Thursday 12 October 2017

Fifty-twee



 “More parsnips than I know what to do with!” laughed the man as he showed off his basket of home-grown vegetables.  And there’s nothing wrong with that, except….  

Except….

EXCEPT…

… “It’s all so twee!” I found myself saying.

Honestly, I think I said it out loud on my own in the room. The reason being the man with his too many parsnips was in a TV advert for over 50s life insurance and that meant it was aimed at....(braces self)....me.  And maybe you too, either you now or the person you’ll be in just a few years’ time. 

I should add, it wasn't really the parsnips.  It was everything.  It was these advertisers' convenient vision of the over-50s – all pelmets and trugs and an oh-so-gentle sense of humour.   All tweed, velcro and lacy doilies. I felt so patronised!  I can’t bear being patronised and, oh god, I know it’s only going to get worse.  Fuck it. 

I’ve nothing against growing parsnips, just so you know.  You’re very welcome to show me your parsnips or any other homegrown root vegetables for that matter.  In a trug.  And I know all ads for any demographic are horribly generalised and broad, whether you're a teenager or a woman or a cat-lover or whatever, but it seems that the stereotypes for ‘older’ people simply haven’t been adjusted in decades.  They're more like a vision from the '50s than a vision of our 50s.  It’s as if once you pass 49 you instantly become some sort of sub-species, inoffensive and chintzy and dressed only in beige.  

These are not people like my peers and me - people who still go to gigs, or who like wearing pointy shoes, or who still have their old Joy Division albums in a dusty box in a room with an Andy Warhol poster on the wall, etc.  Insert your own version here.

(Note to advertiser: those parsnips can be inserted elsewhere.)

25 comments:

  1. The problem, I suspect, is that the people charged with coming up with ideas for these ads are all in their 20s. For them, 50+ might as well be Martian...

    I could probably use a trug, but I'll be damned if I'm going to buy one now ;)

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    1. Ah, a trug. I wouldn't hold it against you. Lovely things really. I just wish the man had said, "More parsnips than you could shake a shitty stick at" - now that would've made me smile.
      Yes, I'm sure you're right about the people behind the ads, and I'd be equally useless at creating an ad for 20-somethings, but I wouldn't try!

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  2. Another great post from you this week - Inspiration has struck! Funnily enough the same thing occurred to me this week, but in my case from being in town during the day - No longer at work, I went in to the bank yesterday and for some more computer training this morning and it seems there is an army of ladies my age whose whole raison d'etre is to "go shopping" and "have coffee". They are all very smart in their tweed jackets and sensible shoes but I can't imagine there being no purpose to my life except lots and lots of shopping. Perhaps the advertisers have got it right but as you say, for many of us that kind of life is just not appealing in the slightest - It's bright colours and defying the advertisers for us all the way, and there won't be a bumper harvest of parsnips around here anytime soon!

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    1. Thanks Alyson - these latest posts have just come about through unexpected external triggers, so perhaps spontaneity is the key for me now?!
      I knew you'd get this too, and you're right about some other people of a certain age, so in that respect I suppose the advert hasn't got it so wrong, it's just gone with that side of things and not the side we know. I wish there was more balance, so it doesn't keep perpetuating that twee, corny stereotype. Even those 'grannies' on that cereal adverts aren't like today's real grannny generation in their 40s, 50s and 60s, they're more like women who would in reality be great or great-great grannies, all curly perms, blue rinses and little wire-rimmed specs.
      Yes, we must stay bright and defiant, with or without parsnips and coffee....

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  3. I turned 57 in April and last month, out of the blue, I received a letter concerning my state pension, which is due to kick in in exactly 10 years time. It's the first communication of that kind I've ever had and it briefly made me feel quite the ancient old duffer, so I stuck on the Nadine Shah album at neighbour-bothering volume and soon felt a whole lot better.

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    1. Oh no, it's all getting a bit mind-blowing... pensions? retirement? bus passes?... arghh. You're right - best stick to playing loud music (and not because we're getting hard of hearing).

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  4. Count yourself lucky Swede up here when you turn 50 you have to poo in an envelope and send it to Dundee!
    Actually a bowel cancer screening programme so a worthwhile sacrifice

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    1. And then every two years after that! BUT, well worthwhile if it saves some lives and it's not quite pooing in an envelope, but close.

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    2. Oooohhhh....(or should that be poooohhh?) It happens when you turn 60 here. I'll look forward to that :-/

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    3. I've never heard of this to be quite honest, but judging from C's comment, I guess I'll find out all about it in 3 years time.

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    4. Mr SDS has done his... I had to post it for him!

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  5. Good post. I read something on similar lines somewhere else a while ago, can't remember where, saying that the new generation of pensioners grew up with punk etc and aren't shockable as previous generations were. Not so much the little old ladies and men.

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    1. Thanks - yes old punk pensioners - what a thought. Even more reason for advertisers not to keep painting this nauseating picture of older people as all being so inoffensive and twee!

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  6. Advertising is an evil, evil industry full of arseholes. I should know. I spent the best years of my life fighting against it. What was Bill Hicks' message to them...?

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    1. It's shit, isn't it? Haha, yes, I remember Bill's very helpful suggestion....

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  7. 60 up for me at the end of the year. For a couple of years now I have been receiving glossies in the past advertising retirement villages and the like You should see how old and twee the people are in the photos. (Mrs Darce who is a couple of years younger than me has just started receiving them too. That did make me chuckle a bit). Mother-in-law recently sold her house to move into a flat in one of these complexes, She is in her 80s, as are many others, so fair enough, but you can own a flat there from 60 onwards.
    Perish the thought!

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    1. That's the thing - as you say, fair enough for those in their 80s+, but those of us in our 50s and 60s are a whole generation apart.
      I'm heartened by fellow bloggers approaching 60 or over and the youthfulness round these parts - proof that we're not ready for the cosy patronising treatment just yet!
      And age is (still) just a number...

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  8. makes one shudder, doesn't it? Suppose it's time to get out the casual slacks and the cardy. Then you get the letters from Saga and AgeUK! Bugger off!

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    1. A warm welcome, Rickety Rackety,and thanks for coming by... Just not ready for all this softly softly oldie stuff. I guess everyone just wants to sell us something, so the sooner they can fit us into a neat little category, that might overlap with a few other neat little categories, the more they hope to get us.
      Not yet. No way.

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  9. I am going to retire shortly, I'll still do a bit of manic dancing around the kitchen if the right song is on, get very drunk and stay up till dawn and I'm contemplating escaping around Britain ( very slowly !) on a narrow boat, yet I do have an allotment and indeed a trug.Anyone can do whatever they want at any age, I think they always have done, except the current generation are more vocal with their rebellion

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    1. I do agree, we can do what we like at any age, and we seem to stay younger longer! Your idea of a narrowboat tour of Britain sounds great fun, a whole different pace and view of life. Trugs and allotments are lovely things - it was just the context in this ad (and other ads and examples) where suddenly being merely over-50 is bracketed into some cosy, conventional, don't-get-too-excited dearie-me half-life vision of twee senior citizenship!

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  10. Every Sunday when I was young my mother made Scotch Broth with all the veg coming from the garden. I hated it. But now I might trade one of my Joy Division albums for a plate of that soup.

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    1. Ah. Then may I suggest opening a tin of Heinz vegetable soup, imagine it's your mum's broth, put Unknown Pleasures on the turntable and enjoy both! :-)

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  11. Vivian said it better than I could ever say it (i.e it was a highly articulate out burst)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEQJubPhHvI

    Ben

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    1. Oh blimey I'd forgotten that but - YES! A perfect highly articulate outburst.
      Thanks Ben!

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