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My goat

May 25, 2008

It’s 10 am, Sunday.  I’m listening to a radio station where the DJs tout their program as “less talk and more light rock love songs”.  Not that that stopped them from talking lengthily!  My attention was caught when sometime during one of their interminable conversations, this time something about relationships, the female DJ said something to this effect: “hello! 59 na ‘no” implying that older men (and perhaps older women?) should be boxed and put away, shelved and placed out of reach, consigned to homes to knit and do needlepoint, and wait for death. When did we become so ageist? When did we start to assume that physical and emotional feelings/needs of older people completely wither away as soon as they reach a certain age? When did we start to think that older people no longer had the right to love (except their grandchildren, if they had any) or have physical relationships?  Where did this kind of thinking come from?

 

When you reach a certain age – anywhere from 50 up and for some, 40 up – get ready because people begin to make cracks about senility, reduced mobility, poor eyesight etc. It’s like you’re being primed for a sedentary life and being unobtrusively prepared for death.  It’s a fact that human bodies slow down over time but this should not  mean you have less feelings or your fate is to become more stupid and acquire Alzheimer’s.

 

What’s the difference when an adult says to a child “Sit here and wait.  Don’t go anywhere” and an adult consigning their older family members/relatives to homes? Or for others, to obscure parts of their lives in order to reduce contact?  It’s choice, which is not yet given to children.  But for older persons who’ve gained self-determination (or a semblance of it), there’s absolutely no need to accept a lifestyle that’s restricted and defined by those who take away your choices.

 

Persons who are ageist really gets my goat, not that I keep one.

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