Personally I don't care whether Madonna wears nothing and jumps around the stage and becomes best pals with a bunch of 18 year old pop stars.

I just don't like her music or find her interesting so my dislike of her is not based on her age or any of that stuff. It's not a gender issue for me. It's just my personal taste.

Really...the best people to answer these kind of questions would be people who loved Madonna when she was younger but who hate her now and then they could say whether it was the music that they no longer liked or whether it was because they couldn't take Madonna seriously now because of her age. I'm in the "was never a fan" camp so our opinions have stayed fairly consistent.

My suspicion is that it's really the pop audience who put more emphasis in things like age, looks and superficial stuff to begin with who are most likely to turn against an older artist. I don't value these things to begin with.

couldn't have put it better myself.

I'll just add that it's really only pop music, look at country music, Dolly, Emmy Lou etc, all perform but again, the don't roll around half naked. You also got the rock chicks like Chrissy hynde, no one calls her a granny, apart from her grandkids! it's just the style of music. male pop acts tend to disappear before they get too old, or get caught like Gary.

I agree hence the reason comparisons of age etc. aren't nearly as bad with artists like Bruce Springsteen etc. Most pop artists careers are short lived so they have a peek early on in there career and have usually vanished by the 10 year mark. Madonna stayed in the limelight and as a huge fan I would be the first to say not because she has the best vocals or she releases the best pop music. She managed it because she is extremely clever at manipulation and marketing herself as a brand. From spectacular OTT shows to clever use of imagery in videos to striking the right deals with media. What's continuesly being questioned isn't really her music or direction in music but should she be doing pop. it splits the vote as young people struggle to relate to an older artist. Some older fans because they have grown up and music tastes have changed expect Madonna to have changed like they have. But it's all really irrelevant as if you don't like it don't buy it why get upset and feel aggrieved or get abusive.

To be fair the film industry has suffered ageism especially with females since films were made. It's ok for older male actors in there 50's 60's and even 70's to prance about bare chested being an action hero and have 20 year old wives on screen. But should an older female actress play the wife of a young man or play a sexier role it generally receives poor media attention and comments.

but those male actors get a slagging for doing that too

basically, the bigger the star you are, more people will talk about you. so a big well known celeb does something daft and more people talk about it than a lesser artist. so therefore more people are going to criticise madonna for going topless as she's so well known. it does really matter what iggy pop does, unless he committed a major crime it's not going to get talked about half as much as madonna. his music isn't as well recognised as madonnas

tina turner was also called a granny and too old etc a lot when he was still touring, so it's not just madonna, but as she wasn't stripping off on stage, her critisism was more along the lines of that aimed at the strolling bones to use one of the more well known references to their age

perhaps as madonna is pop and has a certain audience that may not be quite so famaliar with music history, just like many other things she's done that some of her fans credit her for doing first when someone else did it long before her, perhaps they are just ignorant of the fact that it's nothing exclusive about her or about any certain age. that's the most likely answer

if take that were stripping off and dancing about in baby oil now when they are in their 40s or whatever they would get critisism too, nevermind if they were doing it whilst nearly 60

Kiss Me Once was Kylie’s first real underperforming album since Impossible Princess in 1997. Light Years sold over two million copies in 2000, Fever sold over seven million copies in 2001, Body Language sold over two million copies in 2003, X sold over a million copies in 2007, and Aphrodite sold over a million copies in 2010. Every studio album Kylie has released from Light Years to Aphrodite has been certified at least platinum in the UK. The deleted Ultimate Kylie compilation album has sold nearly a million copies in UK and over four million copies worldwide. Do people mention any of this? Nope. They just focus on the disappointing chart performance of Kiss Me Once.

For what it’s worth, Fever sold more copies in the UK last decade than what any Madonna album did. It's currently the 43rd biggest-selling album of the 2000s. Kylie achieved more top 10 hits in the UK last decade than Madonna. Can't Get You Out of My Head has sold over a million copies in the UK, something which Madonna's never achieved despite selling the most singles in the UK by a female singer. Kylie's debut album was the first album by a female singer to sell over two million copies in the UK, and it's still the 58th biggest-selling album of all time. Especially for You is still the second biggest-selling single of the 1980s by a female singer. The song finally surpassed a million sales in the UK last week, giving Kylie her second million-selling hit.

Threads like this one are the reason why I don’t visit a lot of music forums anymore. I was a member of Say Hey, various Madonna forums and several others, but I stopped going on them because it wasn’t enjoyable anymore. People suck the excitement and the fun out of things when they insist on creating threads like this one. Kylie’s lasted in the music industry. She didn’t fall by the wayside like a lot of people predicted her to do, and I think that's why some Madonna fans don’t like her. She didn’t become an afterthought like Paula Abdul and Tiffany. I usually just leave Madonna fans to simmer in their own superiority and pettiness. The truly pathetic thing is a lot of them are middle aged. I guess some people just have way too much time on their hands.

Male actors generally don't get nearly as much critasism as female actresses. Yes there might be the odd comment but in no where near does it compare to the critasism females get. Both in the film and tv business it has always been a problem with ageism towards woman.
To be fair if Take That had maintained there bodies they most probably would go shirtless. Former member Robbie frequently does shirtless shoots. I also remember when Gary trimmed down a few years ago he had a full shirtless spread in ID magazine. In fact older male music and film stars often appear shirtless in Gay Tmes, Attitude and Men's Health without it being a big deal. But on the other hand as previously said Madonna is a fantastic manipulator of media and no publicity is bad publicity before you launch an album or tour.

what criticism is this? got any examples of what you mean?



got any examples of what you mean here?

things are perhaps a bit different with film and tv as for example, if you are young and pretty and female you can get a lot of certain roles even if your actual acting talent is slim to zero, whereas when older the options may dry up. there isn't quite the same demand for hot young and dumb males. if many/most of those hot young females are relying on looks instead of acting skills then it's understandable why they struggle to get roles when older


but the members of take that are about 2 thirds of the age of madonna. i have no idea what gay magazines like those you mention print, but the images don't usually appear in the mainstream, at least not topless photos of male celebs knocking on 60, however if they did i probably wouldn't notice unless other general media made a big thing out of it. likewise take that aren't half as well known as madonna around the world so won't get half as much critisism in the press and by public for that reason alone

the more famous you are, the more you get noticed and the more critisism you will attract. of course for somelike like madonna who's actual talents in the field she is most known for are limited, getting a load of press, good or bad, is probably considered a good thing in the no news is bad news way. it's not like she's in the papers for being a junkie or peado like some celebs, and she's never killed anyone to my knowledge either. so what's the worse thing she's done? took her clothes off and make shite music? not much to worry about there. even in the last 7 days she's been in the press due to "leaked" music, coincidentally at the same time as sony have some alleged hacking issues with north korea and at the end of the year where celebrities naked photos appeared online due to "hacking". it's as if it was all planned...

Actually the Gay magazines I mentioned are mainstream magazines. With regards to having to give you examples if I could be bothered getting into a meaningless debate with you I would. However IMO there is no point as you appear to have your point of view and I have mine. As I said in my previous posts everybody is entitled their own opinion. If you want examples of how the industry both in music and film &tv is more critical of females do a bit of research yourself there are plenty of examples online.

My Mum went to a Nina Simone concert when she was in her latter years of performing and she was very good. I think artists such as these are not affected by image or looks in the way modern day artists would be such as Jennifer Lopez.

For the doubters, here's Tina Turner from 1996 (Wildest Dreams Tour) when she was the same age as Madonna is now. Check the legs and the Versace(?) dress.

http://tinaturnerblog.com/tag/wildest-dreams-tour/

And here is a performance from the same tour

http://youtu.be/6uQOdI2-Lw0

I like to see the reviews that suggest Tina was too old to perform they way she did.
The reviews for the Anniversary Tour in 2008 when Tina was 68 described her as 'the world's sexiest sexagenarian' ( Washington Post)....

Tina Turner - Acid Queen 2009 wow! And what a voice as well!

Really some of you guys have a hangup about older women looking hot...get over it.

Age is just a number.

I haven't noticed that as much recently - maybe it was more true of the 70s and 80s but then everything was a bit more sexist in those times. Can you point out a place that was happened? I'm not disputing the fact, I'd just like to have a specific example to refer to.

If anything, Meryl Streep seems like the most acclaimed actor in Hollywood today and people like Helen Mirren still get the odd racy role and even action role. I've even seen Stallone, Arnie, etc criticised for acting the action hero due to age and they have cut down on their action movies (until this inexplicable Expendables series). Stallone was even the one to joke about it in recent press for his boxing movie but he's quite self-deprecating so it wouldn't bother him one iota.

I can see it more in the 80s when action movies were the big draw (by number of films rather than just box office receipts) but I think all those stereotypes have been subverted in movies by now. Ripley in Aliens was the best action character of the 80s. Jolie did the female spy thing and Lara Croft too. One of the best action movies of recent years (I think) is Haywire and the female lead was cast as the strongest physical person in the movie. Kick-Ass had the accomplished girl alongside the more useless boy.

I don't think a female action hero is such an unusual thing now in 2014. Maybe in John Wayne's day it was more evident. As for roles for older women....

Well, I suppose there isn't a great demand for older women in straight action roles but, to be honest, which older actress wants that kind of role anyway? I can't imagine Meryl Streep, Glenn Close or Ellen Burstyn sitting at home dreaming about playing a version of Bourne or Rambo or something of that nature. To be honest I can't imagine De Niro or Pacino or Jack Nicholson wanting that kind of role either. As people age they generally settle into different roles which, to be honest, are more a showcase for their acting skills anyway rather than your standard action movie, and I think they prefer it that way otherwise some of them (Streep etc) would have enough clout to make the movie happen herself.

The only ones who I see as having any desire to continue being action stars into older age are the likes of Stallone whose careers have been built on that kind of fare and others who have been drawn into those projects quite reluctantly because they are basically cash-in movies. Take a success from the 80s and get the original star and try and reboot it - Indiana Jones kind of thing. And that's probably a black mark against their abilities to graduate into other roles or them cashing in on a bit of nostalgia rather than something most actors would aim for. If they could get the roles which Streep, Nicholson, Pacino can get then they would take them themselves.

I think as women and men age then they probably get offered different roles but that's something I would want if I was an actor myself. Who wants to be playing a teenager in a slasher horror when they are 45 or dashing army soldier when they are 60 anyway?

So is Madonna a Stallone or a Von Sydow/Pacino/Nicholson etc? (or indeed, a Streep, Close, Weaver, Burstyn, Keaton, Mirren, Smith, Linney).

I think it all depends on which audience you chase. If you go for the pop or action movie route then you are more likely to be judged on superficial things. If you go for....I don't know.....soul or dramatic acting then I think the roles and respect get better as you age.

Me-ow!

Honestly, there's nothing wrong with having a healthy debate on threads like these. It's good to discuss these things & get different opinions. I haven't seen any negativity towards Kylie on this thread - unless my comments about her sales have been taken out of context again? I like Kylie. I have a few of her albums & I like them. I'm not sure where your last comment about her pathetic fans has come from? There aren't many people on this thread defending Madonna - a few are but there's a lot of negativity towards her as well & I'm not getting in a huff about it.

Good points made here, thank you.

This is the kind of thing I think is being referenced. The leading male and leading female
age gap and its consequences,

http://www.vulture.com/2013/04/leadi...ests-dont.html

http://jezebel.com/the-crappy-age-ga...love-479811066

http://culturewarreporters.com/2014/...eading-ladies/

So it is not really about action hero stuff as much as the limitations it puts on older women's opportunities.

I have to strongly disagree with you on these points, and it's not just because I'm a fan of M's. I find it hard to believe that an artist, ANY artist, could fool their way into topping the charts for over 30 years if they didn't have any talent whatsoever. That is a ridiculous statement to make. She is not the strongest singer, I'll admit, she's certainly no Whitney or Mariah, but you don't have to be a Whitney or Mariah to be a successful popstar. There are plenty of popstars out there today with weaker voices than the big divas but the overall package works - they have quite simply that elusive X Factor. The same goes for Kylie, J-Lo, Katy Perry, Britney just to name a few - none of them have powerhouse vocals when they sing live but they have something - they can sing (varied ability), dance (very well) & entertain (very well). None of us know exactly how much input she gives to the songwriting process but she has songwriting credits (along with many others, yes) on a lot of her material. She also learned to play the guitar a few years ago. She works incredibly hard to make the best of what she has.

I'm not sure what you mean about the money & boss thing?

^That's the bit I don't get. I'm not talking about this thread where opinions have been invited about her but on the comment threads on articles about her or her videos on YouTube - non-fans just going on there spewing abuse & negativity...why? It's ok to dislike her, obviously, but I'm just thinking of all the artists I don't care for - not once have I ever even thought about writing nasty comments about them.

Oh that's definitely true on the age range thing. I just put it down to the egotism of the (often) male star/producer. I don't think they make movies specifically thinking about female characters beyond "hmm...she's kind of pretty" but that's really just an insight into their thinking rather than anything else and their finished products reflect that. They are vanity projects. Some markets are more superficial than others.

You can look elsewhere and see movies where there are great roles for older women too. You can also see older women who are very much acclaimed in the industry. There's even a few actresses who often play the sexy cougar role which is a sort of reverse of the situation we are talking about - Tilda Swinton springs to mind.

Looking through your links - these really are all crap movies. If I was an older actress I think I'd consider myself lucky not to be offered a role in any of them.

that's an oxymoron


you don't have to do anything. you made a point, to which for reasons of clarity i asked you for some examples


i don't want anything from you. i don't need to do any research. i was simply asking you to clarify what you meant. you don't have to do that if you don't want to

there's a big difference between the 70s and 80s and even most of the 90s and now, in that media has changed considerably as a result of the internet

i mentioned before that madonna isn't alone in getting critisism about various things, and it's been done over the years, and for men as well as women, but when jagger or turner were around the age madonna was now, most critisism would either be in papers or magazines and discussed in person between people, in pubs, workplaces or playgrounds for example, and those comments were usually in mainstream media, whereas now people can discuss things online, and if it's something you have little interest in, even if there's a huge scandal about an issue, it can completely miss you if you don't follow certain circles. sometimes you may come across reference to something if it creeps into other areas, such as seeing a thread title in the general discussion section of a forum, but if the title doesn't interest you then you are less likely to read it. skip back before the internet and people were more likely to get a paper or magazine and read most of it, even having a quick look at articles they may not normally be interested in, as they have came across them by turning the page

simply not coming across something before doesn't mean it hasn't happened. just as an example, someone mentions men don't get as much critisism about age, and then someone else posts a number of links critisising mens in regards to age. there's critisism everywhere, it just depends where you look

at the end of the day madonna may get more critisism about her age in the very much pop music dominated music forum on this particular site, but most forums will have certain stats like this which vary from the global norm

I completely agree with you and your viewpoints, I can understand someone disliking her and giving their own personal viewpoint but the same as you I can't understand people just spewing nasty ageist comments. It's interesting that if someone brought race/ gender into it they would be immediatly be moderated for racism, homophobia but for some reason when it's some ones age you can be really abusive. Generally I'm not talking about General discussion about their age because for some people they are different generations so age does factor. But it's the really nasty comments of which especially on you tube and the comments section on DS. I can't understand why someone then looks at the article if it upsets them so much and then make abusive comments. IMO I also think it is far more evident on articles about females in general rather than males.

I think the new media has been the catalyst for a lot of that online behaviour.
And people say things which they might not say person to person but will do behind the relative anonymity of being online.

Maybe Springsteen and Tina Turner fans are too old to use the internet? Maybe Madonna suffers from looking too good for her age? Is being a cougar a bad thing?

I did mention to a Springsteen fan once that he might have had hair plugs and a facelift and I was greeted with some abuse! You just have to push the right buttons it seems.

Are we.?

But i really like Motorhead,Iron Maiden,deep purple,UFO,Micheal Schenker ect ect all still going strong,and yes we can even use the internet.

The sexy image females in music try when young is bought on by performers themselves, they are their own worst enemy on a lot of occasions i cite.

Rita Ora stripping to her smalls at a performance, Miley Cyrus looks like a Lingerie display model,Madonna uses her sexuality to sell music.

Then as they get older they will get looked on less favourably as the days when they could use their bodies to flog a song are behind them.

Performers of real substance like Stevie Nicks,Christine Mc Vie (Fleetwood Mac) are two examples where the music speaks more loudly then their underwear.

To answer the original question posed in the thread topic...Ageism In The Music Industry - Why Do Females Get Attacked But Not Males?

I don't believe this is true older male performers such as The Boss often suffer from having the derogatory term 'Dad Rock' labelled at them, which to me seems like a form of ageism?

I should have put a smiley/sarcastic face after that to be fair.
The young ones like Rita and Miley are not really relevant and it's not even really about using sexuality to sell music (bearing in mind that a lot of pop/rock music is about sexuality so I'm not sure why that's such a problem).

It seems to be more about age appropriate modes of dress and behaviour. With Tina, she was showing her legs and midriff right up to her last tour when she was in her late 60s and I don't recall much abuse aimed at her at all. She had the vocals and power to go with it. And it's probably because her audience grew up with her and don't do abuse rather than don't do the internet.

Who cares about age appropriatess? I don't . Women don't owe anybody "gracefulness" as they get older, nobody does. My moral code for life is quite simple, as long as you don't hurt anybody else and you don't break the law you can do whatever the hell you like. Madonna getting her tits out doesn't hurt me, they're only breasts and people should get over it.