Ageism.... Does it exist?

Well very recently I enrolled at college and as I enrolled for my business studies subject they asked me to pick a piece of paper up. I am supposed to complete an assignment.

My paper said 'ageism.... Does it exist?' so now I have been given the task to write up my views.

So, it made me think I think that it exists for both older people and for younger people and against older people and agains younger people in different circumstances.

I will be adding more as my assignment gets nearer to completion by the end of this week but I wanted to know what people think in countries other than mine and just your views in general on this?

 

Yes, agesim is very real. There is the formal version, with age restrictions for driving, voting, drinking, etc. And people also prefer spending time with people about the same age as them, while there are alot of generalization about age groups different than one's own.

There is a lot to write about, it shouldn't be a problem.

 

*ism* at the end of anything generaly refers to a group of people being discriminated against because of something about them *usualy the pre-fix i.e *race*ism *sex*ism etc*

Any kind of discrimination can justify this, like the person above me stated, resctrictions to some old people, things along those lines justify that ageism does exist.

 

Yeah you are right, I hadn't even considered the formal restrictions at all. Thanks for that.
By generalization about age groups different than one's on you mean stereotypes such as that teenagers carry knives and go round attacking other people right?

 

I'm not 100% sure what you mean there, but i'l try to answer it anyway lols.

Refering to teenagers, most small shops around where i live won't let more then 2 school children into a shop at the same time in fear that they'l steal, by doing this their basically sending out the message that they think children are more likely to steal then older people, i don't know the statistics, it could be true, however them implying it could be true is in some ways still a discrimination, because its singleing out a specific age group and basing their actions on a small group of the same age group, in the same way if a shop was to say, we don't let more then 2 asian people into the shop at the same time because their more likely to steal then white people, the statistics might or might not be there idk, however its still kind of the same situation, just a bit more drastic and of a different type of discrimination.

 

I understand you and its same sort of thing as I meant

 

Absolutely. I hate anyone under 12 and anyone over 40, just because I know one or two people who I don't like out of those ages. I really have no valid reason for it. :\

 

Ok thats true I would watch out for someone of my age between say 15-25 more than I would an old person when I was walking down the street so that is being prejudice and therefore ageist against people of your own age?

 

Exactly. I'm not saying there's anything wrong in trusting old people more than teens, but that is a mint example of prejudice.