{"id":1464,"date":"2016-08-12T07:50:00","date_gmt":"2016-08-12T11:50:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.silvercentury.org\/2017\/09\/six-more-questions-about-my-new-manifesto-against-ageism\/"},"modified":"2018-05-02T08:40:37","modified_gmt":"2018-05-02T12:40:37","slug":"six-more-questions-about-my-new-manifesto-against-ageism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/78.142.243.82\/~silvercentury\/2016\/08\/six-more-questions-about-my-new-manifesto-against-ageism\/","title":{"rendered":"Six More Questions about My New Manifesto Against Ageism"},"content":{"rendered":"

Since the publication of <\/em>This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism<\/a> (2016), I\u2019ve been asked a lot of questions. Are you curious about why I’ve become an Old Person in Training? About my slogan for a radical age movement? Answers to these and a few other good questions are below in the second part of a two-part post.<\/em><\/p>\n

Are olders really as much of an economic drag on society as the media portrays?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Absolutely not! People 50 and up fuel the significant, fast-growing, and often-overlooked \u201clongevity economy,\u201d which, according to AARP, accounted for 46 percent of US gross domestic product ($7.1 trillion) in 2012. By 2021 the 50-plus age group is projected to drive more than half of US economic activity, as their spending fuels industries that include apparel, health care, education and entertainment. These statistics capture only part of the economic contribution of older Americans, whose unpaid volunteer work in 2013 was valued at $67 billion. And while \u201centrepreneur\u201d might conjure up an image of a kid in that proverbial garage, twice as many successful American entrepreneurs are over age 50 as in their early 20s. More resources have always flowed from older generations to younger ones than the reverse.<\/p>\n

This is despite widespread age discrimination in employment, which prevents older workers from finding challenging work of which they\u2019re eminently capable and relegates them to jobs that don\u2019t take advantage of their skills and experience\u2014Walmart greeters, say. It also makes it harder for them to find part-time and volunteer positions. Discouraged and diminished, many become economically dependent, contributing to the misperception that olders are a net burden on society, but it\u2019s not by choice.<\/p>\n

Society has grown far less tolerant of sexism and racism. Why do ageist attitudes and behaviors still get a pass?<\/strong><\/p>\n

That\u2019s what I\u2019d like to know! Can you imagine anyone (not counting Donald Trump) complacently identifying themselves as sexist or racist? Yet no one even blinks when older people are described as incompetent or boring or even repulsive. Older people can be the most prejudiced of all, having had a lifetime to internalize negative myths and stereotypes that have gone unquestioned\u2014until now. Diversity became a buzzword because society grew less tolerant of racism and sexism and homophobia. We want different faces around the table because we don\u2019t think access to opportunity should depend on what someone looks like. Graying hair and wrinkles count, just as attributes like skin color and sexual orientation and using a wheelchair already do. It is high time to make the last socially sanctioned prejudice as unacceptable as any other kind.<\/p>\n

If that seems like a tall order, look at how much has shifted in how we look at gender, and how rapidly. It used to be viewed as a rigid binary, male or female, but we now understand that it\u2019s far more fluid. If gender can be conceived of this way, why on earth not age, which is inherently, obviously, a continuum? Why not shake off our fear of being on the \u201cwrong\u201d side of some imaginary old\/young divide and embrace a more flexible, friendly and far more rational view of age?<\/p>\n

You call yourself an Old Person in Training. Why?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019m 63. I know I\u2019m not young, I don\u2019t see myself as old, and I know many people feel the same way. We spend a lot of energy pretending that the old are somehow not us\u2014not even future us\u2014and that we\u2019ll somehow never get old. Even though it\u2019s irrational. Even though we\u2019re doomed to fail. Even though it fills us with needless dread. Even though that denial is where ageism takes root. That\u2019s why I\u2019ve become an old person in training, a phrase I appropriated from geriatrician Joanne Lynn.<\/p>\n

Becoming an Old Person in Training bridges that divide between our younger and older selves and connects them empathically. It acknowledges the inevitability of growing old while relegating it to the future, albeit at an ever-smaller remove. It swaps purpose and intent for dread and denial. It\u2019s a relief. It feels right and it makes sense.<\/p>\n

What does becoming an Old Person in Training involve? It means looking at older people instead of past them, remembering they were once our age, seeing resilience alongside infirmity, allowing for sensuality, enlarging our notion of beauty and acknowledging that an apartment or a room or even just a bed can be home to an internal world as rich as ours\u2014and very possibly richer. It means thoughtful peeks through the periscope of an open mind at the terrain we\u2019ll inhabit when we are finally old. I see the 90-year-old me as withered and teetery but also curious and content. Envisioning her won\u2019t make it happen, but the aspiration will surely help. The consensus from people over 80, who should know, is that young people worry way too much about getting old. So the earlier we make this imaginative leap, the better\u2014and the better equipped we\u2019ll be to benefit from the journey.<\/p>\n

You\u2019d like your book, This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism<\/em>, to help catalyze a mass movement against ageism, the way Rachel Carson\u2019s Silent Spring<\/em> (1962) catalyzed the environmental movement. What kind of actions would you like to see?<\/strong><\/p>\n

My book lays out a blueprint in every domain. Change starts between our ears, with the difficult task of unlearning beliefs we\u2019ve held all our lives. Some places to start:<\/p>\n