Agism

Women like me probably feel they've all gone through their lives suffering some kind of discrimination for being female and for being non-white.
And now, I am starting to realize _ and maybe I am lucky for not having to see this earlier _ that I am going to encounter another reason for discrimination: Age!
I was naive: I thought that with age, women will be seen less sexually desirable as females, and that would help even out the score and lead to more equality.
No such thing.
Japan is a culture that worships youth, which is strange (or maybe not so strange) given that this is one of the most rapidly aging societies on earth.
In the US, youngsters get pushed around because they have no power, money or status.
And that's why we grew up saying: Don't trust anyone over 30.
Agism, it turns out, is just as ridiculous as discrimination on the basis of sex and race.
Age really has nothing to do with anything. But there seems to be a fear about the inability to keep up with the latest.
Appearance is another obvious factor.
Yuri Kageyama gains another battlefront!
Kimiko Date is making a comeback in tennis at 38.
Her husband, a racing driver, told her she may have always won up to now, but what she must learn now is that she must lose, sometimes to those who are younger than she is.
This struck me as very wise words.
That may sound like a contradiction, after all I said about agism, but it's not, really: We must learn to accept defeat, including defeat to those who are younger than us, because, after all, we're getting older, and statistically there are going to be more people who are younger than you, if you live longer.
(We never accept discrimination _ which is totally, totally different from defeat judged by performance, which is irrelevant to age per se.)
No one wins all the time _ age and experience are no guarantee for your win.
You win some and lose some.
And it's just as important to accept rightful defeat as it is to keep going at it to win.