What is Ageism?

Many of us are familiar with racism, sexism, homophobia, and ableism, to name a few. All of these forms of injustice exist, but there is yet another form of injustice which is within and around so many of us, yet is seldom talked about. This form of injustice is so seldom talked about that even I wasn’t aware of it until a couple of years ago.

The injustice is ageism.

Before making any posts on ageism, I want to establish what ageism is and give examples of this form of discrimination, in case any of my readers aren’t aware of or knowledgeable about it.

I define ageism as a form of discrimination where people are judged based on the age they are or the age they look.

This definition of ageism is more expansive than most definitions I see on the internet (including the definitions from the Merriam-Webster Dictionary and the Oxford Dictionary), because many people define ageism as discrimination based on a person’s age. However, I’ve noticed how people who “look old” (even if their actual age isn’t that old) are discriminated against; as a result, I believe that age-based discrimination involves the age that people are and the age that people look.

Ageism can take on many forms, both blatant and subtle.

One example of blatant ageism was the forced retirement of a woman by the name of Maggie Kuhn from the Presbyterian Church in 1970. In Kuhn’s case, was required to retire after she turned 65. This is blatant ageism because she was judged on the sole basis of age. Namely, she (and anyone 65 and older) was judged to be less capable of doing her job than a younger person. Thankfully, she used her forced retirement as an opportunity to form an anti ageism organization: the Gray Panthers.

Ageism can take on many forms, ranging form comments about “entitled millennials” (a comment which make me cringe, not just because I’m a millennial but because it is a way of talking down younger people) to the societal stigma associated with looking old. In these cases, and many others, people are judged on the age they are and/or the age they look.

Hopefully, through the posts I make on ageism, I can help others confront both blatant and subtle ageism, and help us respect people in all stages of life.