Inhibition deteriorates with age ("chromatic dementia"?)

I recently heard a commentator on CNN (regarding Donald Sterling) saying repeatedly that racism was an "aberration," as though he'd just learned this word and if he said it enough times, we could learn how to use it, too.

Now, we all know a racist old man, white or black or some shade in-between.

If you don't, you're just not looking very hard, and may be unaware of the medical reality that the parts of the brain that control inhibition begin to deteriorate with age and we say things we wouldn't have dared say when we were younger.

You'll do it too, in some way on some subject that someone someday thinks so egregious they may not give you a pass for being a doddering old fool.

It's easy to be unapologetically judgmental of old people.

[2014-05-13]

c0

If racism among the aged were instead called something like "chromatic dementia," would we discuss it any differently?

There are more euphemisms for mental illness than sexual behaviors.

There's a good reason for that: Mental illness is more taboo than sex.

[2014-05-19]

c0