• E-mail
• Print
• Comment
• Font Size
• Digg
• del.icio.us
• Discuss article

Asa Winner Callahan Asks, 'What Can They Do to Me Now?'

Posted on: Thursday, 31 July 2008, 03:00 CDT

By Callahan, James J

The notion of positive aging, I would guess, goes back at least as far as the ancient Greeks. For our times, though, one need go back only to Frances Perkins, President Franklin D. Roosevelt's Secretary of Labor and the author of The Report of the Committee on Economic Security of 1935. As much as anyone then in the federal government, Perkins was responsible for the creation of Social Security. Her oblique reference in the report to positive aging showed a realization of the positive aspects of later life. She wrote, "Old age ... is a misfortune only if there is an insufficient income to provide for the remaining years of life." Two decades later, Ollie Randall, who founded the National Council on Aging in 1950, and Ethel Percy Andrus, who established the American Association of Retired Persons in 1958, recognized older people's talents and contributions to the community. The Older Americans Act of 1965 was infused with the notion of elders as resources for the community, not a draining cost.

POSITIVE AGING

Since then, positive aging has come of age and is being legitimated in books, conferences, practice and policy. In 1981, for example, anthropologist Ashley Montagu reinforced the potential of older people in his book Growing Young (New York City: McGraw-Hill, 1983). Montagu argued that humans are designed to continue to grow, change, play and learn into old age, rather than become fossilized into Stereotypie roles. Also, scientists, such as Marian Diamond of the University of California, have proved that older adults can continue to add new brain cells, thus giving biological support to Montagu's argument.

High on the list of current literature on what's positive about later life is Gene Cohen's book The Mature Mind: The Positive Power of the Aging Brain (New York City: Basic Books, 2005), which presented a new theory defining four phases of positive human development in older people's middle and later years.

A core idea of positive aging that Cohen and others discuss is that older individuals can find a sense of liberation once they've shucked off the demands of middle adulthood. The mantra "What can they do to me now?" captures that sense of freedom to be oneself. Although that refrain holds some truth, from my point of view, they can do quite a lot to reverse and restrain the freedom of older people.

WHAT THEY CAN DO

Let me count the ways: They can confuse elders with complicated drug and health programs; they can imperil people's standard of living with medical cost shifting through denied benefits, rising insurance premiums and higher deductibles; they can impoverish older people by stealing their pensions and piling on home mortgage debt; they can abuse elders financially, physically and psychologically; they can kill or injure people with medical errors; they can cut funding for home and community-based services, thus wearing people out from family caregiving responsibilities. Moreover, they can send the job of someone's adult children overseas, not to mention jettison company health and retirement plans. No doubt, readers, you can add to this list.

Another implication of the question "What can they do to me now?" is that it raises the question "What can I do to them now?"

Again, let me count the ways: I can insist on driving when I can no longer do so safely; I can keep my scatter rugs even though I have been warned of their hazard; I can take my pal's medication because it seems to help me more than my doctor's prescription; I can cook on the gas stove wearing my loose-fitting clothing; I can speak my mind even though it hurts someone who loves me; I can ignore the costs-in time and maybe in money-I shift to my kids because of an underlying feeling that they owe me. No doubt you can add to this list as well.

If it seems that I am throwing cold water on the good idea of positive aging, I am not-but I have never been called a Pollyanna. In fact, one of my friends once said, "Jim, stop being so g- dIrish." Actually, I considered that a caring comment, not an ethnic slur, because, as the late Sen. Daniel P. Moynihan said, "I don't think there's any point in being Irish if you don't know that the world is going to break your heart eventually." An intuitive sense of vulnerability helps one focus more clearly and realize that there are alternative endings to any story.

THE AMERICAN PSYCHE

The fundamental weakness in the American psyche is not a sense of vulnerability, but rather the unquestioned commitment to individualism, be it of the rugged or soft variety. Individual acquisition always trumps the common good, vague as that idea may be; individual autonomy and being in control of one's destiny overwhelm the recognition of dependency of any type.

This self-oriented belief system, the necessary bedrock of a consumer society, ignores the fact that we are social beings who are intricately dependent on one another. A person can age successfully only within a set of social provisions and relationships. One thinks of family, churches, voluntary associations, professional societies and others as composing the private sphere, whereas Social Security, Medicare, social services, tax policy, the FDIC, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, consumer protection laws and the like comprise the public framework. Americans age, successfully or otherwise, within a social context.

When Newt Gingrich launched his conservative, individualist movement in the early 19908,1 became troubled at how quickly friends of whom I had expected otherwise moved into his corner and began praising individual responsibility-a term I am hearing again regarding the debate over national health insurance. In response, I was impelled to write the following:

On Being Tired and Fed Up With Glorified Individualism and Personal Responsibility

I gave myself life

From my own breasts I suckled

My caring hands nurtured me and wiped

away my tears

I observed the world and created

my language,

knowledge and skills

Through my own enterprise I created

wealth

In a test tube I propagated myself

I dug my own grave and shoveled the din

down upon me

Ridiculous

During the 20th century, two great unifying events overrode the American default setting of expected individualism: the Great Depression and World War II, both of which brought the country together. In contrast, the attacks of September 11, 2001, have divided Americans and have been used to create a diversion from war and from the new, rapacious greed that threatens everyone through an imperiled world financial system. Now seeing their edifice crumbling, the individualistic, free-trade and free-market acolytes are seeking the succor of the community.

WE IN AGING

We in the field of aging exist simultaneously in the world of individual persons and of social institutions. Our work and advocacy activities must encompass sets of values from each domain. Philosopher and political thinker Isaiah Berlin made a convincing case that there is no absolute ranking of values that is true at all times in all places. Tradeoffs between individual interests and social requirements are always necessary; we must be willing to make tough choices based on respect and understanding.

I have had a happy career: I have worked in private business, public service, television and education. I have seen people in success and failure, happiness and grief, work and play. My observation is that although we differ vastly-heterogeneity, anyone?- we are the same in our basic need for respect of our common humanity. An enduring sense of respect for others should guide us in all our works.

With this realization, I have also learned the answer to the question "What can they do to me now?" Hug me! Please!

HALL OF FAMER

James J. "Jim" Callahan is the 2008 recipient of the American Society on Aging (ASA) Hall of Fame Award, presented to an elder ASA member who, through lifetime advocacy and leadership, enhances the lives of older adults. His article on this page is based on the address he gave during the recent Aging in America Conference of the National Council on Aging and ASA, where Callahan received the honor.

A professor emeritus at the Heller School, Brandeis University, in Waltham, Mass., Callahan headed the university's Policy Center on Aging for more than 20 years and directed a mental health services research and training program funded by the National Institute on Mental Health.

Callahan, a past member of ASAs board of directors, is also the founding chair of the steering committee of the National Academy on an Aging Society, as well as a fellow of the Gerontological Society of America (GSA). Professionally, fie served as Massachusetts' Secretary of Elder Affairs, as well as other distinguished positions.

ASA gratefully acknowledges the support of the Atlantic Philanthropies for the Hall of Fame Award.

I'm not throwing cold water on 'positive aging,' but I have never been a Pollyanna.

Copyright American Society on Aging May/Jun 2008

(c) 2008 Aging Today. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.

Source: Aging Today

More News in this Category