by Cathy Goodwin | May 31, 2018 | stereotypes of aging
This blog is about outrage against stereotypes of age, sex and marital status. I also rant about the medical profession and talk about comedy. When you put these together, being old, single and female completes the perfect trifecta, making you a target for society in general and the medical profession in particular.
I’m not amused when a fifty-something author jokes about not remembering her ATM pin number. I know my pin number. I also know my library card number and my credit card numbers. It makes life easier.
I’m even less amused when someone asks me if I use email. I tell them I build websites.
I don’t laugh at jokes about old people. Google “old people having fun funny.” Now try, “black people having fun funny.” We laugh at children, cats, and older people who are just being themselves.
It’s time to stop accepting a second place, subservient role just because you’ve had a birthday. Instead of quiet acceptance, let’s belt out the old George Jones anthem, “I don’t need no rocking chair.” Let’s recite Dylan Thomas: “Do not go gently into that good night. Old age should rave and burn at close of day …”
This is a blog for raving, for gym memberships instead of rocking chairs, and replacing calm acceptance with a few well-chosen four-letter words. I want to be blown out like a candle, while I’m still burning.
Why sneakers? I’ve worn nothing but sneakers for the last fifteen years (with a few brief exceptions, like the time my friend got married and announced, “No sneakers at my wedding!”). Sneakers are associated with having fun, relaxing and being yourself. Stilettos have become associated with female success; just google “success in stilettos.”
The idea is that people, especially women, should accept pain and discomfort in exchange for beauty. In the 21st century, when women are landing fighter planes on Navy carrier decks, this idea seems a little dated, to say the least.
Associating high-heeled shoes with success incidentally associates beauty with success, and for most people, beauty equals youth. In her book Never Say Die, Susan Jacoby has pointed out that women in particular are judged by their faces, even if their bodies are toned and firm.
Compliments are conditioned by “for your age,” as in, “It’s impressive to see a woman your age who is bungee jumping… or running a marathon… or doing stand-up comedy … or simply surviving without medications].”
Aren’t those accomplishments impressive at any age?
I may have to go down for the count but I don’t have to go there quietly. If you relate, this blog is for you.
by CathyG | Dec 23, 2021 | Uncategorized
It has to be one of the misguided articles in the New York Times. Covid’s Risk to Older Adults by David Leonhardt.
The article quotes Janet Baseman, an epidemiologist at the University of Washington and presumably an expert:
“I think the risk is not super high for relatively healthy and boosted people in their 70s,” Janet Baseman, an epidemiologist at the University of Washington, told me. “I think it’s moderate at most.”
So what more do we need to know? This response echoes other comments from doctors about Covid-19. which I reported in this article. But if we stopped there, we’d have no story to fill the Times column-inches.
Baseman goes on to say “that if she were in her 70s, her primary worry would be getting moderately ill, needing standard medical care and not being able to get it at an overwhelmed hospital.”
Wait….being moderately ill isn’t the same as having moderate risk. Moderately ill patients are defined as needing hospital care but not “organ support..”
It’s not clear what’s meant by “moderate risk.” The only definition I could find refers to long-term health conditions that aren’t immediately life-threatening but could cause problems later, such as pre-diabetes, obesity, and hypertension.
Regardless, we’ve got some muddy thinking here.
Even worse, the article lumps all 75-year-old women together. The author seems to have listened to “Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer” a few too many times. Many 75-year-old women have comorbidities. Many live in some form of assisted living or even nursing homes. Without controlling for those factors, the numbers are meaningless…and of no particular relevance to any 75-year-old reading this article. You have “older” people like Willie Murphy, the body-builder who attacked a burglar in her home. You have people like the late Olga Kotelko, who died at 93 a few weeks after competing in track and field events. You have thousands of men and women competing in senior games…and even more who are healthy and trying to stay that way, despite the best efforts of their doctors.
The 75-year-old women I know are less concerned of dying from Covid than of living long enough to end up in nursing homes, where 25-40% of the residents are abused. Every time an article gets published about the horrors of these homes, hundreds of readers write comments to express their wish for easier access to assisted dying.
They’re frustrated with doctors who treat them like children, catastrophize minor problems or dismissively ask, “What do you expect, at your age?” They’re tired of doctors who lack understanding of the physiology of people over 50 and who impose meaningless tests, such as EKG’s with an 80% false positive rate that were never intended for screening healthy people.
At a certain point in life people stop fearing death. They’re more concerned with how they will die and how to avoid. the tortures conceived by the medical industrial complex. After all, spies in World War II got cyanide pills they could use to avoid torture; nobody suggested they see a psychiatrist first. They knew torture when they saw it, and so do older people today.
Articles like this portray older people as uniformly weak and unhealthy. They make it difficult (if not impossible) for anyone over 6o to be taken seriously. I shudder to think how many well-meaning adult children will insist that their healthy parents take precautions that will do little to affect their health and well-being, but do more to take away meaning and happiness from the time they have left.
by CathyG | Nov 25, 2021 | Uncategorized
In an article appearing in the Washington Post, Teresa Guilarducci suggests that saving expenses can be as valuable for retirement as saving and investing money. That statement is true only if people invest those savings instead of spending on something else.
Anyway, this article seems unnecessarily cruel. Guilarducci uses the hook of Thanksgiving dinner: an extra piece of pecan pie can lead to diabetes (if it’s part of an overall pattern of overeating, she’s careful to say). And people with diabetes spend $3470 extra per year in medical costs, for a total of “nearly $160,000.” She doesn’t say if that’s before or after insurance kicks in. That’s 46 years x $3470. I don’t know how she gets that number. When did the extra expenses kick in? How long will this 55yo diabetic live? After a certain number of years, she’ll be dead, with zero medical expenses
Then the article says diabetes is ” largely preventable by eating right and staying active…”
True: many people have managed to avoid diabetes with diet and exercise. But for some it’s hereditary and there’s nothing that can be done. Additionally, getting access to “eating right” and exercise can require a certain level of income.
Ghilarducci then tacks on an extra warning to “take your medicine.” She’d do well to note that a high percentage of prescriptions are not necessary and may even be harmful.
The real culprit is the notion of retirement. I’ve written about this elsewhere. After a certain age (which can be as low as 45 in some industries) ageism takes over. It becomes difficult or impossible to get a job at market rates. Freelancers experience discrimination when it comes to referrals for gigs. Not everyone wants to retire.
Secondarily, the health care system makes it hard to refuse treatment, even with advance directives. You should be able to make decisions that will be binding even if your human proxy can’t be reached. You should be able to choose to die rather than face years of misery in a poorly staffed institution, where there’s a 25-40% chance of being abused.
Fifty-five is still on the young side. When you get to be in your seventies and eighties, not much will affect your all-cause mortality. Have another piece of pie and add the ice cream.
by CathyG | Nov 7, 2021 | Uncategorized
Responding to Medicine’s Wellness Conundrum, by Jessica Wapner, New Yorker, November 6, 2021.
The medical establishment tends to look at alternative vs mainstream medicine as separate entities with clearly delineated boundaries. Mainstream medicine – the kind supported by insurance and taught in medical school – claims to be supported by scientific research.
The truth is, many medical practices are prescribed by MDs and reimbursed by insurance, even when published research shows those practices are useless at best and even potentially harmful.
Research shows little benefit of annual medical exams and many screening tests, including annual mammography.
Millions of dollars are spent on useless heart surgeries and procedures, yet doctors resist offering less lucrative medication options. More millions have been spent on studies, which doctors still ignore. This article sums up recent findings.
Hospitals require pre-op screenings for outpatient surgery requiring only a local anesthetic; some even require an EKG, although research shows – to EKGs for screening asymptomatic patients – not to mention an 80% false positive.
Research consistently shows no difference in outcomes between screened and unscreened patients for these surgeries. Yet insurance – including Medicare – happily pays millions for these useless procedures.
They may be worse than useless. False positives lead to more unnecessary, sometimes invasive procedures.
A large number of doctors don’t even bother with research. They go by guidelines, which can be heavily influenced by pharma companies and which certainly don’t apply across the board.
Psychological studies frequently rely on self-reports, which should be regarded with suspicion. A 2021 report revealed 51% of women in medicine reported feeling burned out compared to 36% of men. How do we know the result isn’t due to actual burnout, but the possibility that women are more comfortable admitting they are burned out?
https://www.medpagetoday.com/opinion/second-opinions/95439?xid=nl_secondopinion_2021-11-07&eun=g1608186d0r
Similarly, a lot of research reports older people feel “happier” than younger people. I always suspect a cohort effect; people in the old days were brought up to be positive and avoid complaining.
by CathyG | Nov 13, 2020 | Uncategorized
Columnist Liz Ryan addressed this topic several years ago in this Forbes article. She got a call from someone who was in shock: “The headhunter actually told me the client said I was too old for this job.”
You can’t sue, as she points out.
Does a third party say a hiring manager made a single inappropriate comment? Forget it. “Failure to hire” is almost impossible to prove, unless the company hired someone who was totally unqualified.
“I hear more examples of age discrimination than I hear of sex discrimination, racial discrimination, and every other kind put together,” she says.
Liz speculates that employers don’t see older people as “nimble.” Or they view them “overqualified and likely to bolt the minute a better job comes along.
Her advice? When you understand “what business pain you solve and can talk to hiring managers about that pain, they can’t afford to ignore you.”
I’d say that is ridiculous.
Most of the time the hiring manager won’t even hear you. All they’ll hear is your age and all they’ll see are your wrinkles and gray hair. And not every job lends itself to a discussion of “pain points.”
She admits pain interviewing isn’t a cure, “but it’ll give you a focus and an edge that will make discrimination a non-factor in your job search.”
Nonsense!
Discrimination will always be a factor. Even if you’re hired, your age will be visible, on the line, and open to discussion.
Dan Lyons wrote a book, Disruption, about his experiences working at Hubspot. He didn’t have to go through the hiring process in the normal way. The company president invited him to work with them in a special capacity.
But once on board, he encountered many age-based frustrations — everything from being assigned a workstation with a ball instead of a chair (he got them switched) to being ignored in favor of less experienced colleagues.
For instance, a New York Times business columnist wanted to interview the company president. Dan, an experienced journalist, knew the columnist. He offered to help prepare for the interview – a rare opportunity – to gain maximum positive exposure for the company. He was ignored, while the inexperienced younger staff planned the interview.
I don’t blame Liz Ryan for suggesting upbeat, positive approaches. When you’re presenting in major media or speaking formally, you are expected to share some of the “party line.” That’s what you get here: You can overcome these obstacles if you’re just sufficiently clever.
There’s really only one way to overcome job discrimination, especially age discrimination. That means not depending on getting hired by a company, where you have minimal control in the hiring process.
Start a side hustle and let it grow into a business. Even if you end up getting hired, keep up the side hustle.
Do you fail? No problem. You’ll get better or learn for next time. You’ll approach these jobs more confidently and frankly, you won’t care if they discriminate. You’ll be able to say confidently, “It’s their loss.”
Get a start with Chris Guillebeau’s book, Side Hustle. Hang out in coworking spaces and talk to people who navigated self-employment. Consider hiring a coach or consultant.
Most of all listen to your intuition. When I interviewed 12 people about their transition from corporation to self-employment, the one consistent piece of advice was, “Listen to your intuition.”
by CathyG | Apr 30, 2020 | Uncategorized
A lot of businesses find themselves drooling over the profit potential of the over-50 set. After all, those 55 and up have 41% of the buying power of all consumers, according to an article in Insider Radio. That amounts to $3.2 trillion annually. Yet, this article reports, consumers feel “shunned” by advertisers.
It’s not just big business. If you’re a financial planner, life coach, accountant, real estate agent, organizer, you’re among the many independent professionals who frequently target buyers in this age group or even older.
5 Ridiculously Common Mistakes Marketers Make When Targeting The Senior Population
As a copywriter, I’ve discovered that many people in those fields actually make marketing decisions that work against them in trying to reach this “senior” market.
(1) Making vast, unsupported generalizations about “older” people.
As people get older, they become more diverse, although they’re often lumped together as a target marketing segment. But you don’t need an expensive research study to figure this out.
You can make a lot of accurate predictions about teens based solely on age. A 15-year-old will be able to achieve very specific levels of fitness unless she’s been injured or seriously ill. She’s almost certainly attending school, living at home, and not concerned about having a heart attack.
You can make far fewer predictions about a 45-year-old. He might be retooling for a new career or in the prime of his current one he’s almost certainly working to earn money. He might be single, married, or divorced but rarely widowed. His kids could be anywhere from toddlers to college age. He could be in perfect health or seeing the first signs of chronic illness. But he could be a couch potato, in shape to play a pro sport, or anywhere in between.
Don’t bother making age-based predictions about a 65-year old you’ve never met.
If you go to any gym you’ll see people in their 60s, 70s, and even 80s who are training to run marathons. In the same gym, you’ll find people in the same age group who are decorously walking around a circle slowly in time to music. Some work at demanding jobs; some have retired. Some understand the complexities of the Internet; others can’t send an email.
There’s a common saying among geriatricians: “If you’ve seen one eighty-year-old, you’ve seen one eighty-year-old.” That applies to ages 50, 60, and 70 also.
Unfortunately, when you assume you’re writing to one type of “senior” audience, you’ll thoroughly alienate the others who will resent the identification.
(2) Confusing age effects with cohort effects.
We often hear things like, “Older people can’t use technology.”
Someone who’s turning 70 this year will have grown up with computers. She’s using social media, building WordPress sites, and texting.
Someone who turns 70 in another ten years won’t remember an age before smartphones.
A local magazine introduces a “resources for seniors” section with a photo of a gray-haired lady clutching an old-fashioned desk telephone. I don’t know where they found one to use in the photoshoot.
(3) Don’t refer to sixty-five as a retirement age.
Many people want to keep working their whole lives. When you assume an “older” person is retired. You can’t make assumptions about work status based on any age above twelve.
(4) Assuming your offer won’t appeal to people a lot older than you are.
Assume people of all ages will be interested in your offer, unless you have a good reason to exclude them overtly. I know a number of business owners, fifty and over, who work with coaches half their age. These days people of all ages look for recreational activities based on their interest, not their age.
(5) Referring to an older woman as “grandma.”
They’re everywhere, and they’re truly cringeworthy: “the kind of sweater your grandma would wear,” or “language you can use in front of a grandma.”
Not all women above a certain age have children, let alone grandchildren. All too often, they’re wearing the same clothes as your disreputable teenage daughter. And more and more of them are swearing like sailors.
The “senior” market can be extremely lucrative, especially for certain categories of travel and finance.
But a number of independent professionals could find happy clients among this population. There’s often no need to target them, as more and more people over fifty see themselves as ageless. The key is to avoid giving offense by stereotyping and stigmatizing.
Cathy Goodwin is a copywriter and marketing strategist, helping small businesses find and tell their story. She’s working on a book, When I Get Old, I Plan To Be A Bitch.
by CathyG | Jan 12, 2019 | Uncategorized
Re The New York Times, Jan 12, 2019 – The Joy Of Being A Woman In Her 70s – by Mary Pipher:
Mary Pipher writes, “In America, ageism is a bigger problem for women than aging… we are denigrated by mother-in-law jokes…” Mother-in-law jokes are mild. What about those grandma and geezer jokes?
There’s no place for a woman who wants to keep working, who’s up to date with tech and social media, who’s lucky enough to be going to zumba class instead of medical appointments. She’s still treated as “cute” and subjected to patronizing, insensitive remarks on a daily basis. Potential employers look at her face — not her fitness levels — and the stereotypes surrounding age. They point to movies that reinforce stereotypes, such as The Intern.
No other disadvantaged group is expected to tolerate this degree of disrespect and discrimination, and still come out smiling and praised for being resilient “in spite of…” this treatment. We should be fighting for our rights instead of celebrating our vibrancy (which is, as some readers noted, limited to healthy, financially comfortable women).
The Times regularly runs articles about African-American women who experience prejudice in work and in life. Those articles do not run with the subtitle, “Happiness is a choice.”
And if you’re not healthy, you’ll be treated patronizingly by the medical profession. You’ll be subject to abuse in many institutions. You’ll likely be overmedicated and over-treated. Read Christiane Northrup’s book, Goddesses Never Age. Read anything by Gilbert Welch on overdiagnosis.
Would we tell other groups (such as African-Americans) that “happiness is a choice” and dismiss these very real assaults on their personhood? I think not.
by CathyG | Dec 5, 2018 | pollyanna views of aging, stereotypes of aging, Uncategorized
Marc Freedman’s latest book should be subtitled Prescription for Aging Well: Become Mentor to Younger People & Work With Children. Rather than break new ground, the book subtly reinforces some of the most common stereotypes of aging. For instance, “older people are more concerned with leaving a legacy than making money;” “older people want to nurture younger people and children.”
For instance Marc says he has three young children and no grandparents close by. “Our silver-haired safety net is located two doors down. Our quirky, engaging eighty-something neighbors …have become quasi-grandparents for our children… “
Freedman notes institutional factors that help older people: social acuity, Medicare and … AARP?! The truth is, many people avoid AARP because of their overly aggressive advertising (I stopped them by sending a public Facebook message) and because it’s not clear how they really help older Americans. In the last election, the two main party candidates differed significantly in their positions on Medicare and Social Security; one clearly would benefit recipients more than the other. Yet AARP remained steadfastly neutral, merely reporting what each side said.
AARP supported the drug “donut hole.” And AARP is, above all, an insurance company, which many people believe is sub-par in both value and customer service. You can just look at the comments under most AARP articles. r
Freedman points to Experience Corps as a model of ways to help both seniors and children. In fact Experience Corps seems to target “vulnerable older adults.” Their web page includes an excerpt from a newspaper article, “Older citizens have time on their hands and skills to share.” Really? Could this be another stereotype.
Freedman praises the movie The Intern as a “great example” of introducing an older person into a Millennial environment. In fact, the notion that older people need to become low-paid (or no-paid) interns seems preposterous. It’s not unusual for companies to hire executives who bring special skills to the table, even if they’re not familiar with all aspects of the organization. DeNiro reinforced many stereotypes — tech-challenged, always wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase. Today’s executives of all ages are likely to show up in business casual or even jeans and sneakers. A Pew Trust survey found that 67% of adults ages 65 and older say they go online, in contrast to just 14% in 2000.
Freedman takes a top-down view of aging, talking to people who create services, products or policy for older people. He talks to architects who offer innovative cross-generation housing. He talks to academics and authors. But the “boots on the ground” older people often don’t want any part of that. They want integrated housing but that means they want to live in an ordinary neighborhood or apartment with people of all ages. They want to work in real jobs for market wages and growth opportunities. These days, five years is a long time in any job, so they have time.
The truth is, some people — age 18 to 80 — just naturally enjoy working with children. Some others in the same age group would rather work in a for-profit environment as a contributor, not an intern. Some people are simply not qualified, by temperament or skill, to work with children. And many younger adults can afford to pay a coach or consultant to mentor them.
The workplace is the single biggest area of ageism (closely followed by the medical profession, which tends to pathologize medicate normal aging processes. See Christiane Northup’s excellent book, Goddesses Never Age.)
Finally, many older people aren’t afraid of dying. They’re more afraid of ending up in a nursing home, where many will be abused. They want to die with dignity. The advice to “accept your mortality” seems to apply to a specific segment of the population.
by CathyG | Nov 15, 2018 | pollyanna views of aging, stereotypes of aging
Chris Conley’s book, Wisdom At Work, may be approaching best-seller status and he’s collecting many 5-star reviews on Amazon. Yet if you read it carefully, the book actually reinforces the very thing he’s trying to attack – ageism. Conley defines himself and his relationship with AirBnB entirely in terms of age. He writes about taking on a new role in a youth-oriented company and getting a performance review from someone who’s thirty years younger. I winced when he reports asking someone, “Aren’t you old for an engineer?”
As an aside, Conley conveniently ignores the controversy surrounding AirBnB and its offerings. Millions of people have been displaced in urban areas as residential apartments become high-priced touristic AirBnBs. Just one AIrBnB can disrupt the community of a condo building or a block of single-family homes. There’s a reason hotels have trained managers and security forces. To be sure, some folks benefit from AIrBnB but we need to realize it’s a mixed bag.
The truth is, companies of all sizes have always brought in experienced advisors of all ages to serve as consultants and sometimes as managers. His role could be described without reference to age: he’ll be a consultant and his contribution is so great that the company will help him fill his knowledge gaps.
Conley’s not familiar with the nuts and bolts of tech because, in his previous job, he had people working for him to do those things. He doesn’t need to reach for a silly term like “mentern” to describe this role. In reality, today’s businesses are collaborative. If you don’t know something, you find someone who does. They might be older or younger; they just have to know what they’re doing.
Similarly, Conley’s tips on learning, counseling, and collaborating would apply to people at all ages. The founder of my coworking space, barely 35, would make many of the same observations.
Performance review? That’s a joke. If they don’t like his performance, he’ll gracefully bow out; it’s not like he needs the money or the status.
Anyway, Conley began his journey into elder hood at the age of fifty-two — an age where discrimination has begun to appear. It’s an age that’s not uncommon among senior executives or many kinds of professionals. Calling a fifty-something an “elder” seems a little silly.
In fact, the book seems to fall into the a new sub-genre of highly successful older people joining a millennial-dominated company. We saw this pattern, complete with stereotypes, in the movie The Intern and the book Disrupted. In all these narratives the senior male was the condescending sage and change agent, brought in my senior management solely because of his previous career status.
Conley references Meredith Maran’s book, The New Old Me. But Maran’s attitude is completely different. She wasn’t hired as a change agent and she attempted to fit in with the younger employees in her company. Her sardonic comments on her former coworkers seem based less on age than on the LA culture. As someone who’s lived all over North America, I can say that I had more trouble as a New Yorker adjusting to southern culture than as an “older” person adjusting to younger groups.
We will be truly age-agnostic when someone can apply for a position without having to be a sage or a wise old elder…just an ordinary person who will do the job. In any company, you’ll find people who like to socialize with each other and others — even the same age — who have different values and interests. They’ll get along on the job and who cares what they do on their own time? In any company you’ll find people who need extra consideration, whether they’re young parents, caretakers of relatives, or going through tough times.
I did find some good things. I love the quote from Eric Schmidt, the COO who told Sheryl Sandberg to “get on a rocket ship” and her career will take care of itself. The chapter on “counsel” is good for people of all ages. And some of the resources are quite good. Ironically, the selection of movies shows that people of different ages have teamed up for a long time.
Willie Nelson once said, “ I’ve known straight and gay people all my life. I can’t tell the difference,” We need more people to say, “I’ve worked with young and old people all my life. I can’t tell the difference.”
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by CathyG | Jul 31, 2018 | not the real me, stereotypes of aging
From a really good murder mystery by Harry Bingham, Love Story, With Murders. NY: Delacorte Press, 2013.
p 100: “Then I stare at my face in the mirror for a minute, wondering if it feels like mine. In Bram Stooker’s Dracula, the dark count is invisible in mirrors and I often feel something similar is true of me too. I can’t feel any deep relationship between the face that is mine and the person I am. Like they’re two different things. I don’t know if this is something that everyone feels.”
The heroine of this book, DC Fiona Griffiths, is probably in her 30s. And a lot of people who are “old” could relate exactly to where she’s coming from.
So it’s not just about aging … it’s about the feeling.
by CathyG | Jul 20, 2018 | Uncategorized
I wanted to like this book. I ended up hating it.
First, the guy is heartless. His mother had a DNR. On p 19, he writes: “Her DNR said to withhold care if she had no reasonable chance of regaining a meaningful life. But this was more like bringing in a hose if the drapes in her room caught fire. Afterward she would return to the life she had in her neat apartment. She had friends and grandchildren she loved; she had matinee concerts at the Philharmonic. People with much less enjoy great lives. It seemed ungrateful to reject that life as not worth living. If she wanted to starve to death she could do it without our help. We approved the tube.”
This is cruel and heartless. He’s clearly judging his mother and her quality of life. And starving to death isn’t as easy as it seems. He’s able to be more dispassionate with his interview subject, John Sorensen: “None of us really wants immortality on other people’s terms; it’s no kindness to wish a scaled-down version of it on the people who want it least.” (more…)
