....Or How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the Population Time Bomb
Good old fashioned panic. That’s how almost all the press greeted the latest report from the Office for National Statistics about “greying Britain.”
We’re all doomed! Prepare for a Britain in which pedal-powered ambulances roam the streets with “bring out your old!” sung through a megaphone to the tune of “bring out your dead” by latter-day Baldrick types. Not only will we have run out of oil. We’ll have run out of youth. The number of pensioners already exceeds those under 16. Prepare for the fall out from the explosion of the “population time bomb”.
The Age Concern boss demanded immediate improvement from the NHS in “mental health and foot care.” Imagine hoards of ancient, bewildered bunion-sufferers milling aimlessly in our city centres. Meanwhile young chiropodists – their youth and foot-care expertise prized for their rarity - grow rich on the laws of supply and demand. Elite squads of Para-psycho-feetcarers will be needed, licensed to trim hard-to-reach toenails and offer counselling, but without the credentials to tackle a full on verruca or prescribe valium.
The threat is something we need to deal with now. Old people. These limping crazed crones could destroy life as we know it. According to all the papers they will be forced to work on until their seventies, which means they will take our jobs and…Wait a minute. It’s not them. It’s us. And we’re modern, aren’t we? We grew up with youth culture. Better health care. So why all the fuss? The new old – or a lot of them - will know what they want and won’t be scared to ask for it. A lot will have jobs and a bit of money. And they - sorry we will be in the majority! So lets prepare for a new kind of old age. Ours. (Especially the men, who tended to die before they get old. See book.)
Thursday, 28 August 2008
Wednesday, 6 August 2008
GROOVY OLD MEN ON THE FRONT PAGE OF THE INDIE
Great to see the book title on the front page of the Indie....
http://www.independent.ie/lifestyle/groovy-old-men-the-rise-of-the-silver-swingers-1442376.html
....but sad to see that they’ve got the wrong end of the stick about the whole idea. Maybe they should have read it first.
The Indie piece groans with brand names and references to hoity toity new rock bands, as well as the obligatory reference to Mick Jagger at 65. Groovy Old Men isn’t about that. The guys I spoke to over the past year or so are old enough and wise enough not to worry about labels or whether they are as fit as Mick. They may have a passing interest in the Stones but they’re old enough and wise enough not to see them as comparable to real people. Or to worry about brands. The real GOM treats brands and bands in the same way. If they like em, they’ll buy. They don’t give a stuff about what the Indie thinks is Groovy. Or what anyone else thinks, for that matter. Despite what the Indie claims, Groovy Old Men isn’t a “style bible.” It’s a spotter’s guide. Style bibles are so eighties.
Spotter’s guides are rather early-sixties. But unlike the old I-Spy books which encouraged kids like me, sitting in the back of the Ford Popular, to tick the boxes for a police box or a foreign motor car, the idea of Groovy Old Men is to get people to assess the older men they encounter. Treat them as real people with real histories and cultures. Work out how Groovy they are without too much reference to designer pants or name-drop rock.
The Indie also featured the obligatory online vote for the silverest fox, or some such nonsense. Entertaining, space-filling stuff, but nothing to do with Groovy Old Men. Vote for the punkiest punk, the gothiest goth or the rockiest rocker if you want, but the original conception of Groovy Old Men has nothing to do with top tens, lists of brand names, or celebrity haircuts. Groovy Old Men are too old (and too relaxed) to be swayed by upmarket shopping lists. That’s the whole point. For many, it’s a case of “When I am old I will listen to Deep Purple.”
http://www.independent.ie/lifestyle/groovy-old-men-the-rise-of-the-silver-swingers-1442376.html
....but sad to see that they’ve got the wrong end of the stick about the whole idea. Maybe they should have read it first.
The Indie piece groans with brand names and references to hoity toity new rock bands, as well as the obligatory reference to Mick Jagger at 65. Groovy Old Men isn’t about that. The guys I spoke to over the past year or so are old enough and wise enough not to worry about labels or whether they are as fit as Mick. They may have a passing interest in the Stones but they’re old enough and wise enough not to see them as comparable to real people. Or to worry about brands. The real GOM treats brands and bands in the same way. If they like em, they’ll buy. They don’t give a stuff about what the Indie thinks is Groovy. Or what anyone else thinks, for that matter. Despite what the Indie claims, Groovy Old Men isn’t a “style bible.” It’s a spotter’s guide. Style bibles are so eighties.
Spotter’s guides are rather early-sixties. But unlike the old I-Spy books which encouraged kids like me, sitting in the back of the Ford Popular, to tick the boxes for a police box or a foreign motor car, the idea of Groovy Old Men is to get people to assess the older men they encounter. Treat them as real people with real histories and cultures. Work out how Groovy they are without too much reference to designer pants or name-drop rock.
The Indie also featured the obligatory online vote for the silverest fox, or some such nonsense. Entertaining, space-filling stuff, but nothing to do with Groovy Old Men. Vote for the punkiest punk, the gothiest goth or the rockiest rocker if you want, but the original conception of Groovy Old Men has nothing to do with top tens, lists of brand names, or celebrity haircuts. Groovy Old Men are too old (and too relaxed) to be swayed by upmarket shopping lists. That’s the whole point. For many, it’s a case of “When I am old I will listen to Deep Purple.”
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