To get peed off with ageist comments on social media.

[Helendee]

I don't personally bother to enter debates online as generally I can't be arsed but I have several friends who are a similar age to me (early fifties) and I must admit we tend to look it!
Anyway I have noticed that they receive a lot of nasty, comments about their being old, stupid old bag, old witch etc if their opinions aren't popular.

I just feel that ageism is tolerated by society far more than other -isms.

Is it just me?

"the OP has said something along the lines of 'an elderly woman on the bus' without any malicious intent. I don't think this is helpful or useful for educating other posters about ageism"

Do you similarly think that highlighting casual sexism is unhelpful?

Really, it has to be challenged all the time. Or the unthinking ageism will continue unchecked.

AuntieStella I think berating someone for a phrase clearly not used abusively, then other posters piling on to have a go while ignoring the OP's actual problem which may be genuinely distressing, then reporting it so the thread is deleted is not in the spirit of MN. Especially when the OP has apologised for inadvertently causing offence.

I agree, casual ageism is bad in the same way that casual sexism and racism is, but I think trying to educate people is better than shouting st them and shutting them down.

To educate, you do have to talk about it when it occurs, though. So the 'shouting' may be a perception issue.

One person's 'derailing a thread' may be another person's 'taking an opportunity to open a conversation'.

Rather like when people casually drop some hideous anti-SN word into, say, a conversation about children's TV. Do you stop, and discuss the inappropriateness of the language? Or do you think it will be derailing?

You don't have to 'shout' to make the point, and I agree it's wrong to keep labouring the point if OP has apologised (but not everyone RTFT)

If it's OK to post in a ageist way sometimes, then you may as well not bother to challenge it at all.

If you choose to use unnecessary discriminatory language, then you risk derailment because it is simply not reasonable to expect other people to ignore it. If you have done it unthinkingly, then perhaps it's time to think a bit more before posting to a global audience.

But is it ageist to mention someone's age? It is if it's irrelevant - but in the example of "an elderly woman on the bus" I can think of various reasons why it might be relevant to mention. Physical infirmity, intergenerational hostility- depends on the issue obviously. Quite often age is mentioned in the context of elderly drivers and the poster is told off for ageism. But it is relevant that as people age, they tend to lose some of the things that make good drivers (speed of reflexes, sharpness of sight and hearing at.) I don't think it's ageist to point out that a driver is elderly - assuming "elderly" is used to mean 81 not 51!

On Mumsnet saying that a woman is "elderly" or "old" or even "older" means that she is automatically in the wrong, whatever the rest of the story is. She might be rehabilitated if it becomes glaringly obvious that she has done nothing wrong, but it is unlikely. And it won't happen if she has had any sort of interaction with a mumsnetter's child. She sometimes then becomes "dirty" as well......

There was one thread a while back where a kids grandmother had all but shoved a sandwich in his friends face trying to get him to eat it, he got cross and told her no; and a lot of posters then painted her as a poor little arthritic old granny, who had no other pleasure in life but making sandwiches and feeding them to people, it had probably taken HOURS, the poor dear...(ignoring the fact that the grandmother of a young child can easily be a fit, healthy, full time working woman in her fifties or sixties, and there was no evidence in the OP to suggest either way). That just really pisses me off. When I'm that age if anyone 'defends' me in that way they will be getting an earful. (Hints of disablism there too; my DM has arthritis and has a very full life far outside sandwich making!).

I've read other threads which are shocked at people leaving their kids with great grandparents...my daughter goes every week for a day with my DGM who is 88, and would be horribly offended if it was ever suggested she was incapable of looking after her (she is more than capable, loves Dd to bits, and is fantastic with her).

It's the assumptions people make that old=incapable, and most annoying of all, is that people who make that assumption genuinely think they're being NICE.