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.
Why It’s Just Fine to Fail at “Successful Aging,” Part 3 September 21, 2018 - More about what’s wrong with the concept of “successful aging”—a topic explored in Parts 1 and 2 and in Successful Aging as a Contemporary Obsession: Global Perspectives (2017), a collection of essays edited by Sarah Lamb. What else is problematic…- Why It’s Just Fine to Fail at “Successful Aging,” Part 2 September 20, 2018 - Part 1 of this series of blogs argues that, as a model for growing older, “successful aging” leaves ageism unchallenged or contributes to it. What else is problematic about “successful aging”? There are some insightful answers in a collection of…
- Why It’s Just Fine to Fail at “Successful Aging,” Part 1 September 18, 2018 - Eleven years ago I started a writing project about people over 80 who work. Upbeat! Inspirational! Safe! I didn’t realize it at the time, but it epitomized an approach that has dominated gerontology since the 1980s: “successful aging”—also known as…
The New Yorker’s Ageist Take on Ageism August 22, 2018 - I’m a lifelong New Yorker addict, so when I heard they were running a piece on ageism, I got excited. That was a mistake. Tad Friend’s article in the November 20th issue, “Why Ageism Never Gets Old,” is glib and…
The Beauty Industry Is Shifting from Anti-Aging to Anti-Anti-Aging. So What? June 6, 2018 - The New York Times Magazine opens every Sunday with an essay about what a given word or phrase reveals about the moment. On September 17, 2017, the word was “anti-aging.” The line at the top of the print version read,…
If Aging Is So Awful, How Come No One Wants to Be Younger? October 18, 2017 - You hear people say “I wish I were young again” all the time. Yet I’ve never met anyone who would actually choose to move their game piece back on the board.
Let’s Get Intergenerational! August 4, 2017 - A century ago, Americans didn’t need programs to connect the generations: homes and communities housed people of all ages. But as people started living longer and moving into cities, we started thinking differently about those at both ends of the…
10 Vital Truths about Aging and Health June 26, 2017 - The World Health Organization (WHO) is in the public health business, and no organization has done more to raise awareness of ageism—the biggest obstacle to meeting the challenges of population aging.
What Does ‘Old’ Look Like to Millennials—and to AARP? May 19, 2017 - AARP’s #DisruptAging site has some commendable goals: to “hold a mirror up to the ageist beliefs around us,” and “change the stories we tell ourselves about aging.” In other words, as they put it, to “disrupt aging”—which also just happens to…
19, Going on 90 April 24, 2017 - Here’s a note that came to me recently from a reader of my Q&A blog, Yo, Is This Ageist? She wrote that:
Let’s Put Films to the Applewhite Test March 24, 2017 - Invented by the sharp American cartoonist Alison Bechdel, a movie passes the Bechdel test if at least two women talk to each other about something other than a man. Low bar, right? Yet surprisingly few movies pass it. I propose the…
In the Fight against Bigotry, Where Does Ageism Fit In? February 15, 2017 - I wake these days remembering that something awful has happened. Reality assembles itself, and I feel worse. The multicultural, egalitarian, globalized society I hope to inhabit is under assault. Bigotry is ascendant. Racism, sexism, homophobia, religious intolerance—pick your prejudice!—are sanctioned,…
Action—Global and Local—against Ageism December 19, 2016 - October [2016] brought me two very different gigs—one on the world stage and one in a Brooklyn community center. The first was at the United Nations on October 6 to celebrate the 26th International Day of Older Persons. It was…
Think Old People Will Tank the Economy? That’s Just Plain Wrong October 19, 2016 - Many economists agree that, as the number of boomers leaving the workforce swells, younger workers will shoulder ever-greater burdens. Social Security will be bankrupted by all those lazy old people! Medicare exhausted! These dire predictions of economic turmoil are biased,…
Age Takes Center Stage around the Brexit Vote—Not in a Good Way September 14, 2016 - On June 23, 2016, a referendum (a vote in which everyone of voting age can take part) was held to decide whether the United Kingdom should leave or remain in the European Union. Leave won by 52 percent to 48…
Six More Questions about My New Manifesto Against Ageism August 12, 2016 - Since the publication of This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism (2016), I’ve been asked a lot of questions. Are you curious about why I've become an Old Person in Training?- Six Questions about My New Manifesto Against Ageism July 18, 2016 - Since the publication of This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism (2016), I’ve been asked a lot of questions. Are you curious about why I find aging so damn interesting?
Droneliness June 22, 2016 - Concerned about an onslaught of enfeebled old people? Don’t worry, robots will take care of them! American techno-optimism knows no bounds, and so-called “age-independence” technologies are proliferating like crazy. But in a profoundly ageist culture, the implications can be disturbing.…
What’s Behind the Growing Geriatrician Shortage? April 15, 2016 - I was delighted to see an editorial in the New York Times about a crisis in the making, the growing shortage of geriatricians.
I’ll Have What She’s Having—Minus the Internalized Ageism March 21, 2016 - “There is also something profoundly liberating about aging," Dominique Browning wrote in the New York Times.
