"The 'generation gap' is an important social tool for any repressive society. If younger members of a community view older members as contemptible or suspect or excess, they will never be able to join hands and examine the living memory of the community, nor ask the question, 'Why?'" 1/2
Audre Lorde
+we must be alert to who gets served by premise 'elderly=disposable'
those who require /workforce/ but don't wish to care for its members in return. who're equally ready to penalize young adults who can't /produce/ +to discard children
i.e. if we allow bias against old folx we allow it@ all ages
Yes exactly. And we see this with ableism more broadly. Capital and the state are like "what can you produce?".
Gross examples include "let die" policies of people in care homes and in prisons when the cost of care exceeds profit. And neglect of veterans, underpaid care professionals, etc
It's important to point out that many cultures across the world revere and respect their elders. But capitalism and Western hegemony work to undermine this view.
Do people not understand they’re screwing themselves over when they help enable ageist bigotry? EVERYBODY grows older every year. Grow older or die now, those are the only options. Conversely EVERY older person was a younger person once.
Ageism is stupid and self-defeating in any direction.
The type of people from my generation that knocked the older generations for everything and whined constantly about all the mistakes they made, are now the "seasoned" ones taking about how bad society treats them and "kids these days" don't respect them. Eventually the shoe's on the other foot.
I see some too, but at the same time we’ve done little to earn “reverence.”
-the environment
-the chance at a stable life
-lack of coherent healthcare
-chemicals and pollution
-wars and geopolitics
-consumption of irreplaceable resources
Heck we CHOOSE NOT TO PROTECT OUR CHILDREN FROM GUNS IN SCHOOL
All our lives. The sheer amount of energy we spent attempting to warn politicians / educate / protest / avert global warming / vote green / recycle / run co-ops... it feels like nothing has improved in 40 years. That is a choice from the top.
yes, this is true, I tried to reply an apology to the OP too, it’s just that from the outside (a diff generation) they don’t see good reults collectively.
Generations aren't the problem. 35-year-old tech bros are presently scraping your data in order to fry the planet with energy-gobbling AI. It's depressing how even the tiniest headway has been erased.
Yes of course - the thing is that they wouldn’t have been able to do that pre-Reagan basically. But after that (look at Commanding Heights docu on Pbs if still avail.) there was Clinton all in, evryone except people who were labeled quasi terror-adjacent (Seattle protests for instance.)
I’m not questioning whether anyone in particular hasn’t fought, I apologize. I know many who have given up a lot for that as well. Collectively the results are there, though, and we own the fact that those at the top act like they do, too.
