To be shocked at the ageism on here tonight

[drudgetrudy]

AIBU to be shocked at the terms used to refer to older people tonight.
We've had "old duffers", "old biddies" "old dears with nothing better to do" and this isn't a TAAT-its been on more than one thread.

If any other group were referred to in generalised and negative terms like this people would be going nuts.
People are people and come in many varieties over all age ranges.
Seriously pissed off tonight.

[BIWI]

People get old. As they get old they will experience physical and sometimes mental declines. This is entirely normal, natural and to be expected.

That's totally different from being derogatory about older people, simply because they are older.

[GarlicGiftsAndGlitter]

as if anyone who succumbs to infirmity at a younger age has somehow failed.

I don't think I implied anything of the sort.

What I'm saying is that age doesn't equal disability. The assumption that it does creates blanket perceptions of old people as infirm. Old people are more likely to be infirm, not always infirm. As drudgetrudy & others have said, we already have contempt & bigotry against people with disabilities. We also have it against old people.The assumption that all old people are disabled makes this even worse.

To resort to an analogy: how would you like to go back to the times when being a woman was assumed to mean you were feeble of mind, incapable of managing money, and physically frail? When, as such, your activities should be curtailed for your own good, and you'd be packed off to an institution when a man decided you'd become an annoying burden?

[ilovesooty]

Well I have modified my diversity training at head office for next week. Our consideration of inappropriate language and context now includes the term "old biddy"
I shall be very interested in people's responses. I hope and expect them to decide it's unacceptable in any context.

[magimedi]

I will be very interested to hear your results, sooty.

we can have "silver foxes" like George Clooney and they are not just acceptable but sexy, but women are all madly slathering on the Clairol.

I am not & never have. Am more than happy to be white haired. I strated going white at 27 & was fully white by 45 & knew I could never be arsed to go down the 'Clairol' route. Life is too short.

[ilovesooty]

Thanks magimedi.

I shall certainly report back.

[Moniker1]

case of a man of 84 who killed a woman and left another brain damaged and also clipped a pushchair because he pressed the accelerator instead of the brake

This argument always fails because young men under 21 have more accidents than anyone else, that's why their insurance is so high.

[Floisme]

I'm with BIWI. For me, the main point of this thread is that people are entitled to be treated with dignity and respect at all ages, regardless of physical or cognitive abilities.

It doesn't matter whether I end my days trekking up the Amazon or doubly incontinent and talking the the tea pot - no-one should have the right to insult or belittle me.

[GarlicGiftsAndGlitter]

I have 'trekked' up the Amazon, and met an astounding number of visitors aged 70+ and 80+! Many of them were doing much more arduous trips than mine. That's just an aside; I thought you might like it :) Your main point is, of course, what matters.

[Floisme]

I would not last five minutes up the Amazon and wouldn't have done at any age Respect to anyone who does it!

[magimedi]

It's taken about 8 posts on a Christmas shoppers thread (in AIBU) for someone to moan about 'pensioners' getting in their way.

[BIWI]

Did you report it?!

[magimedi]

No - just commented.

Maybe I'll go back & report!

[DidoTheDodo]

Celticlass, yes she can actually! (I don't think she has ever had an accident in all they years she has been driving)

[BrendaBlackhead]

What I'm saying is that age doesn't equal disability

Piffle! We're not immortal!

Agree that older people are entitled to respect at whatever age but no, no one is as fit at 95 as they were at 20. Why on earth do you think there's a care crisis if all these old people are zooming about in their cars quite competently, fit as fiddles and with the brain cells of an 18-year-old?

[ArsenicSoup]

Can I recommend "Somewhere towards the end" by Diana Athill to anyone who hasn't read it?

It is memoir/autobiography and she was almost 90 when it was published. It is the kind of clear-eyed, unsentimental writing on her own experience of being older that many of you would appreciate.

Of course, it probably wouldn't have been published had it not been her fifth or sixth volume of memoir and has she not had a long career in publishing herself, but we need more of it.

[DidoTheDodo]

But Brenda, the point is that not everybody needs care when they get older, that some people are indeed pretty fit and zooming about confidently in their cars and have all their mental faculties, but society still insists on lumping them all together under an "incapable, need patronising and are not contributing to society" umbrella.

[ArsenicSoup]

Putting my social science hat on, Dido, I suspect what happens is that someone high up in Public Health looks at the figures that show a male ex-manual worker of 65 in Glasgow is likely to be 'enjoying' similar health to a wealthy 95 year old woman in Kensington and decides to deliver one 'egalitarian' public health message/programme to all over 60s and that this approach now has a stranglehold on the influential public sector.

So an attempt not to discriminate/patronise has led to an endemic culture of just that.

[Floisme]

Before someone comes along complaining that they're 'not allowed to say anything anymore', I would like to clarify my earlier post:

' ... no-one should have the right to insult or belittle me....'
I should have added because of my age. You're still at liberty to insult me - just leave my age out of it, as I'm sure you would my race or sexual preferences.

[GarlicGiftsAndGlitter]

:) Thanks, Flo! Just off to think up a few insults ...

[Floisme]

I'm sure there's still plenty to go at, Garlic

[BrendaBlackhead]

Quite, Floisme. An 89-year-old woman should not be insulted nor belitted because of her age . But I can't get my head around those on here who are saying that that same woman has no age-related limitations. That is absolutely ridiculous.

It's no good coming up with, "Well, my Aunt Mary...." - One swallow does not make a summer.

[GarlicGiftsAndGlitter]

She may have impaired abilities. She's statistically more likely than a younger person to have some. But, if you separate your mental linkage of age with disability, you'll be seeing her more as a person and taking her on her own merits. Otherwise, you're starting from a point of 'all old people have impairments; they all need XYZ segregated treatment and/or controls'.

When you treat any sector of people as a homogeneous mass, assuming characteristics based on some arbitrary factor, you have begun de-humanising and 'othering' them.

As I mentioned above, it used to be commonly accepted that all women were mentally & physically impaired. This simply isn't true, is it? Yet it was enshrined in law until ~50 years ago. Making assumptions based on age is just as irrational as basing such assumptions on sex.

We can make assumptions about children based on their age - human development passes through some known stages - but old people aren't children; they're individual adults, to state the obvious.

[Moniker1]

When you treat any sector of people as a homogeneous mass, assuming characteristics based on some arbitrary factor, you have begun de-humanising and 'othering' them

I think this is the crux of the matter. My DM was fit and able to live a full life until roughly the last 3 of years of her life when arthritis meant she was unable to walk any distance . So for only a tiny part of her 'old age' was she needing full time support.

Many corner shops and community post offices have gone, where people once had contact with neighbours. Community mini buses with organized days out, trips to shopping centres might be a way to go for those who see no one.

[BrendaBlackhead]

But isn't that ageist? There are a few people on here suggesting it is patronising to assume just because a person is elderly they may need mini buses and organised days out. Surely it follows that these services should be provided for a lonely 35-year-old as well?

[GarlicGiftsAndGlitter]

Yes, Brenda If you position a service as helpful for adults in certain conditions - can't get about much independently, say - then why would you need to specify an age range for your service users?

As things stand at present, you might do that because of the way funding's allocated. Would funding be made available for a minibus service to be used by gay people or black people only? (I don't know the answer to this, btw.)