Challenging stigma and discrimination on all fronts is massive, we experience individual discrimination, societal discrimination i.e. a creeping feeling of exclusion and lack of opportunity and institutional, the latter is the most challenging, it is political and the very fabric of our society (laws, policies) an example was the 'Liverpool Care Pathway' fortunately this has now been scrapped, it was shocking. The NHS discriminates against older people all of the time. Refusing life saving surgery on the grounds 'they would not survive the anaesthetic'. 'Aging population draining the NHS' etc. etc. this leads to 'moral panics' and then parliament rushes through ill thought out policies as a knee jerk reaction.
One of the most challenging things to achieve is how to ensure that the wealth of experience and knowledge is not lost. We see examples of this everyday, a lot of what politicians come out with has all been said before, but the younger generations think they are the first to think of it, it is like reinventing the wheel over and over again. This leads to repeated mistakes and no solutions. This is a direct result of not listening or valuing older people. Our society does not value the older generation, therefore future generations miss out on some much experience.
Awwww, he is so happy to see me…..