Britain can sometimes feel like it’s no country for old men. Our elderly folk get a hard time; they’re blamed for society’s woes, accused of messing up the planet for younger people and hogging houses which families struggling to get on the ladder could never afford.
How is Attenborough, who joined the BBC in the 1950s, still making breathtaking television eight decades later?
This ageist stereotyping, and the narrative of intergenerational unfairness which puts the blame on older people for anything that younger people don’t like, has pitted generations against each other, but is it as fair as we think?
A national treasure who turns 99 today is a one-man defiance of all the ‘selfish oldie’ stereotypes. With his energy, social awareness, and natural kindness, the impish David Attenborough is an example to everyone younger than him – almost everyone on the planet.
People often become more conservative as they get older, but Attenborough’s taken a more radical shift during his nineties.
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