Together with racism, machismo, classism and eleven others, we could also place old age, frivolity. Although the exclusion that can be tolerated on the basis of age is possible for all, when faced with another type of discrimination, the reality can be hardened. Simone de Beauvoir, for example, although he did not use the term intersectionality, reflected in his work that the punishment a person suffers socially and culturally in old age is different if she is a woman. What to say, if we add a question of race to that!

Addiction, however, is a phenomenon that occurs at different stages of life. Although biologically we have a certain age, the habits and thoughts in society make a kind of social classification. So we will be too young or too old for certain activities. If someone thinks they are safe from this judgment, they only have to look at what is happening around them: the youngest are blamed for lack of maturity for work activities, for political demands or for sexuality, sometimes they are infantilized, but the older ones have passed, they are too old.

According to the World Health Organization’s 2021 report on addiction, most people who suffer from this type of discrimination are older, in many cases in need of care, and among younger people, women are more likely to suffer. In this report I found it very interesting to look at the profile of the people who are persecuting: they are generally young people, predominantly male, who have often received poor education and who, interestingly, are people anxious about death.

It is, of course, a subject that touches many threads. Over the years, we will all undergo physical change, we will live moments of vulnerability, we will need vigilance and even death, before or after. Acceptance of this process is not a slow task and there are resistance. Proof of this resistance is the inexhaustible catalogue of services and products for the maintenance of youth. There is also a belief that drives us to live actively (sometimes hyperactively). They generate a number of needs that must be met, often with enormous anxieties.

Furthermore, I believe that age social classifications also generate competition between these age groups. Pensioners, for example, are often pointed out in some sectors by over-pensions. On the contrary, innovative movements that may come from younger people are sometimes ignored or ridiculed. Like a world limited to adults. Behind these divisions of age groups are, of course, the interests of the insurance companies, the wishes of the people who apply for the extension of the retirement age or the lobbies who want to maintain the youth canon. And the discourses that the latter can adopt around addiction are worrying.

In fact, awareness of the problem of addiction is increasing, and initiatives at global and local levels are increasing. Intergenerational meetings will serve to address the many issues we have in common, to build healthy relationships, to address the changes we are going to experience and to foster cooperation. But for this we must first recognize ourselves, know ourselves and understand ourselves honestly, because it is essential to accept, know and understand the other.