I'd heard reports of this for a while, mostly from Adam who is convinced he is to be the next victim, but recently it has all come into focus. Not least with the defeat of Andre Agassi who, as he was knocked out of Wimbledon this week, was described as the old man of tennis. Old man of tennis? Andre Agassi is 33.
OK, so it's sad, but maybe not all that surprising in Andre's case. Being realistic, he's a sportsman and, well, a sporting life has always been a short one, but for the rest of us who happen to be around that age and decided against taking up a sporting career, you wouldn't have expected to have been told you were over the hill quite yet.
Well, there you would be wrong. These days, ageism starts to kick in much earlier with people of the tender (well tender-ish) age of 35 and under being told they are over the hill. It's not even just 35-year-olds who are suffering, it is also people barely into their 30s. According to a survey by Maturity Works, 3% of those who had experienced ageism were not even 35.
There are several things to say about this, but most importantly (of course) is that I will 35 in just days, with St Swithin's Day marking my demographic shift (OK, some people call this day a birthday, quite why baffles me) and, well, frankly, it's not all that exciting to find out that I may as well arrive with a sign saying "past it". I did actually consider this (getting a sign), but it would be one of those things that was at the outset meant to be ironic, but instead of being ironic it would just be well... true, which is obviously not so good, not to mention a whole deal less funnier.
I knew that writing about the demographic shift was significant, sociologically and culturally, but I didn't think leaving the 18- to 34-year-old age group would be this momentous.
It's like Michael ('Dam Busters') Anderson's 1976 movie 'Logan's Run' has come true -- apart from the bit where you get hunted down and killed. Let me recap. It's the 23rd Century and it's the perfect future. You have everything you ever needed, it's a total world of pleasure, except that no one is allowed to live beyond their 30th birthday. Talk about sucking a lot.
Surely you remember? A young Michael York goes on the run with the young Jenny Agutter (well, wouldn't you?) to avoid being eaten by the nasty AI that runs the future. Eventually, of course, they bring down society and go on to launch a bad spin-off TV series -- but that was everyone's fate in the 1970s.
OK, they didn't get everything right. They plumped for 30 as the year things end when, as everyone now knows, 34 is the crucial turning point in one's life -- well, according to advertisers, at least.
Most of us have heard of ageism before now, but it always seemed to be people in their 40s or 50s being passed over for some younger, faster and, crucially, cheaper option. It's the latter in these ever increasing times of budgetary constraint that seems to have lowered the barrier even further to hit not just those in their 40s and 50s, but those in their 30s as well.
As I said earlier, my friends are experiencing this as well. Adam is convinced it's about to happen to him and that he is about to be culled and replaced by someone younger and more junior. I tell him to run faster, but (strangely) he doesn't find this at all amusing. It's only amusing really because Adam has been convinced that they have been going to axe him for about the last year and it hasn't happened yet. It's always one of the first thing he says when he picks up the phone. It's like his catchphrase. I'm surprised it's not the first thing he says to people when he meets them for the first time ("Hi, I'm Adam, I think I might be made redundant").
It got so bad recently that a few weeks ago at a dinner party at Adam's flat (and after far too much wine had been drunk) I heard him saying this very thing at the other end of the table ("I think I might be made redundant") and out of nowhere I found myself saying "Adam is suffering from Premature Redundancy Ejaculation" after which I rolled around (not quite on the floor, but as good as) in laughter. I have no idea where the term Premature Redundancy Ejaculation comes from (or PRE as I'm now calling it), but like the ageism that it is related to, it's a generational preoccupation. This sent everyone else rolling around on the floor as well, which did not overly impress Adam. To be fair, I think I could have shouted "ejaculation" very loudly and it would have had the same effect on everyone around the table -- I mean, people were (as they say) sloshed.
I digress, a bit, as the other thing that struck me is that lots of people only seem to have got into their stride and worked out where their careers were going as they hit 30 and then, before you know it, just a few years down the line, people are experiencing the terrors of ageism and are finding themselves redundant as firms hire younger and cheaper staff.
I'm not quite sure how this squares with the government's new wheeze to counter all this ageism and make it possible for everyone to work until 70 (gee, thanks Tony).
We seem to spend a lot of time these days talking about the world of work, so it wasn't much of a surprise that I found myself covering this subject with my friend Paul (of France and Alison fame) the other night after his law firm axed a few people in a corporate restructure.
"It's harsh," Paul said, "that's what it is. It used to be you had a career for life and now..."
"Yeah, I know, and now pick a number. I saw some research and it said people of our generation might end up with half a dozen different careers. I really need to get moving. I'm lagging way behind the class."
"Me too, I'm only on my third. I'm trying to work out where the next career will come from."
"Oh, that's easy. After we've all been made redundant a few times, but still can't retire because Tony wants us to keep going until we're 70, we'll end up working in one of those giant DIY stores offering fatherly advice to kids trying to put up new shelves with glue. We'll be able to tell them just how it was done in our day."
"How was it done in our day? I don't know anything about DIY?" Paul says.
"It doesn't matter, we'll be old and grey, and we'll look the part, and that's really all that counts. They'll put you on TV. You'll be in ads and the shooting script will just refer to you as 'Grey man no2', that'll be your new demographic."
"'Grey man no2'? That's depressing."
"Yeah, I know, but on the upside you'll get a discount on DIY products so you'll be able to finish all those little DIY jobs that you spent a life time screwing up."
"Gord, can you stop talking now?"
"OK."
PS. Officially I should just give up writing this now -- having, I guess, shifted, but you know, I've have to see what it's like when I break on through to the other side.
The Demographic Shift is a regular column on Brand Republic as Gordon MacMillan charts his own demographic timebomb.
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