It's a smack in the face to this 69 year old but there's a tiny bit of truth to it.
Ask a 20 something if 68 is elderly. Better yet, remember back to when you were 20 or 30 years old, did you think then that 68 was elderly?
Nobody better call me elderly or I’ll be on them like ugly on Alan Grayson.
No, you are absolutely right. My point however is that the media often uses words that have strong connotations such as “elderly” and “teen” as a form of doublespeak. They use these terms to obscure and euphemize an accurate portrayal of what actually happened.
The Reuter’s headline was, “West Virginia teen charged in beating death of elderly pastor” This was a brutal crime by an evil predator who could just as easily have murdered a 20 or 30 year old by busting open their head with a heavy club. But the headline gives a description that allows the public to continue feeling safe. After all it was just an irresponsible “teen” who is a “student” beating on an “elderly” person. The article then carefully avoids any detailed description of the predator or the victim. How would the public react if the headline had instead been, “Beloved Minister Brutally Beaten to Death by Black Gang Member”.
In recent years the violent crime rate in Beckley, WV has sky rocketed. It is a town of only 17,000 people. The percentage of black people in Beckley has been increasing and is now eight times more than the average for the rest of West Virginia. Most small towns in the United States have a crime rates far less than the national average. Beckley has a violent crime rate approximately 3 times the national average. A carefully concealed statistic is the number of victims in Beckley who are white and the number of predators who are black. Does anyone care to speculate?