ageism

Description

Ageism is a social exorcism born from the absolute worship of youth and deep terror of aging. The young are dismissed as inexperienced, while the old are branded obsolete. Under the pretense of fairness, it tramples both energy and wisdom. This paradoxical bias builds walls between generations, elevating a fleeting youth to eternal value. Eventually, victims and perpetrators alike find themselves sitting on the same bench of fate.

Definitions

• A social ritual that worships youth as a religion and punishes aging as a crime.
• A simplistic selection criterion that weighs ability and value on a scale of age, praising only one side.
• A paradoxical denial of wisdom that labels experience as worthless garbage and exalts momentum as supreme.
• A court that uses time’s cruel judgment as a get-out-of-jail-free card to unilaterally try individual dignity.
• A misjudgment that ignores the round trip of aging and youth everyone takes, treating one as life’s final destination.
• An invisible chain feigning ‘synchronization’ between generations, causing mutual sabotage.
• A merciless metric that refuses to add knowledge and passion together, entrusting all meaning to a single digit.
• A marketing strategy that sticks an age tag and arbitrarily ranks human beings as products.
• A social violence that regards aging as a blemish and ruthlessly hacks away at the art of individuality.
• A narrow-minded verdict that condemns a being swaying between past and future by the single number of ’now’.

Examples

• “You’re so youthful! Experience? That’s a nice-to-have.”
• “Sorry, your age doesn’t meet the qualifications.”
• “Let’s move older employees off new tech projects—they might struggle.”
• “Young ideas look forward; veteran proposals are just ghosts of the past.”
• “Ten years until retirement? Hardly mentoring material.”
• “I thought it rude to be taught by someone older.”
• “Youth is invincible. Aging is incompetent.”
• “We need a fresh perspective for this role…sorry.”
• “Considering your age, we’ll defer your promotion.”
• “Your age? Oh, then I’ll pass.”
• “Wisdom of age? You mean golden handshake?”
• “Age talk is tedious—let’s judge purely on ability.”
• “Fifties? Uh… maybe next time.”
• “The senior slot? It’s just an after-retirement safety net.”
• “Experience doesn’t guarantee skill, but age is the ultimate yardstick.”
• “Irony: Too much experience is seen as a lack of flexibility.”
• “This is a young team—you might feel out of place.”
• “Out of respect for your age, we’ll skip you.”
• “Saying I have time until retirement isn’t helping me now.”
• “Age discrimination? It’s not my hobby, but it’s tradition.”

Narratives

• Under the banner of ‘fresh graduates welcome,’ the resumes of middle-aged applicants are habitually shelved before review.
• At the lunch table, jokes from older staff are heard as nothing more than ‘war stories,’ eliciting no laughter.
• Interviewers focus not on skill sheets but on the printed birthdate.
• Targeted for layoffs are those oblivious to the ‘winds of youth.’
• Leadership training boils down to an exclusive young-persons’ party.
• Veteran insights lie dormant in warehouses labeled ‘relics of the past.’
• Corporate events stand on the pedestal of ‘young energy.’
• Career paths begin to shift dramatically at the age of thirty.
• Once branded ’too old,’ one’s combat power resets to zero.
• The gate called ‘age limit’ bars the passage of talent.
• In organizations enforcing a youthful dress code, both maturity and youth lose their luster.
• Borrowing shoulders with interns is touted as the company’s vision for the future.
• Innovation’s pace serves as a pretext to discard experienced workers as disposable pawns.
• Ageism is a fate that showers down indiscriminately on everyone.
• By dividing workers by age, society discards its own wisdom.
• The ‘senior slot’ is not a refuge but a prison with no escape.
• Sometimes, the ‘most and least capable’ swap places in the company for reasons of age alone.
• Orders to lower the average age arrive accompanied by the cries of newborn hires.
• The label of age is transparent, but its weight mercilessly crushes the spirit.
• Those measured by age between past and future forever bear a shadow named anxiety.

Related Terms

Aliases

• Youthism
• Generation Wall
• Wrinkle Harassment
• Forever Twenty Syndrome
• Birthday Bias
• Temporal Judgment
• Age Ruler
• Rookie Worship
• Eldercide
• Birthdate Censorship
• Ring Discrimination
• Reverse Mentorship
• Aging Purge
• Youth Cult
• Decaying Rules
• Aging Scandal
• Anti-Aging Discrimination
• Generation Trash Bin
• Time Segregation
• Experience Penalty

Synonyms

• Life Discount
• Generation Trial
• Youth Supremacy
• Experienced Neglect
• Seniority Reversal
• Experience Gap
• Chains of Time
• Age Excommunication
• Years Wall
• Old Guard Purge
• Eternal Youth Doctrine
• Retirement Seal
• Age Bounce
• Birthday Prejudice
• Ring Rating
• Age Penalty
• Rejuvenation Purge
• Life Meter
• Birthdate Game
• Judgment of Age