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“I’m older. Not old.” says American TV Star

Established American sitcom actor, Doris Roberts, who plays the meddling Mum in ‘Everybody Loves Raymond’, becomes extremely annoyed when talking about ‘ageism’ in TV, and bemoans the fact that although the over 55s watch more TV than any other group, the TV stations prefer to concentrate on an 18 to 54 age market.

 

Ms Roberts, 77, said that “ageism is rampant and it is wrong. There is no reason for the mature not to be working.  We are living longer and taking better care of ourselves.  We are having more sex than in the history of the world and that’s a good thing.  In fact it’s a great thing, and I look this good because of it.”

 

On holiday in

Melbourne
, Ms Roberts told the Herald Sun newspaper that ageism was “the last bastion of bigotry.  Nobody protects older people.  I’ve been doing a lot of comedy, but I also won an Emmy for playing a bag lady on ‘St.Elsewhere’ and I’d love to do more drama, but nobody is writing it for older people.  They seem to airbrush us out of society.”

 

“I’d like ‘old’ struck from the vocabulary and the word ‘older’ used instead, because from the moment you are born you are getting older.  So call me older, but don’t call me old”, Doris Roberts said.

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