PSYCHOLOGICAL INSIGHT

It is generally recognised that we pay scant regard to the elderly in our society. Before criticising them I think it needs to be pointed out that we do this alongside a ridiculous fawning over youth. We seem to glorify the status of being young in a way that defies intelligence. I think this is totally contemptible and stupid and worthy of the staunchest reprimand.

But that isn’t the point I want to make here. What doesn’t help the cause of the older people of the present day is that they are a sorry bunch. It’s not just that we chose to disregard them that they appear to have nothing to offer, that they seem to have no insight or wisdom to impart, that there is nothing from their experience worth hearing about. I think it’s to do with the particular flaws that befell these recent past generations. They came from a pre-psychologised age whose sense of value didn’t allow much insight into their emotional well-being. Emotions were to be shut out in favour of reason and the materials of existence and survival. Reason was good, emotion was bad. Practical issues were more pressing than the complexity of a person’s inner life. Feelings were not to be trusted. They weren’t consistent. They were associated with women and women were inferior beings. Emotion was relegated to the lower ranks, something to be overcome rather than embraced.