Manifestations of Ageism[1]
Ageism can
be manifested in many different forms.
At a systematic level, laws and policies may be made without regard to
the needs of older adults, or service cuts may have disproportionate impact on
older adults. Ageism may take
the form of “granny bashing” in
the popular press (blaming many of society’s current economic worries on older
adults). It can be reflected in
media where older adults are portrayed as uniformly poor (and consequently a
perceived potential drain on society), or as a uniformly well off group who are
unconcerned about the needs of others.
Ageism may
be more commonplace in economic and political literature where demographic
shifts in population are characterized as portending a future health crisis or “age
wars” with the young with the young and old fighting over their share of social
and health services. Ageism and age discrimination are based on social fears,
and social response expresses those fears.
It has been
suggested that there can be both internalized and externalized ageism. Internalized ageism refers to the
extent to which older adults take on the social norms that devalue or marginalize
older persons. They may do this at
the individual level by acting in ways the reinforces the youth norm—battling the
obvious and visible markers of ageing such as grey hair or wrinkles. Internalized ageism may also be manifested
by denial of any commonality with others in a cohort, such as familiar objection
of an eighty-five year old woman or man who vehemently does not want to be
associated with “all those old people.”
[1] Ten
years ago I began my journey of combating Ageism with a Seminar, I was 64 years
old and Mandatory Retirement was still in place. I created a seminar and the above is some material contained
in it.
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