This Chair Rocks *[EPUB]
Author, activist, and TED speaker Ashton Applewhite has written a rousing manifesto calling for an end to discrimination and prejudice on the basis of age. In our youth obsessed culture, we’re bombarded by media images and messages about the despairs and declines of our later years. Beauty and pharmaceutical companies work overtime to convince people to purchase products that will retain their youthful appearance and vitality. Wrinkles are embarrassing. Gray hair should be colored and bald heads covered with implants. Older minds and bodies are too frail to keep up with the pace of the modern working world and olders should just step aside for the new generation. Ashton Applewhite once held these beliefs too until she realized where this prejudice comes from and the damage it does. Lively, funny, and deeply researched, This Chair Rocks traces her journey from apprehensive boomer to pro-aging radical, and in the process debunks myth after myth about late life. Explaining the roots of ageism in history and how it divides and debases, Applewhite examines how ageist stereotypes cripple the way our brains and bodies function, looks at ageism in the workplace and the bedroom, exposes the cost of the all-American myth of independence, critiques the portrayal of elders as burdens to society, describes what an all-age-friendly world would look like, and offers a rousing call to action. It’s time to create a world of age equality by making discrimination on the basis of age as unacceptable as any other kind of bias. Whether you’re older or hoping to get there, this book will shake you by the shoulders, cheer you up, make you mad, and change the way you see the rest of your life. Age pride! “Wow. This book totally rocks. It arrived on a day when I was in deep confusion and sadness about my age. Everything about it, from my invisibility to my neck. Within four or five wise, passionate pages, I had found insight, illumination, and inspiration. I never use the word empower, but this book has empowered me.” ―Anne Lamott, New York Times bestselling author Read more
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Why Must Read This Chair Rocks?
I found this author through a New York Times editorial and was led to her website and blog, which I so thoroughly enjoyed. Is Ageism the "Last Acceptible Prejudice?" I've heard that said about casual anti-Semitism ("Jew him down"), casual homophobia ("that's so Gay!"), but jokes about "I've fallen and I can't get up are endemic without a second look. In my practice, I see long-term employees with good evaluations over a long period of time, suddenly deemed incompetent. I even, in one case, collected the data from the entire Board of Education of New York City and learned that statistically, teachers over 40 were more likely to be charged with incompetence than those under - and with each ten-year increase in age, the chances went up. The Court rejected the evidence because an arbitrator had accepted the testimony of the principal - a rule rejected by another part of the country. I took the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, and my brief got some notice, but was not accepted for argument. Later, the Supreme Court made it harder for aggrieved employees to sue. Local laws, like those in New York City lessen the burden, but "out with the old in with the new" is presumptively accepted in the workplace, and the employer will find a way to get rid of an employee for some reason or another. People in my position must hunt for clues - like statistical evidence - and statements and negative treatment that will allow a jury to infer ageism. This author's book gave me so many insights (and now citations) to inferences to be made from statements and actions and I'm so glad I was surfing the web and found this wonderful and important book about fundamental human rights.
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