You’re Looking Very Well

by Lewis Wolpert

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  In politics, the standing of the old varies widely between different societies. Governments based on rule by the elderly—gerontocracy—have been common in Communist states, in which the length of one’s service to the Party was held to be the main qualification for leadership. In the time of the Eight Immortals of the Communist Party of China, who held much power in the 1980s, it was quipped that ‘the 80-year-olds are calling meetings of 70-year-olds to decide which 60-year-olds should retire’. For instance, Party leader Mao Zedong was 82 when he died, while Deng Xiaoping retained a powerful influence until he was nearly 90. In the Soviet Union, gerontocracy became increasingly entrenched from the1970s, at least until March 1985, when a young, ambitious government headed by Mikhail Gorbachev took power.

  The public may not always be keen on old politicians. Sir Menzies Campbell was 64 when he was elected leader of the Liberal Democrats in 2006. Cartoons in the newspapers made him old, bald, derelict, and looking 150. The media went for his age, which made him, it was claimed, unacceptable and not suitable for the job; the Financial Times said leaders had to be young. He was repeatedly asked whether he was just too old for the job. He vigorously defended the advantages of aged people and argued that their experience was very valuable, but he was forced out of office. Similarly, at 72 John McCain was regarded by many as too old to be the next US president—far too long in the tooth. Had McCain succeeded in his 2008 campaign he would, at 73, have been the oldest President in American history. Discussions about his age dogged McCain during his failed run, and people recalled that Ronald Reagan showed early signs of Alzheimer’s in his late 70s. Yet the president of Egypt, Hosni Mubarak, at the age of 81, has been in power for 28 years. The economist J. K. Galbraith, at 87, was irritated by ageist remarks like a ‘Are you still working?’ And ‘Are you taking exercise?’ To those who asked such questions he wanted to reply with ‘I see that you are still rather immature.’

  The young, not the old, benefited in the 60s from postwar affluence in the West. Youth began to develop its own culture and the young of the 1960s did not want to lose the benefits. Cosmetic sales to hide ageing in the USA went up some tenfold in this period. Fitness became popular and women began to refuse to accept their old-age stereotype. Advertising focused attention on the third age, and there were magazines directed to older customers, but the old were dismissed from most of public life. Roger Daltrey in the 1960s sang ‘I want to die before I get old’, and Timothy Leary advised those on the campus to ignore anyone over 30. Many of us, when looking at the old when we were young, did not believe that it would happen to us.

  One attempt to produce an antidote to youth culture is The Oldie, a monthly magazine launched in 1992 by Richard Ingrams, who for 23 years was the editor of Private Eye. It carries general interest articles, humour and cartoons and is sometimes regarded as a haven for ‘grumpy old men and women’—an image it has played up to over the years with such slogans as ‘The Oldie: Buy it before you snuff it’ and its lampooning of ‘yoof culture’ and the absurdities of modern life.

  It is encouraging for those who fear ageing that nearly half of Americans aged 65 and older, when questioned, described the present as ‘the best years of my life’. But at the same time many of the comments made by the elderly about themselves do not stray far from the stereotypes: ‘My body’s ugly obstinacy in keeping on living strikes me as admirable’; ‘What do I want? Money and a younger woman’; ‘In myself I observe the very traits that used to irritate me in men of late middle age whom I have known: a forgetfulness, a repetitiveness, a fussiness with parcels and strings, a doddery deliberation of movement with patches of inattention… I feel also an innocent self-absorption, a ruminativeness that makes me blind and deaf and indifferent to the contemporary trends and fads that are so crucial to the young’; ‘Every attempt to be specific about the afterlife, to conceive of it in even the most general detail, appalls us.’

  Not atypical current attitudes to getting old come from a recent article by Tim Lott, who is in his 50s, in the London Evening Standard. He points out that the novelist Kazuo Ishiguro, now 65, thinks writers are over the hill when past their 30s, and that a woman of 34 feels she is already old. Lott recognises that many great writers flowered in later life but says:

  There are disadvantages to growing old—you smell, your teeth crumble and the bad habits that you once thought you could rid of by sheer force of willpower you now realise are as inescapable as your rumpled skin. But the great consolation is that all your contemporaries are crumbling in much the same way. Even people who were once rock stars can now be joyfully observed on TV resembling balding retired pork-pie tasters.

  In another piece, he says the advantage of being older is that at last you know who you are. If you are then ugly, so are all your contemporaries. You also probably have more money.

  The charity WRVS, which supports volunteers working for the elderly, found that 40 per cent of the public don’t feel that they do enough to support older people, 65 per cent of people feel that older people make a positive contribution to society, and 76 per cent of people feel that older people are not treated with respect; they claim that the elderly are perceived as unhelpful and rude. ‘Silly old goats growing old disgracefully’ is how the elderly were labelled in a newspaper article describing their activities at a party. Another similar recent anti-age remark can be found in the list of the world’s most livable cities: Vienna comes top of the list, but a negative comment is that it is full of grumpy old fur-coated ladies.

  ‘You cannot teach an old dog new tricks’ is but one of many proverbs about the old. In spite of the numerous tales and proverbs celebrating the wisdom of old people and promoting their care, folklore is replete with reflections of a basic distrust of age. The fear of the old is further reflected in the fairy tales of many countries in which old women, even those who at first appear to be helpful and kindly, frequently turn out to be sinister witches. Various demonic personages, notably changelings and the devil himself, can be rendered powerless by tricking them into revealing their age. Parents cannot necessarily expect the same care in their old age that they earlier tendered to their children. As the proverb has it ‘One father can better nourish ten children than ten children can nourish one father.’

  In an Irish folktale a man has a father who has grown too old to do anything but eat and smoke, so the man decides to send him away with nothing but a blanket. ‘Just give him half a blanket,’ says the man’s son from his cradle, ‘then I’ll have half to give you when you grow old and I send you away.’ Upon hearing this, the man quickly reconsiders and allows his old father to remain after all, saying: ‘Good deeds are wasted on old men and on rogues.’ Another man in the prime of life abuses his ageing father; he strikes him and drags him out of the house by his hair. When he too becomes old his son treats him the same way. One day the son drags him out the door and on to the street. ‘You go too far!’ cries the old man. ‘I never dragged my old father beyond the gate.’

  Many attitudes towards the old are deeply ingrained, recurring from one generation to the next. How they effect the practical ways in which the old are treated and cared for will be discussed next.

  11. Mistreating

  ‘Ageism is as odious as racism and sexism’

  — Claude Pepper

  Herr Levin von Schulenburg, a high official in Altmark, was travelling in about 1580 when he saw an old man being led away by several people. ‘Where are you going with the old man?’ he asked, and received the answer, ‘To God!’ They were going to sacrifice him because he was no longer able to earn his own living. When the official grasped what was happening, he forced them to turn the old man over to him. He took him home with him and hired him as a gatekeeper, a position that he held for 20 additional years.

  Geronticide—the killing of the old when they are no longer of any use—features in the folk tales of many lands but has also been a historical reality. Even today some cultures do not encourage the
survival of the old, much less suffer their continued burden. It is exceptional that in some primitive tribes the old are revered and cherished. The toughness of life, and scarcity of food, can render hearts impervious to soft sentiments with respect to the old. Particularly nasty examples have included claims of the killing of the old in several indigenous societies such as the Inuits, who live in the Arctic, the last example being in 1939. It is not clear how reliable these reports are.

  The term ‘ageism’ was introduced in 1969 to refer to a combination of prejudicial attitudes towards older people, the promoting of negative stereotypes of old age, and discriminatory practices against older people. But as we have seen, it has a very long history. One of the comments about prejudice against the old before the term was in common use was by Max Lerner in 1957: ‘It is natural for the culture to treat the old like the fag end of what was once good material.’ The psychologist Dominic Abrams has claimed ‘Ageism is the most pervasive form of prejudice experienced in the UK population and that seems to be true pretty much across gender, ethnicity and religion—people of all types experience it.’ Ageism was described in 1975 by Robert Butler ‘as a process of systematic stereotyping of, and discriminating against, people just because they are old’; and by R. C. Atchley, as ‘a dislike of ageing and older people based on the belief that ageing makes people unattractive, unintelligent, asexual, unemployable, and senile’. He claims that research indicates that most Americans subscribe to at least a mild form of ageism.

  A major example of ageism and age discrimination in everyday life in the UK is the mandatory retirement age set at, or after, the age of 65, though the mandatory retirement age for civil servants has been abolished. Early retirement is not necessarily a good thing for an individual. Over 100,000 people were recently forced to retire against their will and this has made life very difficult for many of them. With an estimated 120,000 older workers forced to retire in 2009, this policy is draining billions of pounds from the economy every year. Forcing over 100,000 employees out of the job market has opened up an estimated £3.5 billion gap in lost economic output, inclusive of £2 billion in lost earnings for the workers themselves. But the government has pledged to get rid of the mandatory retirement age.

  A survey in the Economist of articles involving ageing over a recent 10-year period found that most showed a predominantly ageist view of older people as a burden on society, often portraying them as frail non-contributors. Costs of healthcare for old peope are regularly viewed unsustainable and pensions as a demographic ‘time bombs’. Over time small increases in average life expectancy can lead to very large increases in the size of a population, but have also resulted in large gains in economic welfare over the past century; these gains are consequences of improvements in life and health expectancy and are not restricted to a handful of old people.

  Work in later life can contribute to older people’s health and wellbeing and can make a dramatic difference financially: ten more years of working life can double the value of a typical private pension. Magistrates and jurors are not allowed to serve past the age of 70, and older workers are rated consistently lower than younger workers, despite no significant differences in work achievements. In fact older workers are actually more reliable in terms of absenteeism than younger workers. The Employment Equality Act (Age) Regulations 2006 has made it unlawful to discriminate in a work or training context against someone because of their age. A worker should not be disadvantaged in any area of employment such as recruitment, employment benefits and dismissal. But there are still crucial exceptions, the main one being that this does not apply to those over 65.

  If a task genuinely has to be done by someone who has a particular characteristic related to age, it is currently lawful to discriminate in order to achieve this. An example would be the case of an actor having to play a role of a young character—here there can be discrimination against old actors and a young one can be selected. But it is unlawful for an employer to discriminate against someone because he or she is over 50 unless they can justify their actions, or it is covered by one of the exemptions included in the law. An example of discrimination could be the case of a job applicant aged 60 who has evidence to show that she is better qualified than the person who got the job, who is aged 35, even though the job advert stated that the employer was looking for a ‘junior manager’. The application form had asked for her date of birth. Pay and benefits should be based on skills, and not age.

  In the USA the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 protects individuals who are 40 years of age or older from employment discrimination based on age. It permits employers to favour older workers based on age even when doing so adversely affects a younger worker. An article in the Wall Street Journal claimed that as unemployment intensifies in the economic downturn, claims of age discrimination are soaring. Although mandatory retirement has been abolished in the USA, there are certain types of jobs that do have mandatory retirement laws. These are jobs that are too dangerous for older people or jobs that require particular physical and mental skills. Some of these jobs are those of military personnel, fire fighters, airline pilots and police officers. But retirement is not based on an actual physical evaluation of the person, and this is why many people consider mandatory retirement laws for these jobs to be a form of age discrimination.

  Ageism is more than simply having negative attitudes about old age. It can include the following: being refused interest-free credit‚ a new credit card or car insurance because of age; an organisation’s attitude to older people resulting in them receiving a lower quality of service; age limits on benefits such as Disability Living Allowance; a doctor deciding not to refer an old patient to a consultant; losing a job. Age discrimination can involve serious negative treatment that can affect how one lives.

  A major biennial survey of over 2‚000 adults run by Age Concern since 2004 exposes the full extent of age discrimination in the UK. It reveals that more than three times more people have been the victims of ageism than any other form of discrimination. Direct discrimination occurs when an employer treats a worker less favourably than other workers on the grounds of age. Three fifths of people aged 65 and over believe older people suffer widespread age discrimination, including in the workplace.

  Not surprisingly there was strong support for the Labour minister Harriet Harman’s attack on ageism in a new Equalities Bill which has not been made law, but which advocated ban on age discrimination in provision of goods, facilities, services and public functions. Such a measure could be a milestone in the battle for fairness in later life. But as Age Concern point out,

  The Bill only gives ministers the power to ban age discrimination in services if they wish. We want to see an unbreakable legal commitment to introduce new rights, across the public and private sectors. Age discrimination in health and social care services can literally mean the difference between life and death. Because of their age, older people are being denied vital treatments with no legal protection. Each day older people are refused financial products like travel insurance for no better reason than the date on their birth certificate.

  Research indicates that most Americans subscribe to at least a mild form of ageism. International Longevity Center-USA found that a majority of older adults reported that they’d been ignored or experienced insensitivity, impatience and condescension from others based solely on their age. The outcome can be more than just an embarrassing situation. Research shows that individuals receiving such treatment often end up with debilitating lowered self-esteem and self-confidence, as well as substandard healthcare. While nearly a third of those in the survey had experienced ageism in the last year, those over 65, and particularly those over 75, were less likely than the rest of the population to view age discrimination as serious.

  The former deputy prime minister Lord Heseltine, aged 76, claimed that Britain is becoming an ageist society ‘worshipping at the altar of the young’, and blamed a 24-hour news culture for perpetuating stereotypes ab
out young and old. He said:

  To my mind, ‘old’ is first and foremost something mature, ripened and proven, something that has survived time’s test. But I appreciate that society as a whole, and the media especially, does not see it that way.

  Rabbi Julia Neuberger believes that in the UK many older people are demeaned and made to feel worthless. It has been suggested that ageism is worse than racism or sexism because there is so little recognition that it is wrong. Discrimination on the basis of age is under-researched compared with racism or sexism; the most serious form of prejudice is considered to be racism, followed by prejudice based on disability.

  Abuse of the elderly is the most serious problem of ageism. As many as half a million elderly people in the UK may be being abused, according to a House of Commons report in 2004. It found two thirds of the cases of abuse occur in people’s own homes, and take the form of sexual, physical and financial abuse, neglect and overmedication. Much abuse is not reported because many older people are unable, frightened or embarrassed to report its presence. Often care staff take no action because they lack training in identifying abuse, or are ignorant of the reporting procedures.

  A UK Study of Abuse and Neglect of Older People in 2006 found that in the past year about 227,000 people aged 66 and over living in private households reported that they had experienced mistreatment involving a family member, close friend or care worker. Mistreatment by neighbours and acquaintances was reported in about one third of cases. Overall, half of mistreatment involved a partner or another family member. About 10 per cent involved a care worker, and 5 per cent a close friend. Most of those responsible for physical, psychological and sexual abuse were men, while financial abuse was spread more equally between the sexes. Three quarters of those asked said that the effect of the mistreatment was either serious or very serious, and left the person feeling upset and isolated. About one third told nobody but most told family, friends, or a social worker or health professional. Very few informed the local authority or the police.