Rising Above Ageism

This Chair Rocks! Continuing my ageism research, I found Ashton Applewhite's book, This Chair Rocks:  A Manifest Against Ageism .   Applewhite also maintains a blog and has given TED talks on the subject.  (Links for those are at  https://thischairrocks.com ). Applewhite covers the origins of the term ageism ( Robert Butler ), the reasons ageism is as important to combat as other culturally constructed "-isms", and goes on to consider economics, memory, health, sex and intimacy and the workplace.  She doesn't flinch when it comes to examining the end of life and how it might be well navigated. She points out that ageism is a form of self-hatred:  "Like racism and sexism, ageism is not about how we look.  It's about what people in power want our appearance to mean.  Ageism occurs when the dominant group uses its power to oppress or exploit or silence or simply ignore people who are much younger or significantly older.  We experien...

You are a Valued Customer (Unless You are Too Old) You Stinker! In October I received an email from Roku inviting me to participate in a survey. " As a valued Roku customer, we want to hear what you think!" the message announced.   I had a little time on my hands that morning, and as I had recently upgraded my Roku equipment successfully I was feeling quite favorable towards the company.   I clicked through to the survey link, which took me to a site from Maru Surveys. I started out answering the usual demographic questions, my zip code, gender, and my age, but I was asked only these three questions.  Once I put in my age, which is 67, the response was "Thank You" and the survey was over.  I thought: is this a glitch or are they gleaning out elders here?  To check that out, I changed browsers, returned to my email, clicked through to the survey again, and this time I lied about my age, entering 37. There were MANY questions for a 37 year old, bu...

What is "Ageism"?  It's complicated ...    I went to our public library to see what I might find about "ageism".  For the subject heading there were 8 books across the multi-city locations.  Only one was in our local library, Still Here by Ram Dass (which I happen to own, and highly recommend), so I expanded my search to keywords, and within our library found a book by Robert N. Butler.  The description in the catalog record indicated he claims to have coined the term, "ageism" (see note below).  So I went to the stacks and found his book, The Longevity Revolution  in the 612.6 Dewey Decimal area, picked up Butler's book and a few others adjacent to it, and retreated to a quiet table to peruse them.   As the LC Subject headings note, the subject is "complex" ↓   Label Vocabulary Concept Type Subdivision Type Identifier 1. Ageism LC Subject Headings Topic sh90001720 2. Ageism in advertising LC Subject Headings Topic s...

Advanced Style:  Girls Just Wanna Have Fun! For many people of all ages that includes playing with one's presentation to the world, to friends, and to oneself.  Yet in our culture, women who are beyond their reproductive years are shamed into invisibility, retreating into clothes they were taught were more suitable for older women.  But not everyone succumbs to the idea that due to being older they should just shuffle off the stage of life, retreating to the comfort of sensible shoes, a cup of tea and the couch.   The photos on this page are from Advanced Style, the work of Ari Seth Cohen. To celebrate the sense of style of some stylish over-age-60 women he'd seen on the streets of NYC,  Cohen used his photography to focus on them and got to know many through interviews and repeated photo sessions.  He eventually published a book as well as a documentary about women who don't give up the self-expression they've enjoyed all their lives just because...