Keeping Pace with WEAAD's Founder, Dr. Elizabeth Podnieks opens the section because Elizabeth gives the cause its face — and its heart. The analytical and policy essays that follow are, in a real sense, the argument her life already made.
The Predicate Ageism, the Law, and the Animating Condition of the Guardianship Crisis Ageism is not simply individual prejudice — it is the most socially normalized of all biases, embedded in law, medicine, and institutional practice, and the foundational condition without which guardianship abuse could not function at the scale it does.
"Out With the Old, In With the New": Resolve to Abolish Ageism by Practicing Engageism Mid-century modernity declared war on anything old — buildings, neighborhoods, and people — and the cultural damage has never been fully repaired; this essay names the practice that repairs it: engageism, the deliberate replacement of age-based diminishment with age-based recognition.
A Strategic Framework for a National Plan on Aging: An Assessment and Recommendations An eight-part assessment of the federal government's Strategic Framework for a National Plan on Aging — arguing that framing is not a communication strategy but a foundational determinant of policy effectiveness, and that guardianship is the litmus test for whether the plan is serious about rights. Begin with the Preamble.
Let's Elder Justice With 'elder' as a verb with high transitivity Language shapes thought — and the way we talk about aging shapes what we are willing to do about it; this essay proposes treating elder justice not as a noun describing a field but as a verb describing a practice, and asks what changes when we decide to act on it.
The Right to a Different Story How fifty years of bad theory, a landmark lawsuit, and a scientific reckoning converged on a single truth — and why that truth must now be carried into every clinic, courtroom, and conversation about aging A landmark Medicare settlement established that improvement is not required for coverage; a landmark 2026 Yale study confirmed that improvement in later life is not exceptional but common — and together they demand a fundamental rethinking of the assumptions that drive clinical practice, Medicare policy, and guardianship law.
Image: Kaibab National Forest, AZ