“Discrimination” is one of the worst things you could be accused of these days, but sometimes, discriminating is normal and fine. That is, sometimes it’s right to judge someone by their characteristics such as their height, sex, intelligence, or even age.
Today, as the Democrats’ 81-year-old president and presumptive nominee is showing his cognitive and physical decline on a daily basis, the word “ageism” is thrown about a good bit. And its usage shows clearly why it has become a broken concept that rests on a knee-jerk rejection of anything that can be called “discrimination.”
For years, every mention of President Joe Biden’s fading memory, occasional inarticulateness, and visible confusion has earned a cry of “ageism.”
The problem here is that it’s not out of line to use age as a factor when considering someone’s fitness for a job or qualification for some privilege or duty.
We generally demand our soldiers be between the ages of 17 and 35. We demand our presidents be at least 35. If a politician is younger than 30, we hold him or her to higher standards of maturity and intelligence.
And so it’s right and fitting that for a candidate older than age 80, we study his mental acuity with extra diligence.
But sometimes, we are told to pretend that age doesn’t matter. The most shocking instance, which got little attention, was when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention suggested it was “ageist” to prioritize the elderly in giving out the COVID-19 vaccine.
Smart and decent people thought that we should discriminate on the basis of age because discriminating on the basis of age was sensible. Some woke bureaucrats said no.
After a federal prosecutor refused to charge Biden for his willful mishandling of documents on the basis that his memory was too faded, Democrats are trying to establish that all criticism of Biden’s mental acuity amounts to ageism.
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(A brief note on Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD): He was one of the Democrats to object when his state’s Republican governor distributed COVID-19 vaccines proportional to age rather than favor Raskin’s constituents.)
Biden’s age is perfectly relevant to his bid for a second term. Anyone who denies that is either blinded by an absolutist anti-discrimination ideology or is a partisan liar.
