World Elder Abuse
Awareness Day (WEAAD).
"We owe it to
older persons and societies at large to fight ageism in all its forms and
enhance the dignity and human rights of older persons everywhere."
The United Nations has designated
June 15, as World Elder Abuse Awareness Day (WEAAD)
This day aims to focus global attention on the
problem of physical, emotional, and financial abuse of elders as well as to
understand the challenges and opportunities presented by an ageing population,
and bring together senior citizens, national and local government, academics,
and the private sector to exchange ideas about how best to reduce incidents of
violence towards elders, and to develop elder friendly policies. It demands a global multifaceted response, one
which focuses on protecting the rights of older persons. From a health and
social perspectives, unless both primary health care and social service sectors
are well equipped to identify and deal with the problems, till then elder abuse
will continue to be under-diagnosed and overlooked. The global
population of people aged 60 years and older is about 1.04 billion in
2013. Around 15 to 16% of elderly people are experiencing some form of
maltreatment. Elder abuse is a major problem that exists in both developing,
underdeveloped and developed countries and is highly under reported.
All elders should be loved, respected and taken
care of because they are the ones who have lived through the tough times which
we can hardly imagine and that too without any advanced technical outside
support of computers, cell phones, Google and Facebook etc. They're
authentic amazingly strong, intelligent, and interesting heroes those who have
gone through real experiences and lived through history. Now when they have
grown old and will not be here forever, it's time they must get the credit
which they truly deserve. We all should together applaud to their
credibility not by words, but by deeds i.e. by being patient and polite towards
them, respect them, love them and care for them. They should not ever feel
neglected and unwanted.
All elders should be loved, respected and taken
care of because they are the ones who have lived through the tough times which
we can hardly imagine and that too without any advanced technical outside
support of computers, cell phones, Google and Facebook etc. They're
authentic amazingly strong, intelligent, and interesting heroes those who have
gone through real experiences and lived through history. Now when they have
grown old and will not be here forever, it's time they must get the credit
which they truly deserve. We all should together applaud to their
credibility not by words, but by deeds i.e. by being patient and polite towards
them, respect them, love them and care for them. They should not ever feel
neglected and unwanted.
We should be grateful to them that what we are
today is because of inheritance, culture and traits developed in us by
non-other than them.
We should always remember:
1) As you sow, so
shall you reap:
Respect begets respect so invest respect now to insure respect later in life?
3) Knowledge
Bank: Wisdom is in the eyes and eyes give away the age. The phase of
our life is already experienced by them and we are indeed fortunate to have
them as such an amazing asset.
2) Humanity: Pushing
an elder to get a better seat or the last piece of cake is never worth it. It’s
a payback for safe childhood and hope for more assisted old age.
3) Knowledge
Bank: Wisdom is in the eyes and eyes give away the age. The phase of
our life is already experienced by them and we are indeed fortunate to have
them as such an amazing asset.
4) They love you: Our elders love us
and always want the best for us and expect the best from us. The least we can
do is to value this precious relationship.
5) Heritage: The
heritage of our family is made by elders, the elders are the concierges to
endless family treasure and it makes sense to always respect our guardians.
6) Family
tree: We all have a beautifully laced family history. This gives us
roots in this world and back story to depend upon. We should respect our
history and those who create it.
7) Strong
morals: We should be grateful to our elders for the strong values and
morals inculcated by them into us, giving us a strengthened foundation for a
bright future.
8) Love: We are always loved by our elders no matter what
ever circumstances may be, but do we reciprocate that love to them? Their acts
of kindness and care reflect the deep rooted affection for us. Similarly,
towards their old age, we should let them feel the same by respecting their
words and actions, caring for them and most of all spending some time with them
so that they do not feel neglected. This will cement the relation and
trust which will multiply in multiples.
9) A true guide:
10) They deserve it: Aging does not mean that they’ll stop living or
are of no use, it is in fact, a wonderful achievement and a mark of respect, as
our elders have won a nice long race of life in form of kinship. We shouldn't
respect them just because we should, we should respect them from deep within
the core of our heart. As a new member of team follows a legacy and later
becomes the flag bearer, in the same way this cycle works only if it’s based on
love, affection, emotion truthfulness, honesty and belongingness.
We need to let elders whom we love know that they
are on the topmost priority in our lives. There are many millions who find
themselves increasingly isolated as partners die, and children and
grandchildren live farther and farther away. This is one of the most crucial
reasons why we need a serious debate about growing old as today the scenario is
very different from the past. Most of the children are settled away from their
families secluding the elders leaving them all alone to fight the consequences
of ageing. Hence, a cornerstone of the debate has to be the question of how we
re-engage the family so that, even when the pace of modern life makes it more
difficult, we should feel a sense of personal responsibility towards our loved
ones as they get older, rather than expecting the state or NGO’s or old age
homes to pick up the tab.
Each one of us must take up the responsibility to
ensure that family members should take care for elderly parents, and they don’t
have to fight to obtain the help and support they need? How do we persuade
individuals and families with a major asset? Why not then, show a gesture of
kindness in the form of respect, loyalty and admiration to our elders. These
are basic lessons that we and our children should learn through a good example
and a first-hand experience. Let us make our elders happy by giving them our
utmost care that they need. Let them feel we love and respect them for they had
done so much for us that made us what we are now. They are in their sunset
years and we have to make the most of the precious time to make them happy. For
one thing is sure, you and I will soon be in their shoes because it’s the
nature of life. It’s the essence of joy, of feeling connected, accepted, valued
and those are things we could all use the most in our lives.
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