“Little Old Lady” on the Tube
Every week we pick a person – senior or junior, well known or not – who’s been in the news over the past seven days. Got a nomination? Email editor@seniorplanet.org or enter your suggestion in a comment below by Thursday.
Aging with attitude means a lot of things. One of them is standing up for yourself when someone discriminates against you, makes assumptions about you or gives you a hard time because of your age.
Aging with even more attitude is standing up for someone else, despite your age.
A “little old lady” on the London tube did just that recently and in the process – thanks to a Facebook post about her rant that went viral – might have changed thousands of people’s opinions about the power, value and open-mindedness of older people.
The scene: A man gives a young woman a hard time because of her scanty dress – the type of revealing outfit that older folks are considered famous for tut-tutting. For the “little old lady” sitting next to her, it’s a call to arms:
“She can wear or not wear whatever the fuck she likes, even if she was naked with a sign pointing to her fanny (she said fanny on the central line by St Pauls) and the sign pointed to her fanny which said …PARTY CITY ALL INVITED…then that would still be none of your bloody business now fuck off back to your bored wife!”
A few points of translation:
“Fanny” = “Vagina” or “Pussy” (translation courtesy of the Urban Dictionary)
“Bloody” = “Damn”
“St. Pauls” is St. Paul’s Cathedral, worthy of respect as the seat of the Bishop of London
Scott Sparrow’s Facebook post has been shared more than 9,000 times to date, and the story has been picked up by blogs and London tabloids – even Britain’s edition of Good Housekeeping – giving “little old lady” a whole new meaning.
What was the fallout of the subway rider’s rant? The skies did not fall. Shamed, the avenger left the subway car. The young woman hugged the old lady. Several subway riders probably made a mental note not to judge people by their looks (scantily clad young ladies and very old ladies alike). And Sparrow decided that the woman whom he still chooses to describe as “almost dead is how old she is” (maybe he should rethink that?) will be his hero for the rest of her life.
Little old ladies rock.
Who would you nominate as person of the week?
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Comments
This story doesn’t make sense.
Even though I don’t dress that way now, I remember going braless and wearing micro-mini dresses in earlier days. I think that the young women today look fabulous in their shorts and short dresses! It’s just a a part of fashion and being youthful, not necessarily “advertising sexual availability” or “enticing sex”. That man read his own thoughts into the young lady’s choice of attire, not hers. It’s surprising how different men and women think. It seems that men’s thoughts skew towards sex no matter the context. It’s all in the eye of the beholder. In some countries, if her ankles show a woman can be whipped! We were given our bodies by nature (or the God of our choice). We should glorify this creation rather than shaming it.