Rachel Ward unwittingly sparked conversation about people’s obsession with youth and beauty. But most importantly, the unreasonable expectation that women stop ageing after their 20s.
After scrolling through “photoshopped” images on social media, New Zealand actress Rebecca Gibney took a moment to share her reality.
“Scrolling [through] social media all I see is bad news, AI rubbish or perfect photoshopped lives. Then I came to images of @rachelwardofficial and I breathed a sigh of relief,” Rebecca captioned a selfie on Instagram.
“I’ve followed Rachel for a while and @thegoodfarm.shop and it’s just so lovely to see real faces and real lives so I thought I might add my unfiltered sun damaged face and my funny old cowl lick fringe and fine over processed hair to the mix.”
In December 2025, Rachel Ward shared a video from her northern NSW farm – with no make-up or filters. The actress then received an influx of online vitriol, commenting on her appearance.
Rachel didn’t take the comments personally.
“Why are we giving ourselves these expectations to maintain youth, and what is perceived as attractive? It’s so great to not weigh into that anymore,” Rachel told The Weekly.
“Maybe if I was 40, I would mind the comments, but now I’ve so left any kind of attachment to youth and beauty behind… It doesn’t touch me because it’s not important anymore.”
Rebecca’s post to Instagram echoed this sentiment. The Packed to the Rafters star revealed one of the best parts of ageing was “you finally stop trying to please and appeal to others.”
“It’s vital particularly in the current world we live in that seems to be run by lunatics , that we remember that we are unique, our time here is finite and we really need to try and make the most of every moment we have,” she continued.
“So I for one am going to embrace every single day, I’m going to stop looking in the mirror and searching for what’s wrong with myself (luckily my eyesights not great anymore so from where I’m standing I look ok 🤷♀️😂) and finally I will just try to spend each day being as kind as I can to those around me.
“To myself and the 10 year old girl that’s still as crazy and kooky as back then. I believe we are here to help each other through this crazy old life and to do it with kindness and compassion.”
Just like Rachel inspired Rebecca, she inspired Home and Away actor Debra Lawrance to share her own unfiltered selfie.
“Following the post from the fabulous @rebeccagibney_ my 69 year old face au naturel. Changing the algorithm one pic at a time. Let’s do this ladies. 👍🏻❤️” she captioned the post.
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