One click shared of a cute kid holding a teddy, and suddenly 1K plus likes and shares happen. An article discussing ignoring kids is shared a thousand times, while a link protesting Child labour is made globally live for a petition. While, I too am prone to the cuteness of the little beings, I fail to understand, as to why the same people feel it a right to joke, harass and demean the elders, who are akin to a baby in their helplessness. What they lack in cuteness is shown in their wrinkled faces which have seen many hardships, their bent bodies have labored to bring up the next generation, their toothless mouth has actually debated and shaped the future that you live in. If you are to value on the worth of a being, an elder has surely delivered more value to the world than a baby who has just arrived.
Rake your eyes on the global economy, and you will see that elders are still forced to work long hours despite their failing health. Countries have laws which freeze salaries for elders, refusing to pay them more. This is saying something like, ‘Since you are old, you do not deserve more funds to live a comfortable life’. The world around, elders are either treated as baby-sitters, or expected to pay forward their pension to support the home of which ever child has agreed to provide board. I wonder, if a child was treated the same, and how would the world react? Would the condition that bringing only an A grade will give you a shelter and food, and anything less means a ‘Young-home’? I wonder if human rights activists would find it befitting. Yet, elders not meeting the criteria are daily shipped off to old-homes, with no one even concerned about their feelings and rights.
Have you seen the chaos that is created when a child is bullied ? Name-calling is treated like a crime, and media jumps in left and right to defend the youngling, and criminalizing the caller. Yet, look at your own society, which refuses to socialize or entertain ‘Aunties’ and ‘Uncles’, with cold comments of , ‘this age is for praying’, and elders do not need anything else. I wonder that either we change the definition of a ‘Human’, where anyone who is an elder/senior, is simply NOT a human, and can be treated like a bag of oldness to be stuffed away.
It makes me shudder to think,that if my parents were to meet and communicate with such people, they will be abused, and stripped of the respect they deserve. Does this mean that everyone justifies that they should ignore their own parents because they are… gasp.. old? If not, how do these same people justify treating other elders that way. It makes one question, have these people forgotten that they too will grow old?
Finally someone spoke about the elderly 🙂 good going girl !