I have been volunteering for Age Concern Wellington Region and was asked to comment on the negative connotations associated with the use of the collective noun “Elderly” when referring to senior citizens, older people etc. My opinion is set out below.
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There is an ongoing debate about describing older people as a group. The trouble is that finding a word to refer to a very heterogeneous collection of citizens over the age of 65 years.
As soon as you start you run into the problem that just about any generic word can or could cause offense to either a single person or a sub-group of the population you seek to define. Ageism rears its head, along with all the other collective nouns in common use, but there are those who claim that the senior generation is not regarded as important as the other sectors of society.
When it comes to a crunch it is the collective word or words used that can cause many of the problems. The issue is that the word aims to define a group of people comprising some 15% of the population, aged between 65 and over 100. It includes any number of people with different abilities, interests, and levels of experience, living in a multitude of different circumstances – well off, to getting along as best they can.
Other groups like kids are more easily defined as they are lumped into smaller well-understood cohorts of pre-school, primary or secondary aged groups, without generally offending anyone.
But defining over 65-year-olds in a single group is a problem. It may be that the word chosen becomes over-used or associated with (real or imagined) negative aspects of the group and thus becomes unfashionable or unwanted. The current out of favour word is “elderly”. Does this phenomenon go in cycles?
That brings up my memory of a skit by stand-up comic Stan Freberg back in 1957 (I had to do a Google search to find the date). He was interrupted by a censor from the ‘citizens radio committee’ who objected when Freberg began to sing “Old Man River”.
The censor claimed, “The word “old” has a connotation that some of the more elderly people find distasteful. I would suggest you make the substitution.” So, Freberg changed it to “Elderly Man River”. The song went on with frequent interruptions from the censor. What goes around, comes around.
Now “elderly is out of favour and there is a whole lot of substitutes including ‘older people’, ‘seniors’ and the rather unfortunate ‘older adults’ which is a confusion, in its own right.
My question is whether it is the older generation who is worried about this or those who face the prospect of being stereotyped by an ageist collective name? I would hate to raise the issue of political correctness.
Admittedly, there are reasons some negative connotations such as the perceived cost to society due to superannuation and health charges, and there are seniors requiring support because they are isolated, disabled, become frail, or have mental issues. But this should not be regarded as being any different from other sections of society, — education, social welfare, unemployment, police, or corrections. It is all part of the cost of living in New Zealand.
And it might be said that getting to be older means these people have been through the mill, paid taxes, brought up kids in a proper manner (mostly) and probably done some pro bono work on the way.
Just like those other sections, there are organisations established to provide support and care for the less active older members of society. Age Concern Wellington Region provides a Visitor Service, Companion Walking Service, Pop-up Hubs for Seniors, Steady As You Go fitness and balance classes, as well as Staying Safe driving workshops and Tea & Tech classes to assist seniors in their daily lives.
Many of these organisations rely on the voluntary services of seniors who have experience and wisdom gained from a lifetime of getting on with it. So seniors could be regarded as contributing to, as well as depending on society and life in Aotearoa New Zealand.
From a personal point of view, I don’t really care what generic name I am saddled with. There is a view that ‘elderly’ is an offensive moniker for us oldies, silver tops, old farts, ancients, sages, or if you are an Aussie silver top campervan addict- SADs (See Australia and Die).
If you have been around as long as me and most of my mates you have been blamed, shamed, occasionally framed, and renamed. Basically, it is not something I lie awake at night worrying about.
I am of the opinion (and you can get opinionated when you have reached a certain age) that most of the venerable, revered, occasionally forgetful people do not give a tinker’s curse as to what the rest of humanity calls them. We have been there, seen and done that, bought the T shirt, acquired the cap, and possibly even kept a written record or diary retry about it.
There is more to life than worrying about a collective noun.
WorkinWords 