Media coverage of anything aging-related has long been characterized by alarmist hand-wringing, the most egregious example being the gray tsunami metaphor. Coverage of the pandemic is no exception, given that an estimated 80% of COVID19-related deaths are of people over 85, many occurring in nursing homes where the virus has run largely unchecked. Typical headlines read, “Ageism on the […]
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Baby Boomers soared through their 60s and early 70s, shattering ageist stereotypes as they went but many have yet to realize that they still have an ageist view of old age. No wonder so many dread it. “The Last Spell of Ageism” relates my own efforts to overturn ageist views of the last stage of life and to see it in a life-enhancing way.
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The people working in nursing homes do not need blame right now. They do need supplies, encouragement, and love.
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Why is coronavirus spreading across the US? Not because a virulent virus jumped from an animal into a human. Not because of China, or selfish youngers and clueless olders. COVID is spreading because the virus is new and contagious and because we live under a system that picks profit over people at every turn. The […]
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I had hoped, with the current focus on healthcare workers as heroes, that the demonizing of nursing homes would cease during the pandemic.
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Why we need to queer age now more than ever.
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I don’t know which person in this video is more annoying, the college kid saying, “If I get corona, I get corona. I’m not going to let it stop me from partying,” or the 93-year-old dissing the partiers: “They think they know it all. They think they’re better than children were years ago.” Both are foolish. The […]
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Dementia, Alzheimer’s, senility, forgetfulness. All of these words point to an experience. But do they point to the same one? Are they different? Are they the same? I often hear these words thrown around interchangeably. Here I hope to give some etymological clarity. Aging in America is confusing. By using clear language, I hope we can communicate […]
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