What is the social imaginary of the elderly from the perspective of the adult?
As a first measure, I want to reflect on the journey through time that the old man’s vision took and how it changed until reaching the present day. Nowadays, Many times there is a negative image of the old in Western societies there is a myth of “eternal youth” that we believe can hide the passage of time. Nowadays, where it is very fashionable, surgeries and beauty treatments, in their extreme use, are some of the ways to cover the pass of the time.
Changes in the body can be considered as a setting for prejudices and the importance of the skin and being caressed as a means of communication and a way to prevent isolation.
Social factors
I consider as relevant data the increased life expectancy which began to be detected from the second half of the 20th century and the decrease in the fertility rate. The proportion of people over 60 is increasing faster than any other age group in almost all countries. As a result of this, we must pay attention to the positive things that this period has, which is the simple fact of being alive. It is a challenge for society to value the role that older adults can play and achieve the maximum improvement in their quality of life and health, as well as their participation in society.
Old age, as explained in Erikson’s Theory of Psychosocial Development, refers us to a psychological struggle of the individual during this life stage. In today’s society, where advertising and image culture have great relevance, youth is a rising value and, on the contrary, old age is hidden and denied, to the point that many people of a certain age live obsessed with the negative sensations linked to aging. This is what is known as Gerascophobia.
A culture that rejects old age
Culture rewards youth as symbols of joy, success and fertility, while it repudiates old age, associating it with illness, asexuality and the absence of desires or projects. In the collective imagination, ready-made phrases such as “leave it, it’s old” “it’s age stuff” “it’s like this because it’s old” are planned, not to mention verbs like “raving” or “raving”, which are often associated with people. of a certain age.
Many professionals who deal with older people every day feel that the elderly are not listened to but rather silenced. Just the opposite of what an elderly person needs: to speak and be listened to, communicate with those around them and notice that they are useful and valued. Is there something in the speech of the elders that we do not want to hear? This is another of the questions we ask ourselves when addressing the topic.
Prejudices, stereotypes and misconceptions about old age
Taking as reference the gerontopsychiatry Argentine Leopoldo Salvarezza and the North American psychiatrist Robert Neil Butler, I consider that old age and its social imaginary represent:
Fanciful expectations and unproven treatments to stop the passage of time and try to achieve “eternal youth.”
Irrational biomedicalization of the aging process based on the medical paradigm.
Participation of health professionals themselves, without gerontological training, in the criteria for old age.
Collective unconscious of society that is usually gerontophobic and thanatophobic.
Psychoanalysis and its concept of desire It gives us the possibility of “choosing” the old man we want to be. We believe that neither happiness nor joy are attributes of young people, as well as Neither is the lack of desire typical of the elderly These are prejudices implanted for centuries and that lead the elderly to deny themselves when they feel desires, passions, emotions that are supposedly “no longer for their age.”
For this reason We must be less critical of our own body and more critical of social prejudices about the elderly so that they do not leave us locked in a feeling of shame towards ourselves.
