As the economic going gets tough, campaigners say we should be looking at older people and valuing their wisdom and experience. After all, it wasn't them that got us into this economic mess. Carl O'Brienhears from some residents at Leopardstown Park Hospital
DO PEOPLE become less useful, less interesting and of less value as they grow older? Judging by society’s attitudes towards older people, it’s hard to escape any other conclusion. The media and political worlds are awash with derogatory references to older people: old age crisis; pensions time-bomb; bed blockers; the burden of care for the elderly.
Joe Larragy of the department of applied social studies at NUI Maynooth, says the problem of ageism has always been with us – but ageist attitudes have become even worse due to the economic downturn.
The culture of elder-baiting is plain to see in what he says is a disturbing tendency to “rationalise some of the measures aimed at tackling the economic crisis as though they are a response to a ‘crisis of ageing’”. These measures include restricting access to medical cards for older people and increasing the pension age.
Anti-ageism campaigners say now more than ever we should be looking afresh at older people and valuing their wisdom and experience. After all, it was the actions of signifcantly younger “masters of the universe” that got us into this economic mess.
“Older people do become invisible as they grow older,” says Eamon Timmins of Age Action Ireland, which is hosting a “positive ageing” campaign beginning later this month. “Society tells them that they aren’t needed anymore, so in the process we’re turning our backs on a huge wealth of experience.”
Dr Robert Butler, who coined the term “ageism” in the 1960s, is the founding director of the US-based National Institute on Ageing. He has been telling governments and societies around the world that it’s time to think differently about ageing.
People are living about 30 years longer than they used to, he says, which means society is going to have more older people and we’re going to need different prioritites and mindsets.
Leopardstown Park Hospital in Dublin is as good a place as any to canvass the views, wisdom and experience of older people.
Established in 1917 as a hospital and home for the care of former British Army servicemen, it has now expanded to provide a home for some 170 older people from different sections of Irish society. It has a bright, homely atmosphere where older people say they feel their rights and independence are fully respected.
Few groups of people are better placed to identify the recurring themes of human fraility, irrationality and – sometimes – plain stupidity. Most of the residents here have lived through recessions, wars, poverty and political crises, and come out the other end, older and significantly wiser. Here are some of their reflections.
Dr Jim Redmond, 88: ‘You learn that war is always with us. It’s human nature’
I was just 19 and I was watching Dangerous Moonlight, a film about the bombing of Poland. There was a scene with a Polish airman and pianist who was one of the last to escape from Warsaw. It was so poignant. His home was destroyed, he had lost everything. I still remember the music he played in the move, the Warsaw Sonata. That was one of the reasons I joined the RAF in the early 1940s.
The attitude of people was mixed. My mother didn’t want me to go, but she agreed in the end. What stands out most? Comradeship. It’s amazing.
It was like a new family. You become part of a family. I flew with bomber command. It was frightening at times but if your number’s on it, that’s it, mate. You did the best you could and hoped you’d get back.
We were given to understand that one of these place was sending out these rockets and they were working on bigger ones – and it must be destroyed.
One raid in particular I remember: we flew to northern Germany, out near the Baltic, right at end of our range. We were told they were manufacturing rockets and there were these huge ramps leading into the sea. It was only later I learned it was a nuclear testing facility and they were on the verge of cracking the atom.
We had hope after the war. Things were going well for a while. Peace reigned for a while. But now it’s all gone wrong again. We have a new kind of war in Afghanistan and Iraq. Pakistan is unstable and has nuclear weapons. If the Taliban were able to get their hands on them? I can leave that to your imagination. You learn that war is always with us. It’s human nature. The key is in dealing with threats before they escalate into something too big. Sometimes it feels now we’re going back into the dark ages with threats of war all over again.
Kitty Ledden, 84: ‘People put themselves and their families under an awful lot of pressure these days and sometimes they can’t see it’
I grew up in the Iveagh Trust flats in the inner city. They were Lord and Lady Guinness’s properties – and I couldn’t thank them enough.
Back then, there were tenements all over the place. And the poverty – you wouldn’t believe it. There’d be 10 children and a husband and wife in the one room. The entire house would have to share the one toilet in the outyard. We were in luxury, by comparison. There were nine children in two bedrooms and we had a living room, as well as a veranda. And we had our own toilet.
Lord Iveagh opened the most beautiful place for children to go after school for dinner, so everyone had a meal. We called it the “bayno”.
He built a swimming pool, a concert hall, a covered market for the dealers, or traders as they’re known now. You wouldn’t see it now. We need to encourage more people like that – people who are willing to give – instead of celebrating wealth and celebrities.
You can’t compare life between then and now. But life is still tough for a lot of families. Even compared to the tenement days and the struggle they had, I’d give gold cups for parents these days. They’re under more pressure to work, to pay the mortgage and to be there for their children.
I think it was easier in my time: the community helped each other out.
Everyone did, without living on each other. People might be financially better off, but they’ll never have what we had: family life.
I’m glad of the times I was born in. People put themselves and their families under an awful lot of pressure these days and sometimes they can’t see it.
Maureen Waddell, 94: ‘I remember a bank manager getting demoted for lending too much to a client’
I used to work in the bank. That was when we didn’t have any bad banks.
The women worked downstairs in the basement. There were six of us using these big ledger machines; they were like large typewriters which went like hell. You wouldn’t trust a girl with access to cash – that seemed to be the feeling at the time (although look what the men have done in the meantime). The banking sector was completely different.
There was none of the big lending that’s been going on. You just wouldn’t get it. The bank was for saving money. It was very conservative. I remember a branch manager getting demoted at one point for lending too much to a client. It seemed to be a big scandal at the time.
Until recently, the banks would have lent money to any dog barking on the street. Sure they were sending out unsolicited letters to people offering loans. It was crazy. Of course, it’s all going back to the way it used to be now: it’s almost impossible to get money. Everything had to be accounted for. On New Year’s Eve, we’d have to stay on late until all the books were balanced.
I think what changed in the meantime was greed. People were given quotas and targets, so they were lending money for the wrong reasons.
Another big difference [in the bank] is the atmosphere: it was very formal. You had to be exceptionally well behaved and dressed. We had to wear these dark uniforms – we were almost like something out of the Magdalene laundries. A friend of mine says it drives her mad to see the bank staff chewing bubble gum these days behind the counter.
I feel sorry these days for people who bought houses on the impression that there was no tomorrow. That’s very sad. The poor devils. We don’t have the poverty we had back then – but in its own way, it’s worse because people are mired in debt. One big difference is education: young people are very well educated. They’ve been to college, they have qualifications. That is a big plus in their favour.
John Crisp, 86: ‘We’ve been there before, and we’ve come through it’
I remember the first property bubble. It was the mid-1950s and there was a building boom. I was involved in supplying steel products like metal windows and structural steel to builders.
Housing estates were sprouting up everywhere; local authority flats were being built in areas like Rialto, Mespil Road; PV Doyle was building his hotels. Trade was booming. I couldn’t meet demand. Then, suddenly, the demand fell. It was all too easy to meet demand. And soon it had all dried up.
In many ways it was just like the most recent property bubble. People tend to close their eyes to what’s going on. There’s a little voice in your head saying: “This can’t last – but as long as it does, let’s make the most of it!”
People are people, at the end of the day. I thought I had lined up another job in Belfast. It fell through because I didn’t have a work permit for Northern Ireland.
It was bleak. I felt scared. Very, very scared. I had never been in a position like that. I’d been broke when it didn’t matter – while serving in the army. But the thought of not being able to look after my wife and family and pay our mortgage was very scary.
Ireland was a very bad place to be out of a job. There was a lot of emigration.
There was a time when I seemed to know more people in Canada and America than here. I eventually started my own business for a while. Then I got a job with another engineering firm and I never looked back. I was with them up until I retired.
This cycle of boom and bust seems to be a feature of Ireland. I always told myself back then: “We’ve been there before – and it got better.”
That’s what I’d say to anyone today. We’ve been there before, and we’ve come through it. I’ve had a great life.
Now I’m living here in Leopardstown Park for a few years. My wife has died but my daughters live close to me, family are still near. All in all, I’m a very lucky person.
