I remember once seeing on the cover of Oprah Winfrey's magazine that it was published for women ranging from their twenties to the age of fifty-nine. I remember thinking, as I was approaching sixty, how insulting it was that between the ages of fifty-nine and sixty, something happened to you as a woman that made Oprah's magazine no longer relevant to you. As I have now passed sixty, I see more and more that everything in the popular culture is geared to people under sixty or even fifty: television shows, fashion, music, cars, etc. The older you get, the more invisible you are to advertisers, and in fact, to the culture at large.
However bad it may be for sixty year olds, however, it is worse for octogenarians. My parents are both eighty two, and both in ill health. Nothing except Medicare is geared to them. And even Medicare can't provide them with everything they need. For instance, my dad has difficulty with his vision. I have looked around for good magnifying glasses to help him and they are hard to find. I finally found one with a light on it, but the light it provides is disappointing. I can't imagine that my dad is alone in his need for vision aids, but his needs are not the concern of coroprate America.
Even for those who don't have the severe vision problems of my dad, older Americans have trouble reading the fine print on things, or even reading the print on over the counter medicine bottles. One would think since older Americans use the most medicine, including non-prescription medicines, that the pharmaceutical companies would figure out a way to make the print readable to an older person. But they don't.
The same is true for things like contracts and discount offers from companies. My mom, who orders many things from catalogues because she can't really do much shopping these days, recently got a forty percent off coupon for the Penney's catalogue. She made out her list of items (underwear for my dad, a pair of shoes for her, a nitegown, etc.) and called in the order. She had figured out how much it would cost by deducting the forty percent. When the woman on the phone gave her the total it was a far higher amount. When she reminded the woman of her coupon, she was told that the things she ordered were not included in the coupon offer. "Didn't you read the fine print?" the woman asked. "Honey, I can't read fine print," my mother replied in anger, and then cancelled the entire order. I would imagine a lot of women of my mother's generation shop through the Penney's catalogue. You would think the company might consider helping them out a bit by not sending them misleading offers and making the "fine print" not so fine. But they don't.
My mom has been fighting leukemia. Every aspect of her treatment is controlled by whether or not Medicare will approve payment, but no consideration is given to the fact that she must find transportation (she has been advised not to drive because of her low blood counts) to the lab twice a week, the doctor once a week, and the hospital periodically for transfusions. There is no public transportation system here, so she must find a ride either from me or a neighbor. In addition, there are very few handicapped spaces, and in one instance, they are quite far away from the entrance to the medical building. You would think a medical system that really wanted to help seniors like my mother, might make it easier to access treatment with transportation assistance or at least an adequate and well placed number of handicapped spaces, but they don't.
This consumer oriented, profit motivated world is the world of Oprah - geared to those below sixty who still have good eyesight, are able to read the fine print, can still drive themselves to the store and to their medical treatment. If the over-sixties can survive in an under sixty world, more power to them. If not, too bad. Helping them is not profitable, and in our society, that is the most important measure of what we do and don't do for our citizens.
Ultimately, whether we are talking about Oprah's magazine, Penney's discount offer, or the medical system, we live in a consumer culture where what matters is how corporations can gain access to your money, how they can keep you distracted from what matters by offering you newer and better must-have products. What this consumer culture does not much care about are those who have gotten beyond the prime age of consumers. The health and well being of the elderly does not matter to corporate America, to whom our senior citizens are invisible. This is why we must find a way to protect Medicare, keep Social Security solvent as a government program and not allow it to be privatized.
And it is also one of the many reasons why we ought to begin creating a society in which the bottom line is not always money, but instead the health and well-being, within caring communities, of all of its members, even the ones that are now invisible to the culture.
However bad it may be for sixty year olds, however, it is worse for octogenarians. My parents are both eighty two, and both in ill health. Nothing except Medicare is geared to them. And even Medicare can't provide them with everything they need. For instance, my dad has difficulty with his vision. I have looked around for good magnifying glasses to help him and they are hard to find. I finally found one with a light on it, but the light it provides is disappointing. I can't imagine that my dad is alone in his need for vision aids, but his needs are not the concern of coroprate America.
Even for those who don't have the severe vision problems of my dad, older Americans have trouble reading the fine print on things, or even reading the print on over the counter medicine bottles. One would think since older Americans use the most medicine, including non-prescription medicines, that the pharmaceutical companies would figure out a way to make the print readable to an older person. But they don't.
The same is true for things like contracts and discount offers from companies. My mom, who orders many things from catalogues because she can't really do much shopping these days, recently got a forty percent off coupon for the Penney's catalogue. She made out her list of items (underwear for my dad, a pair of shoes for her, a nitegown, etc.) and called in the order. She had figured out how much it would cost by deducting the forty percent. When the woman on the phone gave her the total it was a far higher amount. When she reminded the woman of her coupon, she was told that the things she ordered were not included in the coupon offer. "Didn't you read the fine print?" the woman asked. "Honey, I can't read fine print," my mother replied in anger, and then cancelled the entire order. I would imagine a lot of women of my mother's generation shop through the Penney's catalogue. You would think the company might consider helping them out a bit by not sending them misleading offers and making the "fine print" not so fine. But they don't.
My mom has been fighting leukemia. Every aspect of her treatment is controlled by whether or not Medicare will approve payment, but no consideration is given to the fact that she must find transportation (she has been advised not to drive because of her low blood counts) to the lab twice a week, the doctor once a week, and the hospital periodically for transfusions. There is no public transportation system here, so she must find a ride either from me or a neighbor. In addition, there are very few handicapped spaces, and in one instance, they are quite far away from the entrance to the medical building. You would think a medical system that really wanted to help seniors like my mother, might make it easier to access treatment with transportation assistance or at least an adequate and well placed number of handicapped spaces, but they don't.
This consumer oriented, profit motivated world is the world of Oprah - geared to those below sixty who still have good eyesight, are able to read the fine print, can still drive themselves to the store and to their medical treatment. If the over-sixties can survive in an under sixty world, more power to them. If not, too bad. Helping them is not profitable, and in our society, that is the most important measure of what we do and don't do for our citizens.
Ultimately, whether we are talking about Oprah's magazine, Penney's discount offer, or the medical system, we live in a consumer culture where what matters is how corporations can gain access to your money, how they can keep you distracted from what matters by offering you newer and better must-have products. What this consumer culture does not much care about are those who have gotten beyond the prime age of consumers. The health and well being of the elderly does not matter to corporate America, to whom our senior citizens are invisible. This is why we must find a way to protect Medicare, keep Social Security solvent as a government program and not allow it to be privatized.
And it is also one of the many reasons why we ought to begin creating a society in which the bottom line is not always money, but instead the health and well-being, within caring communities, of all of its members, even the ones that are now invisible to the culture.
