to himself as such a sexy stud that, even at his age, just droves of women send him pictures of themselves to entice him.
Really? We have only his word for it. Especially since, at least in the photo here, he isn't particularly attractive. Kind of a gnome.
Attention seeking and pathetic on his part, or to quote another loser, one DJT - "So Sad".
20
If Mr. Moix and like minded men had to endure the scrutiny and derision heaped upon women about their bodies they would be curled up in the fetal position in their darkened bedrooms, sucking their thumbs. They are the poster boys of male snowflakes. They don't realize one of the most attractive thing in either females or males is when they are comfortable with themselves physically and mentally.
32
Smells like a promotional stunt to boost the sales of his next book. Nothing new here folks; men have mostly acquitted themselves as shallow idiots. But if Moix’s indiscretion leads to French women finally having a real #MeToo moment — right on!
22
Good to know that if I were to tweet something like what Moix says about 'mature' women, I might receive pictures featuring their butts and breasts.
Sorry to 'say' that I am nearing 70 and I don't tweet or know how I could; don't know Instagram from Telegram; ain't 'on' Facebook -- and don't know how to take or view pictures using my flip phone.
(But if mature women 'out there' who are age-appropriately 'preserved' can find me somehow, consider this as your incentive: I look younger than Moix, and am so much better-looking than he that words sufficient to gauge or demonstrate the distinction between his at-best ordinary 'looks' and my extraordinary and continuing 'beauty' escape me.)
15
As Chris Rock once said, “You know that guy at the club? He’s not *old* but he’s s *little* too old for the club...”
Yeah, Moix is that guy.
38
My late partner, who died 4 years ago at age 90, was the kind of man whom many women might overlook. Tall, dark and handsome he was not. What he did bring to our happy 30-year relationship was a sense of humor, a zest for life and acceptance of me as I was (though occasionally he did remark-- "I don't know about you!).
If I had focused on appearance, I would have missed out on the love of my life and the best years of that life.
42
Simple - ageing is is not selective, it happens to us all. Pretty soon Moix will be a has-been who can’t pull the 25 yr olds any more. In fact, it’s already happening by his account. He’s desperate by the sounds. Nobody will remember his name and justice will be served. You reap what you sow. All power to the beauty and wisdom of age.
18
@Southern Girl
>> Nobody will remember his name and justice will be served.
Wow. How is that justice, and was is the crime ... the way his genetics was constituted? And what if your prediction is wrong and he finds someone who he cares about long-term, or who cares about him?
The idea that one reaps what they so seems to be as lazy as any religion, that justice or right always prevails. Most mature people know it doesn't, and many understand these concepts themselves are flawed or need a lot more critical thinking.
Your idea somehow makes all aged person's the recipient of some kind of "judgement", but by your own words we all either age or die?
As one commenter here very wisely pointed out, "They hate the male gaze but even more when it ends."
Brilliant. That sums it all up.
20
@Truth Sayer
You're right, but you don't know it. If one feels one's self-worth is defined by superficialities such as looks, it's painful when it comes to an end, even if one resented it all along. Both the longing for acceptance and the resentment of being judged superficially to gain acceptance make sense. However, there are plenty of us who have at least attempted not to live our lives in either longing for or resentment of the "male gaze."
Your unkind remark is exactly the sort of thing we know to look for, and avoid, in a man. It marks you as the kind of jerk a self-respecting woman knows to avoid entanglement with.
Ultimately, we feel sorry for you, because you're missing out on a lot, and you have only snarky nastiness to enjoy in its place.
12
Older men who don't understand that many younger women are attracted by their money and position are naïve and a bit ridiculous.
25
@bhs
>> Older men who don't understand that many younger women are attracted by their money and position are naïve and a bit ridiculous.
What about women who think because of all the attention they get from men when they are young come to the belief there is something special about them that will always be there, or that they are entitled to judge others based on their needs or prejudices.
There's plenty of naiveté and ridiculousness to go around for everyone in an absurd world that is on a self-destuctive path mostly because it refuses to think about things based on science or social justice?
2
Now you’ve opened another topic. Young women in their 20s and even 30s are often vapid and mindless on average unless they are accomplished. Waking up with stupid with a good body is sad.
7
Doesn't he own a razor? The guy looks about 60 right now. I guess there isn't a lack of brain-mouth disconnect in other countries, too.
12
Why should anyone with half a brain care what an immature loser thinks about the value of women based on their bodies?
22
Down with the evil Matriarchy! Down with the evil #metoo! And if it needs to start with fat, old, post-menopausal cougars, so be it. Your insanity regarding men, particularly straight white men is over.
4
How sad that at middle age Mr. Moix doesn’t appear to know how fantastic sex is with a deep, abiding love of partner ... that grows over time. I hope he can settle down and find out what time tested love really is.
4
@Hortencia
That can happen, but it does seem like the exception rather than the rule, and I doubt anyone is happen to see the physical deterioration and aging of themselves or their partners.
2
No one else finds it weird when 25 year old women find 50 year old men sexually attractive? Moix made the mistake of being too honest. However, if we're really sitting down on the shrink's couch, things tend to get weird pretty fast. The weirdness certainly does not belong to men alone.
And anyway, there is a biological explanation for why men don't find 50 to be the new 30. It's called menopause. Our sexual instincts, male and female, are hardwired around fertility. Your bum or your breasts don't actually matter that much. Most men are lucky to get laid at all by the time they're 50. Not everyone ages like George Clooney.
That's why humans developed cultural solutions to biological problems. We can think of marriage somewhat like a mating ritual. A legally binding social commitment that extends beyond the posterior. The contract works both ways. Everyone gets at least most of what they want. Hopefully.
Systems like these are not strictly cultural either. We find variations among all the great apes. Actually, you'll find a social structure accompanying sexuality and aging in any species. The humble mallard duck is a wonderful example. Humans are simply the only species dumb enough to analyze the structure. There are some things you don't want to know too much about.
8
@Andy
> Everyone gets at least most of what they want. Hopefully.
And like all compromises everyone is supposed to feel equally unsatisfied? ;-)
@Andy it depends 100% on the man. you don't think 25 year old women don't find 50 year old Tom Cruise attractive ? of course they do
1
Reminds of old folkwisdom, updated for here:
If people suspect you're an ageist bigot
better to keep silent, let them wonder
than open your yap, remove all doubt
8
It is a shocking thing to consider, but I wonder sometimes if the French value external beauty even more than Americans do.
It is easy to come up with a list of all the ways France is better than the U.S., but on something like this, they may be a bit worse.
Not to say that the Americans are doing well on this, only to say that the French may be doing worse.
5
This is NYT click bait. No one cares who attracts Mr. Moix. I’ll bet Catherine Deneuve doesn’t care. And Mary Beard surely doesn’t care. Humans who have evolved to use their brains beyond their primitive instincts are more discerning in their choice of partners.
12
Mr. Moix will be lucky if he ever sleeps with anyone in France, ever again.
22
How shallow and pitiful can you get, while perpetually locked in an 18 year old’s hormonal mindset. He and our Fake President should become pen pals.
20
For an intellectual, Mr Moix doesn't sound very smart, just glandular.
22
From his picture, I can see that Mr Mox is not Lancelox and therefore should not tweet " C'est Moix", "C'est Moix", "C'est Moix".
Moix mocks the Woman and the Woman mocks Moix!
5
Men in their late forties and older have ‘issues’ in bed. Often a younger woman is what they need to ‘get going’. They’re not 19, so athough they have a sex drive, the have problems going the distance. They need more visual stimulation.
Frankly I find Mr. Moix unattractive and would prefer someone much younger than him.
Who cares if he wants a twenty year old? I would venture to guess a lot of them have no interest in him.
5
Good god - absolutely hysterical.
I am supposed to be concerned about the opinion of a man of a certain age who only sleeps with 20 yr old Asian women( a slightly weird sexual fetish) because he finds them and them only attractive.
I do not care what this individual's opinions are nor am I concerned about them.
He and his opinions are of no import.
7
ah Paris ! - “Where man may live in direst need, but ne’er lack land to set his seed”
...
'I thought the girls of the 'twenties were rather dazzling.' ... 'Absolute piffle, my dear man. No idea. Spent half your life getting their legs open. Other half wishing you hadn't. Either that. Catching the clap off some tart. Dog's life. Don't know how we stood it.'
- John Fowler, The Ebony Tower.
3
Someone mentioned "moonstruck" for the great scene with olympia dukakis and john mahoney? priceless! go back even further to the terrific young and handsome michael caine, in "alfie". caine is a heartless cad, callously dumping one woman after another, even thr mother of his own baby. the end sers him dumped...for getting older. "what's it all about" indeed!
3
Feel free to send me those pics! Women in their 50's, 60's on are awesome.
When will these guys just close their mouths when a stupid thought hits them. Hmmm...then they couldn't eat huh.
7
Who cares what this guy thinks? Why get defensive about it? It is his opinion only. And he likes Asian women? Ugh.
7
Wonder how much he pays for his 20 somethings, he looks on the geezer side
12
Older women, are beautiful lovers
Older women, they understand
I've been around some, and I have discovered
That older women know just how to please a man
Everybody seems to love those younger women
From eighteen on up to twenty-five
Well I love 'em too, but I'm tellin' you
Learnin' how to really love, takes a little time
Older women, are beautiful lovers
Older women, they understand
I've been around some, and I have discovered
That older women know just how to please a man
So baby, don't you worry about growin' older
Those young girls ain't got nothin' on you
'Cause it takes some livin', to get good at givin'
And givin' love is just where you could teach them a thing or two
Older women, are beautiful lovers
Older women, they understand
I've been around some, and I have discovered
That older women know just how to please a man
3
I feel sorry for the pathetic erotic life of Mr. Moix. He has been colonized by mass media. Poor thing.
4
Moix and Houellebecq are stunningly decrepit by today's standards of male beauty at a certain age, which makes their (and many similarly pulchritude challenged men's) seeming entitlement to young, sexually attractive women all the more jarring.
16
I for one, would welcome French women over 50 sending me pictures of their bottoms and breasts. Why, I'd have no objections at all.
I would do this as an acknowledgement of the eternal beauty of the most magnificent of God's creations: Woman. And to thank France for helping us out during the American Revolution. It's the least I can do.
Actually women of any nationality may apply. As far as age range...I think 50 is juuuust about right. As is 40, 45, 60 and all stops in between. 35 is acceptable, but 30 might be just a little too young. Frankly there are women over 70 who have knocked my socks off.
Now, am I an old geezer in a rest home, pushing 95, just looking for kicks? Mai Non! I am a young geezer just a bit north of the picky Mr. Moix.
I would tell him - had he the wisdom to hear - that there is so much more to a woman than looks, and far more to attractiveness than physical beauty. Your outcomes will be as superficial as your criteria, mon ami.
Go ahead and flame him, ladies, he deserves it. And hold your heads high! You're all beautiful.
13
The fact that he is French says it all. How could those sophisticated women get so wound up by him. Besides he is so wrong. Once an Asian women is over 15 or 16 her body is no longer attractive.
1
@Rich
I'm afraid, Rich, at 15 or 16 they are not "women" they are girls.
3
Dude it is the same for women. Fifty year old male
bodies like yours are just not hot. From the belly fat to the reduced muscle mass and I won't say more to keep it clean...twenty five year old men are something else. Washboards etc. And 25 year old women have zero interest in your old body...I am closer to your age and I do not....so good luck with the paid arrangements
17
@jane allen but do 25 year old men want 50 year old women ? they dont
4
Until the day he died, at 62, my grandfather thought my grandmother was the most beautiful woman on the planet. They had met as teenagers and were married for 40 years when he passed away.
Real men know what and who they have, and appreciate that person. Men like Yann Moix have missed the point of relationships, love, and appreciation of one’s partner entirely. Ladies, life is short: don’t waste yours on idiot men like Yann Moix. If you want to be in a relationship, find a man who thinks you’re beautiful and treats you with respect and appreciation. Anything else is a serious waste of your valuable time and valuable life.
9
We may care about an important moment for Frenchwomen, but we American readers of the Times don't really care about the views of some French man, who may enjoy the esteem of some French people, but is still just some French guy. It's clear the author has mistaken our interest, because the French guy is still the butt of the punch line at the end. Also, all the dreary reader comments are of no interest, which is perhaps a better gauge of whether the piece is apropos.
An opinion piece, like all journalism, should tend toward the truth, a truth which we can recognize as readers and respond to as citizens.
Please do report this tide of opinion if the French guy runs for national office on a sexist and ageist platform. Then we can dispatch our president for a summit.
Possibly the editor overlooked a good dig at the "Musée de l’Homme" so-called.
1
PD once again turns gossip into gold (or at least pocket money to finance her afternoon teas with the ladies) -- nice work if you can get it!
if PD could break out of her Parisian bobo echo chamber long enough to do some investigative reporting, she might earn some street cred and wider readership.
en attendant, we'll just munch her macarons, i guess.
5
It's such a tired old story. I hope Moix's writing is not as shallow as he is. I'm not about to find out by reading any of it.
7
What Mr Moix was careful not to mention is the waning desire for sex that post menopausal women experience. Why would a man be attacked to a woman that no longer has a passion for sexual intimacy?
1
Oh please. The fact that this man's stunted development is even discussed sets women back eons. The fact that 25 y/o women think there is true love to be had with a man with truly nothing deep and abiding to offer does not bode well for them either.
Moving on. So sorry for you, Mr. Moix (rhymes with "box.") You have no idea who many evolved women AND men find you to be nothing more than a punch line. And a ridiculously, stereotyped bad joke at that. Thanks for the laugh.
8
You would think a French man would know better!
5
"An entire demographic doesn't exist to me, because yuck."
-Yann Moix
And no wonder people are disgusted with this decrepit dude!
16
I just can't see why any 25 year old woman would want to sleep with this guy.
17
@ls
He's famous and probably rich. Women are hard wired to go for alpha males.
@ls money and fame
Part of the problem this poor Man is experiencing is likely as a result of excessive masturbatory habits involving "teen" and/or "Asian" porn.
While being attracted to youth and beauty is sure natural; access to the sight of any permutation of female form in seconds has resulted in a rash of sensory overload in many many men. The effects vary. In Yann's case, he cannot have an actual, meaningful, loving & sexual relationship with a Female. Perhaps it was an "Asian" porn site that dug the initial groove, or perhaps he just used it excessively to reinforce the groove. But once it becomes a bona fide fetish: it will eclipse the possibility of anything else ever satisfying.
He has boxed himself into a narrow corner. It is sad.
7
This writer Monsieur Moix should pronounce his name as it should be pronounced « mwah » but it French that would sound exactly like « moi » meaning Me. But that would reveal his narcissism much quicker than he’d wish. I live in France and when I see a 50-60 year old man parading with a 25 year old Asian lady I think to myself ‘monsieur has no game’
12
The only caveat to bedding down 20 somethings , aside from their obvious better looks, is you wind up being a babysitter afterward.
7
Memo to 20-year-old French women: M. Moix wants you for one and only one thing, and it isn’t your thoughts, your intelligence, your accomplishments. Why, why would that be of interest to you?
12
Hilarious words from someone who looks like one of those artificial shrunken heads people used to hang from their rear-view mirrors.
16
this is a silly man who is doomed to repeat his silly behavior until he is left all alone, in his nicely appointed but musty flat, having to pay for someone to cuddle with him while she files her nails behind his sagging back.
8
Sorry, but why is he considered an “intellectual”? He sounds rather stupid to me, and I have no interest in buying anything he writes.
12
For someone so smart, so talented, so well-educated etc. etc., Mr. Moix is amazingly dumb.
6
Boy, does this clown miss the point. There is simply no age at which a beautiful woman is not beautiful. As long as one understands that beauty-- and this is true of men and women - is a miraculous admixture of body and soul. Or that sex, at its best, is a gift of one's beauty to another's. An amazing invitation into the body of a person who, at least for a moment, loves you enough to extend that invitation. And, in shared orgasm, a momentary obliteration of the selves sufficient to allow one soul to briefly touch another.
To rank beauty by age is idiotic. To do so by race is, self-evidently, racist. To do either is to reduce all women to nothing but vessels of one's own desire. Which is to say, nothing at all.
M. Moix's narrow, masturbatory vision of feminine beauty is so limited, so sad. It is as if he has been placed in a profuse garden, and chosen not to see, to smell, to touch anything but himself. He misses everything.
15
What has the expression "falling in love" got to do with it? Love, surely, has to do with more than breasts and bottoms. What Moix is saying is that he lusts after young, attractively firm bodies - preferably Asian because he seems to think them less uppity than young European women. If that means more to him than a loving relationship, one can only pity him.
6
When will it dawn on aging men that they are just as unattractive as the women they despise.
24
Monsieur Moix looks awful, older than his 50 years, with a lined face. He needs to escape his own age. This is why he is seeking out real young girls who do not know better.
7
I would have no problem with this French writer’s attractions to young women if he just happened to have fallen in love with a young woman by chance. Or if, perhaps, he was keen to start a family.
But his whole attitude is slimy. He can only maintain a relationship for ‘a few months’ he says? This is not just about an attraction to younger women, but betrays a consumerist, player-type attitude to women.
This ‘player’ and seducer lifestyle, in turn, can easily shade into predatory relationships that leave damaged women in their wake (this is part of #metoo, isn’t it?).
I don’t believe a promiscuous lifestyle is morally acceptable, especially when involving people a quarter century younger than you. If someone has to be promiscuous they should at least choose to do this with their equals, or with people who are very clearly and obviously in the game — people like prostitutes and swingers.
I wrote an earlier comment on the predatory nature of this man’s comments, but I think I was too passionate and it will not make it past the censors.
~
Too add to this, some seemingly predatory relationships can actually be more benign than a powerful man with baggage churning through tender young women. I know a handful of couples where the wife was what might have been called “mail-order bride” at one time. But through love and care, these unbalanced relationships became solid and productive (producing children and small businesses, etc). But what is this Frenchman creating?
1
Do Frenchwomen feel the same about husbands with young mistresses. It is France after all.
Yes, like he said himself, he is doomed.
Because the day will come when he is so old that cute young things will find him to be a lecherous old man (unless he is rich).
And then he will have no one.
4
The dude likes young Asian women. So what? The heart wants what the heart wants. For whatever reason. Maybe he does have “issues”. Maybe he doesn’t. Who cares? The truth about love between a man and a women will never be known. Let’s all take a deep breath and move on. Nothing to see here.
5
@Mickey Nowak
"The heart wants what the heart wants" - You're quoting Woody Allen to us on this? Nuff said.
8
Big deal! Moix should have kept his mouth shut, but taste is taste, and there's no point in arguing about it: de gustibus non disputandum est. The women he says he doesn't like should stop sending him photos: who do they think they are? Anthony Weiner? One problem with social media is that they make it easy to say a lot of things that don't need to be said.
3
Sending Mr. Moix the photos of bottoms and breasts is exactly the wrong kind of response. A woman's charm, and man's for that matter, is not only in optics. It is the whole nine yard of intellect, self confidence, savoir-faire and wisdom collected through age. If certain men fail to acknowledge that richness, it's their loss not ours.
6
Here is my question...how did the last name Moix become “Mox” and not “Mwah”? In France, no less?!?? He certainly is all about “me”, though...
4
I’ll stand ready to do my part. Send the 50+ French women to me.
5
The French are so unAmerican to care about silly things like sexuality and lust of life. Of (exiled by Napoleon) Madame Germaine de Staël (née Necker, 1766-1817), Benjamin de Constant, novelist, diarist and one of her financially dependent lovers among many, wrote in a fit of pique of the woman then in her thirties - the ridiculous spectacle of a woman who does not know her age. Her grand décolletage, baring fleshy arms and ruddy expanses of neck and bosom; her turbans and birds of paradise feathers; her loud voice; her incessant fidgeting; her utter lack of self consciousness. Behind her back she's a figure of ridicule... Plus ca change...
But where are the clowns
Send in the clowns
Don't bother, they're here
6
As a woman approaching 70 I would say to Mr. Moix: stop dying your hair, stop having your eyebrows shaped, and get rid of your facial stubble and expensive suits, and then let's see how attractive you are...
10
RE: Mr. Moix (it rhymes with “box”)
Sorry to be a stickler but Moix rhymes with "wax". At least, that's how he and the French pronounce his name.
I used to watch Moix on the "On n'est pas couché" TV show with the genial Laurent Ruquier, where Moix critically commented on guests' books, movies, or shows. He appears very smart and knowledgeable, but, no surprise, quite arrogant. Moix himself wrote a couple of prized novels and even made a commercially successful movie.
2
So, if I say insulting things about 50-year old Frenchwomen, they'll send me pictures of their bottoms and breasts. Why didn't I think of this before?
1
If a woman over 50 wanted to sleep with 25 year old boys I could care less.....I wouldn't get my shorts in a bunch. Same difference.
3
Men must age quicker in France. This guy looks like an American 65-Year old.
10
This is an author with a book to sell. His remarks were intended to bring him widespread notoriety - which it did - and help sell his tedious writings.
5
I just find it amusing when men like Mr. Moix say things like that. Seriously, have you guys looked in the mirror? The only reason younger women sleep with you is money or fame. Or both. (Looking at you too, trump)
8
"... he prefers to sleep with Asian women in their twenties...." Sleep is clearly the wrong verb here, though it's used and confused all the time. He prefers to... ahem, yes, you know... enter the darkness and musk delight of Asian women in their twenties first, then possibly, exhausted, spent, they sleep. But sleep is surely not the main thrust of the matter. Throw away the prudish language, please, that we may say just what we mean, do what we do. Thank you.
2
I wish women wouldn't get so defensive about statements by men like Moix. It just makes things worse. Sometimes it's better to just let arrogant and stupid opinions and comments hang out there for everyone to see and brush past. Women don't need to point out that men like Moix are jerks; the men do that all by themselves.
6
Moix admits - he fears aging and rejects older women due to these insecurities and fears. Perhaps he should quit wasting women's time, and adopt a ( non-judgmental ) dog!
2
Ha! As if they know a woman’s age!
What nonesense.
2
In LA, there is a recent trend going on about dating Asian females. Asian females tend to be quite, submissive, and overtly "cute" and they have fallen into the trap of White dominance. White men prefer Asian women because they are submissive. It is all about power-play.
5
What is blowing my mind is how anybody with somewhat sensible priorities ever thought “l’affaire Yann Moix” was “une affaire” to begin with and much less something that should make it into a serious news outlet. The English paper The Guardian spent an article and two opinion pieces on the dating preferences of this 50 year-old French writer, who I bet a fortune on, not many English have ever heard of. Now the NYT follows suit – not because any American previously knew of the guy either - and publishes an opinion piece that is, no surprise here, prefaced with a juicy quote from the aging Romeo (if the NYT wanted to make the point it pretends to make, it would have quoted one of the countless women mentioned in the article). The world is full of shallow, misogynist losers, if we could just stop giving them a megaphone, the world would be a much better place already.
7
Why are we giving this sad, middle-aged Frenchman the power to decide who is attractive or not? Someone needs to show his picture to Asian women in their twenties and ask them if they find him attractive. I bet their answer would be NON.
10
They hate the male gaze but even more when it ends.
11
@DaveD very well put. You are right.
2
OMG! Stop the press.
At the time of marriage, these couples' ages were:
Trumps: Donald-59; Melania-35
Mnuchins: Steven-54; Louise Linton-36
Marshalls: J. Howard-89; Anna Nicole Smith-26
de Gaulle: Charles-31; Yvonne-20
Is this the first time French women have heard of this phenomena?
@JAR
Macrons: Emmanuel-30; Brigitte-54
1
Number 1, don't buy his books. Two, it is curious that he prefers young Asian women. Whose bodies often are so slim, so lithe, so underdeveloped that they almost look like boys. Interesting thought, no?
9
To each is own.
i'm a 50 year old woman and what shocks me the most is that the NY Times thinks this man's particular misogyny, as expressed in his idiosyncratic if also somewhat cliched sexual preferences, are somehow worth writing about for a mass anglophone audience who will surely not know his work--the journalist even needs to tell us how to pronounce his name, since none of us will know it. Who cares that this guy has problems, obviously with himself, and lacks self-esteem? It's not my problem, and nor is it the problem of other women. What's a problem is the idea that his bias must be dealt with, worried over, and discussed in a forum like this newspaper. it's embarrassing, really. There is no reason for any American woman to read about, or be concerned with, his hangups.
9
A silly man trying to sell books.
9
As a 52 year old woman, I am devastated that Monsieur Moix does not find women over 50 sexually attractive because my highest aspiration in life is to be desired by an ageist misogynist. Sigh...oh, well...
19
By the time we are 50, our selfless pleaser days are over...
Its our turn, and thats what those selfish old males don't like...sharing.
Come on Mr. sad French writer, get on down there!
Rhythms with Moix ; )
5
I’ll take all the photos your little hearts desire!!!
1
When people say stupid things along the lines of those uttered by Mr. Moix, one is left scratching their head and asking how did they develop such a ridiculous sense of who they are. Secondly, any one with a modicum of sense would refrain from making such an idiotic preference public. Who cares that this 50 years old (man) prefers 20 yer old (woman). Last point, since most 20 year old woman are not the least bit interest in men his age, you are left wondering what sort of tactics a person such as this employees.
1
Lol. He's one little man, and a disordered arrested adolescent at that. Who cares about his opinion? He's short, 51 years old (and looks every day of it), he has an old man body, bags under his eyes, long ears and saggy neck skin with bits of hair in his chest. He does know he's old, right? Has he looked in a mirror? Any 20-year-old sleeping with this man only wants one thing, and it's not his body or mind. My friends and I are looking at photos of this man online and laughing. Not one of he thinks he's attractive. Our advice to French women? Ignore this vile little human man.
PS: Tinder is a source for this article? You guys are aware that it's a hook-up app, right?
7
@Misplaced Modifier
That article was about the women he finds attractive.
He's not alone. There are data. You could look it up.
1
Wow! Mr Moix better look in the mirror. If I were in my twenties, I would not want to date Mr Moix, much less jump into bed with him!
3
And men over 50? Uhh..ahem! At least 50ish women don’t have those problems!
4
Come on now, Pamela. I usually enjoy your work, but you have buried the lead and missed the mark here. What defines these differential, gendered, and oppressive constructs of beauty? Hello, patriarchy? And how can you proclaim that Mr Moix is not racist in the same paragraph that announces he is only attracted to young Asian women? These things must be called out.
6
The richest and most royal men in the world do not seem to hold a woman's age against her!!
Chacun a son gout! In matters of taste there is no discussion. Frankly, I have found many Asian women completely unsexual/nonsensuous. Womanly yes; sexy, no.
1
18 and 50...hmmm...says something about what both sexes are really after, eh?
But Mr. Moix, why would a twenty-five year old woman want you?
4
WOW! We could use some of this introspective sex humor in the USA.
Yea, France
Too funny. Why would any young woman want to do sex with this aging gentleman? Just for the money? Oh, I get it. He thinks he is God's gift to women. OK. Let's check his small hands. Pictures, please.
2
Suppose he said something thoughtful, intelligent and sensible. None of us would ever hear of him.
In modern news, an intelligent person must be extraordinary and brilliant before he is worthy of remark. How so ever , if a regular garden variety ignorant jerk says something outrageous, instant fame becomes his to market as he pleases.
One unchallenged master of this procedure scummed his way into high office crowing stupid nonsense. It appears to be a growth industry with endless opportunities.
6
Please don't call him an 'intellectual'. He is a (minor) writer who looks good on TV, that's about it.
3
My opinions of the attractiveness of the older woman is quite contre de peureux M Moix. It does not lie in the look of breasts or buttocks, but in one's outlook.
Any errors in my French, blame le Google.
3
Cher Monsieur Moix, In my experience your French women compatriots are pretty clear-eyed about sad men like you. One of the first (sexist) jokes I was told by a French woman collegue many years ago was-
A woman wants a man of twenty for “le choc.”
A woman wants a man of thirty for “le chic.”
A woman wants a man of fifty for “le chèque.”
Fortunately, I have met relatively few of your ilk while living here, in fact quite the opposite.
4
A message to Mr. Moix (and other men with similar views and outlooks),
Sorry to burst your “extraordinary” ego bubble BUT…
…like it or not, you are 50 (same as the age of the women you look down upon)
…like it or not, you will continue to age regardless of who you are dating
…like it or not, those younger women that you prefer will also age too
…like it or not, you attraction to younger women as an older man is more likely than not due to your success/fame/wealth as opposed to your having an awesomely “extraordinary” body (and certainly not due to your extraordinarily enlightened outlook)
…like it or not, younger asian women are not menu options designed to cater to your agist and racist preferences of which you claim to be a prisoner of
3
His requirements are rather specific shall we say? When does it go from being a "type" to being a fetish? Are 25 year old Asian women typically attracted to old guys who don't shave enough? He must have something else they want.....
5
Mr. Moix, you’re a sad person and I feel sorry for you but please keep your preferences to yourself. Most people don’t care.
4
Mr. Moix sounds, to this silver-haired woman’s ear, like a pig. A “peeg,” if I use my best French accent. Next.
7
Why are older women getting in a tizzy?
For a 50-y/o man to categorically imply that women His Own Age can't possibly be attractive to him, and that he'd rather sleep with an Asian women in her 20s (could that be any more cliche or misogynistic?) says volumes about him, and how he perceives women and their 'purpose', as a whole. So really, why should anyone care? He's a loser.
8
@Lisa well, you obviously do care because you are getting all worked about it. I guess you are mad that men desire younger women. Well be mad at Mother Nature if you need to be angry!
1
blah, blah, blah
Look into the beauty of the Natural World
and count your blessings and smile at the
true beauty of smiling babies at the market
1
Mr. Moix is no Emmanuel Macron. Vive la France!
1
Reading the comments it seems to me that many writers confuse 'love' and 'lust'. As a woman in my fifties I find that I still have admirers, men of various ages who find me attractive and pay me compliments. But: we do not want to have sex. It is not just the guys, it is me too. The bodies of older men do not exactly make me feel horny. And yet the only man I currently feel attracted to is turning sixty next month. Why? He is not wealthy or powerful. But he has a brilliant mind and a great sense of humor.
As for Mr Moix - I pity him more than the invisible women.
4
“His relationships with younger women often end painfully after a few months, dooming him to a perpetual adolescence. ‘It’s not something enviable, it’s something sad,’ he said on a French talk show.”
Nope. Not sad: obnoxious. Poor baby; he’s a jerk.
9
It is good for older unattached women that a man as shallow as Mr Moix is so honest about who he is. All the better not to be caught up in such a man's web. I feel very sorry, however, for the poor unassuming young women who accommodate his flattery. The folly of youth is what this man preys on.
4
Tell studly that maybe it’s time grow up.
2
In our times this guy's interest is to sell his new book - all else is very secondary. Therefore I take this piece to be a joke on gullible readers among us.
4
Monsieur Box hopefully has some money bc once the smart 30 something Asian women he pursues read about his comments he's going to need more than fame to get a date, and if and when he does find that wonderfully perfect specimen of womanhood it will be just a financial relationship which is fair game.
2
In the 1988 film 'Another Woman', Gena Rowlands, as her character Marion, describes the midlife crisis plainly, and painfully:
"I didn't think anything turning thirty. Everybody said I would. Then they said I'd be crushed turning forty, but they were wrong. I didn't give it a second's thought. Then they said that I'd be traumatized when I hit fifty...
[long pause]...and they were right. I'll tell you the truth, I don't think I've ever recovered my balance since turning fifty."
Man or woman, aren't we all a little like Yann Moix? Either we are furiously peddling backwards trying to stave off the inevitable, or we have given ourselves I.V. infusions of philosophy, tricking ourselves into getting through the day.
How about just letting things...be? Somehow, my WW2-era parents aged gracefully, without a bunch of me-me-me navel gazing.
P.S. And by the way, I would adapt the above movie line accordingly: To me it is 60 that has completely disoriented my own psychic and emotional compass. To paraphrase another movie line with respect to dating, at my age I don't care who they are, just as long as they show up!
2
An aging geezer laments young Asian hotties find him increasingly less enticing no matter how much money he waves in their smooth faces. He bemoans his fading appeal under the guise of wondering if he’ll always be a flittering Peter Pan. Outraged Girls of a Certain Age send him many photos of their gym-toned bums, sculpted triceps and silky décolletage. “Stop!” he protests “I am but a man trying to get out of this life alive!”
This is a story?
Here’s what I know having been a young hottie, much pursued by older men back when dinosaurs roamed Madison Avenue: an older man is briefly attractive because he seems worldly and he’s got a lot of money. Yes, he’s smart, but he’s twice my age. If he has any friends, they’re embarrassed when he brings me around. My girlfriends are having fun with younger men, guys who can rock it out until 4AM then get up and go running before work. They don’t envy my Channel bag; everyone, especially me, understands the trade.
Unlike a well-styled mink (ask me how I got mine), the author isn’t an investment piece and his story of his “struggle” is drivel. There’s no revealed truth in the story of a 25 year old beauty lamenting the drudgery of sex with her 59 year old “boyfriend” and there’s no story here. She’ll soon grow bored with his mechanical pawing. He’ll find her faded at 26. Both will move on without a hiccup. If she’s smart and has any moxy, she’ll grow up, get a real life and find a real man. There’s no hope for him.
8
My guess is that this is all a cover-up and that Monsieur Moix is not attracted to women at all.
1
Who cares? Creepy guy says creepy things. Media reports it.
8
Was it PotUS45 who declared all women over 35 has passed their sell-by date?
Men seeking young flesh causes immense misery to their children and wives. This man, like PotUS45, sounds disgusting. Don't buy their books.
4
"His relationships with younger women often end painfully after a few months, dooming him to a perpetual adolescence." There is the critical phrase. This alleged "public intellectual" (Really? I'm not impressed) is just another lost boy who cannot, will not or has no idea how to grow up. Why anyone would objectively decide to sleep with this objectifier (who I am guessing is also showing the vicissitudes of aging) is beyond me, but at least they know what to expect.
1
Actually - I get it, I've known a handful of men with this malady of always wanting young women. That he prefers Asians is a gross addition. Well - what of it? He's psychologically immature & attracted to that which is out of reach, he himself has admitted he will never be satisfied. Particularly now that young women can see him for what his is - not into them as a person at all, but just some weird projection of them he creates in his brain. It's really very sad - hard to imagine fully respecting such a person - you might admire him intellectually but sexually he's in a trap, he can only admire those who, as he ages, disrespect him more and more. Rather than sending him photos any sane woman should be glad that she never got involved with him. This kind of personality is never able to just be happy with what they have.
3
Mr. Moix is probably right to avoid women of his own age. He would bore them.
7
He doesn’t look like anything to write home about.
5
woe is mr moix, how tragically our hero suffers! cry me a river, Pygmalion.
1
I am in my 50’s. The idea of sex with a 25 year old should scare both of us. I would be scared of my older body disappointing her. She should be scared of her millennial chatter after sex disappointing me.
8
Mr. Moix: what demographic exactly did you think would be buying your book? Certainly not men or younger women. Congratulations - you've managed to alienate an entire group with significant financial resources! No one cares about your sad, repetitive dalliances that go nowhere simply because you're stuck in perpetual adolescence chasing the next piece of young tail. Non, merci!
2
“the last salvos of an erotic masculine power that’s less and less socially acceptable,” the journalist Cécile Daumas wrote in the newspaper Libération this week.
Keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better. Women at 50 can be very attractive. But a fit woman at 25 is going to fire up the engines for more men. This will not change for the foreseable future. Biology=Science!
Men get the long end of the reproductive stick. Guy made a classic gaffe.
A lot of the comment here are silly and unrealistic. Most men are not interested in women once they turn 40. At this point they have lost their beauty. Men prefer younger women who are more beautiful and sexy.
I am seeing a lot of rationalizations. It's just Mother Nature's way. Women are largely desired for their looks and when they fade, they are no longer desired. They still have value of course. Such women can make many contributions to their community and society and to families. They can volunteer.
But it's just a narrow window for women to be attractive - maybe late teens to late 30s. Many men I have spoken to in private have told me that they no longer find women attractive even in their 30s. They just want women in their 20s.
Look at the research cited in the article. Using real numbers of what men actually DO on dating websites (as opposed to what they say), the 18 year old women got the most attention and it went down from there. This confirms my point.
Some men crave approval from women so they literally make stuff up to win a "like" or "recommended" vote. But if you actually were to see what they truly desire, or even what they do in private, it would be a far different story.
3
@Truth Sayer yup. 100% legit. if a dude has options he will take the younger woman most of the time
Why would any woman of any age want to date this man? He's simply not date-worthy.
4
The man is selling a book and says something provocative that makes people start talking. Is this really news? Its not even entertaining. Women were offended because a 50 yr old man wants to sleep with Asian women in their 20s? This is not a new concept. If it were a 50 yr old woman sleeping with men in their 20s women would be all for it. They would be writing articles in support of that.
Will no women of a certain age admit that they like younger men? Whenever I see the old, rich guy with the young trophy wife, I get him. What I do not get is her.
3
@Vicki I'm starting to like younger men (30-40) and opening myself up to the possibility - as they are the ones who are continually making eye contact and seeming interested. I was aiming older, never wanted to be a cougar or a cradle snatcher, but I'm getting over it.
4
It is dishonest to deny that having sex with a very young body is supremely enjoyable but, on the other hand, I’d rather converse with an older body so to speak.
2
My favorite song:
I'll take you home again Kathleen
Across the ocean wild and wide
To where your heart has ever been
Since first you were my bonny bride
The roses all have left your cheek
I watch them fade away and die
Your voice is soft when ere you speak
And tears bedim your lovely eyes
Oh, I will take you home Kathleen
To where your heart shall feel no pain
And when the fields are soft and green
I will take you to your home Kathleen
3
Blech. Sadly, what else is new?
1
The problem is not with Moix's commonplace tastes.
He is indeed entitled like all of us to his tastes.
But he is a public person making a public statement.
And that statement is quite disparaging to a category of people who did not choose to be that category of people.
Most readers of the NYT do no read French and are therefore spared the ordeal of reading his bland, pretentious prose and his bland, provocative Jerry-Springer-with-an-education thoughts, if they can be called thoughts.
Mr. Moix has shown before he is not the sharpest knife in the box.
6
News flash! Twenty somethings usually look better, often much better, than 50 somethings!
The slightly sad absurdity and irony of the article, and the response of outraged women, is that they only confirm Moix's unremarkable observation - older women are sending him photos of breasts and bottoms that they hope will convince him that theirs still look like those of 25 year olds.
This is news?
6
In contrast to Mr. Moix, there are some really sweet men commenting here.
9
"...some older men fancy younger women". Only some?? On which planet?
2
"One thing that I really like to do is, I'll look in the mirror, and I'll imagine that I'm rapidly aging, until I'm just a skull." -- Anna Akana
We'll all just be skulls soon. So stop obsessing about yourself and start doing something for our imperiled planet before you're dead.
7
After reading "The Sex Diaries" by Bettina Arndt you will see the problem of women over 50 no longer being interested in sex. Mr. Moix has a right to search out women that still have a passion for an intimate encounter with a man.
Boy, this guy sure knows how to push at least one button on a woman. Why are you all so upset about what he said? So what? It's his thing! What is it to you? Do all men have to find you attractive? And if not you get take offense and/or fall to pieces over it?
Disgusting older men like him used to pursue me when I was in my twenties. I was looking forward to being rid of creeps like him, with age. But noooooo, they still can't leave us alone. Now after being chased by these guys in our 20's, we get to be publicly insulted by them in middle age.
“The body of a 50-year-old woman isn’t extraordinary at all.”
Ugly misogyny, pure and simple, from a gnarly little man.
10
Why should we care what one silly man thinks? It is his loss....let's move on.
5
I wonder if he ever thinks that to the large majority of the 20 year olds he is attracted to HE is invisible, or that they would laugh at the idea of having sex with him.
6
I don't get get why this is news. If this guy had said he preferred to sleep with crocodiles over fifty year old women, no one would pay attention. They'd think, "Okay, he's stupid or crazy, in any case irrelevant." What he did say about youth vs. maturity was stupid or crazy or a pathetic cry for attention. Let it go. (Postscipt: As lovely as Halle Berry is, there are thousands of other ways for women to be lovely.)
I disagree. For example, Macron's wife is one of the most sexually attractive women I've ever seen.
3
I enjoy looking at beautiful young bodies. Much more I like touching the mature bodies of women who are responsive and love to receive and give pleasure and have the experience to make sweet, slow love. So after we watch a typical TV show or movie with pretty young things who talk like Valley girls, we head for the sack where she redirects my visual lust and we do it the way it is suppose to be done. Moix is a loser.
3
I am constantly amazed at the inability of people who communicate to shut up. Comedians who tell offensive jokes for laughs get upset when people are actually offended. Politician say incredibly racists things in a public setting and are then surprised when they are called out as racists. Come on people, you talk for a living!
If Moix made these statements to get attention he succeeded. In that case, Moix should stop whining. If Moix was just too stupid to know that these statements would get negative attention he might want to consider taking lessons on keeping his mouth closed.
2
Mr. Moix shows himself to be superficial, arrogant and deeply immature. Unfortunately, he is hardly alone. But what's really alarming is how many young women are seemingly attracted to him anyway.
1
Jeff Bezos new babe is 49.
3
Obviously, according to the picture, “the body of a 50-year-old” (or older?), Mr. Moix isn’t extraordinary at all,” and that’s an understatement. Good news for all of us that Mr. Moix isn’t the last man on earth. The thought of an imagine depicting Mr. Moix’s bottom is cringeworthy.
4
"Chuntering from a sedentary position ineloquently and for no obvious purpose.”
Is that also what love is? Thank you, Ms. Druckerman and the NY Times, for this interesting contribution. Our democracy is in jeopardy, but life and love and love's misadventures go on regardless. I am grateful for the opportunity to climb up our of the political trenches for an hour or two. You've given us a Christmas Truce in our cold civil war. The other bright spot for me today (thanks, again) was the article on the front page (online) about the Parliament Speaker. My goodness! "Chuntering from a sedentary position ineloquently and for no obvious purpose.” If you also love language, please don't overlook it:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/19/world/europe/brexit-speaker-john-bercow.html
2
There is no use arguing over personal taste. He was stating his preference. He is entitled to it. He is not wrong in declaring his preferences. He is just provoding a datapoint. I suspect by the reaction that he is not saying anything demonstrably 'wrong', only something some people desperatly dont want to be 'right'. Climate change anyone?
I would like to read more articles about men who are not always thinking about sex and objectifying women. I really don't care about these examples and I am tired of reading about them. Perhaps a more thoughtful consideration of the EXCEPTIONS to the dominant discourse about men would be so welcome (and lead to positive change). My husband does talk about men in these terms (which irritates me to no end) and is convinced that my son will be similar however I see no signs of this. Perhaps if my husband had more examples of the alternative; that men are not always thinking of sex, than he would begin to change his perspective. My son just experienced his first heart break at 16 and he is so respectful and caring towards her despite her treatment. It was a short relationship and they didn't kiss.....maybe that is relevant ? and if they had he would turn into this sexually preoccupied Neanderthal
5
I long ago had my fill of France after many trips there, especially since the reality ain't a travel poster; however, I haven't had my fill of Pamela Druckerman.
1
To mention MeToo in a piece like this, as if it is any way related deeply cheapens the character of that movement. One man’s sexual preferences are irrelevant to systematic social exploitation. An individual’s personal taste has absolutely nothing to do with this. And confusing the 2 topics makes it less likely that men who are confused by the positions voiced by MeToo will ever understand them and get on board with them. Let’s say a man has already been ill or poorly informed about what the MeToo movement has been about and is not sure it is something he supports. And then he’s told (reading a poor piece like this) it has something to do with men being criticized for the types of women they find attractive (as if that is up to them)….they are obviously going to be less likely to support its real, very important demands that women be treated with equality and respect in society.
4
Yann Moix is pouring salt on a wound for many of us. But I am surprised so many middle aged women are responding so emotionally to an unattractive, pathetic figure like him considers he openly admits that he prizes race and the firmness of his lover’s body above all else to his detriment.
I wonder how many of those responding either in anger or in a plea for validation actually find him attractive?
You love the person as a whole, not only her/his body. If you are attached only to the body, there will be a lot of suffering, and misery for not being able to find a lasting love.
4
What goes unremarked in this piece is the fact that it takes so many decades for some men to achieve maturity -- sexual, emotional, professional, or spiritual; that's what eventually makes them attractive. Meanwhile, many women achieve maturity early in life -- possibly because they're forced to, in their efforts to cope with assorted forms of masculine entitlement and similar nonsense.
Worse, this American woman is painfully well-acquainted with the "invisibility" which these slow-growing men visit upon any female over the age of 25. It's a pity we don't teach young men to use their ears and hearts and brains as well as we teach them to use their eyes.
1
Many women in their 20s find these middle aged men predatory and creepy. For one, who wants to be merely an object to be looked at or a tool to make an older person feel relevant? Secondly, women in their 20s are still growing up and old men want someone they can impress with their “worldly ways.” Women their own age wouldn’t be as easy to fool.
2
This reminds me of the time a few years ago when a man in, I think, Connecticut wrote a letter to the local paper criticizing women for wearing yoga pants in public. He doesn't like the look, apparently. Then 300 of those women showed up for a march by his house wearing, you guessed it, yoga pants. The was the funniest thing I've read in a long time! It was a great way to make the point--you know, we don't care what you think about us!
6
It is remarkable to me that he doesn't consider how odious he or his over-25-year-old body are to the 20-something Asian women he fancies. And it's even worse if he just. Doesn't. Care. There's a reason these age-inappropriate flings of his end after only months.
4
Maybe I am missing the point (if there is one), but my first thought was "Why are strangers sending this man pornographic pics of themselves?" If any stranger--no matter how young, taut or well endowed--sent me nude photos, I would be annoyed.
Consider this. What if men were sending him nude pics. Would we demand that he flattered/aroused/tempted? Would he be denounced if he said "But I do not find those men attractive"?
Mature, older men who admire youthful sensuous females are reacting naturally and are doing nothing wrong until they feel entitled to some kind of cross-generational sensual reciprocity.
Real men know this already and behave accordingly.
Sometimes a real man’s humble recognition of his age is admired and even considered sexy by much younger women.
In this case the real man is challenged to maintain his maturity and wisdom as he resists nature’s lingering instincts in his aging body.
When a mature man capitulates to the younger women, he looks weak, immature and decidedly unmanly — the exact opposite of how he thinks he looks.
3
I am turning fifty soon and can’t wait. Upon reflection, When I was younger, most things I did was to please others. And keeping fit was connected to having an attractive body.
Now, I do things for me. I love walking outside, like moving, but will never again join the gym.
Simple experiences are where it’s at for me, time for real friends and men who appreciate me for me, otherwise I’d rather be alone.
Mr. Moix sounds like a person who hasn’t figured out how to have a good life.
Too bad for him.
7
Mr. Moix insists that there’s hope for him. By the time he’s 60, 50-year-old women will seem young. Alas, I’m not sure any of them will be waiting."
Nope...when he turns 60, he will still like 20 and 30 year olds and that's absolutely okay. Who are we to tell someone whom they should find attractive?
Considering that he is well off, there will be many women who are waiting.
1
Maybe this is a straight male thing. I'm a lesbian, and even in my twenties, I found women in their 40's most attractive. Now that I'm in my fifties, I'm happy to report that there are lots of gorgeous women of 50 plus. Whether I'm one of them, I'll leave for others to judge.
7
Why doesn't anyone talk about biology? I read comment after comment -- women in their 50s (as I am, too) uncaring anymore about the male gaze. Why would we care? All that business of obsessing on our looks and the mates we might (or might not) attract with them was simply evolution at work -- pushing us to pass along our DNA. But by 50, we've either reproduced, or we haven't. If we're psychologically/developmentally healthy, we move on to the next life stage: building homes, participating in communities, raising kids and grandkids. I view the men who cannot find themselves attracted to bodies their own age as the corollary to women who cannot let go of being youthful -- both sort of stuck on a developmental task. No judgment, but I'm sure glad I'm not there and neither is my (same-age) partner.
14
@Cabli Making art, writing books, changing the world.
1
When I was in Dental School in the 80s a 20 yo classmate started dating a famous 60 yo professor. She was beautiful and rich, so what’s on it for her everybody wondered. It turned out it was love. They lived happily together for almost 20 years when he got sick and died. She took care of him and after he died she was depressed for a long time. She missed him terribly. Sometimes it’s just love.
As for Mr Moix, who cares?
11
Written and observed by unhappy women everywhere. Biology cannot be countered by manners, lies, discretion or photo retouching. Younger women are still in a biological reproductive state and might possibly be more attractive. The man is unhappy with his preferences. If he had written a preference for older vs younger women, he would be praised. I am certain he is bright and successful so many of those 50 year olds will be receptive in 10 years. There is not shortage of single people - or masochists. People have preferences- live and let live.
5
Always more attractive
1
Bravo to Mr. Moix for the guts to reveal his truth, however unpleasant it may be. As a woman, writers such as Henry Miller and Phillip Roth have allowed me a glimpse into the darker corners of the male psyche. While I never would have wanted to date any of them, I am glad their art was unfettered by fear of offending.
6
I love my older wife's body (she's 76) and have since the day we met almost 35 years ago when she was 42 and I was 33. Over a decade ago I shared our story in "The Ageless Love Trilogy" (at youngerlover.com) which has had over 100,000 visitors from all over the world. Take my word for it, countless men of all ages appreciate the grace, charm, and soulfulness of older women.
12
I am in my late 50’s, and I want to get some fillers and Botox on my face. What’s interesting to me is that I am actively not looking for a man. I want to do it for myself. I’m under absolutely no illusion that it will change anything or any problem in my life. I just don’t like looking like I’m exhausted when I’m not. I’m more accepting of my aging body, because I don’t see it in the mirror all the time. If I become less invisible will I suddenly want to find a man? Feelings and thoughts about aging and love are extremely layered and complex.
This French man angers me, but it isn’t only about his physical attraction to younger woman. It’s because he’s so narrow minded and obstinate, ( sound familiar?) that he could miss real love. He knows it, he said he’s sad, but he’s unwilling to even contemplate changing, and makes an audacious and infuriating statement instead.
124
@Charlotte since you asked (even if rhetorical) “If I become less invisible, will I suddenly want to find a man?” I will offer an answer from my experience. Yes. Not necessarily suddenly though (gradually) just like becoming less invisible is a gradual thing and takes time to become comfortable with. If men begin to respond to you visually (again) you will definitely notice it and this in turn may stimulate desire on your part to take it further.
9
@Charlotte As a 72 year old retired dentist, might I suggest putting a smile on your late-50's face and forego the surgery. It's painless, cheaper and lasts a lifetime.
42
@Charlotte
Mr Moix does say he is unhappy with his preference. Why narrow minded and obstinate? Because he does not want a self loathing woman in her "late 50's"? You are attempting to become visible. Why? To what audience? I think this clearly shows Mr Moix might be on to something you are trying to recapture or capture. N'est-ce Pas?
9
I think women are deluding themselves, men too. I'm a woman. I've aged. My skin (bones, teeth...ok, you get the idea) isn't the same skin it was many, many years ago. Actually, little is the same. I think my soul's gotten lots better, I like it more. That goes for character and personality, too. My interests have changed.
It isn't about snaring the guy, anymore. It isn't about always looking great because who knows when you'll meet Mr.....
So, that habit of trying to look one's best, persists into later adulthood, (but maybe that's not so bad). It's a different person in this older skin, and maybe a better person. But, reality is reality. Young bodies beckon to
those older men who can't reconcile their aging to their reality. So, yes, some women may have great bodies at 50+, but the natural effects of time, enable other
qualities to dominate. If we women can't face that reality,
that's a pity. Right now, a lot of other things dominate our lives rather than worrying about appealing to these children/men.
200
@Gloria Utopia I've dated several women in their late 60s. They actively maintain great figures - no they don't look like they're in their 20s or 30s - and they maintain great inner beauty. It is possible. Myself, I've dropped quite a few pounds, so I know it can be done.
4
Thank you for your terrific comment. I second that!
8
@Gloria Utopia And, upon further reflection, does my bottom, or my breasts define me?
3
I'm 59, and I can't wait to turn 60 next summer. I've been comfy in my own skin for years and feel that every year gets better. One of the best superficial decisions I ever made was to let my long hair go grey a few years ago. I always avoided wearing much makeup and, two years ago upon retirement, I vowed to never again stuff my feet into uncomfortable shoes. Now, at a time in my life when I could care less about complements from others, I routinely receive complements and turn heads. My take/hope from this unexpected status: I think many people suddenly realize older women are more lovely. By the time your hair is grey and your skin and body aren't quite what they were decades ago, your wisdom and sense of fun shine through and are more supple than ever . . . and as for anyone with views such as Mr. Moix, I'm grateful when they self-identified as someone to be avoided!
230
@TS -- This is an especially ironic subject to confuse complements with compliments.
7
@TS
If, at your age, you do find men who find your wisdom and sense of fun supple enough to inspire romance, as well as your head-turning looks, more power to you!
Surely, this savoir-vivre also understands that Moix's attitude really shouldn't make him a pariah, though this sort of unsolicited temerity should raise an eyebrow, I work in an upmarket hotel and to be frank, it's not an accident they favor women who look like Marie-Claire models for front-of-house jobs. These women wouldn't go out with 60-year-old me. Are you kidding? And I'm just like you, only poorer. Comfy in my skin. Reasonably sage and amusing. Passably sophisticated. Multilingual. The last thing I'd do is shun these women. Their lack of sexual interest is nothing to take personally.
8
@TSBravo, Madame!
3
The age of 60, which I've been for four days, is enormously liberating. I am comfortable with myself, more so than at any time in my life so far. I look back on a rich and exciting life, and I look forward to a rich and exciting life, full of fun, challenge, and adventure.
I will say that a big source of my well-being—physical, mental, and spiritual—comes from doing megaformer Pilates six days a week. (Buns of steel? No, but I can plank for 5 minutes, which is pretty okay.)
I also love my profession, which keeps me so happy and intellectually stimulated that I spring out of bed in the morning. I hope to do what I do until I drop dead. I have 17 books to my credit, so far, and am an active member of three international organizations. To top it all off, the proverbial icing on the cake, I have a handful of exceptional friends and a truly terrific dog.
A man? A man's approval? A man's company? As something to seek out? As something to compete for? As something to complete my life? Why? My life is complete right now. Right now is wonderful.
313
@sarasotaliz
Glad (sincerely) that you are happy in your life and accomplishments. I get the comment "A man's approval?" and wonder if it applies only to men or if it includes women.
However, IMO - the attitude "A man's company? As something to seek out?" is misandrist. Your preference may be for women (fine by me) but to actively denigrate 50% of the world is more than simply excessive. Moix did not denigrate anybody. He simply has a preference. I note that he also suffers (and is aware of) the consequences of acting on it so much.
Personally - I too have preferences. Unlike Moix's they include women my age and the specifics do change with time (sometimes Asian women, sometimes others, sometimes dark, sometimes light ...).
Nevertheless - 25 y.o. women *are* frequently, physically attractive in ways that 50 year olds are not. To deny that is to be completely P.C.-ridiculous.
I myself am closer to Moix's age and have no doubt that were I 25 y.o., I would be more appealing to more women.
C'est la vie .....
9
@sarasotaliz
" I have 17 books to my credit"
Quantity doesn't always equal quality. Smugness isn't a great characteristic.
27
Whoppeedo for you. Bragging isn’t lovely and it has nothing to do with grace and self acceptance as one ages.
16
My husband is 73. He has gorgeous white hair that wings out a bit over his ears and beautiful blue grey eyes that crinkle up at the corners when he smiles. There’s not a time when I’m with him that I don’t think he’s the handsomest man in the room. And when he’s been out on horseback and returns in boots and britches he still makes me swoon.
I suppose if I looked hard I would see that that gorgeous white hair is a good bit thinner than it used to be, that that once chiseled jaw has a hint of a jowl, that it was a tad of a paunch that sent all those 34s to Goodwill. But what I see is a good man, comfortable in his own skin, one who knows who he is and is good with it, one who has the elegance and grace of maturity.
I like to think that when he looks at me he also sees something other than the effects on my body of seven decades of living.
492
@Steel Magnolia
If he is anything like me, he still sees the woman who stole his heart all those years ago. Judging by your posts, it isn't just your looks he finds attractive.
20
@Steel Magnolia
What you describe is love. Much better and more enduring than simple lust.
16
While all of us may be nostalgic for our younger bodies to some extent, I'm certainly not nostalgic for my younger psyche. When I was young and fit, I lacked the self-confidence to recognize my own beauty and therefore navigated the world with trepidation. As an older woman, I feel confident and comfortable in my own skin - wrinkled as it may be - and couldn't care less what a shallow puer aeternus like Moix thinks. Growing up does have its rewards.
806
@CWand, the attitudes we have towards our own attrqctiveness mature as well. At 20, we take our beauty for granted. At thirty, we want to stay that way for ever. At forty, we still want to stay that way but start to look around and notice we aren't noticed as much. At fifty, under the spell of menopause, we think and talk of little else, in certain circles. At sixty, we care less. At seventy, we care much much less and just want to stay ambulatory. That's life, n'est pas?
36
@Kate
"At seventy, we care much less and just want to stay ambulatory. That's life, nest pas[sic]?"
Take a look at the comment right below here by cherrylog754, C'est la vie, nest-ce pas?
3
I am loving life in my 50s. Sure, in my 20s, there was plenty for men to find attractive about me, including my insecurities, under-developed self-worth, and an attentiveness solidly glued upon my attractiveness and on pleasing others. Now in my 50s, my body has changed. My face has changed. And my insecurities are long out the window. Couldn't care less about my sex appeal to men I don't even know. As for romantic partners, the last thing I would find attractive about them is their interest in my looks.
874
@Faith Sing it sister!
14
Moix has decreasing sexual abilities and desires. That is why he needs young women to arouse his sagging libido.
Here is a suggestion for older women. Seek teenagers, of course 18 plus, you dont want to go to prison.
When I was 18, I could do it with any woman of any age, anytime, anywhere. An increasingly distant but fond memory. Moix will e there soon.
6
Ooooo pauvre petit! The little man with the adolescent online-porno-fixated brain is unhappy that the 20-somethings dump him after a few months? Sorry: not sorry.
I find it fascinating that this column appears alongside "Father Ross's" essay about how the Victorians (as racist and sexist as they come) did not create many of the ideals we now call "toxic masculinity"--that they were really sensitive after all.
I would like the men to stop talking and start listening. It is well past time.
2
There's a song that is made for older people who want to prey upon the young . Insert the correct term for each sex....
Do you ears hang low?
Do they wobble too and fro?
Can you tie them in a knot?
Can you tie them in a bow?
Your younger partner might be too polite to mention it. But they don't miss seeing it....
1
Men who like younger women aren’t generally preying in anyone lol
A man in his 50 Or 60s will have more pleasure and fin with a woman in her 40s or 50s. When a guys in g shape and has natural libido we dint need your berating because you’re angry that you age differently. Wobble is biggest in the flabby hug of old broads
Boys! Can't live with 'em. Can't live without 'em.
2
Since he mentioned how he isn’t attracted to women over 50, did anyone ask him, “ Do you really think beyond your ego that women find you attractive?”
Dream on dude!
4
It sounds like Moix's real problem is not with any woman's age, it is with his own.
7
That is hilarious! Where do I send my pic? If he can't handle a 50 year old woman, I imagine a photo of a ripe old 75 year old in the altogether would give him a terminal heart attack.
3
Not a day passes without earnest mention and analysis in multiple articles in this paper about the countless ways in which men, and certain men, are terrible, and terrible compared with women. It seems to be more than anything except criticism of the president the main point of the paper.
I don't care for many men either. Of course men all over the place deserve scathing criticism. But does it occur to anyone that a great many women, too, are highly objectionable people who bother, harm, and disappoint other people, who have foolish, destructive notions and prejudices, bad sexual morals and are immature, vain and egotistical, who stand in urgent need of character improvement, and who, in short, for unjustifiable reasons, exploit others and decrease the stock of human happiness?
You would think that such obvious things would need no pointing out, but after subscribing for two years I've noticed that they actually do.
What could a visitor from another world conclude from reading the Times but that the average woman is quite wonderful and nearly free of faults and that most men are boring, immoral, pathetic, violent idiots? In my view, sustained contact with reality would alter that impression quite a bit.
Your motives come into question.
11
@Dixon Pinfold
You're 100% right!
1
Would I love to hang with Julie Delpy, Juliette
Binoche or Catherine Deneuve? You know it!
6
I was going to add Julia Ormond- but checked and she's English, not French.
But 54 and, well, Julia Ormond.
1
In college, after two upperclassmen took my freshman register to rudely circle photos of very slender women - their roommate explained that they wanted to be members of that kind of club (he said it more crudely), because their own "members" had been found lacking.
In other words - to the women Mr Moix refuses to date: it's absolutely no "great" "big" loss, none at all.
2
„not all truths should be told“
Well, Yann Moix, the truth is that you are at best average looking for your age, wrinkled and tired. I can see, that those hurtful break-ups you went through with women so much younger and fresher than you, left their traces.
And make no mistake, those young women are with you because you have money and maybe because, once they google your name, they find out that you are a writer, although not a famous one as you are hardly known outside your own country.
3
@Marie
Young women are often more attracted by money and connections than the physical appearance of men. While men tend to find the youthful vitality of younger women more important. This may have something to do with the ability to bear children and the ability to support them.
3
Monsieur Moix will one day face the indignities of age as we all do. Erectile dysfunction, incontinence, dementia, or merely becoming invisible himself to those he desires. Perhaps even mocked for his witless attempts. There is no doubt fate will come for Mr. Moix.
4
Perhaps the best thing about menopause is that the scales fall from your eyes - it takes a whole lot more than sex appeal to make me want to be with someone these days.
When I think of all the bozos I wasted my energy on simply because of physical attraction ... and none of them were old enough to be my daddy, like the marvelous Mr. Moix, by the way.
3
I’m cracking up; if this guy only knew what is going through the mind of those younger women of his....tsk, tsk.
1
I enjoyed a very funny and fun burlesque show the other night, and I go to the gym almost daily. I submit that most people over the age of 25 don't look good in the nude. As the burlesquers demonstrated, one can enjoy being naked regardless of how one looks. If you have a body, celebrate it!
1
There is nothing more amusing than an unattractive, balding, droopy old man musing about what he finds attractive -- as if anyone could possibly care what he thinks. He's an insignificant fossil.
6
Its not a pernicious stereotype. Asian women are submissive. Asian American women aren't. But.
Why can't liberals - I am one - just face facts while making otherwise astoundingly accurate arguments?
And why can't liberals, and liberal women, accept that a man like this can express his views? Why does he have to endure the onslaught of pitchforks? The threats to reputation and career? The ad hominems in this forum and in his life now?
Its all so insipid.
Sometimes you want to just give up and become a conservative....
6
@Jc
Correct!!!!!
Dating people half your age? Don't write a book about it! Just stop.
1
A old guy with fuzzy gray stubble is going around making proclamations like this? Sad.
3
Somewhat surprising so many women swallowed the bait on this one. A buffoon voices an opinion guaranteed to incite outrage among those sensitive enough to care. You've been had. "Those who are determined to be 'offended' will discover a provocation somewhere. We cannot possibly adjust enough to please the fanatics, and it is degrading to make the attempt." ~ Christopher Hitchens
5
Apparently M. Moix doesn't realize his story was portrayed in the film Somethings Gotta Give
Mr. Moix attraction to very young females said to me that he likes girls, not women. The adolescent bro-club is still, and will remain, repugnant.
I take it that these are either e-mail beautiful asian women waiting to ...... or commercial transactions
Young women are attracted to him like they are attracted to trump.
I missed the part of the article that explains why anyone - except people who are attracted to HIM - would care about this fellow's sexual and romantic proclivities. So why's this in the newspaper?
1
I’m 60. Young man, you are nearly as attractive or charming as you seem to believe. Just saying.
1
I have been passionately attracted to a woman in her teens, her twenties, her thirties, her forties, her fifties, and now her sixties. Of course the thread that has held this string together is love.
Poor Moix, rhymes with box, loves only Moix, rhymes with pox.
5
Like Mr. Moix himself, I find his situation quite sad! What a pitiful man he is that he's only attracted to a certain type. I find so many different people attractive and men in particular for their sense of humor, intelligence, and other personality traits. As a matter of fact, these trump physical attributes for me. At nearly 60, I am comfortable with myself, am much more confident and accepting of my physical imperfections and if today, I am judged primarily by my looks and not my accumulated knowledge, wisdom, life experience, and personality, there is indeed something wrong with me. Who, at our age, would want a boy man such as this? Let those poor girls have him and offer him comfort as best they can. Meanwhile, I and my saggy boobs and bottom in all of their glory will go on enjoying this wonderful life.
1
It is his choice. Why can't he have his choice?
The women who are outraged seem in a way more pathetic than him.
Be your own person, live your own life. Why should it matter that someone you don't have any relationship to has a certain opinion on whom he desires?
Anger towards him is just anger at yourself for getting old. Be honest.
5
@New Milford
True!!!
As a lad, my female peers could be quite unkind as they made their preference for older men and their total disinterest in “boys” my age crystal clear.
And now that they are in the other side of the equation, they are outraged at the unfairness.
Yes, when you were young the boys would throw themselves at you... now you have to throw yourself at them.
C'est la vie!
Although I’ve never felt quite so bound by age, some people are. For those women who are so outraged at a man expressing his preference... get over it.
Bitterness and anger won’t really prove him wrong.
3
I'm amazed that the author did not mention a fact that was considered quite remarkable until recently - the French president Emmanuel Macron, younger and handsomer than Moix has been happily married for 11 years to a woman 24 years older than himself.
Creeps like Moix are history, Macron & men like him are the future.
1
Sounds like it's time for a trip to France...
1
My most sexy attribute is my mind and imagination, which grow richer with age. For a so called ‘intellectual’ Mr Moix is indeed a prisoner of his tastes.
He’s right. Totally. We can’t be trapped by the opinion of people about aging women. I’d go out with a 60 year old if she gave me a great hug and a great kiss. That’s not happening.
He is paying women in their 20-ties to be with him. Guaranteed.
He just does not have the courage to admit it.
1
Procreation is the drive that keeps men going into their 50’s leaving women behind. Separating sex and pregnancy goes against nature but why bother if you don’t have to. Creating new life is part of the exquisite beauty. Abortion is the young ladies’ revenge.
1
@Eugene Patrick Devany - “Abortion is the young ladies’ revenge”? Gee, I bet they’re lining up to date you.
Also, it’s the 21st century: sex and pregnancy can definitely be separated thanks to effective birth control, and anyone who thinks sex is just about pregnancy is really missing the point of it. People of all ages in loving, mature relationships have sex to express their love or simply to have a good time with the person they care about very much. It’s not always about making babies, not should it be.
And in closing, I know that men can pretty much get a fertile woman pregnant at any point in their lives, but at a certain point in men’s lives, the desire to father children has to wane for them. Do men really, when they get down to it, want to be changing diapers in their 50s, dealing with a crazy hormonal teenager in their 60s, or still paying for college when they’re in their 70s? At some point, that ship needs to sail, and men need to move on into the next phase of their lives.
1
Some scientists say men are programmed to prefer younger women because they're more fertile, and women to prefer older men because they have more money. Wisdom lies in being able to overcome your obsolete programming, and apparently Mr. Moix can't.
1
For an ‘artist’ he doesn’t sound like much of an original thinker. Just an old cliche.
“Don’t send me stuff” is the perfect invitation to bury monsieur mox under an avalanche of stuff.
2
"God sure baked a lot of fruit cake, baby,
When Adam met that Eden lady!"
Joe Strummer, 1952-2002
1
One of the many juvenile idiocies of Mr. Moix (really, there are too many to count) is his conflating of love and sex. It's impossible to fall in love with a woman because she is not as young as she used to be? How is he defining "falling in love." If being physically attracted to someone is the sum of what he defines as being in love with them it is no wonder that he is miserable when those relationships inevitably fail. As for his predilection for "Asian women in their 20s," it only serves to reinforce his shallowness and makes one wonder why any woman would waste their time with someone like Mr. Moix in the first place. Those mature and, yes, beautiful women of a certain age are certainly better off without him.
1
Yann Moix doesn't appear to give any thought as to whether the young women he's attracted to don't experience the same revulsion for his fifty year old body that he displays for the bodies women his own age.
6
There was a time when I and my partner could stay occupied, day and night, all weekend. That doesn't happen with age. His young girl friends spend time with him but eventually they want the virility of men their own age. And they probably get tired of his tropes
1
One thing French women could do to be taken more seriously and seen less as sex objects, is to sing with more mature voices. So many adult female French singers cultivate a voice that sound like a girl trying to sound breathlessly sexy. Times have changed and the poupée shtick needs to grow up. As for the piteous stereotypical macho French womanizer Yann Moix, he really needs a shrink.
4
You’d think he has a new book and wanted some free publicity.
4
It's true, old people are disgusting. Fortunately, my parts don't work so well any more, so I don't really have to care much about any of this, and can think about other things. Still attracted to women under 25, and yeah, those relationships are brief, because they can do anything that they want, and they do.
“The body of a 50-year-old woman isn’t extraordinary at all.” -Yann Moix
Newsflash, M. Moix: I doubt your body is “extraordinary” either. And guess what? I’m in my 30s, and I have zero interest in seeing it. In fact, I would have had zero interest in seeing it when I was 25. Men like you are pretty much “invisible” to me, and always have been.
5
What? A French novelist likes having sex with women half his age and feels he has no choice but to suffer the consequences of his complicated love life, even as it makes him miserable? Incroyable! I hope this guy’s novels are not as cliched as his reality.
4
“Women themselves often believe that youthful bodies look better: “
Aw c’mon! youthful ANYTHING almost always LOOKS better. But that is not the POINT, is it?
2
Are you sure he's not related to Donald Trump? Mr. Moix acts like he is. Saying obnoxious and mean things about women just to get noticed and make more books sales. Quite the man child.
The following understatement: " some older men fancy younger women" and the references to Halle Berry and other old women who aren't obviously offensive, demonstrates the author's desperate attempt to deny that just about all men, other than perverts, prefer young women to old.
2
It is comical to read all the politically correct responses that inevitably reach the top of the Reader Picks list.
As the bard sings 'la donna et mobile'.
First of all, love and attractiveness is on a grand scale, a giant bell curve where some 20 year old women like 50 year old men, and some 50 year old women are proud to be cougars bagging younger men. (Is that politically correct?....of course, because women can do anything, be anything, achieve anything without scorn or scrutiny in the #metoo era)
Please spare me about this not being 'socially acceptable'. Older Richer Men from the President, to George Soros to John Henry keep trading in wives. As the comedienne says 'the older men get the younger their wives become'.
Linda Pizzutto Heney, the 30 something wife married to someone twice as old as her was recently named the most important person in Boston. Because she did what??? More important than the Governor or Elizabeth Warren? Certainly not socially unacceptable to the Brahmins.
Many people find true love and that partner will be the most beautiful person to them until the day they die. A wonderful thing.
When I was in my 20's, in great shape and desperate for a relationship I was invisible to women. Now that I'm in my 50's and rich I sleep with women from 20's to 40's, supermodels, Harvard grads, submissive Asians.
C'est la vie :)
4
Okay the French dude (who is 50) prefers something different than what some expect.
What do the French dudettes (who are 50 something) prefer?
I.e., if they could choose freely, among all available?
Will they, for instance, choose in ways that strictly align with and mirror their demographic, racial, physiological characteristics?
It does not really matter what Moix thinks or believes. What counts more is that many seem to be adamant about him not being entitled to his beliefs. Him finding younger women more attractive turned out to be so threatening as to unleash a barrage of belittlement and insults.
As if. Men are not allowed to say what they like - and/or state the obvious... but women are?
5
I so admire French women. They are elegant and have always seemed to age well. I remember once seeing a French woman whose job was pumping gas do so in a dress and heels. French women do not seem besotted by botox, breast enhancement and other forms of plastic surgery all done to make one appear younger. Too many American women are drawn to bling not elegance. Doubt me, watch "Say Yes to the Dress". The usual response is I want sexy and lots of rhinestones. For a wedding? Doubt you would see such tackiness in France. And oh we forgot to mention Mr. Macron and his beautiful older wife.
I agree completely and the reverse is true as well meaning women in their 50s I’ve known were crazy about a guy in his 30. One enjoys her true love for the time it lasts then feels sad after. I am in my 60s but I don’t “fly higher than 47.” I like women with a good sex drive. Yes women have orgasms and I understand the science, but it’s different than younger women with real sex drive. My libido is good and I like sex. When women date young men other women say “you go sister” but when men want younger women “oh daddy complex” etc. Nope. Young women are more attractive. By the way beautiful Japanese and Chinese women are great.
2
insulting 90% of possible book buyers isnt a smart sales strategy (50+ men dont read novels). his agent should've nixed it before it got published. unless the publisher did the passive-aggressive thing and let him hang himself.
that said, he simply spoke the truth. I'm 50+ and take very good care of myself. I 'll talk to anybody but 95% of women 50+ I want zero to do with from looks or emotional stand point. and obese ones no matter what the age. I'm not attracted, dont need the brain damage and not apologizing. younger women are hotter if thats all you want. but try and have a conversation afterward. arrghh!
many older women are bitter complainers as others write they've been on "depression" pills for a decade. if 80% of them have it, its not "disease" its marketing.
but physical aside THE most important part of ignoring vast majority of 30-50's women is this; the professional victim #metoo'ers. too many women who've been mind blanked by "feminists" intellectualizing their rejection by men who then tell all women life is a minefield of predatory behavior by beastly men. we're all after one thing and thats it.
which is plainly illogical if you think about it. either we're ignoring you or we're all just trying to get into your skivvies. it can be both ways now can it?
The egotism of the man is remarkable and so brazen. What on earth makes him think he’s as good at his age as he was at 22? The women— of whatever age — are too polite to tell him, “ Sir, you have grown soft in so many ways :((“
He'd better watch his mouth, or this middle-aged Midwesterner will send him photos of her t & a and haunt his dreams until the end of days.
4
Both men and women in their 20s tend to be less cynical, jaded, and opinionated than people in middle age. It can be more fun for people of both sexes to have a partner with less life experience. Have you tried to make friends after the 20s? It’s much more difficult. On the other hand, the young Asian fetish is yet another stereotype of submissive females that white men have created. So boring and passé!
The real question is why are we listening to people who believe that a woman's only worth is in her sexual attractiveness.
3
Oh, Lord, these comments are so predictable. We in America are incapable of moderation. That lack of moderation in our caloric consumption and in our grasp of reality transports us from the state of New York, for the plurality of these commentators, to the state of denial.
Men and women over 50 are rarely particularly physically attractive; those in their 20s with good features can be stunningly so. This is nature's imperative: those who can procreate the most readily appear the most sexually attractive. That Mr. Moix stated the obvious so baldly in the #me-too era was his great sin. For we spoiled Westerners want, reasonably, to be treated equivalently in life, except when it comes to our looks where we want, unreasonably, no one else's eyes to see our age and our weight.
A while ago in an Asian hotel, I was chatting, not flirting, with a very pretty lass, who at one point interjected that I must have been quite attractive when I was young. I roared with laughter: a new cousin to the humble brag.
He's fighting his own fear of aging.
Much like the vampire who needs new blood to stay alive.
Throwing women of a certain age under the bus is his way of fighting the inevitable.
And those young girls?
Um, they crave young guys.
I'm guessing he's a big spender.
1
Speaking as somebody who’s, well, in their 60s and in Paris this weekend, what a total doofus. Yes, even if it’s some kind of clever artistic provocation.
Comw to think of it, especially if it’s that.
I am a male in my late 40s and can categorically say that the sexiest women I know are 35 to 55 years of age. There’s a certain something in the way some of them comport themselves and the conversations you can have with them. Give me a kind, loving non judgmental woman who carries her cellulite with confidence and I will give you a devoted slave!
1
Writer screamed at for daring to be honest.
2
@Edward - No, he’s getting “screamed at” because he’s an idiot. He’s also an egomaniac. Whatever makes him think that 50-year-old women want him anyway? I have yet to meet a 50-year-old woman who is that desperate.
Relax, ladies. According to the research on porn searches published in the book "A Billion Wicked Thoughts," one of the most popular age groups searched by men is women over 50.
This is not Susan but me. Her husband. Hi everyone.
I think Monsieur Moix--
--is a SWINE.
Nothing more. Nothing less. Nothing other.
In August, I'll be seventy. Monsieur Moix, no one likes ageing. I sure don't. No one ever said it'd be fun. It's not. Ailments creep up on you. The limbs stiffen--just a bit. The memory is wobbly. You don't think quite as quickly or clearly as you used to.
The Lord has been merciful to me, Monsieur Moix. I still (more or less) have my hair. Other guys tend to LOSE their hair. Long before the age of seventy.
And it happens to women too. The hair thins out. Other things happen to women as they age--but I'm not a woman, so these I'll pass over in a respectful silence.
The operative word, Monsieur Moix, is RESPECTFUL.
I would gather--since you shared the fact so openly--
--you are strongly attracted to young Asian ladies in the twenties. A young Asian lady of twenty five (you assure us) has "an extraordinary body." Right. I can easily believe that.
Almost ANYONE has "an extraordinary body" at the age of twenty five. But life goes on. A pity! But it does.
We reach the age--oh WHAT age?
How about FIFTY? Which is where you are right now.
In twenty years, you'll be--ahem!--SEVENTY.
I wish you joy of it. Oh--one last thing.
Are these Asian ladies in their twenties--
--as stuck on YOU--
--as you are on THEM?
Drop me a postcard sometime--
--and let me know.
4
1) There is no point in being attractive to everyone who sees you. All you need is one person whom you really love and who loves you.
2) No matter what you look like, you can find at least one person who likes you and is attracted to you.
3) You see that amazingly sexy person over there that you can't stop fantasizing about? 99.999999% of the time you will never have sex with them. That's OK, because the sex probably wouldn't be that good anyway. It is equally possible to have good sex with someone society thinks of as ugly, and to have bad sex with someone society thinks of as beautiful. You can enjoy a beautiful flower or sunset without having sex with it. Why not a person?
5) Being beautiful really is a social construct. Compare Twiggy to Jane Russell to the Gibson Girls to the nudes of Titian and Rembrandt. Standards of beauty constantly change, so no matter what you look like, there is a time and place either possible or actual, where you are the most beautiful woman in the world.
6) Some women don't fit the mold of the moment, yet create their own standard of beauty by sheer willpower. Amy Schumer and Melissa McCarthy have built careers around their alleged ugliness, but both have husbands (and numerous male fans) who adore them.
2
French fashion magazines may be as youth obsessed as American magazines. But one of the things that I loved about living in France, as a middle-aged man, was that French women themselves have definitely not bought into the idea that age and sexual attractiveness are a zero-sum game.
I loved seeing beautiful 50, 60, and 70-somethings flaunting, and enjoying, their attractiveness. That's an attitude that is, itself, attractive to the majority of older men (who, the behavior of the unconfident and cads to the contrary) want a sexual partner with similar life experience.
Now that I'm back in the US, I see that style from time to time but nowhere near as often as I did in France. Moix' comments would be assinine anywhere but they were particularly so considering where he lives.
Henri Grippes, an eminent man of letters past sixty, is plagued by his neighbor, Mme. Parfaire, who feeling cast aside has taken to feeding the pigeons and throwing out her window, melted croissants with jam, a mess which he cleans off his ledge every morning.
There appears to have been a misunderstanding; and he remembers the well-cooked meals, the Japanese screen, his hostess describing enthusiastic reviews of other people citing phrases he might want to use such as "Cyclopean Vision", or "the superstructure of essential insincerity" (a compliment apparently).
Later she might even coax him into watching a literary talk show, where Grippes still digesting, would stare hard at false witnesses, plagiarists, ciphers and mountebanks, while Mme. Parfaire, when there was a woman on hand, would comment that all the women looked the same, had terrible legs, and lacked the restraint and distinction of men.
As for the rest of 'In Plain View' by Mavis Gallant, which ends with Grippes trying to make peace, and starting with 'Dearest Marthe', well, you will have to decipher it for yourself, keeping in mind that Grippes is humiliated by the failure of his latest novel written in California, where he wonders if the old teacher and young student theme has become stale.
Bottoms up, Ms. Druckerman, and keep writing to keep your American readership abreast of the literary salons in Paris.
2
M. Moix and Donald Trump share something in common: a desperate attempt to punch above their weight with women far too young and far too pretty. And they're both hideous. So many nice men in the world - these two are in the minority.
2
Women can be beautiful and attractive at any age. Older women have the experience that younger women lack. Mssr. Moix needs to open his eyes and his heart.
1
To suggest a women 50 or older can't be beautiful is offensive. To suggest a 25 year old women is likely to be more physically arousing or erotically beautiful is just common sense. Snapping selfies of your bottom or breasts is "de trop", and you're going to lose that comparison.
Furthermore, do the vast majority of women find the male 50+ set hotter than 20 somethings? Doubt it. Gravity drags us all down and that is just a fact. M. Moix's sin is to discount the stimulation of experience, wisdom and what the French call "je ne sais quoi"--an undefinable but alluring something. Absolutely there are many things in addition to breasts and buttocks that inflame the senses.
Let's not though in the name of a new cultural paradigm start denying the evidence of our own eyes. Nearly all 25 year olds are physically more appealing than nearly all those 50+, male or female, Madam Macron included.
Keep those selfies to oneself.
1
I say, let shallow people pair up with other shallow people to their hearts' content.
3
I completely agree with Agnès Hurstel that "“Desire, erotic thoughts, are never politically correct.". What a strange thing, sexual desire ! anyway, all this story is very funny. Thank you, Pamela Druckerman, votre article m'a beaucoup fait rire
That French writer, and I'm French myself, is an immature idiot that should be ignored. Women can stay beautiful at a much older age than 50. Like men, they have to work at it. When you're 25, for most of us our bodies and faces might not tell too much about who we are. But at 50, every human, men and women, have the face and the body they deserve. That means that beautiful 60 years old women will always be much more interesting than beautiful 20 years old, simply because of the discipline and mind necessary to implement the lifestlyle to be beautiful at 60. Same for mem. Some men don't work to have a six pack at 20. All 50 year old work at it.
2
I dated a man who was 40 when I was a 28-year-old woman and after a while, it was boring. I didn't enjoy listening to The Who as much as he did, and I wanted sex more often than he did. Of course, youth is beautiful. Let us not forget that men age too. Sometimes their bodies can't keep up with their eyes. (Without performance enhancing drugs.) It depends on what you want to do with your partner. No one stays 28 forever. Men with this preference have to get a new woman each time their girl ages out. Some of this is about status. "Look at me, I can still get them young!" What I can't abide is men who complain when their young girlfriends want children. Boo hoo. Keep moving, boys, you're going to have a lot of keeping up to do!
66
For the love of God. First of all, I'm in my 50's and I have no problem at all admitting that my body doesn't look nearly as appealing as that of an 18 year old. Nor is it remotely shocking to me that there are men out there, a lot of them, who's primary goal is not finding a partner that is there spiritual and emotional and intellectual equal, but finding someone that allows them to pretend that they are 30 years younger than they actually are.
And isn't it better that they just go ahead and admit this preference out loud? If you're a woman in your 50's and you meet a single man of a similar age, wouldn't you prefer to know up front that his ideal partner is a girl young enough to be his grandaughter? Kind of sums up everything you need to know about them.
14
@Kristin Took the words out of my mouth, Kristin.
Personally, I embrace being invisible as a woman over 50. I was preparing to attend a wedding, and it suddenly occurred to me that it didn't matter what I wore-- I can chose what makes me feel good and no on else will notice! Thirty five years married, I have more love and support on a daily basis than Mr. Moix can expect in his lifetime. As for his penchant for women in their 20's with whom the relationship never lasts, I can hear the Olympia Dukakis character in "Moonstruck" bluntly telling John Mahoney the reason his relationships fail: "She's too young for you!"
7
"'You don’t look a day under 65,' one woman tweeted to him. 'I hope you’re lonely until you’re 100,' another wrote. They insulted his literary talent and his under-eye bags, and speculated about his wounded psyche. Magazines reprinted the best zingers."
That captures the essential difference, between an ordinary, elderly peasant such as myself and an aging, prominent writer, or perhaps an over-the-hill TV personality (whose makeup for hi-def TV must be designed by a civil engineer). Bill Gates attracts tons of fan mail, while Archie Bunker attracts, well...
The fun thing about being a peasant male is that I am sure I don't look a day under 75. When sags appear in the mirror, they are looked at as reality. Denial is not necessary, because there are some advantages to not being youthful. People sometimes let the aging get away with things young people can't, such as sitting on public transit rather than standing.
Vanity should not be the province, of people who are old, not cute anymore, and don't have anything left to sell.
1
The most distressing part of this piece is how intensely women have reacted to Moix. An insecure older man expressing desire for young Asian women! Quel surprise!
He is boring, and the greatest insult to his clearly enormous ego would be to simply ignore him and his absurd inability to grow up.
The fact that the man cannot find a woman closer to his age attractive has precious little to do with a woman's body and far more to do with Moix's need for power and ego-identification through sex with younger, less experienced partners.
It's such an old trope. One day his type might die out. Probably not. But who cares? Let us get on with the business, and pleasure, of living.
13
@Rachel What you said is true, but I liked the backlash. They showed him their ways, and it just cracked me up! And they said they don't care about his whims and fancies! Love the way the women reacted, have to give it to them, :)
2
"His relationships with younger women often end painfully after a few months, dooming him to a perpetual adolescence."
Oh, the humanity.
It's almost as sad as the dangers Donald Trump faced from sexually transmitted diseases, which he equated to his own “personal Vietnam.”
It's just heart-breaking what these Lotharios have to endure to compensate for their insecurities and shortcomings.
5
Oh, my what a sad little man. No wonder his relationships with younger women end painfully after a few months. What does he expect?
7
Mr. Moix had the courage to speak honestly about what he finds attractive and the professionally offended is surprise surprise, offended "how dare a man speak the truth in terms of what he finds attractive in a woman".
The is a famous TED talk from few years ago given by a 60+ woman who only dates 20 something men and her TED talk is about her preference for 20 something men, and guess what she got a standing ovation and was hailed as a feminist heroine!
Oh the hypocrisy.
7
He's entitled to his preferences, everyone has their sexual preferences. Please tell me that women have not become so insecure that they fall to pieces because a man says he doesn't find their type attractive. What would the reaction be if a 50 woman said she didn't find 50+ year old men attractive? Would their be a collective outcry from 50 year old men, would articles be written about it? No, because nobody would care, least of all 50 year old men. If women want to be empowered then they need to stop falling apart when a random person says he doesn't find them attractive. Grow up and have some self respect.
6
A man declares a preferential bias against sharing physical intimacy towards an entire class of women sight unseen and people are reacting by discussing older women's sexual worth, rather than the man's internalized prejudice and his definition of sexual attraction as purely physical, devoid of human connection. Imagine if a person declared "I don't know why, I just don't enjoy friendship with black people." Would we all be defending their "preference" and asking ourselves if black people really are worthy of friendship? And would black people send that person photos trying to convince them that they are worthy?
2
Over 50% of white women went for Trump. That told me volumes about women and about my assumptions about women. I was truly flabbergasted by this outcome. Women don't even like women. I've seen much more pettiness from women over my many years than I've ever seen from men. In my lucky twenties I was asked into the bedroom by a few women. I still find my 68 y/o wife and partner of forty years to be "sexy" but childbirth, age and finally familiarity do take a toll. To maximize your powers (both sexes) it's important to keep the weight under control, exercise, and eat little and only good foods. Don't discount the importance of smiling, making it as natural as possible.
Re the French writer that rhymes with "box", who cares what he thinks about anything? Like with Trump, don't take the bait. Talking to you Elizabeth warren.
2
@Economy Biscuits
"Women don't even like women. I've seen much more pettiness from women over my many years than I've ever seen from men. "
Throughout the course of her 30+ year professional career, my wife shared such observations with me many times.
1
Great to finally wake up on a Sunday morning with something to smile about. Isn't it obvious that he said this to sell his book?
He is toasting you all with champagne in an apartment on the Left Bank!
Tracking his book sales would be an interesting follow-up. I am sure it's an absolutely terrific diversion after the yellow vest revolution. Better than reading about setting cars on fire!
2
Moix is saying that "falling in love" with a woman has NOTHING to do with the whole person and all the nuances that come with intimacy: of spirit, humor, outlook, experience of human nature and the world that takes years to acquire. For him, "relationships" are purely physical. Women at his own stage of life scare him because he can't be patronizing and magnanimous. But apparently, even the beauteous 20-somethings catch on at some point and desert him. Anyone with brains would get bored with having their identity reduced to their body, at least until they age out of the "status" he bestows on them, at which point they become invisible, having nothing whatsoever to offer this man but the above qualities, which don't interest him. Interesting that there is nothing in the article about how an 18-yr-old might feel about sleeping with an ugly, 60-something, wizened old creep. But then, the article isn't about how these women feel.
2
NO DUH, Sherlock! A double standard exists, for sure, but what 25 year Asian lady old wants a 50 year old guy? Not many, making this issue largely moot. It's purely a matter of supply and demand. Since older single woman vastly outnumber older single men it is stands to reason that men would choose the youngest partner that works for both. Men also are thinking about aging and picking a spouse that will best help them live the longest and most comfortably. If the demographics were reversed, men would be crying the blues instead.
What I find unacceptable in his comments is that they imply a promiscuous lifestyle.
One way to look at this is he is taking a consumerist view of women, using one for a night or a month, and then moving on.
Although for decades after the sexual revolution this was considered acceptable (if the young women were ‘willing’) now we know where it leads. Such men tend to become players. Are they sure these young women want to sleep with them? Are they abusing the women, damaging them? Are they the type of man who plies a woman with alcohol and then has “no idea” that she didn’t want him?
These are the type of men who lead to #metoo. They think sex is like eating a meal and they treat every woman like a prostitute.
Aside from the rage and damage such men leave in their wake, I would never share a table or shake hands with a known promiscuous man — what STDs is he harbouring and spreading?
Men should uphold the manly and adult virtues of self-control, discretion, and delayed self-gratification. Stoicism and discipline should disincline men to skirt chase into pools of younger women, who tend to be more naive and tender than themselves. As a society we should honour the long term relationships that we know from research make women feel cherished and safe.
Sex is a serious matter, and for the sake of both public health cleanliness, and to avoid the date rapes that go with players, we should all commit to personally avoiding promiscuity— and judging those who don’t.
He is unattractive, to put it kindly. And I pity the young, immature women willing to "engage" with him because of his social status. The reason he's not attracted to women his age is because he is not mature enough to handle them, or the fact that they see him for what he really is.
3
Oh. My. God. All I can say is…cheers to me!
I read about a man like this and I think....thank heaven I am so over men like this!
If how a woman's body looks is all that a woman - that sex - means to you Mr. Moix, well then Sir, with all due respect…you are missing out on the best sex you will ever have.
Especially with a woman at – or beyond – middle age.
You will never, ever reach the heights of ecstasy - and the depths of profundity and intimacy - that your fellow open, evolved, learning, growing, funny, smart, playful bro's will.
More significant, you will never ever touch the exquisite beauty, power, and intrinsic erotic nature…of woman.
2
To each his own, but if one's sexual attraction, like Mr. Moix's is attuned only to the physical, that poor deprived soul is missing a whole world out there.
This issue is as old as recorded history. Do we really think getting angry will shame men? Will change anything? I wouldn't trade a day of my 65 years to go back to being insecure, needy and judged only on my sex appeal. In my opinion I've never been more beautiful.
He said what many, many men think. If that offends, so be it.
2
I guess I'm more offended by his preference for a particular ethnicity than for a particular age. That's truly creepy.
2
The fountain of eternal youth doesn’t spring from the loins of 20-year-old women. If you get turned on by woman young enough to be your daughter, you are the problem. Just because studies show that female peak attractiveness occurs at this age is not an endorsement of mental health. Quite the opposite, I’m afraid.
1
Sex is way better with woman in their 30s and 40s. Those in there 20s need the same age
1
I do not know the man nor have read his works. He seems to have a rather shallow view of attraction and is discovering that it is really unproductive. Yet I find no mention of an attempt to change himself, seek greater depth or otherwise do something useful. I wonder if it only an American idea that you can and should change yourself, perhaps with help, when stuck in a rut. Is the "Self-Made Man" not French?
1
It’s a western cultural thing found in France, England, the USA — this narrow idea of beauty — that women must be like flowers, unblemished, blossoming, fragrant, passive, decorative, fertile. This is especially found in classic western fashion. Other cultures appreciate and express women’s beauty and power in terms that extend far beyond flowers, that include the rest of creation including stellar phenomena. Your fancy western gardens are like prison cells ladies.
To each his own. And to this guy, sex is clearly an activity like consumption. From this perspective, you can enjoy the cordon bleu just fine without noticing or caring about any response it might have.
1
Human oogenesis occurs in utero, the DNA is packaged and there it remains, undergoing slow decay, for the next 60-70 years(1). Everything in this universe is in constant flux and while some of these changes are obvious others are often imperceptible. Men have likely evolved a mechanism to perceive the decay of DNA and thus the fertility in a mate, it is as simple and as cold as that. Christian Rudder compiled a much more cogent data set on this phenomenon (2). Men of all ages display a preference for 20-22 year old women, while women display a preference for men their own age. If you want to blame someone for this blame the universe, it is cold and it is cruel and literally everything has a cost. Yet, for some reason, people still keep producing tiny versions of themselves thinking that they will be immune to the unfairness of it all.
(1.)https://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/01/booming/womens-eggs-diminish-with-age.html
(2.)https://jezebel.com/mens-favorite-ages-are-20-21-22-and-23-a-data-dive-1731660984
p.s. it is also likely, considering the first law of thermodynamics and special relativity, that Mr. Moix will be re-born at some point in the future as a women so I wouldn't be too concerned about his on the couch revelations.
There is a line in My Fair Lady delivered by Professor Higgins-- "The French don't care what you do so long as you pronounce it properly."
That penchant for pronunciation does not extend to pronoun declension, apparently. Witness this --“He can sleep with whoever he wants, Yann Moix, who cares?”
Now, whether the writer thinks that the case of the personal pronoun is determined by the preposition "with," or by the verb "wants" within the clause that is the object of the preposition, (it's the latter), the proper case is the accuaative "whomever." He wants whom, not he wants who. He wants her, not he wants she.
And should any of those toothsome 50 year olds seek a more appreciative audience, keep me in mind.
"The Revenge of the Middle-Aged Frenchwoman" -
When I first read that line - I thought - for sure - it must be a review of the latest offering from the French Cinéma vérité --
Oh well...
1
He’s 100% correct. I’m 60 and I’ll be darned if I’m adjusting to someone else’s view of who I should go out with or have sex with. Younger women 25 - 45 are better to be with.
For those who aged together that’s great.
1
This is a subject which for better or worse escapes rational debate, prone to highly subjective interpretations of the human condition.
That said…
1/Yann Moix is wrong with his sweeping generalizations, for beauty is in the eye of the beholder, there are beautiful and disgraceful 'physical specimens' in all age groups ;
BUT
2/The majority of middle-aged women DO lose interest in sex for hormonal reasons. Thus it is not that shocking nor scandalous for men to gravitate towards younger women because they are simply more biological inclined to want to indulge. And please don't bring up an example of stunning seniorhood such as Jane Fonda-- such glorious preservation is the province of the rich and privileged.
I lived in Paris for a couple years and absolutely love French women. They are more irreverent than even New Yorkers, which I think comes across as standoffish to most Americans, but I like difficult women with discerning tastes, so Parisians suit me just fine.
If I'm honest, I think M. Moix is a bit of a wizard. It seems that all I have to do is say something indelicate about their age and attractiveness, and loads of French women will send me nudes? GREAT! Alas--I am relegated to the forum that is the NY Times comments section, so I suspect my comments will go largely unnoticed.
Seriously, though, it's not like anyone gives Samantha from Sex and the City a hard time about her strong preferences for younger men. That's meant to be empowering. The hypocrisy is nonsense, but even if it weren't, I'd still have a hard time caring about M. Moix's sexual preferences. I'm surprised so many French women do when they feign indifference or disinterest so well.
2
Ah, to live in a country not dominated by news of presidential gaffes!
4
moix looks in the photo like a pug dog with indigestion - not attractive, wise with his age, nor much of any class.
1
Sorry, and this physically not alluring man matters because why?
4
He said he is doomed by his preferences... and even as a self conscious weak aspect of one´s soul, it unnacceptable.
So let´s say it out loud: we want censorship! We want hypocrisy. Let´s a modicum of intellectual honesty otherwise why journalism, philosophy or science? Just go back to religion.
It says to me this guy lacks decent eyesight, to think only 20 somethings are attractive. One need not look very hard to see that attractive women come in all ages and sizes and colors.
It says to me he's desperate for attention, to be whining in public about his awful fate.
I turned 72 this week. I've been invisible for quite some time now. It's actually really restful. My kids have turned out well. My husband is still around. We're financially secure and happy with each other. Life is good all around. It won't stay that way of course as we get older and the inevitable deterioration sets in. But as long as it does, we're happy to enjoy our life. Who cares what some 50 year old French idiot says.
6
Why anyone cares what Moix thinks is beyond me.
This is a publicity stunt, and it’s obviously working. The best response would be indifference.
4
Author or not, who cares? There will always be men and women who think this way. Let him “fall in love” with new shiny things that come his way. But, he should stop whining about it.
2
Mr Darwin is responsible for all this. There surely were men who preferred women in their 50s, but since they didn't reproduce, all we got from evolution were these callow guys who like younger, fertile women. C'est domage.
2
First, I have to take offense to the description of Moix as a “public intellectual”. Please. The history of this term in France is far too illustrious for just anybody to claim it!
Second, to be frank, whenever I hear so and so person caused a “big stir” in the media (not that big, depends on your media; no news source I read would dedicate a moment of their time to Moix’s sexual preferences, nor should they) for so and so opinion, and with something to sell soon, I always wonder if the notoriety is really worth it? Is the adage all press is good press really true?
This is especially the case for Moix, who visited, had a good time, and last I heard was going to be a French teacher in North Korea. In any case, he surely had a better time than the people who live there.
He also once accused the French police of physically abusing migrants trying to get to Britain in Calais, and when asked for proof, was surprisingly silent.
Clearly, Moix’s silence is a trait best reserved for special occasions.
Finally, as Ms. Hurstel wisely said, perhaps it would be best to treat Moix, and any other “public figure” (in Europe, in America, around the world) looking for a quick buzz as if they were speaking to their shrink. To reference a European-American First Lady, “I don’t really care [about Moix’s opinions], do you?”
People, society, culture, would be so much better if we simply accepted the fact that just because one has a platform doesn’t mean they have something to say.
1
So, can anybody get middle-aged French woman in good physical condition to send naked pictures of themselves to you, just by making a comment on social media? (Asking for a friend.)
6
How about we make Mr. Moix invisible?
1
For me (Male/36) the actress Michelle Yeoh (56) was sexiest woman in "Crazy Rich Asians". She also looked so great as a starship captain in "Star Trek Discovery". Older women can be very attractive in both personality, talent, intelligence, and their physical looks.
If all these aging male leads like Sylvester Stallone and Liam Neeson keep starring in Hollywood action films -- why not great exciting women like Ms. Yeoh?
I agree with their anger. A dumb and insensitive statement indeed.
But, I’m not sure I understand why it’s taking so long for women to start talking about the stereotyping they do to each other- something that’s independent of men. I think that women should start speaking up about their elephant in the room, which is how women spexualize themselves for the benefit of themselves (e.g. every 9th account on Instagram). Men don’t do that to themselves, not in the sexual realm. An internal dialogue needs to take place as well.
I think what's galling is this attitude among many men who are over 50 that they somehow look more fit and handsome than their same-aged, female peers. So, to find a woman physically equal to a man who thinks that way, he needs to reach for someone 20 years younger.
2
Intellect and maturity can, easily, be mutually exclusive. He sounds like a sad, little, narcissistic (lonely) adolescent boy who is missing out on all aspects of peoplehood, age-related, or not.
3
What a sadly shallow position. It cuts this man off from some of the most interesting (and sexy) women on the planet.
1
Moix doesn't rhyme with “box” in English or in French.
3
This guy sounds like a clown with a penchant for provocation aimed at keeping him in the news and selling his wares. But the fact that men are attracted to younger women is an evolutionary nod, not a cultural development. Younger women can reproduce the species, older women cannot. It's that brutal and that simple and that unfair when you get right down to it.
2
Just marketing. He wins, you lose.
2
Women are just coming into their sexual prime at 50, while men are, for the most part, way past theirs. I believe medical evidence shows this.
3
Oh. My. God.
All I can say is…cheers to me!
I read about a man like this and I think....thank you Jesus, Mary, and Joseph that I am so over men like this!
If how a woman's body looks is all that a woman - that sex - means to you Mr. Moix, well then Sir, with all due respect…you are missing out on the best sex you will ever have.
Especially with a woman at – or beyond – middle age.
You will never, ever reach the heights of ecstasy - and the depths of profundity and intimacy - that your fellow open, evolved, learning, growing, funny, smart, playful bro's will.
More significant, you will never ever touch the exquisite beauty, power, and intrinsic erotic nature…of woman.
2
So – between him and Macron, things sort of average out...
4
This is a big yawn. His detractors should move on with their lives. He should probably stop trying to impress people
2
The French have a saying: that for a man one's ideal woman is half your age plus seven. Perhaps there is some wisdom to this idea, though some American women may think it unfair. Mon Dieu!
The French, being French, also believe that there is an ideal man for French women. That man is 19, no matter how old the woman is!
C'est la vie!
3
Whose beauty will be adored more a century from now - Twiggy or the Venus of Willendorf who is now about 30,000 years old?
Case closed.
At play here is nothing more than testosterone-driven biological nature of a man, as exemplified by Yann Moix. The cases of the unions of older women with much younger men -- the current French example of President Macron and his spouse -- to the contrary notwithstanding, ours is predominant a world of "dirty old men".
I do not see this subject worthy of discussion.
1
Okay...so he’s ONE PERSON who’s sexuality is obviously trapped in a ceaseless state of ephebophilia. I could care less. I pity this guy and I pity those who believe it somehow their birthright to be considered “in the running” for his conjugal attention. I’m sure he wouldn’t reject a female cardiologist simply because she was not an Asian in her twenties.
And BTW...there are literally hundreds of ways in which males...even one in their teens and twenties are essentially “invisible” from an attraction standpoint to women...even to charming physically attractive successful female writers in their 50s.
I agree with those who say his biggest crime is absence of discretion. What in the world is France coming to.
As I recall, he did not just say that he wasn’t attracted to 50 year-old women. He said they were unlovable.
You’re letting him off easy, Pamela. He’s entitled and disgusting. And immature. If you want to assess the maturity of a man, look at his wife. That’s his internal age.
3
The fact that women care what Moix says, and the decible level that ensued following his remarks, seems to me to just acknowledge and give him more power. Are women saying that, if they could, query every man on the planet and retaliate were they to say, "Yup, I'm not so into older women. They're sort of invisible to me." Like, who cares?
1
The best thing this Moix character has done is put 20-something French Asian woman on the alert. He would clearly be an emotionally stunted, selfish partner. Like many so-called "intellectuals" and "great men", this dude's perspective on the human condition has some pretty epic blind spots.
2
And Monsieur Moix? I suppose his body is ripe, lithe, strong, and oh-so sexy. Perhaps he should take a good honest look at himself in the mirror. Or ask his 25 year old girl friends for an honest assessment. The aging process does not discriminate...it's very gender fluid.
5
This is superficial and sad. Beauty is everywhere, in the older and in the younger. Beauty is getting to know someone and make a connection, feel love, compassion, kindness and passion. You know - the difference between sex and making love.
Oh please, the great beauty Nicole Kidman is 50 years old, and she wouldn't even consider accepting a date with such a grizzled and weather-beaten old nobody as him.
1
Men and women are shallow in different ways, that's why women better be beautiful and men successful.
2
The guy is 50, and claims he can't break the pattern of short sexual relationships with younger women, that end badly. So this pattern has continued for probably 30 years.
He's a very slow learner.
Anyone who continues a pattern for 30 years (!) has chosen it. If it makes him sad, then he's also chosen to be sad. It's your choice dude, and up to you to change it or accept it.
3
"All cats are gray in the dark." (Benjamin Franklin, Advice to a Young Man on the Choice of a Mistress)
1
Mr. Moix confuses sexual attraction with love. And seems to be unaware of emotional intimacy. Yes, it is sad when men cannot engage with the person within and only want women as trophies to boost their own sagging egos.
In any case I was hoping to read about French women's methods of revenge!
Pictures if 50 year old fit women are most welcome. Bring them on.
1
The question is - Do the 20-25 year old women, that Mr. Moix likes to hang out with, find him physically attractive? He would be invisible to them were it not for his wealth, fame and success.
4
Who cares what the old (FELLOW) thinks?
With any luck and justice, he will get to rethink his position
at 90.
1
I'm a 63 year old man happily, insanely happily, married to a 60 year old who has been, for me, from the moment I fell in love with her, 34 years ago, the most beautiful woman on earth. I cannot imagine my life without her.
Mr. Moix is an arrested adolescent who clearly sees women as nothing but playthings, that he plays husband and lover to, as a child plays Mommy to her dolls. It's charming in a child, but sad and sickening in a grown man. He bemoans that he's doomed to be lonely? I have not one shred of sympathy.
To reframe and old joke, he can sleep with anyone he pleases,
and I expect he won't please anyone anymore!
Mesdames, he's not worth your effort. Don't argue with a fool. He'll only bring you down to his level and beat you with experience!
6
I feel sorry for M. Moix, but even more sorry for the women he does find attractive and manages to strike up his shallow relationships with.
One small quibble, the models in Marie Claire look like they are barely into their teens, not barely out of them.
1
Since his offensive views are heavily documented and widely distributed, why is he still given a place to publish it s venue to speak? His right to such thoughts should only exist between his own two ears. Misogynistic ideation, racism and the perpetuation of male privilege will never stop as long as they are allowed to see the light of day.
@From Where I Sit. So his sexual preferences are so monsterous that he shouldn't be allowed to express them? Does this of yours extend to women expressing their sexual preference? Why do you even care what one man's sexual preferences are?
The Japanese are making great strides in robotics. Perhaps someday, technology will provide M. Moix with his perfect mate.
1
Robot sex partners exist
1
He’s right but shouldn’t have said it
1
@JQGALT Only women get to be honest?
I am a man in my early 70s. My partner of five years is three years older than I. I cannot understand men my age being interested in younger women. And by "younger women" I mean women under 60.
I have been with many women in my life. Some have been very exciting. But I can honestly say that my current partner is the most exciting of all. I can hardly believe how attractive I find her. As far as she is concerned, she has too many wrinkles and sags. And her tummy is a bit more prominent than she would like. But I truly find her beautiful. When she smiles, I absolutely melt. And the sex is amazing! I can't keep my hands off her.
I'm sorry, but, to me, a 50-year-old female seems like a woman in the making. Hang in there ladies, you'll get there.
4
Last salvos of masculine power? I heard that in the 1990s. I've formed a theory: that not all of the world's 3.6 billion males read the Times op-eds.
I’m 65, strong, fit and I take no meds of any kind. Women my age are in a different place. They have a struggle, before and after menopause. It’s not men’s fault. I don’t want sex with them.
1
that he isn’t attracted to 50-year-old women, and that he prefers to sleep with Asian women in their 20s.
Natural occurrence of interference between different categories is what we call prejudice. This is perfectly a racist comment, whether malign or not.
"As a public intellectual he’s supposed to play the “seducteur” who engages in a chaste flirtation with his audience. Announcing that he wouldn’t sleep with some of them kills the mood."
Ummm, no thank you. I prefer my "public intellectuals" to engage in intellectual matters. Announcing that he wouldn't sleep with some of them is just stating the obvious. What a bizarre and misogynistic presumption the author makes.
1
Being married to an Asian (Japanese) woman for the past 13 years, I can assure NYT readers that Asian women are not ’submissive’.
They are simply much more skilled in getting their own way by subtle manipulstion than most Western women are.
The result is that we menfolk, with our fragile egos, are allowed to live in the happy illusion that it is we who rule the roost.
Rather like a placebo knowingly received still having a positive effect, I am fully aware of my wife’s elegant manipulation, yet my (admittedly rather ridiculous) ego remains intact.
1
I am SE Asia and currently surrounded by old fat men (or, men Mr. Moix's) age, with young girls (some whom I swear are 12) on their arms. I see them in restaurants, in trains, sometimes they are on tours with me. The girls rarely speak English and have a standard set of moves, that they have been taught in the brothels of Patpong Street. The men are ridiculous and frequently can be seen in bars acting out their adolescence. I am over 50 and travel alone, and if we are say stuck in a gondola, or on a boat, these men will start conversations with me, because their girls are busy taking selfies or talking to their friends on the new cellphone he bought her. They will always tell me I'm interesting, when I know they wouldn't look at me twice on the street. To me, the men are pathetic, they are impervious to the way the girls cringe when they grab their bottom, or re-buff them and slap their hand away if when their fed up. As a woman of a certain age, I have also been approached by young men and I always wonder how people can be 'intimate' with other people when the only connection is physical. There is no intimacy there and yes, he will be in a perpetual state of adolescence, until he turns say, 65, then he will be invisible too. I envy my friends who are lucky enough to have had long marriages and relationships. It is truly wonderful to see people who have pushed away the superficial conflicts and worked to create real relationships. Mr. Moix is a sad cliche.
12
Leave Moix to his professed preferences and prejudices, which perhaps are expressed to make himself seem more attractive or desired than he actually is. Why are women sending photos and asking for His validation of their bodies anyway!!!? And maybe the 18 year old Asian women he prefers have their own preferences too! Last time I checked, women get to choose their mates, especially when they’re financially independent.
2
I was an 18 - 20 something woman once. As were my friends and my sisters. We did not find 50 year old men attractive. Maybe we just didn’t meet meet enough old men with enough money. That’s the cliche, right? Mr. Moix is a cliche.
3
So M. Moix dates for looks and the women he goes for date for money/prestige. Plus ça change.... It's nice to know that there's somewhere on the planet where writers are still celebrities. Most ordinary guys his age may want to date women half their age but can't get them unless they're paying by the hour.
2
Women are beautiful at any age whereas men too often end up just plain worn out.
Has Moix's analyst yet brought up his obsession with young women as perhaps a deep fear of aging? After all, anyone who does something repeatedly (dating very young women, preferably Asian) that genders the same result repeatedly (getting dumped within months) falls within the spectrum of a kind of insanity.
3
Keep telling yourself that
1
What can be said about a mature man- by age if not in spirit- who prefers women half his age? When l was that age we called them mashers and lechers. To be avoided, frankly.
Clearly he does not understand what he may be missing. Invisible we are to him? ‘Tis more likely he is invisible to us. Bless his heart . . .
2
Let the dude be- we all men and women say what we may be into- and that has included the prime minister of FRANCE! To each his own! One doesn’t fall for age, one falls for a particular mate.ce la vie!
To be a writer who continues to grow and mature in his craft, Mr. Moix needs to keep himself open to new experiences and opportunities. Being so definitive about his preferences leaves the impression he has nothing new to say and perhaps his latest book is just a rehash of his past. You would think an author would want to surprise his readers, not bore them with the same old.
1
Nature cares about making babies.
A fifty year old man and a fifty year old woman cannot make that happen.
Nature encourages a fifty-something male to be with a twenty-something female.
Stop blaming him for what is natural.
2
Oh, the always brilliant Times commentators! There is such great wisdom in these posts.
1
Although Mr. Moix's hooves and curly tail show, I don't like the counterclaim suggested by Elle Magazine. Sure, TV host Karine Marchand is arrestingly beautiful, and I'll even take their word about her naturalness (beneath a lot of obvious makeup).
The pull-quote on the cover is something again. "A 50 ans, ce qu'on vit, ca se voit," she says. This is a simplified paraphrase of a quote attributed to Coco Chanel that I find cruel: "A woman of twenty has the face she was born with. A woman of fifty has the face she deserves."
Reminds me of the Miller's tale in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. In the story with an older man/younger woman dynamic, she makes a FOOL of him.
1
If we are being honest, both women and men, I think we would have to agree that generally speaking youth is inherently more sexually desirable than age.That's not to say than an older person is undesirable. Sex is only one element in any lasting relationship and our desires and abilities change consistently. Youth is fecund and juicy because conventionally speaking we reproduce more successfully when we are young. Becoming less obviously desirable is simply one of the many issues of ageing.
There's no question that sexual invisibility can be upsetting but we either have to accept it graciously or run the risk of becoming a social embarrassment! I suppose the slight unfairness lies in the fact that, dare I say it, young women often seem to be attracted to older men whereas, on the whole, younger men are not sexually drawn to older women.
Possibly one of the few advantages of being a man is that the ageing process, superficially at least, seems to be kinder to men!
3
Men under 5’10” are invisible to me.
4
1- When you love someone, they are the most beautiful person in the world. What else matters?
2- This will make some people mad, but isn't the May-December romance somewhat of a self-hating thing to do (for the older one, I mean)? They do make movies about it, but it's always older woman/younger man. Moix shows it easily goes both ways.
(And, yes, I know there are always exceptions.)
1
"Mr. Moix insists that there’s hope for him. By the time he’s 60, 50-year-old women will seem young. Alas, I’m not sure any of them will be waiting."
Nope, they won't be as his attitude will still be juvenile.
1
'It’s no secret that some older men fancy younger women. '
Look at Trump.
3
Mr. Moix's admitted predeliction renders him a sad and insecure cliche. He empties his own life. He is of no consequence to the rest of us.
1
Women need to be paid the same as male counterparts. With the strength of equal pay, the ridiculousness of invisible / undesirable/ unvalued / ignored women of age 50 will fade away. Woman are valuable.
1
When I was 50, I contacted a man my age on a dating site who sounded thoughtful, interesting and fun. He wrote back: you didn't read my profile carefully (true); I'm seeking women 25-40. I did some math and responded: So if I date someone commensurately older, I'd be dating your girlfriend's grandfather. HIs reply: I know what happened with YOUR husband. He was dead wrong; my husband and I agreed to part for a whole host of reasons, but infidelity and a younger woman had nothing to do with it. I was then and remain a vibrant, extremely fit women who is frustrated in her attempt to date her age-mates. Am I bitter about it? You betcha.
1
We have to stop being driven or influenced by all those people weird or unstable enough to react extremely to any story and the burst out with their positive or negative feelings. I don't understand why women would feel it necessary to hate a guy like this for just saying something. Their comments say more about them than him, or the issue at hand.
If we took all the calm, collected, rational comments would it really be too boring? Why do we need to go ape at every little thing some people say or do, and why does the media try to provoke everyone into doing that and normalizing it. Why not some intelligent conversation ... is that impossible?
2
It's biology baby, so blame evolution.
A woman's appeal is in the appearance of fecundity, which disappears rapidly with age. Men's appeal is in the appearance of having resources, which usually accumulates with age.
Ladies ... use it while you're young because it won't last long.
Men ... don't despair, you get more attractive with each passing year
4
Eh, @Steve, if you’re going to go the “it’s evolutionary biology” route, I’d say women would desire a man youthful enough to have plenty of healthy sperm and glossily fit and strong enough to chase down and spear a mammoth for dinner ;-)
3
African women do not suffer from this phenomenon. We love to age. Of course our societies are much more respectful of the elderly.
2
This (Mr.Moix’s opinion) is akin to women, of all ages, declaring publicly that they only want Alpha males, and irrespective of their ties or marital status would rather procreate with an Alpha than their “regular” partner.
It’s as demeaning and belittling as than.
Its easy to see why most women react strongly to his opinion, its because its true, men are hardwired to seek out young women, but then all humans are also hardwired to survive at any cost, and yet this world knows love and sacrifice. It’s a matter of being able to think things through. If one claims the benefits of civilization and society then one has to pay the dues too, even if this means crushing your primal instincts Mr Moix.
Mr Moix’s attitude seems to represent more a National Geographic documentary than French or otherwise, society.
His opinion would have been better tolerated by a society based on “only an Alpha male may procreate”
2
Nowhere in here are the words power, money, or patriarchy mentioned. This isn't about 'preference'. it's about power. Who has the power to demand and get a younger, more attractive mate? Because we'd ALL 'prefer' one of those. But only some of us--the male, white, wealthier ones--have the social power to get it. If you are female, old, poor, not-white--you have less money and less power, whether it's the job market or the dating market.
@Cyntha - I don't know who you mean by "all." I certainly don't want a "younger, more attractive mate." I'm in my 50's and I wouldn't even consider dating a man more than about five years younger than myself. I want someone in my own generation. And looks are irrelevant. Connection is everything.
Not my experience. I’m in my 60s athletic and take no meds and I see smart beautiful women in their 40s. They are fabulous and fun. They are independent and sexy. The women in their 30s who flirt with me in stores, business or the gym are generally nice and I don’t ask them out so they are we know each other and I’m not hitting on them.
1
Young Women sleep with him because of his money and imagined power. He sleeps with them for their looks. Neither party has encountered or tasted the intimacy and deep love that can grow after years together. My husband and I have a joyful sexual life together after thirty years of marriage. I don’t envy this guy or any of the women he dates.
1
My first thoughts are that the 20-something women who have had a relationship with Moix are in it for material rewards rather than the sex. There is no way I would have had a relationship with a 65-year old man when I was in my twenties if sex was the primary reward. I would have had a hard time seeing him as anything but a grandfather.
This made me laugh. I am as natural as a peasant too! It's not hard. Can I be on the cover of something?
2
Ladies, men don’t make the rules of evolutionary biology. The most insightful info ever printed in The NY Times was an age preference chart (male and female) from the dating site OKCupid last year. Google it. Required reading for everyone.
I find it hard to believe that young women would find Mr. Moix "hot." They might find other things attractive, but I also believe that if a 50 year old woman is famous and very rich and sort of keeps her self together, she could find a variety of adventuresome young men who might see opportunities and might be willing to overlook a few wrinkles for an easier life....I do think both men and women generally want a companion who shares their likes and interests and with whom they can grow old together. Also, if you love your mate and you keep the bond strong with time spent together, you won't see that he/she has aged. People like the POTUS and Mr. Moix are just sad...
1
Just goes to show there's no accounting for taste.
Women in their 40s reflect better taste than older female mammals in decline.
Am I the only one who finds this completely hilarious? Mr Yann Moix is seriously encouraged to make more of such atrocious comments. His own self-analysis is comedic. Humans are humans and aging is a fact. This painful denial of aging and loss of beauty, trying to revert or recapture part of our youths but still wanting the wisdom of middle age... hah!
This never ends, does it!
The article, at least, made me laugh.
Mr Moix is to be pitied for the pathetic reality of his romantic and emotional life. Ladies have mercy on the poor bloke.
3
As a 51 year-old male (and French), I just want to say that I have only utter disgust for Yann Moix and what he said.
Unfortunately, to his defense, he's become over the years a regular participant in late night French TV shows and also a well known later afternoon program on French radio RTL which are all run by the same small group of boorish men, and who run for the most part on not very subtle misogynist and at times homophobic jokes.
French TV and radio "entertainment" needs a good sweeping ("un bon coup de balais" as we say in French). They are a disgrace to the nation.
5
I’m 25 and have this lady friend neighbor who’s in her late 40’s. She’s an absolute blast inside and outside the bedroom. Older women got my vote!
1
Interesting. We hear so often that the French have a better approach to sex than Americans, that sex scandals are no big deal in France, that French wives don't care if their husbands have affairs and that French women are considered sexy through their 90s.
Smart, confident young women only sleep with old guys because they have been conditioned to think that age and success matters. However, in a short while with this gambit, they quickly realize that young men better match their own youthfulness and sexuality. Age relevance is an act of God and stepping out of your generation framework usually means someone is faking it. Regarding youthfulness, beauty and sexuality, no one disagrees however romance with a twenty or thirty year old would be hard work and sexually uninteresting. I remember thirty-five years ago and deem romance much better today than then. Women past sixty are sexy, confident, beautiful and a spectacular romantic bedroom blast. Now, I'd willingly marvel at youthful femininity and even gaze at specific anatomy but nevertheless would not want to hold hands or chat or smooch.
Some men just don't want to grow up. what's new.
It is hard for me to understand why any 20 year old would find him attractive or intellectually interesting.
As for 50 year old women, he does not date them because they would catch on quickly to his shallowness. A vain old man in the age of much more interesting women.
2
"What does “l’affaire Yann Moix” say about the state of Frenchwomen?
Why have Mr. Moix’s comments provoked such anxiety and outrage?"
Sorry I can't answer those questions but one thing is clear. "L'affaire Yann Moix" is providing lots of titillating marketing that should help sell his latest book.
This seems to be a case of "All attention is good attention." Now a writer I'd never heard of is suddenly part of my consciousness.
Nonetheless, I enjoyed Ms. Druckerman's writing. Witty, with a good flow and a bit of humor. Thanks.
No tie, needs a shave, ill-concealed receding hairline, well past his prime.... the man has lost the freshness and bloom of youth.
Allez vous rhabiller, Monsieur Moix!
1
Mr. Moix apparently cares more about bodies than about hearts and minds. May he get what he wishes for.
1
What does “l’affaire Yann Moix” say about the state of Frenchwomen?
I had to read this line twice before I could believe that it had been written by a woman and printed in the Times.
It says nothing except that Frenchwomen, in common with the rest of humanity, can get distracted by trivial things.
Do you really think Moix's comment has anything to do with women? Of course it does not. The comment has to do only with Moix himself--and, if he is of any importance, the author did not tell me what that importance might be.
Frenchwomen and all women are not very interested in this matter.
1
Sir, aside from being an obvious special person, aka, Narcissist, what makes you think any self-respecting, real woman would like to hop into the sack with someone who looks a bit saggy and not terribly too physically attractive as the best days are past, sorry but that's an unfortunate reality. And I would hope the younger women will not condescend to be involved with such a specious specimen. When I was that age (i.e., long ago) I would hardly imagine why I would ever want to be involved with someone young enough to be a daughter. Perhaps Mr. Moix should consider a visit with his local shrink to ponder this, but then again, I doubt he would be welcome the suggestion.
2
Let’s hear it for honesty. He has the guts to say what he believes, no crime in that.
Nearly all men prefer dating and having sex with younger women. It is nature's way.
I have heard some men say that a woman peaks at age 25.
I think women can be attractive until their mid-30s if they take care themselves.
Sorry but Mother Nature is not interested in being politically correct :)
1
@Truth Sayer: Men “peak” too, and sometimes long before their mid-30s.
Several years ago, I attended a birthday party for my friend’s husband, who was in his 30s at the time. Among the guests was their neighbor, who was around the same age. He was balding, dressed unattractively, and had a gut that rivaled a pregnant woman’s stomach. He was also annoying as all get out, while his wife, who had actually just had a baby, was definitely more mature and put-together than he was. My friend’s brother-in-law, now 38, is overweight and looks ten years older than he actually is: her sister, on the other hand, looks phenomenal. My friend’s sister takes care of herself. Her brother-in-law and neighbor don’t, and everyone can see the results. I think these men are the ones who peaked at 25. The women will probably be attractive long past their mid-30s, and that’s not political correctness: given the way things are going with them now and the men in their lives, it’s probably just fact.
Can you name a book that has a middle age or elderly woman on it's cover ?
1
@OldBoatMan - What’s your point? Can you name a book that has a middle aged or elderly man on its cover?
@Lindsay K
Middle aged or elderly women are invisible - there are many books with men of those ages on the covers
Pretty funny that on the day of the Women's March for equality these women are so concerned about their attractiveness and so upset about being rejected by a man.
2
I once came close to dating a man in my 40s--he was my age. He told me he slept with someone much younger than me "Have you ever slept with a nineteen year old!?" He asked rather smugly. I said "Yes. When I was nineteen." Needless to say, I was turned off by his shenanigans.
90% of the time, if a young person sleeps with an old person, they want something--money, etc. If both parties are ok with that, then fine.
"Mr. Moix tried to explain that he’s a prisoner of his preferences and of his own fear of aging." Norman Mailer made a similar admission in "The Prisoner of Sex" almost 50 years ago. Obviously some aspects of male desire are innate and hard to change.
1
Frankly, the man essentially admitted that his desire for young Asian women resulted from fear and perpetual adolescence. I think we should simply take him at his word, and dismiss his desires as both fear and adolescence.
2
95 percent of men agree with this guy
What's so wrong with being truthful and saying it?
1
Exactly. It’s this simple. Women 30 through 40s can fabulous. be fabulous. Early 50s maybe if their in great shape.
I’m surprised that people seem surprised by this.
2
Let him have very young models, and all the drama and immaturity and self-centeredness that come with them.
1
The world over is full of fellas like Yann.
I found "invisibility" hard to deal with....at first.
However, after a good "talking-to" by an older, wiser workmate, I learned to embrace invisibility. Yes , I did say "embrace".
It sets you free - from the silly, shallow "standards" of others - and, more importantly, from your own....
Just want to point out that 'Moix" does not rhyme with 'box' as is stated in the article. The closest would be "Mwah".
OK, that being said, any man or woman may be attracted to certain people and not to others. To each his or her own.
2
I'm just going to put this out there - most people would be perfectly lovely (and sexy) at any age if it weren't for the many horrible lifestyle choices they may have made, which have a cumulative effect and become m ore and more apparent the older we get. Taking care of yourself (and being lucky) makes all the difference.
2
Here we go again, just like on Twitter a couple of weeks ago, this essay misses the point.
The point is that Moix has created a double standard, since he's 50 years old himself (and looks much older). It's also that he feels entitled to this double standard; that he makes sweeping, prejudiced judgments about ALL women and ALL Asian women; and that he feels entitled to set himself up publicly as an arbiter of half the human race.
The point is NOT that some women over 50 look fabulous, and that all are worthy of love. The point is that he assumes that, just by virtue of being male, he's entitled to publicly judge them.
The Frenchwomen who sent him photos of fabulous-looking 50-year-old women took an approach that was not only defensive, but also accepted Moix's assumptions on their terms: the assumption that, solely because he's male, he's entitled to judge, and his opinion matters.
I find that response weak, pathetic and lacking in self-esteem. Who cares what this person thinks? Who says he gets to judge?
It's another indication that, when it comes to women's rights and sexual politics, supposedly "sophisticated" France is actually decades behind "puritanical," "cowboy" America.
8
Hey, this year 70 is the new 50!
And, next year, 71 will be too! :D
(Go ahead, guess my age! :D)
1
If you measure yourself by how people measure you, you have an unsustainable model. The outrage should not be for Moix’s remark; the outrage should be that it matters. Revenge should not even be part of the mix.
2
The strange thing here is that my preference for natural blonde LatinX dwarves would these days go largely unremarked, while expression of the most commonplace preference imaginable, older men for younger women, is suddenly a matter of intense concern and disapproval.
People used to know better than to argue over matters of taste.
3
I am a 45 year old woman, but I don’t particularly care for the bodies of men past 50, either. But at my age, a 25 year old man’s mind and level of life exp holds little interest for me. There’s more to relationships than just sex.
1
@T We can safely say that the readers of the New York Times will have no issue with a woman expressing a sexual preference, which is as it should be. Why that attitude isn't also extended to the gentleman in this story is a mystery to me.
3
Sounds like Mr. Moix is not falling in love with anyone, over 50 or under 50 if he has serial relationships every three months.
His statements should be ignored for the self involved blather that they are.
Ladies we should not give men the power to offend us so easily.
3
At 66 my wife is not the 18 year old I met decades ago(neither am l). That being said I have no need for powerball tickets as I won the lottery the day I wore her down enough to marry me.I still have the Pavlovian male response when I see a beautiful young woman but time has taught me the foolishness of measuring a woman so narrowly. Now that the every day issues of kids ,careers ,and aging parents are past , sex is still great.
1
Well, well, well. I think men are most attractive in their thirties and forties.
Much better muscle definition.
So what? I’m not going to run around regardless. Who needs a man who makes these kind of pronouncements, as though he were the judge of all females? All attraction is individual. Why are these women even bothering with his opinions?
2
To me, the sexiest part of anyone--the thing that attracts me to them--is the brain. (And what that brain produces--verbal and written and musical and artistic.)
I realize that this may be a minority opinion.
4
Actually, it’s not. I share your opinion wholeheartedly. I’d rather be with a fifty year old (and above) woman who challenges me intellectually than some dolt.
If she’s also a decent chess player, it’s an added bonus.
1
@Glenn Ribotsky You're safe holding that view, there's no outcry when we declare unintelligent people unattractive, everyone is free to dump on them.
I don't think any body, male or female, looks better or as good as an 18 year old body. It is simple biology.
3
Chacun a son gout, and that's fine (as long as it's adult and consenting). But why would a man feel the need to be gratuitously insulting to a large group of people. It shows an utter lack of class and probably betrays something else.
2
Funny, if I passed him on the street, he would be invisible to me.
4
Isabelle Adjani, Anne Parillaud, Isabelle Huppert, Sophie Marceau, Marion Cotillard. Shall I continue?
Beauty is as beauty does. There is nothing more unattractive than a beautiful, empty-headed shell.
My all-time favorite is Ms. Parillaud, especially her incarnation of the title character in Luc Besson’s “La Femme Nikita.” It took a French actress to effectively portray female virility. I also loved her in “Frankie Starlight.”
In Canada, Ms. Amanda Simard—she is all of 29. Ms. Simard is a member of Ontario parliament. She is intelligent, courageous, and possesses the looks of a Francophone anime figurine.
Nuff said. Enough air time to Mr. Moix’s archaic recidivism.
@Silver Surfer I've met some wonderful people who weren't conventionally intelligent, it's sad that to feel so free to demean them while trying to appear virtuous. Elevating one group doesn't require that you disparage another.
"as natural as a peasant." Interesting analogy and if I can find any peasants around here, I'll see if it fits.
2
I wish people wouldn't give men like this so much attention. It's not interesting enough to warrant a big reaction. What he said is obviously silly, and anyone who has lived long enough knows it. Of course people in their 20s are beautiful, and of course many men are instinctively drawn to women of childbearing age. That's just biology.
But to say one can't fall in love with a woman in her 50's, and that no woman that age can be sexually attractive, is nonsense. Humans are varied and complex, and all kinds of non-procreation-determined attractions happen across age groups, nations, genders, and race.
5
Why is the personal opinion of *one* man should generate such an outcry is completely beyond me. It seems like *anything* can be cause for controversy today... Anybody has the right to be attracted to anybody, as long as it's legal. Some men are attracted to younger women, some to older women, some to women of all ages. What's the big deal? It's called "sexual preference" and as long as both parties are consenting adults, it can't be subjected to political correctness.
5
Just a heads up for those wonderful French women who have challenged this particular dinosaur: putting Julia Roberts on the cover of a magazine and touting her "old" age of 51 is the not the solution. Roberts is a very good actor, yet she has been tucked and sculpted and coiffed, as is no doubt required in the movie business. In other words, she has been made to look younger to attract audiences.
I also want to remind all of us: 50 isn't old. A lot of women are beautiful at 50 and 60 without face lifts and botox.
Beauty has to be redefined and only women will do that. But it cannot be redefined as the ability to mimic a 25-year-old.
2
Yann Moix’s comment made me think me of a passage in Rachel Kushner’s novel, The Flamethrowers:
His father had said to him, "As you get older, you tolerate less and less well women your own age."
"You mean you do," Sandro had said.
"Yes, I," his father said. "That's right. And I used to think it was because I'd escaped time and women didn't. But that's not the reason. It's because I'm stunted. Many men are. If you are that kind of man when you grow up, Sandro, you'll understand. You'll go younger in order to tolerate yourself."
4
With his shallow views, it's no surprise that Mr. Moix's relationships have ended up being disappointing.
Why would any woman want to date someone who would consider them invisible and not worth dating after a certain age?
Reminds me of the 60s something professor in "Moonstruck" who keeps showing up at the same restaurant with various young women who end up throwing their wine in his face and leaving. Smart women.
I'm thinking of a certain older female relative. She married twice, having children with each husband. Both were disasters. They were alcoholics, abusers. Ugly divorces followed. When she was in her mid-50s she met a man 25 years her junior. They are still happily married almost 30 years later.
It seems third time was the charm. I'm glad she was not put off by his youthful beauty.
1
To be honest, I’d love to get an 18 year old girlfriend but my 24 year old current girlfriend, who happens to be my daughter’s college roommate, keeps threatening me that she will tell all about us to my wife. I think I will move to Paris (France, not Texas).
2
@PaulN
Thanks for this. Very funny.
1
@PaulN
Ewwww. You should move to Mars (the planet).
1
I'm wondering how many women in their 20s find Mr. Moix physically attractive? Also, as some of us know, intelligence and character can be tremendously sexy in a man. Mr. Moix may also fail that test.
I never expected any one 'type' to be attracted to me, and I doubt any of us can control who we are attracted to. I don't think any of it can be political because we don't make a choice. And it seems silly (in the sense of futile) to demand anything different.
1
Is anyone here seriously suggesting that women AND men don’t look better in their twenties than in their fifties?! People please.
2
Evolution has drawn men to younger women (fertility) and women to mature men (ability to provide resources). This isn't rocket science, it's Darwinism. I've often stated that the most attractive physical aspect of a man is a fat wallet. Yeah, the ladies can have their boy-toys for fun, but afterwards.....?
1
In this opinion piece (about really an uninteresting person) Ms Druckerman tells us „aging while female isn’t simple“.
What the heck does that mean? Does it mean, that aging while male is simple? When I look around, I see that old(er) men cope most of the time worse than old(er) women, especially when widowed. If aging is not simple, then maybe because there is less of lifetime left and people of both sexes realize this. But then again, why so negative? Growing old means after all that one did not die young, a chance not everybody has.
2
For me, a woman in my 60's, it is his opinion and that should be all, no discussion or defensiveness needed.
If everyone had ignored it, it wouldn't have blown up like this.
Are some women trying to bully him out of his visceral opinion?
1
Men over 30 are losing their allure too. They are wrinkled, softening, sagging and experiencing physical frailty. Fellas like this are a dime a dozen. They are looking for tiny young bodies to ease their own horror of aging. They are not interested in relationships, just a series of brief encounters with ever younger females. The older they get the more unattractive they become. There is no twinkle of wisdom and caring in their eye. Gentlewomen of a certain age should not take this immaturity personally. Who cares what he thinks?
3
As one newly-arrived in Paris and wrestling with a mores that often baffle me I found most interesting the rebuke to Moix from Agnès Hurstel for breaching French etiquette by speaking “as if he was on the couch of his shrink”
I’m in trouble! Most certainly as an American who reveals practically everything, one who ascribes to the maxim “the truth will never hurt you” ever since my candidacy for the U.S. Senate a decade ago. Americans deal with the truth much better than a faux image manipulated for political or personal expediency. But- I am neither running for political office nor living in America.
Secondly as an aging single gay man I come face-to-face with age differentials between me and much younger men whose company I keep. I’m not Moix, but the older woman (and not 50 but 62). I neither fall for younger men (what is “younger”?) because of their beauty, nor do I find men 50 years old unattractive. My battle is internal, with the mirror, the hour glass and my self-esteem.
Ironically I blogged about feeling as if I were perpetually growing up before reading this provocative article. When Moix explained that he’s a prisoner of his preferences, and of his own fear of aging; his relationships with younger women often ending painfully after a few months, dooming him to a “perpetual adolescence”. I get it. And I credit him for that self-awareness.
Thanks Pamela Druckerman.
I'm just so glad that I make my own money and don't have to worry about any man judging whether or not I am hot enough to sleep with. What a relief!
3
There are examples of older women that like (and abuse) younger men, such as feminist professor Avital Ronell, as per the NYT article below
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/13/nyregion/sexual-harassment-nyu-female-professor.html
Why this fixation with Mr. Moix? He did not abuse anyone, his only sin is being honest.
Funny, pardon the stereotype, but I always thought that most women age much more graciously than most men!!
Well, I don't find women over 34 to be attractive. Nature doesn't want them to be. Menopause takes a toll on reproductive strategies.
Evolution means men are attracted to women who can bear them children (i.e., age 16 to 30) and women are attracted to men with good genes and the means to support the children so age is much less of a factor.
Many women in SE Asia (not China) have told me they actually prefer older men. Some of that may be sweet talking but there is a reality that older men (especially but not exclusively caucasian) look wealthy and powerful so are kind of a status symbol. Fortunately, these women lack the sophistication to discern between actual wealth and relative losers like me.
1
"Alas, I’m not sure any of them will be waiting."
You are right about that. A lot of those finicky guys who fancied themselves as studs in their younger years have ended up being lonely old men. That's a statistic that is rarely mentioned as well.
6
Late sister was a stewardess in 1950's and early 1960's and quite attractive, but as she got older, she would tell me that as she walked down aisles of the L.I.R.R.--we lived in PW at the time-- men looked as her less . Every woman, in her heart of hearts, wants to be objectified, considered a sex object, nothing wrong with that. Wife Shirley, having been a dancer on the Ted Mack amateur hour and who remembers that, kept her figure but as the years went on, her massages were so wonderful, and she was so generous with them,who cared about anything else?Met on downtown bus in 1990, and she was a census taker, having just interviewed Tommy Tune, when census takers actually went out and knocked on doors.When I left on assignment for Africa in 2004,she stayed in US, but we kept in touch.( We both appear in a video shot CHRISTINA's COURT and available on Youtube, but I digress.) Speculating on "arrieres pensees" of the author, hunch that she wants to "montrer,"indicate her sophistication and her self identification with "les gens bien,"who have the time to worry about such things. With the widespread inequality in France, dissatisfaction with EM as a tool of wealthy urbanites at the expense of middle and working class folks, who truly in France has the time to worry about such matters or have even heard of "un denomme" Moix?
1
French misogyny is grounded, in part, in an economy in which women are paid less than men for equivalent work, need men to survive economically, to get ahead, to take care of their children.
It is also grounded in a culture which privileges form equally with substance (la forme et le fond). Lovely in fashion and food and curtains, but not healthy when it comes to human beings, men or women.
So long as these continue, so long will the Yann Moixes continue to preen, I suppose.
It sounds like Moix is stuck in adolescence or young adulthood mentally and has not grown to be the intellectual equal of mature women (or well-adjusted men of his age who are capable of forming and sustaining stable relationships). I doubt any women in their intellectual prime would be interested in him, even if he were in them.
1
When I was in grad school, two beautiful twenty somethings had affairs with 50 year old men. I rennet them talking about it as an experiment that yielded these results: better in bed but not worth it in the long run (because it felt “gross”). Ha ha!!
Of course there is another response to a man, famous or not, saying that he isn't attracted to 50-year-old women:
"So what?"
4
I got tired of changing the diapers on all my young paramours so I changed my outlook by a couple of decades.
2
Despite what the research says, there are plenty of anomalies. Lately, I've seen more and more men cuddle up to women over a decade older than they are, and I have more than a few male friends in their thirties who are head over heels for their partners in their forties. Men who prefer older women (oh, and at 40 I get far more attention than I did at 22; just the other day a man around 30 begged me for my number) often point to their confidence, intelligence, and aptitude at adulting.
Sure, there are men who only look at a body and a face, and there are women who do the same. These external qualities are about 1/5th of what I scope out when evaluating potential partners.
Good for Mr. Moix. I won't call him a racist (though it's possible), but he is a fetishist. And though Asian women are arguably beautiful, so are women of African descent, Middle Eastern Descent, South Asian descent, Armenian descent (we were voted sexiest women on the planet one year from some travel blog or other!), and Norweigian descent, plus others.
Fetishists don't look at the whole person usually. I've had guys chase me for my feet and my height, and no thank you. I should not be reduced to these physical traits, and I want nothing to do with them.
This pressure on older women to laminate themselves into lost youth would make a lot more sense if you have never stepped into, oh say a restaurant, from the Four Seasons anywhere down to a turnpike diner and surveyed the older men in the room.
Marsupial would be the most succinct description.
Any older man who actually believes younger women are sleeping with them for anything other than financial or some other sort of gain is hardcore delusional.
Women could do that too... but they would rather go shoe shopping any old time.
If there was a KitKat Club for women, it would be all about the Manolos
5
Moix's original remarks strike me as pathetic. Sad. But, then, whatever doesn't turn him on.
In the article itself, I'm struck by this:
"And in a country that lives by the maxim 'Not all truths should be told,' knowing what not to say — and what parts of your life to conceal — are key social graces."
It's also sad that readers of an American newspaper are in a position to be told of a land across the sea where people live by such a maxim. The fact that we're free to talk about everything in public doesn't mean we'd be giving up our freedom by letting some things remain private.
1
Sexual attraction is not "one size fits all". Attempts to put limits on the sexual attraction between consenting adults only reflect personal insecurities and prejudices.
1
Waiting for the 50 year-old writer who states that she only goes for men under 30, and the subsequent "you go girl"s from men and women of all ages.
2
So what really is the issue if a man admits his preference for a particular type of women, to justify being chastised?
Is society entering into another Khmer Rouge type era when social commentary becomes oppressive to independent opinion and preference?
The social media ruling class will obviously disagree and as it is already occurring cannibalism within the self-proclaimed "progressive" class is already devouring their own...
3
A few days ago, the 97 year old luminous star, Carol Channing, passed away. Threaded through her life's story were several failed marriages. Then, in 2003, when 84, she married her Junior High sweetheart, Harry Kullijian, also 84. Though the marriage was cut short by Mr. Kullijian's death at 92, it was the one truly happy marriage of her life.
The great compiler of Greco-Roman mythology, Edith Hamilton, in a section of 4 short love stories, included Ovid's charming tale of Baucis and Philemon, and old, impoverished couple who do their best to show hospitality to 2 strangers who are Jupiter and Mercury in disguise. Their one wish is to stay together and neither outlive the other.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baucis_and_Philemon
True love is true love, at any age.
1
Further down in the story there is a big fat grain of painful truth for anyone willing to think about it. "Mr. Moix tried to explain that he’s a prisoner of his preferences and of his own fear of aging. His relationships with younger women often end painfully after a few months, dooming him to a perpetual adolescence. “It’s not something enviable, it’s something sad,” .....
You know what? I get it. Middle age for men is difficult. That is the truth.
I can't speak for other men but I find women to be inherently beautiful, poetic creatures at all ages. The beauty though comes from depth. Looks are fleeting. Love is long.
1
As a French woman over 50 I find it odd noone comments on the fact that 1) women keep much better care of their bodies than men 2) men live sadly shorter lives than women so it would make sense for women to start dating younger men so as not to make a sad ending as nurses or lonely widows still in their prime. Besides I do not understand the deluge if images to try and convince him of what great bodies women over 50 have - he should be buried under images of unattractive men's bodies over 50.
5
M. Moix is welcome to desire any age group he likes. Why he thinks he's so important that he needs to tell the world that he's Peter Pan (shorthand for male who never gets past emotional adolescence) is another question and the one that matters.
If young women are willing to put up with him, good luck to both. But the rest of us really, really don't care.
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Men's eyes are attracted to the same things from age 13 to 100, a woman whose body says she is fertile. Women aged 15-35 most often fit the bill. This is driven by a part of the brain far older than that conscious part we "think" with. It's not something we choose; it's who we are. So please don't be angry when we glance at a beautiful young thing, and we'll try not to stare.
When choosing a romantic partner, it all becomes a question of priorities. Assuming you're someone that 25-year-old women find attractive, having sex with a young woman is exciting and good for the male ego and libido, but the couple will soon tire of each other when the novelty is over. A greater commonality of experience is more likely to blossom into a longer and fuller relationship.
But some men are quite happy alone, and only wish sex as entertainment. As a well known writer, Mr. Moix has probably always dated women in their 20s. I'm sure his partners regard him as a brief adventure to sample and enjoy, rather than anything serious. If he wants to host the "have sex with a famous writer" amusement park ride, he's free to engage in his hobby. Why should that anger us? Who has he injured? He was merely impolite to state some basic facts of human sexuality that surely we all knew.
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He just stated what should be obvious, regarding most men's views.
Unfortunately, that 25-year Asian also has a 25-year old mind (and perhaps her fingers in his wallet).
Me, I would reject any woman under 40 (I'm 57).
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Its great that middle aged female editors of french magazines are putting middle aged females on the cover. The question is why they did not do so before this gratuitous insult from this hack. A second question is whether they will continue to do after Moix becomes yesterday's news. The answers will determine what female editors of french magazines think of middle aged women.
Women complain when they lose power. When they have power (youth), they often have a huge lists of demands: tall, dark, handsome, rich, high IQ, great career, good family, etc.. When I do online dating, I see tons of women who say "no men under 6 feet tall." Women care about objectification, only once they cease to be objectified. They care about power imbalances, only once they lose their advantage. Frankly, I see women as tyrants (when young and beautiful) and hypocritical sore losers (when no longer young).
Two things are true:
1) all is fair in love and war
2) love is a battlefield.
I'm pushing 50. My response is to work out almost 2 hours a day and to try to get my income as close to seven figures as possible
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@richguy
You sound like quite a catch. (Insert eyeroll here.)
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"Man prefers younger women"-- shocking news!!
In seriousness, everyone knows this. Men are primarily attracted to 20-30s women. Women in their 60s can still "have it," many do, and they are still human beings...but on average, men will find them less attractive. It has more to do with things like curvature, etc., however. Men would find some 60 year old bodies much more attractive than some 25 year old bodies. It turns out men do not have a switch to fix that. And while there are unspoken rules in society about what we ought not to say, surely, someone can say true things once in a while without such uproar?
As another comment suggested, most men understand the feeling of invisibility. Only a *very* small fraction of men will get used to a female gaze. This isn't a bad thing, it just is. Women cannot or need not suddenly be attracted to whoever because of social outrage. Rejection of reality is not a cure to loneliness or aging. That is an incel argument, that people should be conditioned into liking them. No, stop it. Stop this silliness.
This is why discussions of "privilege" ought to be nuanced, as it is highly complex, situational, fluid, and multidimensional. Discussion of it is good but simplistic univariate analysis is badly misguided. Shaming a privilege (like being 'visible') is also misguided.
Can we stop the hierarchies of different standards and silent lying?
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Julia Roberts -- like just about all female celebrities over 40 -- has had numerous cosmetic procedures to keep her looking young. Unfortunately, women who claim to be and ought to be role models for the rest of us -- Susan Sarandon, Jane Fonda, Meryl Streep to name just a few -- are sending the message that a woman past middle age must submit to having her face and/or body surgically altered to remain presentable. Very, very sad.
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Women have traditionally exchanged their beauty and youth for the resources and money older men bring. This is how the world works. You only have to look at the current inhabitants of the white house to see this bargain. Younger women realize beauty and youth are fleeting, better to exchange it for something substantial that will give comfort when they are gone. Men realize that you cannot take money and fame into the afterlife so better to get the most bang for the buck in this life. Women over 50 are invisible to men, men without money are invisible to women.
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I find this whole debate/controversy amusing, entertaining, and even refreshing – something to get our minds off Trump temporarily. An issue not addressed much by the readers is Yann Moix’s preference for Asian women. The real source of this hullabaloo or “rage” may not be the age, I speculate, but the fact that he committed a transgression: he prefers Asian women to Western women who have represented a universal standard of beauty or attractiveness – blond, lanky and blue eyes. His preference subverts this clichéd standard, and subversions always trigger in people sentiments ranging from discomfort to rage. Food for thought… By the way, Asian women submissive? A total myth, if there ever was one.
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As a gay, fit man in middle age I get far more looks and flirtatious vibes from women than I do from men. I used to get equally from both. I think women look more st the whole person than men , gay or straight, do
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