Women are sadly used to being told we're too old, too fat, too saggy, too wrinkly, too whatever by people trying to sell us stuff. But one Montreal mom has had enough and her response to a salesman at Calgary's airport is going viral.
Annick Robinson was travelling through the airport last weekend when she was lured to a shop by the promise of free natural soap. Robinson shared the conversation in a Facebook post.
It started with compliments:
Man: "your skin is so natural looking, you aren't wearing any make-up, right?"
Me: "Um, nooooo?"
Man: "Let me guess your age..." Proceeds to pull out a number 12 years younger than I am.
Me: "I look my age and that's ok actually."
Robinson said he then recommended a face serum to stop her wrinkles from getting deeper.
"What's wrong with a woman looking 40?" Robinson asked him.
Next he tried to sell her on under-eye cream, but she wasn't having any of that either.
"What's wrong with my eyes? I have a miracle baby at home and haven't slept in two years, so if I have bags, I am grateful to have them, and my husband and I laugh a lot. Those are his fault," she told him. "He loves how I look... I don't think I need your cream."
When he then tried to give her a good deal – cheaper than Botox! — she put the final nail in the coffin:
"I look fine now, and when I'm 45 I will look fine, and when I'm 50 I will look fine, because there is nothing wrong with a woman aging. Old age is a privilege denied to many, and I don't appreciate you marketing youth instead of your products, and denigrating aging women as a sales tactic. Thank you, but I don't want or need your cream."
YAAASS GIRL. 🙌🏽
Robinson's post about the encounter now has more than 14,000 shares and women are applauding her refusal to cave to marketing tactics that prey on insecurities.
In an update, Robinson said she was "shocked" to see how many people had read and shared her story but she's hoping it'll start a movement.
"Let's end predatory marketing practices that sell self-loathing to women from cradle to grave. Women have more important things to do in 2016 than spend a single other minute worried about our wrinkles or the acceptability of our thighs," Robinson wrote.
"Flip the script when you hear it. Every time. Until it loses its power. The next generation needs you to change the game."