Is Society Missing The Point On Aging?
Things That Matter, By Dennis Rizzo
My Generation [with apologies to The Who]
I have to join Jim Foster in accepting that I am on the cusp of becoming an extinct specimen. I have arrived at the point where ambition and determination have been surpassed by reality and arthritis. I’m feeling old and in the way. But, my friend Dazzangee says we’re not Senior Citizens, we’re Elders.
Are we?
Senior Citizens implies that we have passed our best-by date and are on the final turn for the home stretch. To be sure, there are aspects that support this. The news is rife with how we boomers are aging out and causing serious strain on service systems. It is we who allowed the rapid decline in the Earth’s sustainability – despite being tree-huggers early on.
Yet we do retain some edifying qualities. A line from the Grateful Dead comes to mind: What a long, strange trip it’s been. That trip gives us value.
So what’s a senior citizen?
Both Canada and the USA consider anyone over 65 as a senior citizen. As with most funding-based terminology, the designation is based on regulations and funding streams rather than physicality. Those of us in this category recognize that it’s not always a factor of chronological age. 50% of the time it’s 80% mental.
Senior site notes: The journey into senior citizenship is a gradual process, influenced by legal, social, and personal factors… the definition of a senior citizen varies across countries and cultures, with different age thresholds for various benefits and services.
What is an elder?
According to School Social Work Network of America: An Elder holds a position of reverence and respect within various cultures and communities, signifying a person who is often older, experienced, and regarded as wise. This role transcends mere age, embodying a deep connection to cultural traditions, communal values, and collective memory.
Often this is manifest by the knowledge keepers in collectivist societies – achievements and decisions are made with the group in mind. Many cultures revere the older, wiser members of the tribe. These are the teachers and mediators that bring the tools of civil living to the younger generations. These are the folks who know where the potholes are and how to avoid them.
Individualistic societies, (which strongly value personal achievement and focus on individual needs) seem to have discarded this role of elder. Western society seems to focus on senior citizens as people viewed to no longer be contributing to the overall benefit of the community.
Why?
It’s possible disdain for perceived non-producers is rooted in the general principles of modern capitalism and our obsession with how much measurable work a person does. Perhaps it is we elders’s own fault for accepting the age-defined role of sedentary retiree.
We know better, in our own minds. But do we tacitly condone the lesser role afforded us? Do we accept the pains and aches as just part of being an elder or do we use them as justification for being seniors?
Western society does not seem to value elders. Instead, we relegate the aging population to senior citizen status. Medical and personal care seem to be rationed based on perceived future worth to society. It feels as though our government has been hoarding transfer funds for aging services knowing that old folks will eventually die off and the public costs will go down. At that point the balance of funds can be applied to privatizing health care, some other mythical endeavour, or a tunnel under the 401. That last might be a function of my cynicism.
But what is on the menu for our final years?
According to RetirementHomePlus – Independent living costs $3,500 – $6,500/month, while assisted living ranges from $4,500 – $7,800/month. Long-term care homes remain the most affordable option at $2,000 – $3,500/month. LTC homes are paid for by OHIP, but the availability is limited, and quality of care varies a lot. Remember the problems exposed during COVID? Remember how our push to move people from hospitals led to the program of placing them hours away from their families? A friend recently told of driving a deceased from St. Thomas to Gravenhurst where family lived – because the person had been moved to a facility that far away.
In the summer of 2022, a few months after Doug Ford and his Progressive Conservatives won a landslide victory in the election, the government introduced Bill 7 in an effort to open up much-needed hospital space. The law is aimed at so-called alternate level of care patients who are discharged from hospital but need a long-term care bed and don’t have one yet. Hospitals can send those patients to nursing homes not of their choosing up to 70 kilometres away, or up to 150 kilometres away in northern Ontario, if spaces open up there first. If patients flat out refuse those transfers, hospitals can charge them $400 a day under the law. [CBC]
For the people, eh?
Not only are the facilities questionable, but Health Quality Ontario notes the wait time in 2024 for LTC placement is 200-225 days from application if you live in the community and 75-95 days if coming from a hospital setting. Instead of investing in more hospital beds and services people are often moved inappropriately. Could it be, since these individuals require public funding for long term care and cannot afford private retirement homes, they should be happy with what they get? When we are labelled senior citizens, I guess we are supposed to accept our new, non-productive role quietly and without recourse.
But as elders, we represent the accumulated learning of a generation. Perhaps there’s our productivity. There’s our value.
As the knowledge and wisdom of seventy-five years slinks its way to conscious thought, I realize something. As my wife knows, I occasionally have to be hit over the head to see the obvious. My mind works somewhat akin to a flock of free-range chickens. In this maelstrom of images, conundrums, and digressions I formulate an opinion. It’s only mine – but you might chime in.
Being an elder means we have the responsibility to educate the next generation as best we can. It also means we can expect to be discounted in many ways, until that generation shares our years and becomes elders themselves.
Recall the fable of the youth of 16 whose parents are so ignorant yet when they reach 21 are amazed at how much their parents have learned in those few years. I can imagine Pliny the Elder sitting in a barber shop in Rome in 45 AD lamenting about how kids these days just don’t understand.
Each generation feels it is different. We aging hippies as well – but in reality only because we have changed over time and experience, and we now see things differently than young folks. Perhaps differently than we saw them fifty-odd years past. That doesn’t always make it better – just different.
I watch as youth take a stand on important issues; I watch them march in the streets and publish essays to support the underdogs. I watch them help elderly neighbours, and single moms, and kids with disabilities, and those affirming gender identity. I watch them build families, and careers, and new traditions. I watch as they join in politics (whatever party) and volunteer for public service and take on causes for their communities. I watch as they do pretty much the same things we did at that age, but with interactive electronics and, frankly, more worldly awareness than we had.
It should be somewhat comforting to know that tidbits of the insight we emit settle on fertile ground. Changing tribal behaviour is difficult and painful. But each time we transfer wisdom to the next generation we make a little mark on the stick of social progress. Long after our role is finished the world will continue on as it has for millennia, just hopefully a tad more equitable, friendly, and sane.
(Images Supplied)
Dennis Rizzo joins SUNonline/Orillia as a columnist writing on big issues affecting ordinary Orillians. He is an ex-pat Yank from New Jersey. Orillia, Ontario. Canada is his adopted home, but he has brought along a degree of puckishness and hubris. Dennis spent more than 30 years working in the field of disabilities, with some side trips to marketing and management. He presented and keynoted for many conferences and served on a President’s advisory committee. Dennis is the author of several journal articles and booklets in the field of disabilities and work and five non-fiction books, including “A Brief History of Orillia – Ontario’s Sunshine City.” He recently republished a novel set in 1776 and a mystery set in 1860. He also enjoys sitting in on music sessions around town when he can.
