Stock Photography pictures “Active Seniors”
Do any of the older people in websites, brochures and advertisements look like or act like any older person you know? Why is everyone so white? Why does everyone have such perfect teeth? Why do they all look so…dopey?
Ask the stock photography houses, those libraries of images used by advertisers and publishers (including Senior Planet). The photographers who supply these photos work with senior models and create the types of images they think represent “older.” It makes for a funny but cringe inducing collection.
Take that popular category “Active Senior.” It’s nice that they realize most of us can get around without walkers, but their choices of activities and situations range from “overly cute” to ‘deranged.” Here’s a cross section of images from the stock library Thinkstock. If you’re an active senior, or if you want to be, take a look and see how closely your experience matches the assumptions about active older people.
1. Active seniors love hula hoops and will take any occasion to use one, even to shimmy — almost —across a stage. And fail at it.
2. Yes, older men love to hula in the park. (You can leave your hat on.)
3. There’s nothing like a hula on the beach.
4. Active senior couples love to crack jokes during a spirited game of hoops.
5. Active senior couples enjoy synchronized exercise and wardrobes; they wear grey to match their hair!
6. Senior couples – even active ones – enjoy outdated gender roles. Wheelbarrows are a must.
7. An active senior couple out for a walk is so seldom seen ‘in the wild” that they should carry a wooden photo frame in case a photographer is strolling by. Snap snap!
Yay for active seniors!
Question: Which stock photo do you find the funniest – or the most insulting!
Interested in personalized content? Sign up for free
Create an account and join our vibrant community to get reminders on classes and unlock a more personalized experience.
Comments
What does an “active senior” look like? Someone that seeks to grow and move? Seeks to feel the joy of movement, whether in sports or something more leisure. These pictures do convey that well.
As a senior, I enjoy both. I even get pleasure from cleaning my house. And that can be a bit of movement.
As a fitness trainer, I feel my clients benefit from a program that is easy to use but has variability for interest and growth. Daily and sustainable motions.
I’m 91 — but so what?! The saying is, “It’s not then years in your life that count — it’s the life in your tears!”
If the writer laments the fact that these photos show only white people, then the writer should (a) choose different photos or (b) take photos of non-white seniors. Create the reality you want instead of complaining about the work other people have done. This is the Land of Opportunity ( to create what you DO want), not the land of Sit-back-point-the-finger-and complain about what you DON’T want.
sheila
Funny and apt…but as a Senior, I can tell you that we like idealized photos a lot better than sad, sick or intentionally degrading, catching people at their worst. And while my lifelong friendships include those of other ethnicities and genders, I’m also tired of advertising that depicts them as enjoying a lifestyle that represents the values of the American middle class which is more often not their own backgrounds. Not keen on the Pop culture purple hair with body piercing either. People and their backgrounds are what they are and that should be acceptable, even celebrated. Those who want to change their locations, lifestyles, educations, careers or appearances should be free to make those changes and live accordingly. But, the plethora of photos projecting everyone to the middle class American ideal is insulting to them and to those whose backgrounds are American middle class.
well, what is senior planet going to do about it? this one sided view of active seniors