About this item
"Wow. This book totally rocks. It arrived on a day when I was in deep confusion and sadness about my age. Everything about it, from my invisibility to my neck. Within four or five wise, passionate pages, I had found insight, illumination, and inspiration. I never use the word empower, but this book has empowered me." -- Anne Lamott, New York Times bestselling authorAuthor, activist, and TED speaker Ashton Applewhite has written a rousing manifesto calling for an end to discrimination and prejudice on the basis of age.In our youth obsessed culture, we're bombarded by media images and messages about the despairs and declines of our later years. Beauty and pharmaceutical companies work overtime to convince people to purchase products that will retain their youthful appearance and vitality. Wrinkles are embarrassing. Gray hair should be colored and bald heads covered with implants. Older minds and bodies are too frail to keep up with the pace of the modern working world and olders should just step aside for the new generation. Ashton Applewhite once held these beliefs too until she realized where this prejudice comes from and the damage it does. Lively, funny, and deeply researched, This Chair Rocks traces her journey from apprehensive boomer to pro-aging radical, and in the process debunks myth after myth about late life. Explaining the roots of ageism in history and how it divides and debases, Applewhite examines how ageist stereotypes cripple the way our brains and bodies function, looks at ageism in the workplace and the bedroom, exposes the cost of the all-American myth of independence, critiques the portrayal of elders as burdens to society, describes what an all-age-friendly world would look like, and offers a rousing call to action. It's time to create a world of age equality by making discrimination on the basis of age as unacceptable as any other kind of bias. Whether you're older or hoping to get there, this book will shake you by the shoulders, cheer you up, make you mad, and change the way you see the rest of your life. Age pride!
About the Author
I didn't set out to become a writer. I went into publishing because I loved to read and didn't have any better ideas. I had a weakness for the kind of jokes that make you cringe and guffaw at the same time. My boss insisted I write them down, which turned into the 1982 best-selling book, Truly Tasteless Jokes, writing as "Blanche Knott." As Blanche, I made publishing history by occupying four of the 15 spots on the New York Times bestseller list.My first serious book, Cutting Loose: Why Women Who End Their Marriages Do So Well, was published by HarperCollins in 1997. Ms. magazine called it "rocket fuel for launching new lives." It landed me on Phyllis Schlafly's Eagle Forum enemies list and an invite to join the board of the nascent Council on Contemporary Families, a group of distinguished family scholars.The catalyst for Cutting Loose was puzzlement: why was our notion of women's lives after divorce (visualize depressed dame on barstool) so different from the happy and energized reality? A similar question gave rise to This Chair Rocks: "Why is our view of late life so unrelievedly grim when the lived reality is so different? I began blogging about aging and ageism in 2007. Since that time, I have been recognized by the New York Times, National Public Radio, and the American Society on Aging as an expert on ageism.Currently, I blog at This Chair Rocks, speak widely and am the voice of Yo, Is This Ageist? . I've written for Harper's, Playboy, and many other publications. I have also been on staff at the American Museum of Natural History since 2000, where I write about everything under the sun. In 2015, I was honored to be included in Salt Magazine's list of the world's 100 most inspiring women--along with Angelina Jolie, Elizabeth Warren, Amal Clooney, Aung San Suu Kyi, Naomi Klein, and other remarkable activists--committed to social change.
