If you live in the United States and I guess just about anywhere else on the planet, you're going to be subjected to cultural ageism. After all, it sells products!
I think it's true though, that many women's communities are less ageist than the general culture. In the straight culture—not that there's just one straight culture—but in general, a woman in her forties or god forbid, older, really doesn't have a statistical prayer in finding a partner.
On the other hand, lesbians, butch-femme people, others in the women's communities, can find lots of people their age looking to date.
For the sake of full disclosure, I will say that about five or six years ago I noticed in a butch-femme dating site I won't name (because it really is a good site and I wouldn't want to discourage people from using it), that most of the butches my age were looking for women at least ten years younger than they were! I felt very discouraged.
But now I don't think that's the norm; it could have just been a fluke or some little cultural eddy I got pulled into; some trend of defiantly emulating the worst of straight culture, who knows. But I do know it doesn't seem a trend, at least in the little peeks at butch-femme culture I get these days.
And besides, women's communities tend to be less sexist, and the less sexist a group is, the less likely they are to devalue a woman because she is aging. Hence, I like it here!
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