Ok, so for many people who know me, I generally let a lot of stuff people say slide. I'll admit it, we're all culpable of saying things when we really haven't thought out the implications. One of those things that repeatably gets said around me involves that fact that I look young for my age. I'll admit it, I don't try hard to look older, but I also don't try to look younger than I really am. What are those remarks? They are the unintentional ageist remarks young adults (22+) quite often hear.
I know I'm not alone in hearing "oh, I thought you were a student" or "you really don't look old enough to ___" or the best "really, you're 25?!! Gosh, I thought you were ____ (usually an age in the teens)". I mean, if I were to reverse those comments to be a comment on how old the person looked, it would A) be insulting, and B) imply that I thought that person wasn't equipped to be doing the job or activity they're doing due to their age.
For awhile (like most of my life), I've let these kinds of comments slide. Most women in my family do look younger than they really are and I will consider myself very lucky one day when I'm 45 and feeling like an old hag and someone says I look like I'm in my 20s. But what really set me off onto a path of thinking about ageist comments was an experience someone I knew had at a professional conference. There's this friend of mine that I encouraged to get presentation experience and she submitted a proposal, which got accepted. She worked long and hard on it, and did a fabulous job. What really irked me was when we were reviewing her presentation feedback forms and some of the comments read "what a great job she did, considering how young she is". I was flabbergasted! Age shouldn't have anything to do with how qualified someone is.
Grr it really makes me mad.
