These days, pitting old against young is considered good politics by some. Part of the pre-midterm get-out-the-vote frenzy was a PSA aimed at millennials. Funded by Democrats, the ad features a set of older, out-of-it, conservatives telling young people, “Don’t vote.” One ditzy dame “can’t keep track of which lives matter”. Another smirks as she describes climate change as a “you problem. I’ll be dead soon.” It’s slick; Adweek chose the video as an Ad of the Day. And it’s satire. But it’s hateful.

A version pitting the interests of white against black, or straight against gay, or men against women is unthinkable today. Racism, misogyny and homophobia remain alive and well in this country, but at least they no longer get a pass. It’s time to add ageism to the list of prejudices we no longer tolerate, and to deny it a foothold in our political discourse.

Instead of smearing older people, how about an ad targeting the racists behind 2018’s widespread voter suppression efforts who actually did want Democrats to stay home? The Trump administration’s anti-immigrant, anti-refugee and anti-minority agenda is already exploiting deep divisions of class, race, ethnicity and country of origin. Do we really want to add age to the roster?

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This toxic trend surfaced in 2016, when older voters were widely blamed for Trump’s victory and for the Brexit vote. Younger Britons suggested that their elders be banned from the polls, and cheered their imminent deaths. “It is a sure sign that politics is running on empty when generational revenge becomes central to an election campaign,” observed sociologist Frank Furedi about efforts to mobilize youngers in the 2017 UK general election. The invective and contempt that we’re used to seeing the alt-right show towards immigrants and women is being hurled at olders without an apparent second thought.

Old v young framing – what’s good for “them” is bad for “us” – is shortsighted and ill-informed for countless reasons. Olders are not “them”, they are us: our parents, our neighbors, our friends, and it is grotesque to suggest that our interests are inherently opposed. Fully a third of social security recipients are young people. Class, race and gender all predict voting behavior far more accurately than age does. Families are inherently multigenerational. All of us were young, and everyone is old or future old. It makes far more sense to bridge this contrived divide than to succumb to prejudice against our own future selves.

Above all, old v young framing plays right into the hands of the forces and institutions that also benefit from racial, gender and economic inequality. It is critically important to see the headlines that blame climate change or our kleptocratic Congress on “old people” for what they are: a distraction from the underlying social and economic issues that affect the entire 99%. Income inequality does not discriminate by age.

Instead of letting ageism divide us further, let’s nip it in the bud – by forging a New Generational Compact.

The world is facing an unparalleled set of challenges, from rising tribalism to rising waters. Turning the tides is going to take all hands on deck – and all ages. Instead of letting ageism divide us further, let’s nip it in the bud – by forging a New Generational Compact.

I first heard the phrase from Laura Carstensen, founding director of the Stanford Center on Longevity, but she doesn’t take credit for it. Perhaps that should go to Maggie Kuhn, who founded the Gray Panthers in 1970 and whose motto was “Age and Youth Together”. Let’s all run with it. Let’s convene around transgenerational responsibility and mutual commitment to our collective future on this fragile planet. Our slogan: act like an ancestor!

Why, for example, asks Carstensen, don’t we demand more of grandparents? Why don’t we support the ones raising the kids of millions of incarcerated young Americans, often on limited incomes? How about assessing the effects of federal legislation on every age cohort? Let’s forge compacts as diverse as the people who commit to them, in private handshakes and on the world stage, in every sector and on every scale. What policies do we want in place by 2050, when the US will be a lot less white and a lot more gray?

America has become a gerontocracy. We must change that | Daniel Bessner and David Austin Walsh Read more

Joining forces across the years isn’t a new idea. It’s how we all lived until the 20th century, until industrialization, urbanization and unfettered capitalism subverted the natural order of things. As four and even five living generations become commonplace, transgenerational initiatives are popping up all over. Programs are under way from Seattle to Singapore, tackling issues as disparate as loneliness and childcare in domains as different as housing, higher ed and the workplace.

Longevity is here to stay, and it’s new. The roles and institutions around us were created when lives were shorter, and they haven’t had time to catch up. Ageism is new too, as is the age segregation that feeds it. This gives us a critical window of opportunity to shape a world that supports people of all ages, especially the most vulnerable at both ends of the spectrum. Ageism cuts both ways.

We need pathfinders and mapmakers of all stripes, to help create the more compassionate and interdependent society we all hope to live long enough to inhabit: a world that enables participation and purpose lifelong, where basic human rights do not expire.

Let’s make the compact a route to solidarity around all other forms of oppression, because a better world in which to grow old in is also a better place in which to be a woman, to be queer, to be poor, to be from somewhere else. When we show up at all ages for whatever cause we believe in – save the whales, the clinic, the democracy –we not only make that effort more effective, we dismantle ageism in the process. And when we act like ancestors, we build a better future for everyone.