Monday Musings: Is it immoral to live so long?

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By Amitabh Srivastava , Copy Edited By Adam Rizvi, The India Observer, TIO: News of some celebrity deaths last year made me squirm. What right do we have to live that long? Ryan O’ Neal died at 82, Norman Lear died at 101, Henry Kissinger died at 100 and Merle Goldman an expert on China died at 92.

When I started counting I could add a few well-known names from India. Indian Prime Minister Morarji Desai died at 99, Khushwant Singh (author and journalist) died at 99, my own school principal Mrs. Rajni Kumar died or to put it positively, lived up to 99, Acharya Rajneesh with acres of land and Ashrams in India, US and some other countries also died at 99 with 99 Rolls Royce.  Former US President Jimmy Carter died at 100 after years of hospice care at home.

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The point I am coming to is, how fair is it to ask the over-burdened, hard-working younger generation to be paying for the luxury of living of the ‘useless’ and non-working elderly whose number is on the increase due to better health care, technology and modern medicines. Among the countries with a burgeoning population of seniors Monaco tops the list with 65% seniors, followed by Japan (29%) and Italy at (24%) is at Number three.

Is not ironic that today we are forced to discuss this situation when about a decade back the world was rejoicing on being told that medical science had discovered some medicines that would make it possible for humans to live forever and ever. Ugh! The fragile situation of the population of the sixty plus seniors was first highlighted by the demographic change in China. With its huge population China could be an extreme case because it had tried to ‘fiddle’ with the normal birth rates by imposing a one-child norm decades back. But with its economy and subsequently its ‘global power’ in danger with the purchasing power of the youth taking a nose-dive it started urging its women to have more babies even if it was out of wedlock. That did not find many takers either, with the result that now India has overtaken China in population.

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The situation is so desperate that President XI Jinping of China, a country that prided itself for its record on gender parity and equal rights is telling women to give up their careers to produce more babies. He said as much in his address (November 9,2023) to the National Women’s Congress. But that’s going to be a tough call. With the spread of English language as a medium of education, the youth of China are also becoming more aware of words like freedom, choices, dignity, gender parity and human rights.

Reports from China indicate that working women are getting too addicted to their new life style and are somehow managing to avoid getting married till 30 as decreed  by their parents and the State. And once they have crossed that age they are dubbed as Sheng nu (leftover women) a term introduced by the All China’s Women Federation in 2007.

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Following Chinas example Russian President Putin has also started asking people to have big families like they had in earlier times. Those with large families are being felicitated by the state. And latest to join this trend is RSS Chief in India who urged people to have at least three children as against the standard policy of two (hum do humare do was the slogan).

However this angst against the rising population of seniors is not restricted to these countries alone. In France, the youths took to the streets for months to protest against the Government decision on increase the age of retirement. The intention of the government was to keep its population productive and working for a few more years. But the youths believed that the seniors were cutting into their employment opportunities.

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Different countries see different ways to tackle this change in demography. For instance, there were editorials in leading newspapers in the USA and Britain suggesting that the senior citizens should work for a few more years before they start availing the benefits of social security.

The argument is that the numbers of those who are paying to provide for the social security benefits was going down, especially the job cuts after Covid-19 while the numbers of those availing the facilities was going up! But the trend had started much before that. Official figures show that between 2006 and 2018 household income for retired households rose by 60 % while the non retired were left behind with an increase of just 36 %” reads an article by Philip Inman in the Guardian (27th April,2019).

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In the developing countries where pensions for retirees are very few, taking care of the elderly is a huge financial issue and becomes a cause of major cause of families breaking up. The elderly having spent all their earnings in taking care of their children till they are settled in life in developing countries expect their children to take care of them when they are physically and emotionally drained out. Is there a middle way? Unfortunately for most middle income groups the answer is a big NO.

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Clear statistics many not be available but some reports indicate that in the US as many 42 million Americans are supporting elders 50 or above. We expect worse dilemmas in families in the developing countries which are holding on to the joint family system for emotional reasons. What is all this boiling up to?

Indications are that this will lead to a brutal break up of the family system with the youngsters trying to get rid of the ‘parasites’ that includes their parents, grandparents or other elders who had outlived their utility.

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Will Senicide (killing of the elders) become normal in civilised countries? A news item in ‘The Times of India’ in 2017 showed that forest officers of Pilibhit Tiger Reserve in the state of Uttar Pradesh were surprised to discover bones of elderly human beings killed by tigers on a regular basis. When they checked with the villagers they admitted leaving their elderly in the forest to be killed by the Tigers. Later they would collect their bones and spread it in the fields as the government gives a monetary compensation for villagers killed by wild animals in their fields. This phenomenon was also turned into a Bollywood movie in 2022 titled “Sherdil: The Pilibhit Saga” starring Pankaj Tripathi directed by Srijit Mukherjee. While Sherdil was released in 2022 the Tamil film Thalaikutthal was released in 2023. But the practice of Senicide is not limited to India alone.

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According to a book published in 2023 “Senicide and Old Age Killing. An overdue discourse” authored by Pousset, Raimund and several other books, there are 162 ethnic groups across the world that are practicing Senicide. A little research shows up that among the countries or communities the practice existed in various forms include Heruli( Germany), Inuit (elders left on ice to die) Korea (those above 70 left in a cave with a pot of rice, Scandinavia ( elders thrown to death from a mountain), Rome, Serbia etc.

Tim G Parkin in his book “Old Age in the Roman World” (2003) has mentioned that there were 18 cases of Senicide of which two occurred in Greece, one in Rome and others in different cultures. Basically, all these cases, whether legendary or factual are a manifestation of the ‘survival of the fittest’ syndrome at it’s extreme. It seems an imaginary dark Future is turning into a grim reality by the tough Present.

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Curated and Compiled by Humra Kidwai

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