Author and activist Ashton Applewhite has been recognized by the New York Times, National Public Radio and the American Society on Aging as an expert on ageism. She blogs at This Chair Rocks, speaks widely, and is the author of This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism, “a book we have been waiting for… that blows up myths seven to a page like fireworks” (Los Angeles Review of Books). In 2016, Next Avenue, a website that’s part of the PBS system, named Applewhite its Influencer of the Year, for sparking a revolution against ageism.
Ageism Shortens Lives—New Studies Confirm It March 26, 2024 - “Ageism, and an older person’s perception of aging, may hold the keys to a longer life.” That’s the first sentence of “Why age bias has real world health effects,” just published by the Association of Health Care Journalists, which supports excellence…
Think ‘Too Many Old People’ Will Swamp Social Welfare Programs? Think Again. February 20, 2024 - Since the 1970s, population aging—the proverbial “gray tsunami”—has been used to justify “pension reform,” austerity and privatization across the wealthy nations. Alarmist projections have long fueled neoliberal, small-government policy reforms. In the Fall 2023 issue of Jacobin, editor-at-large Seth Ackerman argues that…
Women in the Workforce Are Never the Right Age January 16, 2024 - Why are women still so underrepresented in positions of power? In the United States, for example, why do women still make up only a meager 10 percent of people running Fortune 500 companies? Take heart, there’s always a reason. (Content warning: this article,…
Becoming Less Ageist Can Reverse Cognitive Decline November 17, 2023 - A growing body of fascinating research shows that attitudes towards aging have an actual, measurable, physical effect on how our minds and bodies function. People with more positive feelings about aging—fact- rather than fear-based, that is—walk faster, heal quicker, live…
Enough with the Headlines about Age! August 18, 2023 - Age and age discrimination have never gotten more media coverage, especially in the wake of President Biden’s announcement that he’s running for reelection. If there’s anyone who should be delighted, it’s me. I’m in the age and ageism business after…
Is the Term ‘Senior Abuse Prevention’ Ageist? July 25, 2023 - I hardly ever cross-post questions from my Yo, Is This Ageist blog. I’m making an exception because the question below occasioned such a meaty discussion during this week’s Old School’s Office Hours meetup. It also helped me understand why the phrase…
Is it Ageist to Offer Actors the Right to Hide Their Age? June 22, 2023 - The Screen Actors Guild (SAG-AFTRA) has been waging a years-long legal battle with the Internet Movie Database (IMDb) to stop the site from disclosing the ages of screen actors. Last June, GLAAD, an LGBTQ advocacy organization, signed on to support…
For the Umpteenth Time: ‘Too Old to Be President’ April 11, 2023 - Wondering how to respond when people equate a political candidate’s age with their fitness for office? You’ll find plenty of answers in “Biden is now America’s first octogenarian president,” which appeared in Salon. The writer reached out to experts like physician Louise…
‘Ravages of Age,’ Really? That Phrase Has Got to Go February 3, 2023 - [Last October] the New York Times Magazine opened with an essay by Elizabeth Nelson about whether we’re missing out on [something] when elite athletes—Roger Federer and Serena Williams in this case—retire from their sports. This sentence in the first paragraph made me…
World Elder Abuse Awareness Day: It’s a Thing. It Shouldn’t Have to Be December 21, 2022 - World Elder Abuse Awareness Day, which was launched in 2006, falls on June 15. That happens to be my mother’s birthday, which I find darkly amusing and which probably has something to do with my ambivalence around the event. It’s…
‘Age Against the Machine—Ending Ageism in the Workplace’ September 23, 2022 - That’s the kickass-if-I-say-so-myself title of my new talk, which debuted earlier this month, in real life, at the annual conference of the Financial Planners Association. The catalyst was my pre-event call with the organizers. “There’s grousing from our older members,…
Ageism Affects Us, Both Physically and Mentally August 8, 2022 - Ageism affects how our minds and bodies function, and not in a good way. We’ve known that for a while, thanks in large part to the work of Yale’s Becca Levy, PhD, whose groundbreaking work, Breaking the Age Code: How…
The Paradoxes of Aging June 17, 2022 - I recently came across a passage about contemporary aging so concise and insightful that I had to post it. It’s from a review by eminent gerontologist Thomas Cole of Aging and the Art of Living (2012) by Jan Baars. We…
Escaping Our Same-Age Silos May 18, 2022 - I often point out that age has far less to do with compatibility than we think it does. There are exceptions, of course: reproduction is largely a young person’s game, along with extreme sports. Age differences can’t be wished away,…
Ageless, Clueless … I goofed September 22, 2021 - During my book tour, I often closed readings with a passage about aspiring to agelessness, declaring it a form of age denial. A woman at Powell’s Books in Portland, OR, said, “Saying you’re ageless seems like saying you’re color-blind,” and…
Learning from the Women’s Movement’s Mistakes July 14, 2021 - Here’s an excerpt from Ageist? Sexist? Who, Me? How to Start a Consciousness-Raising Group Around the Intersection of Ageism and Sexism (out later this spring from the Old School Clearinghouse). It’s about how women with privilege have left other women behind in the…
The Year of Letting Our Hair Go Gray May 14, 2021 - Six year ago, on an escalator coming out of a weekday movie matinee, I had a wild idea. Despite the fact that the entire audience was older, I spotted only one gray-haired woman. Covering the gray, I realized, is a…
The Possibilities Even Where Our Darkest Fears Reside March 18, 2021 - My new talk, “Still Kicking—Confronting Ageism and Ableism in the Pandemic’s Wake,” debuted earlier this week at n4a, the national conference of Area Agencies on Aging—to rave reviews, yay! Here’s a look at some of the ground it covers: Remember…
Age Justice Requires Disability Justice—and Vice Versa February 5, 2021 - A terrific special section of the New York Times [in July 2020] was devoted to the 30th anniversary of the passage of the Americans With Disabilities Act. There is no mention of age or ageism. It would be convenient to…
Discrimination Is Intersectional. Activism Can Be Too January 9, 2021 - … What 2020 brought home for me was that being anti-ageist means supporting every movement for equal rights. It’s a big ask, but we cannot dismantle ageism without dismantling ableism, and racism, and sexism and all the rest, because these systems reinforce…
